If ever there was a case for armchair opera—and on CD at that—it is Rossini's Guglielmo Tell. The very limitations which have made it, so far, a non-repertory work, give space for the imagination to redress the balance: the short, Rousseauesque scenes of life by Lake Lucerne, the distant entrances and exits of shepherds and huntsmen, the leisurely but perfectly balanced side-vignettes of fisherman, hunter, child.
This recording is the only one in which the entire opera is available in this form; and thanks to the clarity and liveliness of the recording itself and, above all, the shrewd casting, it creates a vivid charivari of fathers, sons, lovers and patriots, all played out against some of Rossini's most delicately painted pastoral cameos.
Riccardo Chailly keeps up the undercurrent of tension between private love and public loyalty, as well as working hard the rustic jollity of the score. Tell himself could hardly have a better advocate than Sherrill Milnes, who succeeds in portraying the moral rectitude of a man who casts himself in the role of his brother's keeper, while managing to glow with true ardour and integrity in the cause for which he is fighting.
Arnoldo and Matilde, too, are cleverly cast. Pavarotti contains the coarse, direct impulsiveness of Arnoldo's shepherd stock with the tenderness of love, in his characteristic charcoal cantabile and, indeed, the numbness of his remorse. Even in his reflective Act 4 aria, ''O muto asil'' there is a rough, peasant edge gritting the vocal line which is both entirely truthful and nicely propulsive. Freni, singing opposite him as the forbidden Princess Matilde, phrases with aristocratic poise, folding into every fragment of embryonic bel canto the fragile ardour of a young girl's love. The vocal chemistry between them in their Act 2 declaration of love is a lively incarnation of their respective roles.
A similarly interesting patterning of vocal timbres is produced by the casting of Elizabeth Connell as Edwige, Tell's wife, and of Della Jones as Jemmy, their son. Their last act trio with Matildeis matched by the contrasting colours of the basses of Ghiaurov, Tomlinson and Van Allan: their roles may be small, but their characters are vividly stamped on what is an excellent ensemble performance.'