Verdi - Luisa Miller
|
List Price: Our Price: $14.63 You Save: $15.35 (51%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Verdi - Luisa Miller
Movie Review: excellent
Summary: 5 Stars
I am relatively new to opera, and found this performance to be delightful. Domingo and Scotto were wonderful, and also Sherrill Milnes.Movie Review: Great Cast
Summary: 5 Stars
Excellent production values in this lesser known work. It features a cast of outstanding singers and directors.Movie Review: A Treasure Returned to the Catalogue
Summary: 4 Stars
To the best of my knowledge, this is the first DVD featuring Renata Scotto although I would be delighted to be proved wrong (please reissue a Tokyo Lucia with Bergonzi). The only other DVD (with June Anderson)is hardly in the same league so perhaps I should have rated it five stars!
My only negative is the very dated production; it clearly shows its age, especially aesthetically although I would be hard put to suggest how it should be staged. Suffice it to say that it works and with Scotto and Domingo the emphasis is clearly on the singing and they deliver in spades. It is ironic that Verdi didn't give his title soprano an aria that had been excerpted and sung by sopranos of the past whereas the tenor has the glorious aria that has be recorded countless times in the days of 78's and LP recitals. Needless to say Domingo garners the greatest ovation. Milnes was clearly an audience favorite (if not one of mine)and there is no doubting his committment to the role both in his aria and the wonderful duets with Scotto. It is somewhat ironic that Milnes and Domingo are roughly contemporaries while Domingo continues to sing (albeit a reduced and different repertory)and Milnes career started to fade a number of years ago. Ordinarily baritones can enjoy longer careers than tenors, but in this case.....
Scotto is a treasure; the DVD should be required viewing and studying for any one who aspires to the repertoire. It was late in her career yet she is savvy enough to know how to capitalize on her strengths and minimize the weaknesses. Her attention to text is an object lesson and of course it helps that she is Italian, but she animates every phrase she sings, does nothing that is superfluous. I saw her only once, a Butterfly in San Francisco in the 70's; it was a glorious performance. But then she is a glorious artist.
Movie Review: An item for Verdi lovers
Summary: 3 Stars
Of course a profound Opera lover will prefer more sophisticated and advanced works of the Italian verismo, German Opera, etc. Even a novice in Italian Opera will always have more popular and vibrant Verdian repertoire to choose from. But Luisa Miller is a fine work which already shows the Verdi we would really know immediately after, with his Rigoletto, Il Trovatore and La Traviata phase. Not to mention his mature works, the best! But this is virtually the one complete Luisa Miller available. What is really interesting is that it is taken from a series of fine Met performances from the late 70's and early 80's which were originally negotiated exclusively for PBS telecast and so, very difficult to renegotiate for release on DVD. But I'd say it is worth the effort and I truly hope Universal honors the Deutsche Grammophone label and keep up with the releases. The first has been Rigoletto featuring Domingo, McNeil and Cotrubas. Now, Luisa Miller, but there are many other incredible performances that can not be lost forever. After all, even though technically, lights and cameras weren't as good as they are today, the performances are of unique musical quality and interest. This Luisa captures Met singers at their prime. Domingo, Scotto and, especially, Milnes, are in great shape. Milnes, once laureled as the greatest American baritone, later to be somewhat forgotten for his health problems which really affected his stage performances in the late 80's and 90's, sounds like a million bucks here! From this "Live from the Met" series period, I remember a striking Pagliacci (Domingo, Stratas, Milnes - an unforgettable "prologue"), Zeffirelli's Otello (Domingo, Cruz-Romo, Milnes), Cavalleria Rusticana (Domingo, Troyanos, Monk) and MANY OTHERS. Let us hope Universal keeps on releasing them. And, most of all, let us BUY THEM, otherwise it gets difficult for those businessmen to justify it.