Ermonela Jaho’s debut album Anima Rara shortlisted for the 2021 Gramophone Awards

We are extremely proud to hear that Anima Rara, Ermonela Jaho’s first recital album, has been short-listed by the members of the Jury of the 2021 gramophone Awards in the category Voice & Ensemble.

Recorded in Valencia in November 2019 with the Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana and Andrea Battistoni, this recording brings together music championed by the Italian soprano Rosina Storchio who created the role of Cio-Cio San in Puccini’s Madama Butterfly premiered in 1904 at La Scala, Milan. Alongside well-known arias from Madama Butterfly and Verdi’s La traviata – both operas with which the Albanian soprano is closely associated – Jaho sings excerpts from operas by Boito (Mefistofele), Catalini (La Wally), Giordano (Siberia), Leoncavallo (La bohème), Mascagni (Iris, Lodoletta and L’amico Fritz) and Massenet (Manon and Sapho).

Anima Rara features among the 72 recordings that form the second round of the Gramophone Classical Music Awards 2021. In the Voice & Ensemble category, Anima Rara is running against Sandrine Piau’s album 2Clair-Obscur2, the recording of Mahler’s Lied von der Erde by Dame Sarah Connolly and Robert Dean Smith, “Amici e Rivali”, the album by with Larry Brownlee and Micheal Spyre,  Lise Davidsen’s second solo album dedicated to Beethoven, Wagner and Verdi and last but not least, Ludovic Tezier recording “Verdi”.

From this list of celebrated recordings, an album will be chosen as the winner, and from that shortlist, a single album will be named ‘Recording of the Year’. Winners will be announced on October 5th.