Marston celebrates Baritone HERBERT JANSSEN - Yves St Laurent’s newest issue of CHRISTOPHER KEENE with ELMAR OLIVEIRA -Immortal Performances presents performances of JANSSEN in DER FLIEGENDE HOLLANDER

Marston celebrates Baritone HERBERT JANSSEN . . .

Yves St Laurent’s newest issue of

CHRISTOPHER KEENE with ELMAR OLIVEIRA . . .

Immortal Performances presents two performances of

JANSSEN in DER FLIEGENDE HOLLANDER . . .

and ‘SALE’ titles continue. . .

HERBERT JANSSEN: Portrait of a Mastersinger, incl. Songs by Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Grieg, Strauss & Wolf; Arias & Duets (w.Schone, Perras, Ljungberg, Leider, Flagstad, Witte & Melchior from Johannes-Passion, Siegfried & Gotterdammerung, Die Walkure, Tannhauser, Die Drei Musketiere, Zar und Zimmermann, Der Waffenschmied, Rigoletto, Madama Butterfly & Faust. 6-Marston 56005, recorded 1923-48, featuring many Live Performances & Unpublished material. Essays by Michael Aspinall and Iain Miller. (V2670)

Specially priced, 6-CDs for the price of 4.

Critic Review

“The recordings of the baritone Herbert Janssen (1892–1965) have continued to delight listeners, beginning with their first appearance in the 1920s up until the present, where contemporary critics often revere them as standards of distinguished singing. The very individualistic beauty of his voice has long been held in the highest esteem by connoisseurs of both operatic and Lieder singing. His perfect Italianate legato, his breath control, and the 'long-bowed' phrasing of his vocal art were greatly praised by critics and audiences throughout his thirty-year career, first in continental Europe and at Covent Garden, and latterly in the Americas.

His musically rich and varied career in Europe ended abruptly in 1937 when his outspoken opposition to Hitler’s regime led to his pursuit by the Gestapo and eventual escape and exile. Until then, he had given highly praised performances, not only of the Wagnerian roles for which he is chiefly remembered today, but of Mozart, Gluck, a great deal of Verdi and other Italian and French operas, as well as of contemporary works and even Russian repertoire.

Janssen’s Lieder singing on record has left memorable interpretations of songs by Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Wolf, and Strauss which are still highly prized today.

The present collection includes all his surviving pre-war studio recordings of opera and operetta (except for the 1930 Columbia Tannhäuser); all of Janssen’s surviving 78 rpm Lieder recordings, including several previously unpublished items; and rare broadcast material that appears here together for the first time. The set includes liner notes by Iain Miller and Michael Aspinall, as well as a large selection of rare photos. As a portrait of one of the greatest baritones on records, this six-CD set of Herbert Janssen is the most complete yet to appear."

- Ward Marston

"Herbert Janssen - with his plangent, fine-grained voice, keen intelligence, aristocratic musicianship, and (not incidentally) handsome appearance - was the leading German baritone in several major theatres during the 1920s and 1930s. After study with Oskar Daniel in Berlin he was immediately accepted by Max von Schillings for the Berlin State Opera, where he made his debut in 1922 as Herod in Schreker's DER SCHATZGRABER . He remained at the Berlin State Opera until 1937 singing both lyric and dramatic roles, many of them in the Italian repertory. He later appeared in important productions of DER FLIEGENDE HOLLANDER and TRISTAN UND ISOLDE at Covent Garden conducted by Reiner and Beecham, also singing Orest / ELEKTRA and in 1935 taking the title role in Borodin's PRINCE IGOR, for which he was highly praised.

Janssen was a fixture at the Bayreuth Festival from 1930 to 1937. His Wolfram in TANNHAUSER set a standard not approached since, and, fortunately, it was recorded in a somewhat truncated 1930 production. During that decade, he established benchmarks for several Wagner roles, particularly Kurwenal, Telramund, Gunther, and - especially - Amfortas. His interpretation of the latter was an exquisitely sung realization of a soul in torment, achieving a remarkable unity of voice, movement, and makeup. His doggedly loyal Kurwenal is preserved on complete recordings of TRISTAN UND ISOLDE made live at Covent Garden in 1936 and 1937. His tortured Dutchman is also available in a live recording made at Covent Garden and featuring Kirsten Flagstad as Senta.

