mentions:
Joan Sutherland ~ La fille du régiment
Beverly Sills - 1956
photo by
Showing posts with label Joan Sutherland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joan Sutherland. Show all posts
September 26, 2024
November 8, 2021
Hector Berlioz articles/mentions
January 20, 2021
Joan Sutherland articles/mentions
Donizetti ~ La fille du régiment
Gounod ~ Faust
Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
mentions:
Leontyne Price ~ the ultimate Aida
Joan Sutherland
Date & photographer unknown
July 7, 2020
April 5, 2020
Allan Warren articles/mentions
Betty Davis, Kaisik Wong & Sandra Sakata
Debbie Reynolds
Joan Sutherland articles/mentions
Allan Warren - September 14, 2012
Photo by Christoph Braun, CCO 1.0.
February 25, 2019
March 7, 2018
March 4, 2018
October 29, 2015
101 Reel-to-Reel Tapes 113: Joan Sutherland sings excerpts from Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
~
Don Giovanni
~ ~ ~
I
started the Vinyl LP series because I have a collection of over 20,000 vinyl record albums I am
selling; each blog entry is about an album from my collection. The 101 Reel-to-Reel Tapes series is an extension of that collection. Inquire
for information here.
~ ~ ~
The first opera I ever saw was not actually a live production; it was a film. I remember it vividly! I saw it at a theater, the El Capitan, on Mission Street in San Francisco, California, in the late fifties. It was an ancient movie palace from the twenties that had seen better days and was in sad condition. It is no longer there; well, the external structure is there but it was gutted years ago and turned into a parking lot. The entrance to the lot was the original theater entrance. I was to move into my studio two blocks away fifteen or so years later. To the right of the theater you can see the sign for the Greek import store where I would buy those great albums from Greece
I didn't even know what I was going to see. I was expecting a regular old movie but I was in for a gigantic surprise. It was a film of a 1954 stage production in Salzberg, Austria. This production of Don Giovanni was filmed in Salzburg’s open-air Felsenreitschule theatre as part of director Paul Czinner’s movement to preserve renowned theater performances for posterity. It was conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler and featured Cesare Siepi as Don Giovanni, Lisa della Casa as Donna Elvira, Elisabeth Grümmer as Donna Anna and Otto Edelmann as the Don's comic man servant (link to this film on YouTube below).
El Capitan theater, San Francisco, CA
photo by
Joan Sutherland sings Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
reel-to-reel tape box
photo by Styrous®
reel-to-reel tape box
photo by Styrous®
The complete title for Don Giovanni is, Il dissoluto punito, ossia il Don Giovanni, literally The Rake Punished. It is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. Da Ponte's libretto was billed, like many of its time, as dramma giocoso, a term that denotes a mixing of serious and comic action. Mozart entered the work into his catalogue as an opera buffa. Although sometimes classified as comic, it blends comedy, melodrama and supernatural elements. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga (now called the Estates Theatre) on October 29, 1787.
Joan Sutherland sings Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
reel-to-reel tape box back
photo by Styrous®
reel-to-reel tape box back
photo by Styrous®
Don Giovanni is currently tenth on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide. It has also proved a fruitful subject for writers and philosophers. It is based on the legends of Don Juan, a fictional libertine and seducer.
Joan Sutherland sings Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
reel-to-reel tape box back detail
detail photo by Styrous®
reel-to-reel tape box back detail
detail photo by Styrous®
The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard wrote a long essay in his book Enten – Eller in which he argues, writing under the pseudonym of his character "A" and quoting Charles Gounod, that Mozart's Don Giovanni is "a work without blemish, of uninterrupted perfection." The finale, in which Don Giovanni refuses to repent, has been a captivating philosophical and artistic topic for many writers including George Bernard Shaw, who in Man and Superman parodied the opera (with explicit mention of the Mozart score for the finale scene between the Commendatore and Don Giovanni). Gustave Flaubert called Don Giovanni, along with Hamlet and the sea, "the three finest things God ever made." E. T. A. Hoffmann
also wrote a short story derived from the opera, Don Juan, in which
the narrator meets Donna Anna and describes Don Juan as an aesthetic
hero rebelling against God and society.
