Braccioli Riccardo

This ranks among the most intelligent and striking recital discs of recent years. Spanish counter-tenor Xavier Sabata explores the worlds of Handel's villains – the tyrants, hypocrites and sensualists who are integral to his dramatic and moral vision, but whose music is rarely heard outside of the theatre. The album reminds us that Handel characterises evil with the same complexity and insight with which he depicts good; and it forms a superb showcase for an exceptional singer, who's never received the attention he deserves.

This old (1990) and thoroughly old-fashioned production truly is Verdi as Verdi should be done. The orchestra in black, elegant Riccardo Muti in white tie and satin lapels, traditional sets, almost no milling around on stage by the chorus, no hint of nudity, no singers lying on the floor or leaning into the walls for their arias, huge voices and gorgeous costumes … Or perhaps it should be gorgeous voices and huge costumes, to accommodate the lovers Arrigo and Elena … singers standing stage front, feet planted foursquare, arms extended to expand the rib cage, projecting gorgeously even to the cheap seats in 'paradise'! By Giordano Bruno

Riccardo Muti has conducted a number of Da Ponte's Mozart operas in Vienna, and this, together with the 1996 'Cosi fan tutte', are musical winners through and through.
The reason is simple - the casts in both productions are GREAT. By Abert

Early recordings of Franco Zeffirelli's 2006 production of Verdi's opera which saw Roberto Alagna's high-profile exit during the second performance. Egypt and Ethiopia are at war. Radames is appointed commander of the Egyptian forces by the King, whose daughter, Amneris, loves Radames. It is in fact Amneris' Ethiopian slave Aida whom Radames loves. Ramades wins the war against the Ethiopians, capturing Aida's father Amonasro in the process. On his return to Egypt he faces a choice between marrying Amneris or betraying his country through his love for Aida.

Caffarelli, castrato assoluto, was a famed rival to the more famous Farinelli. Born Gaetano Majorano in Bitonto in 1710 - he was to die in Naples in 1783 - he studied with his rival’s teacher, Nicola Porpora. He travelled across Europe, singing in the most prestigious opera houses, earning huge amounts and behaving exceptionally badly. His one season in London in 1737-38 singing for Handel was, however, a resounding failure and it’s to the repertoire of the Naples School that this disc turns in order to present arias most associated with this most touchy, querulous and downright rude castrato of the eighteenth-century.
– Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International.

Already a well-established name on the European jazz scene, at the end of 1979 came the decisive meeting in Rome with the trumpet player Chet Baker. Riccardo Del Fra played alongside Chet for about nine years both in Europe and Japan on tours, for the radio and for the television; a collaboration which led to the recording of twelve albums, videos (Live in London at the Ronnie Scott) and the movie Chet s Romance directed by Bertrand Fevre. Chet's death in 1988 curtailed their partnership, but 25 years later the Marciac festival commissioned Del Fra to lead an ambitious project uniting a jazz quintet with a classical orchestra to play tunes associated with the doomed trumpeter.

A rare recording of Pergolesi’s second opera, a comic and colourful tale of tangled love in which three girls resist their arranged marriages in pursuit of the same young man. Rediscovered by conductor Riccardo Muti, this forgotten jewel sparkles in its 1989 period production..

Bellini’s bel canto masterpiece I Capuleti e i Montecchi, inspired by the tragic tale of Romeo and Juliet, is what The New York Times calls “an opera of definite dramatic appeal.” The cast is headlined by international stars Joyce DiDonato (winner of the Grammy and the ECHO Klassik) and Nicole Cabell as the ill-fated lovers Romeo and Giulietta.