In addition to his stage work, Janssen acquired a reputation as a superior singer of Lieder. The exceptional beauty of his voice and his interpretive acuity made him a prime candidate for Walter Legge's Hugo Wolf Society venture of the 1930s. Among the finest singers Legge could pull together, Janssen was given the largest assignment and his subscription recordings made throughout the decade remain supreme, even in the face of the best achievements of post-war Lieder singers.

Janssen was very unpopular with the Nazi regime, having turned down a dinner invitation from Hitler at Bayreuth, Janssen left Germany in 1937 and with Toscanini's assistance traveled immediately to Buenos Aires. After a season in Argentina, he came to the United States where he made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera in 1939, remaining at that theater until his stage retirement in 1952.

From 1940 onwards Janssen sang regularly at Buenos Aires and with the San Francisco Opera between 1945 and 1951. Following his retirement in 1952, he remained in New York as a respected teacher.

Janssen's performances were notable for the warm and sympathetic timbre of his voice, his excellent command of legato and clear enunciation, as well as his convincing acting. Also a highly accomplished lieder singer, he had in addition starred in the musical DREI MUSKETIERE at the Metropol Theatre in Berlin during 1928 opposite Gota Ljungberg."

- Erik Eriksson, allmusic.com

CHRISTOPHER KEENE Cond. Syracuse S.O.: Music for the Royal Fireworks (Handel), Live Performance, 17 Nov., 1980; w.ELMAR OLIVEIRA: Violin Concerto in D (Brahms), Live Performance, 26 & 28 March,1981 (both Mulroy Civic Center, Syracuse, NY). (Canada) St Laurent Studio YSL T-1149. Transfers by Yves St Laurent. (C1940)

Critic Review

“These two performances come from the latter part of Christopher Keene’s decade with the Syracuse Symphony, and they reflect the enthusiastic praise given to 13 previous releases in St. Laurent Studio’s historic Keene series. Even though he had risen quickly as a young conductor and eventually became music director at New York City Opera, Keene’s name was forgotten after his tragic premature death in 1995 during the AIDs epidemic; he was 48. I began listening to these recordings, transferred from excellent broadcast tapes, out of a mixture of curiosity and duty. Keene wasn’t always at his best, and the only time I heard him, conducting the Denver Symphony, the concert wasn’t a success.

That experience led to the unalloyed delight of discovering how fine a conductor he actually was, and his best period apparently came in Syracuse. Keene was fortunate to arrive after a fully professional orchestra had been trained by its founding music director since 1960, Karl Kritz. Born in Vienna in 1906, Kritz sang in the Vienna Boys’ Choir and later studied under Franz Schmidt before graduating from the Vienna University of Music and Arts. His immigration to the U.S. in 1937 was part of the cultural influx that overnight gave this country a profound musical foundation. By no means was Kritz to become a star in America, but he conducted with the Pittsburgh Symphony, San Francisco Opera, and the Met. One feels, listening to the polish and musicality of the Syracuse Symphony, which Kritz led until his death in 1969, that he was an unsung hero and undoubtedly far more talented than his faded reputation indicates.

The same holds true for Keene, and anyone who anticipates an underwhelming or routine reading of the Brahms Violin Concerto will be surprised. Keene takes the orchestral introduction with quick, intense energy, and the orchestra delivers a true Brahmsian sonority. Soloist Elmar Oliveira is sympathetic to this approach and enters with passionate conviction. Oliveira was born in 1950 of Portuguese parents and made his big break at 16 in a televised Young Person’s Concert with the New York Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein; the theme of the program was child prodigies. He was later co-winner of the 1978 Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow.

With such credentials, which led to a successful career that slipped a little under the spotlight, it naturally follows that Oliveira should be impressive in the Brahms concerto. The first movement reveals some roughness in double stops, however, and the Joachim cadenza feels roughshod. Everything settles down in a superb reading of the slow movement where the orchestra’s oboe and horn soloists perform with real intensity and Oliveira exhibits a flair for Romantic ardor. The finale proceeds exuberantly, its Hungarian flavor underscored by Keene’s strong accents and the violinist’s feeling of abandon.

