It would appear Gruberova's popularity in Germany has led her to record repertoire not always well suited to her talents and voice, and for this reason I find her recital here a mixed blessing. Gruberova is perhaps happiest as Bellini's Amina (La sonnambula), a close cousin of his Giulietta of which she is such an accomplished and pleasing exponent. Here her keen line and touch of innocent pathos are wholly in harmony with the music in hand. But the authority and depth of feeling of ''Casta diva'' seem beyond her, and in the cabaletta she indulges in bursts of extra embellishments that are clumsily executed. One would have expected such a high voice might have restored the aria to its original key of G as Sutherland once did, but no such luck, nor in the second verse of the cavatina does she follow the autograph instruction on the repeated high As. It also seems odd today to hear the Fille du regiment piece done in Italian rather than French.
Suddenly on Side 2 we are plunged into the entirely different world of Mozart and Weber. Gruberova certainly gets around the coloratura of ''Non mi dir'' more easily than heavier sopranos, but the price to be paid is a rather too light, unemotional rendering. The singer's somewhat glaring tone, which becomes tiring when listening to the items on end, is not what the Countess's music calls for, and again one wants the sense of a context. Her attempt to alter her timbre to suggest Agathe's eager anticipation isn't wholly convincing and the Innigkeit is missing from her finely chiselled singing of ''Leise, leise''. Role and soprano are inevitably mismatched, for all the seriousness of purpose behind the attempt.
Then at the end of Side 2 we are wrenched back to Italy for poor Amialia's Act 2 scena from I Masnadieri. Here, Gruberova enters into the world of early Verdi with a will, providing richer tone than I had expected and long breathing for the aria proper, and purposeful coloratura for the cabaletta. AS in the other Gruberova recitals, Eichhorn is an obedient rather than a very positive partner.'