Meyerbeer's Vasco da Gama from cpo

[Mark Thomas]

cpo are, by their lethargic standards, rushing out a recording of last year's performances of the reconstruction of Meyerbeer's Vasco da Gama. This is the score left unfinished on his death, which was condensed by Fétis into L'Africaine. It's got to be a must buy for any opera lover. A few details, but no audio extracts, here.

[Alan Howe]

I saw this too. My immediate reaction, though, was to wonder how good the singing is going to be. Meyerbeer requires world-class singers who can cope with both florid writing and heroic declamation, but the few (official) recordings that have been made have pretty well all fallen down in one area or another. So I fear for the quality of singing on this new set - unless it's really good, I'll be passing this time round.

BTW there seems to be an introductory video (in German) on this production on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBNGSGXSnmE
And another here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdUa3YzsvfE

[BerlinExpat]

In my very humble opinion as an opera buff with no musical training other than an 'O' level but with 50 years experience of attending opera, I fell professionals cannot always be relied on to deliever the desired goods.
I attended Vasco da Gama in Chemnitz and could hardly believe the quality of the production which kept the audience spellbound for the 250 minutes of this fantastic score and which was universally praised in the press.
I also attended L'Africaine at the Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin in 1992 with some top names, but they didn't manage to do the piece justice and it was never revived.
Jürgen Schläder's critical edition as used in Chemnitz corrects the incongruities of L'Africaine and as a result the opera wins tremendously.
I surmise CPO's relatively quick release is in honour of the 150th anniversary of Meyerbeer's death on 2nd May 2014. I would thoroughly recommend purchasing this recording and as an appetiser I've uploaded Act 3 from Deutschlandradio Kultur's broadcast last year.
I'll delete it once the CPO set is released.

[Alan Howe]

I take all your points, but my ears can already hear a pretty ordinary-sounding tenor in the title-role. My point is this: what can be overwhelming experienced first-hand in the theatre may not transfer to the purely audio medium of CD - especially if the singing is sub-par. Whereas lesser orchestras (especially German ones) can produce stunning results in the unsung orchestral repertoire, provincial opera houses often have problems attracting the standard of singers necessary for repeated listening when a recording is made. An exception is cpo's new recording of the Freiburg production of Cilea's L'Arlesiana which features one of the world's finest young tenors, Giuseppe Filianoti - which shows what can be done. So, I'd love to think that this new recording of Vasco da Gama is going to be up to scratch vocally, but somehow I doubt it.

Incidentally, a similar disagreement has been aired on the 'net about Christian Thielemann's new Ring Cycle for DGG, Those who attended the production (Vienna, I think) found it overwhelming, but oh the singing! Frankly, it's about as bad as it gets on any commercial Ring cycle. So, there's a real issue here, I think.

[Mark Thomas]

I think I take a middle course. Whilst appreciating the points which Alan makes, beggars can't be choosers, and if I have a choice between this recording or none at all, I'll have this recording, thank you very much.

[Alan Howe]

And I'll probably buy it, play it once, listening to the singing through gritted ears (as it were) and never play it again - a fate of all too many of these productions. And then I'll go back to the DVD of L'Africaine with Domingo and Verrett to hear how it should be sung.