One wouldn’t expect a traditional reading of Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks to be equally enthralling, but by 1981 the mustiness of grandly robust British performances had been challenged. Keene leads a reading that is truly celebratory. The large battery of woodwinds is bright and exciting. We are nowhere close to Handel’s original instrumentation of 24 oboes, 12 bassoons and contrabassoon, nine natural trumpets, nine natural horns, three pairs of kettledrums, and side drums, but he went on to rescore the music for an indoor performance at the Foundling Hospital that added strings to replace a mob of wind instruments. St. Laurent Studio provides no program notes, so I can’t offer details about the instrumentation here. What really matters is the buoyant, high-spirited music-making.

So, Vol. 14 in a series that has brought much joy and, hopefully, raised Christopher Keene’s reputation as high as it really deserves to be. There were not many American conductors of his ability back then, and even fewer who could afford to be openly gay, which Keene wasn’t. Whatever the personal costs to him, which must have been severe at times, we now realize how well he fulfilled his amazing potential.”

- Huntley Dent, FANFARE

DER FLIEGENDE HOLLANDER, Live Performance, 24 Jan., 1937, w.Heinrich Steiner Cond. Reichssenders Berlin Ensemble; Herbert Janssen, Kurt Bohme, Elisabeth Friedrich, Marius Andersen, Margarethe Arndt-Ober, etc., w.broadcast commentary in German; World Premiere Release; HERBERT JANSSEN: Arias & Duets (w.Lotte Schone, Margherita Perras & Gota Ljungberg) from Rigoletto, Faust, Madama Butterfly, Zar und Zimmermann, Der Waffenschmied & Die Drei Musketiere - recorded 1926-28. (Canada) 2-Immortal Performances IPCD 1080. Restoration by Richard Caniell. Includes 33pp Booklet w.notes by Dewey Faulkner & Richard Caniell. (OP3249)

CRITIC REVIEW

"In the period 1937-38, Reichssender Berlin produced a number of operas for broadcast, including this DUTCHMAN. While most of the singers used remained in Germany throughout the war years, Herbert Janssen did not. In 1938, a year after this broadcast, he fled Germany, having been warned by Toscanini that he was now on a "hit list" of the Nazis because the baritone had rebuffed a dinner invitation at Bayreuth from Hitler. He traveled to Buenos Aires, and eventually, with Toscanini's help, settled in New York and never returned to Germany again. Although his repertoire was quite broad, the Met's general manager Edward Johnson liked pigeon-holing his artists, and Janssen was mostly limited to Wagner and a few other Germanic roles. He never quite achieved the stardom of Friedrich Schorr; his less rich voice was perhaps responsible for that, but Janssen was a great artist. He was known to state that he sang opera to build up an audience for his Lieder recitals, an art form he evidently preferred.

It is that aspect of Janssen's singing that makes this broadcast, never before available, unique and worth hearing. Because this was a broadcast meant for radio, with the singers all singing directly into microphones (though there was an audience present, as we can tell from applause between acts in this three-act version of the opera), Janssen could apply a degree of coloration and subtle inflection that would be lost in the opera house. His big monologue,’Die Frist ist um', seems related as much to Schubert's WINTERREISE in its sense of desolation and loneliness as to operatic models from Weber or Marschner. Instead of the thunderingly heroic climaxes that we get with singers such as George London (whose Dutchman I adore, by the way), this is much more of an internal monologue. The character sounds beaten down by his despair, rather than raging against it. This is an extremely valid and intriguing interpretation, one that is not often encountered with as much interpretive detail as we get here, and Janssen is consistent throughout the opera. We know that Wagner admired Bellini, and in this early opera there is still a bel canto influence at work, and the way Janssen sings the opening of the duet with Senta, ‘Wie aus der Ferne’, makes that clear.

