Oberon's Grove

Lucia Valentini-Terrani sings Brahms

While best-remembered as an interpreter of the great Rossini mezzo-soprano roles, Lucia Valentini-Terrani here shows another facet of her artistry, singing Johannes Brahms' Alto Rhapsody. Peter Maag conducts.

Lucia Valentini-Terrani - Brahms ~ Alto Rhapsody - Peter Maag cond - RAI 1979

Valentini-Terrani, born in Padua, sang at all the major Italian opera houses, as well as at Paris, Moscow, Buenos Aires, Chicago, and Washington DC. She debuted at The Met as Isabella in L'ITALIANA IN ALGERI in 1974, and had a huge success at Covent Garden in 1976 in LA CENERENTOLA. Beyond Rossini, her repertoire extended to such diverse roles as Eboli, Carmen, Charlotte in WERTHER, and Jocasta in OEDIPUS REX. 

Diagnosed with leukemia in 1996, Lucia Valentini-Terrani passed away in 1998 at the age of 51.

Silent Noon

"Your hands lie open in the long fresh grass, 
The finger-points look through like rosy blooms:
Your eyes smile peace. The pasture gleams and glooms
'Neath billowing skies that scatter and amass.
All round our nest, far as the eye can pass,
Are golden kingcup-fields with silver edge
Where the cow-parsley skirts the hawthorn-hedge.
'Tis visible silence, still as the hour-glass.

Deep in the sun-searched growths the dragon-fly
Hangs like a blue thread loosened from the sky: -
So this wing'd hour is dropt to us from above.
Oh! clasp we to our hearts, for deathless dower,
This close-companioned inarticulate hour
When twofold silence was the song of love."

~ Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882)

Zelenka ~ Magnificat in D

The Bach-Collegium Prague in a performance of Jan Dismas Zelenka's Magnificat in D, given in 2018.

Watch and listen here.

Julia Hamari ~ Bach's "Erbarme dich"

The Hungarian contralto Julia Hamari (above) is perhaps best-loved for her classic performance in Karl Richter's 1971 televised performance of Bach's Saint Matthew Passion, which is preserved on video. Her singing of the aria "Erbarme dich", with violin soloist Otto Büchner, is spellbinding. Watch it here.

ERWARTUNG

Arnold Schönberg's ERWARTUNG performed by soprano Karen Armstrong in a Götz Friedrich film.

Watch and listen here.

Morten Lauridsen's AVE MARIA

Above: composer Morten Lauridsen

The Luther College Nordic Choir perform Lauridsen's Ave Maria. Watch and listen here.

The performance took place at Bethany Lutheran Church in Denver, Colorado, in January 2012.

Myriam Marbé ~ REQUIEM

Above: Myriam Marbé

I came upon this composer's Requiem totally by chance, and am pretty intrigued by it.

Myriam Marbé (1931-1997) was a Romanian composer; she composed the oddly-titled Fra Angelico–Chagall –Voronet-Requiem in 1990. 

Listen to the work, performed by the Heidelberg Philharmonic Orchestra  with Barbara Werner as soloist, conducted by Jan Schweiger, here.

Gouqi Island

An abandoned fishing village on Gouqi Island, China, has been completely overgrown with ivy. I want to move there!

Aldo Protti's Prologo...and Credo

The Italian baritone Aldo Protti (1920-1995) was a native of Cremona. He studied at Parma, and made his operatic debut in 1948, at the Teatro Pergolesi in Jesi, as Rossini's Figaro. Within two years, he was at La Scala, singing Amonasro in AIDA. From that point forward, Protti sang in Italy's leading theaters as well as making guest appearances in Vienna; he participated in several broadcasts for the RAI, and in 1957 sang at Lyric Opera of Chicago as Barnaba (GIOCONDA) and Marcello (BOHEME).

Protti made important recordings for Decca, including a 1954 OTELLO with del Monaco and Tebaldi, Alberto Erede conducting. When Herbert von Karajan planned his stereo-remake of that Verdi opera for Decca in 1961, Ettore Bastianini was chosen to sing Iago. But Bastianini had failed to learn the part, so Karajan called upon Protti to repeat the role; the baritone surpassed his earlier recorded portrayal both vocally and in terms of characterization.

In 1985, at the age of 65, Protti sang a single performance as Rigoletto at The Met. He then joined the Company on tour, singing the role in six cities (including in Boston, where his Gilda was Roberta Peters in her final performance with The Met). He sang Rigoletto twice more, in concert form, with The Met in the Parks.

Rigoletto was Protti's most frequent role, which he performed 425 times in all; Scarpia, Count di Luna, and and Iago each figured prominently in his repertoire, with 100 performances of each role in his résumé.

Also Protti passed away at Cremona in 1995.

Aldo Protti - Prologo ~ PAGLIACCI

Aldo Protti - OTELLO ~ Credo - Karajan cond

~ Oberon

Régine Crespin

Régine Crespin - Ich sah das kind ~ PARSIFAL