Two years after the DVD/Blu-ray release of Jonas Kaufmann’s first Otello in the theatre (A/18), here is a full studio remake, from the same address as the Gramophone Award-winning Aida that gave us Kaufmann’s Radamès (A/15). The tenor’s first complete studio opera recording for Sony Classical (and the first studio Otello in 27 years) doesn’t quite have the same no-expense-spared feel as Warner’s effort with its predecessor, and is marred from the start by the cloying, gushing hagiography of a booklet note that announces the recording’s greatness before one’s even heard a note.

The sound that Sony’s engineers capture in Rome’s Auditorium Parco della Musica feels less refined than Warner Classics’ for Aida, too, with a slight lack of precision and a rather two-dimensional sound picture. It also compares unfavourably to DG’s detailed sound for that last Otello, recorded in Paris under Myung-Whun Chung. One regularly catches the sound of Pappano on the podium, too, as he encourages his players to stoke the fire of this great drama. It’s a forceful, visceral reading of the score that packs an irresistible punch, but which could do more to capture the refined lyricism and stately grandeur that are also such essential parts of the work. But the conductor’s enormous experience with the piece in the theatre pays significant dividends, especially in its second half.

Reviewing Kaufmann’s filmed Otello, I wrote that his performance gave the sense of ‘a role being expertly negotiated rather than lived’, and, although he had also notched up a Munich production before going into the studio, that feeling remains. Vocal decisions and dramatic decisions don’t as yet always feel seamlessly aligned: certain floated phrases still feel a little self-conscious and moments in ‘Dio! Mi potevi’ over-mediated. Elsewhere, though, the tenor bares his dramatic teeth impressively and to powerful effect; he is nobly moving in the final scene.

But the characterisation is also held back by the fact that, although he has all the notes and plenty of power, the voice itself sounds short on juice, the timbre lacking in colour and depth, with little of the necessary trumpeting ring at the top. Comparison with the experienced Domingo on the Chung recording might seem unfair but it gives an indication of what’s missing.

Carlos Álvarez’s Iago is perfectly respectable, with plenty of powerful, rich tone, but he sounds unimaginative, too, in comparison with Chung’s oily-voiced, insidious Sergei Leiferkus, not to mention other great Iagos on record. Federica Lombardi, though, is a lovely Desdemona: her timbre is appealingly soft, but there’s no shortage of strength either vocally or in terms of characterisation. Liparit Avetisyan is a suitably ardent Cassio, and Carlo Bosi an unusually vivid and engaging Roderigo. The rest of the secondary cast is solid.

Kaufmann’s many fans needn’t hesitate, and this is certainly a useful, if not necessarily essential complement to the filmed performance: a solid, impressive achievement but not a recording that’s likely to replace anyone’s existing top choices in this great work.