It is interesting to compare Janssen here with Janssen in a live Covent Garden performance conducted by Reiner (also issued on Immortal Performances [OP3017]). That is of course quite impressive because of the presence of Reiner and Kirsten Flagstad as Senta. But what is fascinating is the interpretive and coloristic differences applied by Janssen in a staged setting vs. a broadcast studio. There is much that is more stentorian in the Covent Garden performance, some of which even stretches his vocal resources a bit. But in this broadcast he can bring a subtlety of coloration and inflection that humanizes the character in a more detailed way. You can hear it at all points - in the big opening monologue, the duet with Senta, and in particular in the opera's final scene. The anguish and desperation of the character is made stunningly real. In this broadcast setting, singing to a microphone, he can create an emptier, more hollow tone reflective of the Dutchman's fate.

Elisabeth Friedrich, the Senta, is a soprano previously unknown to me. According to Dewey Faulkner's superb notes she was a member of the Berlin State Opera and was quite popular. She made very few actual recordings, and this is her only complete role known to exist in recorded form. She is lovely throughout. Her Ballade is beautifully sung, the tone having a real luster to it, if not necessarily the distinctiveness of timbre that identifies a star. It is rather monochromatic, lacking tonal variety.

Distinctiveness of timbre does, in fact, mark the deep bass of Kurt Bohme, heard here in his younger days. This singer, who contributed to many performances and recordings into the 1960s, is a powerful Daland, but he too catches the overall mood of a more inward-looking style of Wagner singing than would be appropriate in an opera house. His Daland is a complex character, father and greedy villain all wrapped up in one.

The remaining singers are quite good, and they too catch the highly musical, lyrical atmosphere of this broadcast. At the core of this is conductor Heinrich Steiner, apparently one of the regulars in the Berlin Radio's series of opera broadcasts. There is nothing really special about his leadership, but neither is there anything distressingly wrong-headed. The chorus is, in fact, excellent in terms of ensemble and intonation, and except for some occasional roughness from the brass the orchestra too plays well. Steiner works well with his singers, and when Janssen sets a particularly rapt, quiet mood (the opening of "Wie aus der Ferne" for example) Steiner captures it well in the orchestra.

The value in this recording, and it is considerable, is in Janssen's inward looking, complex, and very convincing Dutchman. It is a performance unlike any other of which I am aware (in some ways close to Fischer-Dieskau, but frankly more spontaneous and natural in its flow and its interaction with other characters). It is a performance that adds to one's knowledge and understanding of the opera, and that is not something that can often be said.

The bonus material is a revelation. I was quite astonished to hear the idiomatic performances of the RIGOLETTO and FAUST scenes (the former sung in quite good Italian). The elegance and stylistic rightness of Valentin's scenes, sung with a remarkably smooth legato, are particularly attractive. He is a wonderfully sympathetic Sharpless too. This release makes clear the intelligence and keen musicianship of Herbert Janssen, an artist perhaps under-appreciated in our time.

Immortal Performances' usual high production standards are of course present. Given that they were starting with a broadcast recording, the sound is quite remarkable for a 1937 transcription. The booklet's notes are informative and provocative, and the photographs are lovely. The inclusion of the German radio announcers will interest some, and the others can skip those tracks."

- Henry Fogel, FANFARE, Sept. / Oct., 2017

"The German-born baritone Herbert Janssen had a distinguished career, both in Europe and the United States. This broadcast was, in fact, Janssen's final performance in Germany. An opponent of Hitler, Janssen was soon forced to escape Germany, which he accomplished in part thanks to assistance by the Italian maestro Arturo Toscanini. Janssen ultimately became a regular presence at New York's Metropolitan Opera, where he was, with a few exceptions, limited to Wagnerian roles.

If you are in the market for a unique and truly inspired rendition of the opera's title character, this new Immortal Performances release is enthusiastically recommended."

