To mark the occasion of Victoria de los Angeles’s 75th birthday Testament have reissued these, two of her earliest complete opera sets, while EMI have brought out a collection of her recordings of Spanish song. In the case of both these works, the soprano made later, stereo sets, but there is a strong argument to be made for their mono predecessors: the Barbiere appears for the first time on CD. In this Rossini she is at her freshest and most alluring, her tone youthful and smiling, her manner utterly delightful, nowhere more so than when she voices her love for ‘Lindoro’ in the duet with Figaro, “Ah, tu solo amor”. Indeed, throughout one capitulates to the grace and allure of her singing.
As Almaviva, the equally young Monti sings with an elegance and line that has seldom been surpassed in the role since. Bechi has been severely criticized in the past for his rough Figaro: listening to him again I forgave some loud-mouthed singing for the enjoyment of hearing such a lively, articulate, properly Italian interpreter, one who has the role in his bones, gives us a face in his singing as he enjoys conveying every nuance of the text. The same can be said of Rossi-Lemeni in his over-the-top but wonderfully zestful Basilio. Luise gives us a more serious, menacing Bartolo than some, a valid reading of the role. The cast, as a whole full of Latin temperament, is held together by Serafin’s immensely experienced hand. All the old, now discredited cuts are made, but one hardly notices the omissions when the performance bowls along with such vitality in an excellent modern recording, one or two moments of distortion apart, well refurbished at Abbey Road.
Vitality is also the chief characteristic of Gavazzeni’s flowingly dramatic conducting of Butterfly, superior to Santini’s on the soprano’s later recording. The supporting men are also better than their successors, di Stefano a swaggering, impassioned Pinkerton, who makes you love and hate him at the same time, Gobbi a highly articulate and sympathetic Sharpless. As for de los Angeles, her detailed, sincere, glowingly sung Cio-Cio-San is just as I recall it on stage at Covent Garden at about the same time this set was made. Although she had deepened her reading by the time of the stereo remake, something of the simplicity and direct feeling of this version had perhaps gone.
She isn’t as tragic in the role as Callas for Karajan or Scotto for Barbirolli (both EMI), nor does she carry the vocal sumptuousness of Tebaldi on the contemporary Decca set under Serafin, now at mid price. Yet when the Spanish soprano sings “Butterfly, rinegato – e felice” or “Che tua madre”, or practically anything else, with such honest conviction, such pointed diction, such natural phrasing, wonderfully supported by Gavazzeni and his Rome Opera Orchestra, the hardest heart must surely melt and no other Butterfly comes into it. Here’s singing and artistry of a rare distinction, an interpretation no Puccini collection should be without. Testament’s remastering, of what in the first place was a finely balanced recording, is first-rate. My only reservation concerns cost: why should one have to pay, in both cases, full price for recordings more than 40 years old, in mono, when the stereo remakes are available at mid price from EMI?'