From Adam to Zandonai, from 1954 to 1996, 20 CDs made up of no less than 28 Decca opera recordings, most of them recorded as highlights albums, many long unavailable, newly remastered and all featuring the greatest singers of their age. In bygone years, before 24/7 streaming, recorded music was less readily available than it […]

The sole, completed opera by one of the nineteenth-century’s most shrewd librettists, ‘Mefistofele’ has always held a tenuous place on the fringes of the repertoire but its merits were established in the minds and ears of countless record-buyers in the 1960s and 70s by this 1958 Decca recording, the first to be made in stereo […]

The Lyric Opera of Chicago was founded as recently as 1954 but within two years it had secured the services of many operatic stars of the day who were doubtless reassured of the quality and warmth of reception at the company by the trailblazing US debut of Maria Callas as Norma in its first season. […]

In the 1950s and much of the 60s, the great bass roles in the Italian repertoire and the title part in ‘Don Giovanni’, were synonymous with the name of Cesare Siepi. Gifted with a commanding presence on stage and a firm, sonorous, pliant ‘basso cantante ‘– a true successor to the mantle of Pinza and Pasero, […]

Given Bernstein’s sheer sweep of the music of Richard Strauss (the ‘Salome’ excerpts are spine-tingling) it’s a pity he didn’t record any more. These precious recordings with Montserrat Caballe, are valuable not only for Bernstein’s advocacy of Strauss on record but also for the Spanish singer’s shimmering interpretations – girl-like in the opera, ravishing in […]

During the 1950s, 60s and 70s Decca recorded several LPs of recitals by both well and lesser-known opera singers of the day. This collection of famous opera arias, issued across two volumes, includes several of the singers known, in the main, to connoisseurs. The present volume features three singers represented by their 1950s recital discs: […]