- Ken Meltzer, FANFARE, Sept. / Oct., 2017

DER FLIEGENDE HOLLANDER, Live Performance, 6 -11 June, 1937, w.Fritz Reiner Cond.Royal Opera House Ensemble (slightly abridged); Kirsten Flagstad, Herbert Janssen, Ludwig Weber, Max Lorenz, etc.; Kirsten Flagstad, w.Merola Cond.San Francisco Opera Orch.: Senta's Ballad, Live Performance, 1949; Befreit, Allerseelen, Cäcilie (all Strauss), Live Performance, 1950. (Canada) 2-Immortal Performances IPCD 1051. Elaborate 40pp. Booklet with photos & notes by Richard Caniell. Restoration, re-creation & transfers by Richard Caniell. (OP3017)

Critic Reviews

"Score another triumph for Richard Caniell and his remarkable Immortal Performances label….Having Flagstad's Senta, captured here in the prime of her career, is the obvious selling point for this set. Indeed her performance may surprise those listeners who have typed her as a matronly personality. She makes real the naive, sacrificing, and hopelessly romantic maiden that Wagner imagined in creating his Senta, with singing that is extraordinarily beautiful. The highlight is 'Wie aus der Ferne', the second act duet between Senta and the Dutchman. Flagstad sings with a tenderness and a glowing radiance that no other Senta has duplicated. What is particularly special here is having Flagstad's Senta, captured here in the prime of her career, the interaction between Flagstad and Janssen - not a baritone and soprano singing to us, but two characters relating with specificity to each other. It is this duet, rather than the Ballade, that is the locus of Flagstad's performance.

Janssen too is a uniquely specific Dutchman. One normally thinks of Schorr and George London as perhaps the greatest of Dutchmen on disc, and indeed Janssen lacks the particularly lovely and darkly focused sound of those two. But his voice makes clear the desperation and anguish of the character, and the specificity of his way of inflecting individual words and whole phrases making his portrayal treasurable. The Dutchman is one of Wagner's darkest characters, in a state of perpetual despondency….What strikes me about this performance, more than any one specific element, is its dramatic force and unity. This is a true musical and dramatic ensemble performance, where the characters seem to be truly interacting with each other and engaged in a real drama, rather than a high level vocal concert. These are characters who listen to, and react to and with each other. Even the orchestra seems wholly involved with the drama.

If you have this performance in some other restoration, you really have not heard it at all and need to replace it with this. It is worth pointing out that Immortal Performances upholds their usual high production values beyond the technical quality of the recording. The booklet contains wonderful photographs and two extremely valuable essays by Caniell.

- Henry Fogel, FANFARE

. . . REPEATED . . .

FROM THE RECENT PAST . . .

ARTURO TOSCANINI Cond. NBC S.O: All Verdi Concert, 25 July, 1943, w.Gertrude Ribla, Nan Merriman, Jan Peerce & Francesco Valentino, with Commentary by Ben Grauer: RIGOLETTO - Act III; GERTRUDE RIBLA: Forza – Pace, pace, mio Dio!; NAN MERRIMAN: Don Carlos – O don fatale; JAN PEERCE: Luisa Miller – Quando le sere al placido; FRANCESCO VALENTINO: Ballo – Eri tu? - incl. Announcement of Mussolini's downfall; ARTURO TOSCANINI Cond. NBC S.O: The Star Spangled Banner (Key), Garibaldi Hymn & Commentary, 9 Sept., 1943. All Sibelius Complete NBC Concert, 18 Feb., 1939, The Swan of Tuonela; En Saga; Finlandia; Symphony #2 in D. (Canada) 2-Immortal Performances IPCD 1141. Notes by Robert Matthew-Walker. Transfers by Richard Caniell. (C1937)

ARTURO TOSCANINI Cond. NBC S.O.: Complete Brahms Concert, 23 Oct., 1948: Serenade #1 in D; w. VLADIMIR HOROWITZ: Piano Concerto #2 in B-flat (both Brahms); ARTURO TOSCANINI Cond. NBC S.O.: Gesang der Partzen (Brahms), Live Performance, 27 Nov., 1948; Rare and Unusual 1933-39 Toscanini Recordings from Vienna, Lucerne, Palestine & Salzburg (incl. LOTTE LEHMANN's 'Abscheulicher'). (Canada) 2-Immortal Performances IPCD 1128. Essay about Toscanini by Robert Matthew-Walker; Transfers and Essay by Richard Caniell. Extensive notes, broadcast commentary and ovations. (C1936)

