No sooner had I been writing about the absence in the CD catalogue of the three central operas of the Puccini canon, Boheme, Tosca and Butterfly (see page 1117), than this excellent CD transfer of Karajan's highly-dramatic recording issued in 1980 arrived to fill an important gap. The Philharmonie in Berlin is for the engineers a difficult recording hall, and an opera presents even more problems than straight orchestral sessions. Yet what the extra clarity and definition of CD brings out is the relative spaciousness of the sound here. All the voices have air round them, and though Angelotti's very first words ''Ah finalmente'' may seem to be mumbled from rather far, this natural placing is far preferable to 'close miking'. Jose Carreras, unlike many a star tenor, is equally given a just balance, the size and power of the voice if anything the more apparent when not presented in close-up. The orchestra too has a fine bloom on it, and the only real problem of the CD is to select the most effective volume level; for if the voices are to convey the most vivid sense of presence, that setting may be too loud for such fortissimos as the very opening, where Karajan draws out the heavily brassy Scarpia chords very luxuriantly indeed.
Compact Disc brings an advantage not only in the placing and presence of the voices but as usual in the extra convenience. The first record brings 15 cueings, the second 16—which one would have thought ample, except that the arrival of ''Mia gelosa'' in Act 1, one of the most memorable of all Puccini melodies, is unaccountably left without a band in the middle of band 5.
As to the performance it centres not just on Karajan's superbly concentrated conducting but magnificently too on the darkly sinister-toned performance of Ruggero Raimondi as Scarpia, superbly coached by Karajan in a role that a bass would find it hard to sing on stage. Ricciarelli gives one of her very finest performances on record, not flawless vocally, but the more touching for conveying a vein of vulnerability. Carreras is not in his freshest voice but he, like Raimondi, has plainly responded to the detailed coaching of Karajan.'