In Nordic and Germanic languages, Leporello's "Catalogue Aria" provided the name "Leporello List" for fan-folded printed matter, as used for brochures, photo albums, computer printouts and other continuous stationery.
Joan Sutherland sings Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
reel-to-reel tape box spine
detail photo by Styrous®
reel-to-reel tape box spine
detail photo by Styrous®
Joan Sutherland made her debut in Don Giovanni on July 26, 1958, with the Vancouver Opera, the largest opera company in western Canada. It was conducted by Berthold Goldschmidt.
She was dubbed La Stupenda by a La Fenice audience in 1960 after a performance of the title role in Handel's Alcina.
Her voice was described as "fresh," "silvery" and "bell-like" until 1963, Joan Sutherland's voice, later became "golden" and "warm", music critic John Yohalem writes it was like "molten honey caressing the line." In his book Voices, Singers and Critics, John Steane
writes that "if the tonal spectrum ranges from bright to dark,
Sutherland's place would be near the centre, which is no doubt another
reason for her wide appeal." According to John Yohalem, "Her lower register was a cello register, Stradivarius-hued." Her voice was full and rounded even in her highest notes, which was brilliant, but sometimes "slightly acid."
Joan Sutherland sings Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
reel-to-reel tape box and libretto
photo by Styrous®
The Libretto
reel-to-reel tape box and libretto
photo by Styrous®
The synopsis
Don
Giovanni, a young, arrogant, and sexually promiscuous nobleman, abuses
and
outrages everyone else in the cast, until he encounters something he
cannot kill, beat up, dodge, or outwit. The infamous womanizer, makes
one conquest after another
until the ghost of Donna Anna's father, the Commendatore, (whom Giovanni
killed) makes his appearance. The Commendatore offers Giovanni one last
chance to
repent for his multitudinious improprieties. He will not change his
ways, so, he is dragged into hell by a horde of demons amid fire and
smoke (link to complete synopsis below).
The Libretto
Net Links:
Mozart ~ Don Giovanni on YouTube:
Don Giovanni, Furtwängler, Salzburg 1954 (complete opera)
Don Giovanni - Commendatore scene (Furtwängler)
The Joan Sutherland , Mozart ~ Don Giovanni reel-to-reel tape is for sale on eBay
101 Reel-to-Reel Tapes 112: Joan Sutherland sings excerpts from Gounod ~ Faust
~ ~ ~
I
started the Vinyl LP series because I have a collection of over 20,000 vinyl record albums I am
selling; each blog entry is about an album from my collection. The 101 Reel-to-Reel Tapes series is an extension of that collection. Inquire
for information here.
~ ~ ~
Faust is a grand opera in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play, Faust et Marguerite, which was based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part 1. It debuted at the Théâtre Lyrique on the Boulevard du Temple in Paris on March 19, 1859.
The Devil has a great aria in Faust, Le veau d'or est toujours debout! (Song of the Golden Calf). The Soldier's Chorus is fun, happy and full of life; there is a video of the Kremlin Guard performing it and it is an interesting interpretation. It is slower, aggressive and threatening, almost scary.
But neither the Devil's song nor the Chorus are my favorites in this opera. My favorites are, Alerte ! alerte!, the final scene, and the finale which follows. They are outstanding! The final scene has the singers dramatically, constantly, shifting from one key to the next with intense emotion until you think they can't possibly get any more intense or go any higher. But they do and you go out of your mind with the beauty of the music! And if you're lucky enough to see a production that uses an organ in ADDITION to the orchestra, well . . . (links to music on YouTube below).
The Devil has a great aria in Faust, Le veau d'or est toujours debout! (Song of the Golden Calf). The Soldier's Chorus is fun, happy and full of life; there is a video of the Kremlin Guard performing it and it is an interesting interpretation. It is slower, aggressive and threatening, almost scary.
