Ciquelo Marco Mezquida

This is, by operatic standards of fidelity, a very faithful musical treatment of Edmond Rostand's classic drama about the swashbuckling poet and swordsman with the big nose. The music is competent but not spectacular; that quality is found in the libretto. The title role is expertly filled by Roberto Alagna, who not only has the best tenor voice in France but also turns out to be an accomplished actor in a demanding role. He is well-supported by a cast that clearly loves the story, its various characters and its often brilliant dialogue.

Following their acclaimed debut release on Resonus Classics (The Waiting Sky, 2019), the award-winning vocal ensemble SANSARA presents an album of choral works and electronic refractions by their Associate Composer, Marco Galvani. Recorded in the midst of the global pandemic of 2020, Invisible Cities showcases Galvani’s distinct voice through a synthesis of contrasting soundworlds. This powerful sequence of new music features settings of well-known sacred texts, reflecting on the importance of community and hope in times of fear and uncertainty.

At Christmas, vocal music is particularly close to us. What is it that makes this music so appealing? Is it just the memories and traditions associated with it, or do Christmas carols actually sound radically different in their basic mood? For centuries, Christmas has inspired composers to write delightful works, many of which have been forgotten or never performed.

The “Scala Academy Project” has chosen an opera by Donizetti never before performed on the Scala stage. Le convenienze ed inconvenienze teatrali (Viva la mamma !) is a dramma giocoso which premiered in Naples in 1827. Italian actor, director and writer Antonio Albanese, a true master of wit and satire, made his debut as opera director. The Orchestra is conducted by Marco Guidarini.

Having dazzled opera audiences from St. Petersburg to L.A. as Lucia, Anna Netrebko triumphantly returns to the Metropolitan Opera in this touchstone coloratura role. Mariusz Kwiecien’s Enrico delivers theatrical truth with a matchless baritone, the lustre of polished mahagony.

For his third album for Chandos, the saxophonist Marco Albonetti turns to the rich tradition of film music from his native Italy.

Giuseppe Mazzini, the greatest revolutionary of the 19th century in Europe, was very passionate about music, he attended theaters and organized an annual concert to support the Italian School he founded in London. He published a very interesting “Philosophy of music” in Paris in 1836 and, as we know from the letters to his mother written in periods of exile from Italy, he loved to play the guitar. His three guitars, appearing for the first time together in a single recording, are preserved in his birthplace in Genoa, today Museo del Risorgimento – Istituto Mazziniano, at the Istituto Storico Nazionale Domus Mazziniana in Pisa, where he died, and in the private collection preserved in Milan by Marco Battaglia. The album includes a varied and fascinating repertoire of original music by Niccolò Paganini, Luigi Moretti, Giulio Regondi and Luigi Legnani, a song specifically mentioned in a letter from Mazzini, a theme by Giovanni Pacini varied by Mauro Giuliani, also author of a pot-pourri that includes parts of works by Gioachino Rossini, and a fantasy on Verdi's Traviata, elaborated by Caspar Joseph Mertz.