Sallyanne Monti

Like Lucia di Lammermoor and Elvira (I puritani), Amina, the gentle heroine of La sonnambula,was a role that had become associated with light-voiced coloratura sopranos. Callas brought both a new substance and subtlety to the role when Luchino Visconti staged it for her at La Scala in 1955. This recording was made two years later, when the production was revived.

Shining Line is a great AOR project, lead by italian duo Pierpaolo "Zorro11" and Amos Monti. The album was produced by Alessandro Del Vecchio (Edge Of Forever, Glenn Hughes, Axe), mixed & mastered by Michael Voss (Voices Of Rock) and features lead vocals from world class performers such as Robin Beck, Harry Hess (Harem Scarem), Erik Martensson (W.E.T., Eclipse), Bob Harris (Axe), Brian & Robbie LaBlanc (Blanc Faces), Michael Voss (Casanova, Mad Max), Michael Bormann, Mikael Erlandsson (Last Autumn's Dream), Michael Shotton (Von Groove) and many more.

The first complete recording of the rarely performed Naples version from 1651 of Claudio Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea convinces with great joy of playing and shows the well-known story about love, seduction and power in a new light.

Der norditalienische Haudrauf oder besser römische „Orpheus“ Alessandro Stradella stellt musikalisch das Bindeglied zwischen Monteverdi und Scarlatti her. Trotz aller Arten von kriminellen Machenschaften, anrüchigen Liebesaffären, vereitelten Mordversuchen und einem unrühmlichen gewaltsamen Tod auf offener Straße fand Stradella genügend Zeit, um qualitätsvolle Musik zu schreiben, ja es gelang ihm, Geniestreiche an melodischer Invention und kühnen Studien eines klingenden „chiaroscuro“ zu hinterlassen. Die überirdisch schönen Concerti grossi von Arcangelo Corelli wären ohne Stradellas Experimentierstube undenkbar.

The role of Nedda in Leoncavallo's verismo classic never entered Callas's stage repertoire, and so her recording made with the forces of La Scala, Milan, between 12 and 17 June 1954 represents one of her explorations of an opera made purely within the confines of the studio, rather than developing over a period on the stage. But as in all such cases - this was the first time she recorded a role she had not previously sung - Callas's desire to explore it to the fullest remains paramount. There is a complete identification between singer and character, down to the smallest detail, that make her Nedda an unusually complex creation that grows throughout the opera as she responds to its desperate emotional thrills and spills.

Alessandro Stradella was a highly influential composer in his day, producing an abundance of masterpieces despite his dissolute and dramatically brief life.

In 1607, Claudio Monteverdi premiered his Orfeo for the Carnival opening in the Court theatre of Duke Vincenzo I of Gonzaga in Mantua. For the first time in the history of music, real characters are brought to life with deeply moving human feelings: with this exceptional dramatic power, modern opera in born. Stéphane Fuget, a great specialist in this repertoire and its historical instrumentation, after Le Retour d’Ulysse dans sa Patrie, has brought together some of the finest vocal and instrumental virtuosos for this new Orfeo: he has entrusted the eponymous role to the splendid and sensitive Julian Prégardien, to sing all the magnificence of the first true hero in the history of opera.

1607 führte Claudio Monteverdi seinen Orfeo zur Eröffnung des Karnevals im Hoftheater des Herzogs Vincenzo I. von Gonzaga in Mantua auf. Zum ersten Mal in der Musikgeschichte werden echte Charaktere von überwältigenden menschlichen Gefühlen beseelt: Mit dieser außergewöhnlichen dramatischen Kraft wird die moderne Oper geboren. Stephane Fuget, ein großer Spezialist für dieses Repertoire und seine historische Instrumentalisierung, versammelt nach Le Retour d’Ulysse dans sa Patrie für diesen neuen Orfeo erstklassige Vokal- und Instrumentalvirtuosen: Er vertraut dem herrlichen und sensiblen Julian Prégardien die gleichnamige Rolle an, um die ganze Pracht des ersten echten Helden der Operngeschichte zu singen.

The last great tragédie en musique or “musical tragedy” of the reign of Louis XIV, Alcyone (Alcione, as the title appears in the 1706 edition) is an all-round spectacle poised between the 17th and 18th centuries. From the 17th century it takes its mythological source, its prologue in praise of the king, its high literary quality and its vocation for spectacle, combining choreography and changes of scenery.