Our October Recording of the Month is Donizetti’s Rita or Deux hommes et une femme starring Christopher Maltman, Barry Banks and Katerina Karnéus. Sir Mark Elder conducts The Hallé.
Released 10 years ago, Rita marked our 50th complete opera recording and was the only complete opera by Donizetti not to have been premiered in his lifetime. The one-act opéra-comique received its posthumous premiere at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 17 May 1860 where it had originally been scheduled over two decades earlier.
The latest edition on which our recording is based was created from the composer’s complete autograph score and a newly discovered at the time manuscript libretto with autograph annotations restoring the French-language spoken dialogue orignially intended for the opera.
Head over to our YouTube channel to listen to excerpts from the opera and look out for more later this month:
We’re excited to announce today the launch of Lives in Song: our new Opera Insider series exploring musicians’ biographies through their music.
In this first series, our hosts Flora Willson and Roger Parker will put the music of prolific composer Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1848) under the microscope and tell the story of his life through some of the songs he composed.
Told through six episodes, join the first YouTube live stream on Thursday 17 October at 6pm GMT/7pm BST on our YouTube channel.
EPISODE 1 description:
The year is 1837. Gaetano Donizetti is at the height of his international career as an composer of hugely popular operas. When his beloved wife, Virginia, dies aged just 28, Donizetti is devastated. In terms of operatic composition, the ‘show must go on’ – but does he show his grief through the songs he composes? Flora and Roger discuss the impact this tragic loss had on Donizetti’s life and music, with musical excerpts from his operas Rosmonda d’Inghilterra and Roberto Devereux, and extracts from a lesser-known side of the composer’s career: the songs he composed, in particular “Il sogno”.
Opera Rara was tonight announced as Gramophone’s Label of the Year 2024. Previous winners in this category include BIS, Deutsche Grammophon, Alpha Classics, Pentatone and Harmonia Mundi.
Henry Little with tenor Iván Ayón-Rivas and Opera Rara’s Chairman Charles Alexander CBE
Martin Cullingford, Gramophone’s Editor stated: “There’s something unique about this year’s Label of the Year. Most recipients of this annual accolade are variations on the form of a company offering a recording home to artists, nurturing and supporting them, and issuing their albums on a regular basis. Opera Rara does that of course, but its primary focus – and that of all the superb artists who show such dedication to this cherished company in this mission – is the championing of forgotten gems from the opera archives, specifically the 19th and earlier 20th centuries…
Project after project, singers as renowned as the soprano Ermonela Jaho and tenor Michael Spyres – both official Artistic Ambassadors for the company – happily learn rare repertoire for live performance and subsequent sessions (invariably studio, it’s worth noting!) that they know they will rarely, if ever, be asked to perform again. They, like all who work for and support Opera Rara, do so out of an abiding admiration for this marvellous institution – and it’s in the same spirit that we honour them as our 2024 Label of the Year.”
Opera Rara Chief Executive Henry Little accepts the Gramophone Label of the Year Award
Representing the company at the Gramophone Classical Music Awards 2024 ceremony in London was our Chief Executive Henry Little who said: “Our history goes back 54 years to Opera Rara’s foundation in 1970 by two visionary men: Patric Schmid and Don White. After a chance meeting with Joan Sutherland, their mission of restoring, recording, performing and promoting the great lost and forgotten operas of the 19th and early 20th centuries began. This artistic undertaking has been championed by many great conductors, musicologists, orchestras and singers; their courage and commitment to Opera Rara is exemplary as they learn and perform music that hasn’t been heard sometimes in more than 200 years.”
Our Artistic Director Carlo Rizzi sent a video message from Berlin where he is currently conducting at Deutsche Oper: “It has been one of my greatest honours and artistic achievements to lead Opera Rara as Artistic Director. This award is the culmination of decades of work, with every recording and restoration done with utmost care and incredible passion. Thank you, Gramophone, for this recognition.”
2024 has proven to be quite a year already for us as our list of awards has now grown to include OPER! Awards Best Opera Recording and OPUS KLASSIK Best Opera Recording for Offenbach’s La Princesse de Trébizonde (ORC63). Our latest complete opera recording, Donizetti’s L’esule di Roma (ORC64) conducted by Carlo Rizzi, was also nominated for a 2024 International Opera Award in the CD (Complete Opera) category.
Opera Rara’s work is only made possible by the support of its generous and loyal supporters. If you are interested in making a gift to commemorate this award or are interested in becoming a Friend or Patron of Opera Rara, please donate here.
Donizetti Songs Volumes 1 and 2 are now available to pre-order ahead of their official release date on 4 October.
The prolific and versatile Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti was not only one of the central figures of Italian bel canto opera but also wrote around 200 songs. Here we present songs for baritone and tenor which are rarely performed and some, until recently, completely unknown.