BRUNO WALTER: NBC Symphony Concerts 1939, Vol. I: Bruno Walter, Cond. and Pianist; Divertimento #15 in B-flat, K.287; Piano Concerto #20 in d, K.466; Symphony #40 in g, K.550 (Mozart); Oberon - Overture (Weber); Symphony #92 in G (Haydn); Symphony #1 in c (Brahms); Concerto Grosso, Op. 6, #8 (Corelli); Symphony #1 in C (Beethoven); Suite After English Folk Songs (Mason); Tod und Verklärung (Strauss); Le Corsaire Overture; La damnation de Faust - Menuet des follets; Ballet des sylphes; Marche hongroise; Symphonie fantastique (all Berlioz);. A Faust Overture; Siegfried Idyll (both Wagner); Symphony #1 (Mahler), featuring broadcast announcements by hosts Gene Hamilton and Robert Woldoff. (Canada) 5-Immortal Performances IPCD 1144, Live Performances, March 11-April 8, 1939, New York. Restoration and Transfers by Richard Caniell. Elaborate 28pp booklet features notes by James A. Altena & Richard Caniell. (C1916)

DON GIOVANNI, Live Performance, 2 Aug., 1937, Salzburg, w.Walter Cond. Vienna Staatsoper Ensemble; Ezio Pinza, Elisabeth Rethberg, Virgilio Lazzari, Dino Borgioli, Luise Helletsgruber, Herbert Alsen, etc.; DON GIOVANNI - Act II Excerpts (incomplete), Live Performance, 16 April, 1941, w.Laszlo Halasz Cond. St Louis Opera Ensemble; Pinza, Schipa, della Chiesa, Bokor, Alvary & Carlos Alexander; BRUNO WALTER Cond. NYPO: 'Haffner' Symphony #35 in D, K.385 (Mozart), Live Performance, 4 Jan., 1953, Carnegie Hall. (Canada) 3-Immortal Performances IPCD 1091. Notes by James Altena & Richard Caniell. Transfers by Richard Caniell. Elaborate Edition features numerous lovely photos & 42pp booklet. (OP3268)

DON GIOVANNI, Live Performance, 9 Dec., 1944, w. Szell Cond. Met Opera Ensemble; Ezio Pinza, Salvatore Baccaloni, Charles Kullman, Florence Kirk, Eleanor Steber, Bidu Sayao, Mack Harrell, etc.;

DON GIOVANNI, Live Performance, 6 Dec., 1947, w. Rudolf Cond. Met Opera Ensemble; Ezio Pinza, Salvatore Baccaloni, Charles Kullman, Regina Resnik, Polyna Stoska, Nadine Conner, Lorenzo Alvary, etc. (Canada) 4-Immortal Performances IPCD 1059. Restoration and Transfers by Richard Caniell. (OP3167)

Specially priced at 4 CDs for the price of 3.

LE NOZZE DI FIGARO, Live Performance, 7 Dec., 1940, (replete with Milton Cross' commentary), w.Panizza Cond. Met Opera Ensemble; Elisabeth Rethberg, Licia Albanese, Jarmila Novotna, Ezio Pinza, John Brownlee, Salvatore Baccaloni (debut), etc.; LE NOZZE DI FIGARO – Act II, Live Performance, 12 Oct., 1940, w.Leinsdorf Cond. San Francisco Opera Ensemble; Ezio Pinza, Elisabeth Rethberg, Bidu Sayao, Rise Stevens, John Brownlee, Irra Petina, etc. (Canada) 3-Immortal Performances IPCD 1094, taken from the NBC transcription line-checks. Notes by Henry Fogel & Richard Caniell. Transfers by Richard Caniell. Elaborate Edition features numerous lovely photos & 38pp booklet. (OP3267)

IDOMENEO, Live Performance, 14 July, 1951, w.Fritz Busch Cond. Royal Phil. & Glyndebourne Ensemble; Sena Jurinac, Birgit Nilsson, Richard Lewis, Leopold Simoneau, Alfred Poell, Alexander Young, etc.; SENA JURINAC, w.Busch Cond. Danish Radio Orch.: Ch’io mi scordi di te?... Non temer amato bene, K.505 (Mozart), Rehearsal of 18 Jan., 1951. (Canada) 2-Immortal Performances IPCD 1015. Transfers by Richard Caniell in greatly improved sound, in association with Bruder Busch Archiv. (OP2259)

