Badische

Richard Wagner is best known for creating several complex operas, including Tristan and Isolde and Ring Cycle, as well as for his anti-semitic writings. 43 CD set on Membran International Documents: Der Fliegende Hollander (Krauss–1944); Tannhauser (Heger–1951); Lohengrin (Keilberth–1953); Das Rheingold (Neuhold–1993); Die Walküre (Neuhold–1994); Siegfried (Neuhold–1994); Götterdämmerung (Neuhold –1995); Rienzi (Zillig–1950); Parsifal (Knappertsbusch–1951); Die Feen (Ötvös–1998); Meistersinger (Karajan–1951); Das Liebesverbot (Heger–1963); Tristan & Isolde (Furtwängler–1952). Included is a 24 page booklet with cast lists, plot summaries, and background notes.

Here's the complete concert that brought together four of the world's most exciting singers, performing beloved arias, duets, and quartets. Anna Netrebko and Ellna Garanca appear together for the first time on stage in this dazzling gala for a quartet of "superstars" (Badische Zeitung). "Bel canto at its most beautiful and most ravishing" (Badische Neueste Nachrichten).

"Countertenor Franco Fagioli, an exceptional singer with an even rarer modesty, was equal to the challenge of Handel's music in all its facets – the breakneck coloratura, which he is able to propel powerfully and effortlessly in the highest range, but also the profound melancholy of 'Scherza, infida,' for which he knows how to enshroud his voice in the hues of sorrow." This is what the periodical Opernwelt wrote in the spring of 2010 about the Argentinian countertenor Franco Fagioli, who sang the title role in Handel's "Ariodante" at the Badische Staatstheater in Karlsruhe.