Rossini Overture

Rossini’s opera overtures discharge a function of decisive importance – that of captivating listeners even before the actual opera action begins. Therefore they are the instrumental highlight of every opera and in their time quickly made their way into the concert halls. In them there are numerous aha-effects such as the unusual horn solo in the first section of the overture of the comic opera Il turco in Italia. The faster part reveals further hallmarks of Rossini’s style: catchy short motifs, loud-quiet contrasts, and question-answer games between the instruments (here, for example, between the woodwind group and the solo trumpet). In the end the concluding crescendo quite literally lifts the listeners out of their seats. And all of this occurs within a quite simple formal structure – but one that functions as a guiding idea. Whether The Barber of Seville, La scala di Seta, or Il signor Bruschino – all of these famous, sparkling opera overtures are dashingly and rousingly performed by I Virtuosi Italiani. A release that you will never forget!

From the moment they were performed, Gioachino Rossini’s overtures have enjoyed the status of colourful, elegant orchestral showpieces. With their sweet cantilene, their rich harmonies, their brilliant orchestration, and their powerful and exciting rhythmic drive, these overtures encapsulate all that was modern, exhilarating and electrifying in Rossini’s music, yet maintain their freshness and attraction to modern audiences.

A fifteen track, full digitally recorded CD; including well-known overtures from the great composers of the world; such as Borodin, Verdi,Rossini, Bizet, Mozart, Beethoven, Gluck and Weber.

More than 25 years after his first EMI album, Antonio Pappano has established himself as a leading figure of conducting, particularly in music from his native Italy. This collection includes excerpts from all his EMI and Warner Italian recordings, from the famous Verdi and Puccini cycles with Roberto Alagna and Angela Gheorghiu to the recent praised versions of Turandot and Rossini’s sacred works.

On the whole, Rossini's early overtures are astonishing for two reasons: so young a composer's mastery of the nuanced musical language of his time and his attainment to his own unmistakable tone. Apart from the crescendo and manifold musical drive, his personal style was characterized by the combination of nimble melodies and rhythmic vitality, by the blending of simple harmonic processes and sudden modulations of surprising wit, and by the tension between simple melodic cantilena and virtuoso coloratura. The special quality of Rossini's music, something his contemporaries found so fascinating, namely its autovibration or unique vibrancy, is best summed up by the Italian »brio«, a word signifying liveliness and swing, inner fire, or often mere embers - but embers emitting sparks....

Of the artists active today, Ricardo Muti has been a welcome guest at the Festival for more than 40 years. His first conducting engagements there did not just provide the basis for his current “telepathic” relationship with the Vienna Philharmonic, but also brought collaborations with important soloists of the older generation. Thus the new CD in the series FESTIVAL DOCUMENTS includes the Piano Concerto by Robert Schumann under Muti’s baton, with Sviatoslav Richter once more proving the uniqueness of his pianistic gifts. Over and above all its virtuoso challenges, Richter and Muti together give an account triumphant in its formal cohesion and in which they sculpt it as a large-scale musical arch.