But neither the Devil's song nor the Chorus are my favorites in this opera. My favorites are, Alerte ! alerte!, the final scene, and the finale which follows. They are outstanding! The final scene has the singers dramatically, constantly, shifting from one key to the next with intense emotion until you think they can't possibly get any more intense or go any higher. But they do and you go out of your mind with the beauty of the music! And if you're lucky enough to see a production that uses an organ in ADDITION to the orchestra, well . . . (links to music on YouTube below).
Faust was rejected by the Paris Opera, on the grounds that it was not sufficiently "showy", and its appearance at the Théatre-Lyrique was delayed for a year because Adolphe d'Ennery's drama Faust was playing at the Porte St. Martin. When it was finally staged, in 1859, it was not well received.
However, when it was revived in Paris in 1862, it was a hit. A ballet had to be inserted before the work could be played at the Opéra
in 1869: it became the most frequently performed opera at that house
and a staple of the international repertory, which it remained for
decades, being translated into at least 25 languages.
Its popularity and critical reputation have declined somewhat since
around 1950. A full production, with its large chorus and elaborate sets
and costumes, is an expensive undertaking, particularly if the act 5
ballet is included. However, it appears as number 35 on the Operabase
list of the most-performed operas worldwide.
reel-to-reel tape box back
photo by Styrous®
It was Faust with which the Metropolitan Opera in New York City opened for the first time on October 22, 1883.
It is the eighth most frequently performed opera there, with 747
performances through the 2011-2012 season. It was not until the period
between 1965 and 1977 that the full version was performed (and then with
some minor cuts), and all performances in that production included the Walpurgisnacht and the ballet.
reel-to-reel tape box back detail
detail photo by Styrous®
Synposis
The action takes place in 16th Century Germany. during the German Renaissance. It is the story of of a man who sells his soul to the Devil
in exchange for knowledge and power. Gounod’s opera does not attempt to
match the thematic breadth or the philosophical sophistication of
Goethe’s sprawling masterpiece, concentrating instead on Faust’s
romantic encounter with Marguerite (Gretchen in Goethe’s drama) and the
tragic results of their liaison (link to complete synopsis below).
photo by Styrous®
The copy of the libretto
that came with the tape has yellowed with age with the form of the reel
emblazoned on it which gives it a strange depth effect.
Joan Sutherland first sang the role of Marguerite on March 9, 1965, with the Connecticut Opera, a professional, non-profit, opera company based in Hartford, Connecticut, and a member of OPERA America. The company closed in February of 2009, after 67 seasons.
Credits:
Baritone Vocals – Raymond Myers, Robert Massard
Bass Vocals – Nicolai Ghiaurov
Contralto Vocals – Monica Sinclair
Mezzo-soprano Vocals – Margreta Elkins
Soprano Vocals – Joan Sutherland
Tenor Vocals – Franco Corelli
Choir – The Choir Of Highgate School
Chorus – The Ambrosian Opera Chorus
Chorus Master – John McCarthy
Conductor – Richard Bonynge
Orchestra – The London Symphony Orchestra
Label: London Records – L 90172
Format: reel-to-reel tape
Country: USA
Released: 1970
Genre: Classical
Style: Opera
Format: reel-to-reel tape
Country: USA
Released: 1970
Genre: Classical
Style: Opera
libretto detail
detail photo by Styrous®
Links on the Net:
Joan Sutherland ~ excerpts from Donizetti ~ La fille du régiment
Joan Sutherland ~ excerpts from Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
Faust ~ Synopsis
Joan Sutherland ~ excerpts from Mozart ~ Don Giovanni
Faust ~ Synopsis
Faust ~ Roles
Links to music on YouTube:
Joan Sutherland ~ Jewel Song
Joan Sutherland ~ Alerte ! alerte! & Finale
Soldiers Chorus
Kremlin Guard ~ Soldiers' Chorus
final scene (Alerte! alerte!) Joan Sutherland ~ Alerte ! alerte! & Finale
Soldiers Chorus
Kremlin Guard ~ Soldiers' Chorus
Styrous® ~ Thursday, October 29, 2015
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)