Chamber Music & Recitals

Le nozze in villa ('The Wedding in the Villa') tells the story of Sabina and the young Claudio. They are in love, but this match goes against the will of her father, who wants her to marry the Schoolmaster Trifoglio. Misunderstandings and tensions...

Benet Casablancas is widely acclaimed as one of the leading Spanish composers of his generation, and his first opera, L'enigma di Lea, is the fruit of his close collaboration with award-winning writer Rafael Argullol. Reality and myth intertwine and...

L'Empio Punito is the first opera where the character of Don Giovanni (Acrimante) makes his appearance. It was first premiered in Rome on February 17th, 1669 and this release is the recording of the first modern times performance that took place at the...

Shakespeare set this darkest of comedies in Vienna to cloak a scathing critique of hypocrisy in the corrupt authority of his own London. Purity and mercy do win out in the end, but not before audiences are treated to the lighter side of depravity in a...

Ruling by divine right, but himself ruled by caprice, King Richard exiles Henry Bolingbroke and seizes his father's vast estates. While Richard is distracted by a rebellion in Ireland, Bolingbroke returns to England, intent on recovering his rightful...

The production of Siegfried Wagner's "Sonnenflammen" in Bayreuth was unanimously highly praised in the media, describing it as "a discovery, at least in musical terms. The two and a half hours of performance will not be long at any time. The music is...

Weber's 'great heroic-romantic' opera Euryanthe premiered in Vienna in 1823. It concerns the wronged Euryanthe, victim of a plot to establish her unfaithfulness, but her love imbues her with colossal strength which Weber characterizes with acute...

Le Villi is an opera-ballet in two acts that marked Giacomo Puccini's debut in the world of opera. It was first staged at Teatro dal Verme in Milan in 1884. Librettist Ferdinando Fontana based the story on the ancient legend of the Willis, fantastic...

If the legend of the 'sermon to the birds' constitutes a magnificent example of narrative art on the piano, for this way of expressing extra-musical ideas solely with notes the three series of Ann?es de P?lerinage would seem to be a salient cycle in...

An op?ra-comique by an Italian composer? This was a rarity in it's day, but after the "barely averted disaster" of it's opening night, Donizetti's La Fille du r?giment became a popular success, not least for the high Cs demanded from Tonio in the famous...

Andr? Messager's Fortunio premiered in 1907 at the Op?ra Comique, where it received acclaim that was to last decades. One of the last composers to devote his entire career to opera and operetta, Messager exemplified in his music a feeling for dramatic...

Golden Cockerel DVD