Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An elegant jewel in Rossini's crown, 20 Dec 2007
This recording of MATILDE DI SHABRAN (Pesaro 2004) being my 38th Rossini opera on disc (only RICCIARDO & ZORAIDE is missing!), I can't recommend it highly enough, not least to rare opera hunters. Hearing the set over and over again for more than a week now, I purchased it primarily for Massis, whose unforgettable Countess Adele I saw three times in Glyndebourne's LE COMTE ORY 10 years ago and still enjoy endlessly on DVD. She and Florez (my first disc of either artist) nail their fiendish notes disarmingly, as if they're doing nothing less than breathing like the rest of mankind, though many times you'd wonder if they breathe at all! The supporting (obscure but generally secure) cast - together with a superb chorus and orchestra - complement the well-matched athletic couple to near perfection. Only the fade-out of the end of set pieces - also true of Abbado's IL VIAGGIO A REIMS recordings - is slightly annoying: I sense that we lose a second or two evidently left out to preclude applause, which could have been abridged (I can't believe that the audience - whose applause here is confined to the end of each of the opera's two acts - responded silently to those breathtaking numbers, unless they were gagged and bound!). No need to hesitate: the memorable score is no less inspired than IL VIAGGIO and ORY (my favourite Rossini comedies), the extended ensembles (in particular) - which are nothing short of orgasmic - showing the composer at his most regal. It would be a crime if Decca didn't tape this for DVD release: if it weren't recorded, I hope the ROH will do us the favour of recording its production next year (either a new Pesaro staging or a revival of the 2004 production, but I'm sure with Florez). If you seriously think that Rossini is at his best only in IL BARBIERE and CENERENTOLA (neither is a favourite of mine), you'll realize how wrong you were upon discovering MATILDE. An irresistible, charming work from the king of dramatic melody.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Musically a pleasant surprise, in great sound, with superlative singing, 1 Oct 2007
I pretty much agree with all the previous reviewers on Amazon.com, apart from the curiously curmudgeonly and wrong-headed one by S Wells, and would add only that the quality of sound is, for all practical purposes, indistinguishable from a studio recording in quality but gains from its source as a live recording. Florez is, of course, the star of the show but all the singers here have neat, firm, accomplished voices (with the exception of Chiara Chialli's wobbly mezzo as the Contessa; she quite spoils the homogeneity of the ensembles she is in) and I would particularly single out the Israeli mezzo, Halevy, for her "chocolate" tone and accurate roulades. It's true that not all the music is as inspired as that in Rossini's masterpieces and I don't warm to Massis as some do, finding her a little bland, but she certainly has all the notes. Glory in Florez' virtuosity in a part seemingly tailor-made for him; this is great fun and underscored by some nice satirical touches in an ironic plot which parodies the very operatic conventions that Rossini himself helped to establish. This much-vilified plot emerges as no more absurd or incomprehensible than many another more celebrated opera and seems quite straightforward to me, if patently - and deliberately - absurd. A must for Rossini aficionados.
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