Our Artistic Director Carlo Rizzi at the piano performs with American tenor Lawrence Brownlee and Italian baritone Nicola Alaimo.
Click here and here to pre-order both albums, and enjoy two free downloads by joining our mailing list via our homepage.
If you like what you hear, do join us on 3 October for our digital launch with all three artists by registering here.
We’re delighted to announce today that both our Artistic Director Carlo Rizzi and our recording of Donizetti’s L’esule di Roma which he conducted have been nominated at this year’s International Opera Awards. Nominated in the Best Conductor and Best Recording (Complete Opera) categories, the winners will be announced on 2 October in Munich.
We were also so happy to see nominations for both our Artist Ambassadors Ermonela Jaho and Michael Spyres, Katia Ledoux – the star of our recent Salon Series recital which was streamed on YouTube, and Rosa Feola – who joins us for our Donizetti Song Project this autumn.
To celebrate the nominations, we’re offering a 15% discount off all our recordings with Carlo for one month until 2 October. These include L’esule di Roma, Mercadante’s Il proscritto, Leoncavallo’s Zingari and the recital albums Écho and Espoir.
Use the code IOA2024 via our website for all CD and digital download purchases here.
Our Recording of the Month is Offenbach’s Fantasio for which we won the 2015 Best Complete Opera Recording at the International Opera Awards.
Perhaps one of the least known of Offenbach’s lyric works, Fantasio only received a further 10 performances after its premiere in Paris in 1872. Featuring Brenda Rae, Victoria Simmonds, Aled Hall and Neil Davies, our revival recorded with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment uses the critical edition by Jean-Christophe Keck with whom we also collaborated with on La Princesse de Trébizonde most recently.
The title role is sung by Sarah Connolly described by Das Opernglas as ‘abundantly-timbred and effortless’.
Head over to our YouTube channel here to listen to the rousing ‘Vive le roi!’ as well as to discover more about this opera:
We’re looking to fill the role of Development and Events Coordinator starting this autumn.
Working closely with the Development and Communications Director, the Development and Events Coordinator will be responsible for managing and delivering regular cultivation and stewardship events, stewardship communications and donor relations.
They will also provide project management and admin support to the wider Development and Communications team including Opera Rara’s Philanthropy Manager, Marketing Consultant and Press, PR and Social Media Consultant.
Based at Opera Rara’s offices in Battersea Park, the Development and Events Coordinator will also serve as the main contact for Opera Rara’s external communications and look after Opera Rara’s online store.
If this sounds of interest, click here to find out more.
Our July Recording of the Month is Donizetti’s Roberto Devereux featuring Nelly Miricioiu as Elisabetta captured live at the Royal Opera and Ballet in 2002.
The lives of British monarchs from Alfred the Great to the Tudors and Stuarts held a special fascination for 19th century composers – none more so than Gaetano Donizetti who wrote seven operas involving English kings and queens.
As The Guardian noted at the time of the release: ‘Central to the success of this new set is the singing of the fine, characterful soprano Nelly Miricioiu as Elizabeth… she gives a most moving account of the queen.’
Head over to our YouTube channel here to listen to Elisabetta’s aria ‘Quel sangue versato al cielo sinnalza’ as well as to discover more about this opera:
We’re delighted to announce our second YouTube stream going live on 28 July, featuring Katia Ledoux and Anna Tilbrook recorded last month at London’s Inner Temple Parliament Chamber.
Presented in partnership with Temple Music Founation, our Salon Series recital featured rare Donizetti songs alongside other rareties such as Clémence de Grandval’s Le Galop which Katia first brought to our attention and Pauline Viardot’s beautiful Lamento available to watch now.
More details of the livestream via the link here and head to our events page to explore the rest of our 2024/25 Salon Series recitals which have just gone on sale: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyqQ-Jt0KHM
We’re delighted to announce that today the OPUS KLASSIK Awards named our studio release of Offenbach’s La Princesse de Trébizonde as its Opera Recording of the Year. This is the second international award we’ve won for our latest Offenbach release after being named Best Opera Recording at the OPER! Awards 2024 at the start of the year. Our recording was also a finalist in the 2024 International Classical Music Awards. In 2019, we won the same OPUS KLASSIK Award for our recording of Rossini’s Semiramide.
Recorded with London Philharmonic Orchestra and French opera specialist conductor Paul Daniel, our September 2023 release of Offenbach’s comic operetta marked the premiere studio recording of musicologist Jean-Christophe Keck’s new critical edition of the three-act Paris version from December 1869. The recording also includes previously unpublished extracts from the original two-act Baden-Baden version first heard in July 1869.