JEAN PLANEL, w.Godfroy Andolfi, Gustave Charpentier, François Ruhlmann & Georges Briez Cond.; w.Godfroy Andolfi (Pf.): Songs by Hahn, Busser, Franck, Gregh, Yerr, Schubert, Mozart, Charpentier & Plasse; Arias from Manon, Lalla-Roukh, La Fille du Regiment, Lakme, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Martha, Le Roi d’Y’s, La Jolie Fille de Perth, Jocelyn, Les Cloches de Corneville & Les Dragons de Villars. (England) The Record Collector TRC 51, recorded early 1930s. Transfers by Norman White. (V2657)

TITO GOBBI: A TRIBUTE, incl. NABUCCO, w. Bruno Bartoletti Cond. Chicago Lyric Opera Ensemble; Tito Gobbi, Boris Christoff, Danica Mastilovic, Anna Maria Rota, Alfonso La Morena, etc. (Chicago, 10/4/1963); IL TABARRO, w.John Pritchard Cond. Royal Opera Ensemble; Tito Gobbi, Marie Collier, Charles Craig, Elizabeth Bainbridge, etc. (Royal Opera Covent Garden 4/23/1965); GIANNI SCHICCHI, w.John Pritchard Cond. Royal Opera Ensemble; Tito Gobbi, Elizabeth Vaughan, John Wakefield, etc. (Royal Opera Covent Garden, 4/23/1965); w.Molinari-Pradelli Cond. Royal Opera Ensemble; TOSCA – Tosca e buon falco. (Royal Opera Covent Garden, 5/30/55; OTELLO – Credo, w.Zubin Mehta Cond. Met Opera Ensemble (3/11/67); w.Serafin Cond. Rome Opera Ensemble: FALSTAFF - Signore, v’assista il cielo!; E sogno o realta; MARIANO STABILE: Prima di tutto; Eccomi qua (4/22/41); Three interviews with Gobbi. (Canada) 4-Immortal Performances IPCD 1145, w.Elaborate 58pp. Booklet. Transfers by Richard Caniell. Notes by William Russell & Richard Caniell. (V2658)

VOCAL RECORD COLLECTORS' SOCIETY - 2021 Issue: Esperanza Clasenti, Jose Soler, Luisa Ardizzoni-Tosi, Aristodemo Giorgini, Nini Frascani, Tina Poli-Randaccio, Giovanni Inghilleri, Antonio Gelli, Loretta Di Lelio, Elisa Petri, Mathilde Saiman, Berthe Cesar, Yvonne Brothier, Maurice Sauvageot, Guy Cazenave, Maria Janowska, Oskar Kamionsky, Kerstin Thorborg, Louis Dornay (Louis Goldsteen), Jozef Sterkens, August Bockmann & Edwin Steffe . VRCS-2021. Transfers by Seth B. Winner. (V2663)

BOOKS ON SALE

“Books have become our lonely stepchildren! By spending so many hours constantly revising our thousands of CDs we realize we have paid scant attention to our BOOKS ON SALE, thus many have been added (with more appearing), accompanied by greatly reduced prices! Have a glance at our SALE section - for BOOKS!

[many sealed copies of

numerous out-of-print additions:

The Record Collector, Naxos, VRCS, Issues of

Symposium's Harold Wayne series,

Romophone, GOP &

many Met Opera broadcasts &

operas from Moscow's Aquarius, plus

numerous lesser-known operas have been added

throughout our listings, in appropriate categories. .

out-of-print books [many biographies,

Record Catalogue-Discographies . . .

numerous CDs are added each week] . . .

Once again . . .

Welcome to our new bookshop & list of Original Cast LPs, www.norpete.com where you will see a vast array of excellent, used out-of-print books. You're sure to find many books of interest which may have long eluded you, so now is your opportunity to fill in missing gaps. Our online bookshop includes composer and performer autobiographies and biographies. Soon we will include musical criticism, theory and history, plus histories of symphony orchestras, opera houses and festivals. In addition, we shall offer quite an array of vocal scores, many of which are most rare and unusual.

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