Gluck Opera Gala is a 2-album compilation of highlights from seven previously released albums on the ORFEO label. It contains excerpts from Gluck's semi seria opera Alceste (album 1, tracks 1-7); his reformist operas Iphigénie en Tauride (album 1, tracks 8-14), Orfeo ed Euridice (album 2, tracks 1-9) and Paride ed Elena (album 2, tracks 10-16); and two works in a more light-hearted vein, Le Cinesi (album 1, tracks 15-16) and Les Pélegrins de la Mecque (album 2, tracks 17-23). All of the recordings are star-studded, featuring performances by legendary artists such as Jessye Norman, Nicolai Gedda, Thomas Moser, Ileana Cotrubas, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Franco Bonisolli and Julia Kaufmann.

Marina Rebeka is one of the most successful sopranos of her generation. To mark the occasion of the upcoming Rossini year of 2018, she and the Munchner Rundfunkorchester, conducted by Marco Armiliato, have recorded an album of highly dramatic opera arias that is now being released by BR-KLASSIK. The album "Amor fatale" offers the opportunity to reacquaint oneself with the great soprano arias from Rossini's less well-known but musically convincing tragic operas, in a fine interpretation.The concept album entitled "Amor fatal" focuses on powerful female roles from the operas Otello, Armida, La donna del lago (The Lady of the Lake), Maometto II, Semiramide (Semiramis), Moïse et Pharaon (Moses and Pharaoh) and Guillaume Tell (William Tell). The women are obliged to choose between love and duty, and frequently have to subordinate their personal fate to that of their family, nation or homeland.The Latvian soprano has quite some experience with roles in Rossini, above all from his great tragic operas: the role of Anna Erisso from Maometto II, which she performed in 2008 at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, the composer’s birthplace, marked the very start of her career. She went on to attract international attention in 2009 when she debuted at the Salzburg Festival, as Anaï in Moïse et Pharaon. For her album she has worked through Rossini's original handwritten manuscripts and included this in her performance; she also developed her own coloratura, which not only suits her voice both musically and technically, but also best corresponds to the specific stage events and emotions encountered in her respective operatic roles.

Orfeo honors Júlia Várady as one of the most important sopranos of the second half of the 20th century with the release of this 10 album boxed set ‘The Orfeo Recordings’ on the occasion of her 80th Anniversary on 1st September 2021.

A significant number of opera lovers and connoisseurs maintain that Maria Callas’ mantle ought to have passed to Júlia Várady, and that the (now eighty-year-old) Romanian-Hungarian-German soprano actually should, in her day, have ascended the international throne of the prima donna assoluta. But as it is said, her loyalty to her two musical homes, the Bavarian State Opera and the Deutsche Oper Berlin, prevented this. Nonetheless, she made guest appearances at all the world’s major opera theaters – but she was apparently not available to the market as unrestrictedly and ubiquitously as would have been necessary for her image, in order for her to be enthroned as the Várady (as the legitimate successor of the Callas). In addition to her loyalty to the two aforementioned opera houses, another reason seemed to be a natural modesty that prevented her from constantly drawing attention to herself (with a reputation, for example, of being the “difficult one,“ or even with scandals). Her marriage to the titan Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau in 1977 may also have played a role, as she often and willingly stepped into his shadow.

Escerpts from reviews of previously released volumes included in this set:

Julia Varady sings Wagner

Varady's reading of the Wesendonck Lieder is remarkable, enthralling. There's nothing here of the slow, wallowing approach often favoured today. The feeling of the words is one of very present emotions. And transfiguration is a feature of Varady's concentrated, urgent Liebestod, her complete absorption with the text as much as with the music an object-lesson in great Wagner singing. The players of Fischer-Dieskau's Berlin orchestra cover themselves in glory. The recording is exemplary.

– Gramophone

Julia Varady sings Richard Strauss

The final scene of Salome, under the watchful eye of Varady's husband, Fischer-Dieskau, has the perfection of pitch and phrase one expects of this singer, as well as an expected acuity for the meaning of the text.

– Gramophone

Julia Varady - Puccini Arias

A lovely and somewhat surprising record by the most fascinating and patrician lyric soprano of the present age: 'surprising' because, though Varady is associated closely enough with Verdi, the Puccini connection is less readily made, 'lovely' because the voice is still so pure, the style so musical and the response so intelligent, immediate and full-hearted. She adjusts wonderfully well to the Italian idiom, lightening the vowels, freeing the upper range, allowing more portamento than she would probably do in other music, yet employing in its use the finest technical skill and artistic judgement.

– Gramophone

When the ORFEO label was established in Munich forty years ago, surely no one with the music scene back then would have predicted that the record company would develop into a firmly established player on the classical music market. One of the label’s main priorities in the early years was vocal music, with opera rarities top of the list and since the mid 1980s the re-use of historic tape recordings. Big names featured on the label’s own productions, while ORFEO also developed into a talent factory by discovering and nurturing young artist. This “Legendary Voices” 10 album set for the anniversary of 40 years of ORFEO label history features eleven singers, who at their times upheld the art of opera singing and still uphold it in the best interpretation of nostalgia.

Paul Graener was a “latest romanticist” with a strong inclination for French impressionism – which as a composer in the Germany of the first half of the twentieth century makes him a unique case. This month cpo is presenting three of his concertos on our fourth Graener album. Once again it is shown that this music more than deserves to be rediscovered. Hardly any other companion of Paul Graener’s so intensely supported his oeuvre as did the cellist Paul Grümmer, the dedicatee of this composer’s Cello Concerto and the soloist at its premiere in 1927. The critic Adolf Diesterweg wrote in a review: “Graener’s new Cello Concerto contains naturally invented, succinctly formed music enabling the cellist, thanks to the transparent orchestral part, to sound his instrument effectively. In my view the most beautiful movement is the highly cantabile and atmospheric Adagio. The Violin Concerto has harmonically original, fascinating sound elements showing us Graener at an absolute creative summit. The time of composition of Graener’s last finished composition, his Flute Concerto, coincides with the increasing bombardment and destruction of Berlin. Here it is above all the last movement that stands out and attracts our attention – and does so not so much because of its neoclassical guise, something already to be encountered in Graener’s works of the 1930s, but rather on account of his choice of the life-affirming folk song, which displays a cheerful mood that can be harmonized neither with the difficult circumstances of Graener’s life nor with the wartime events taking place at that time.”

the Joker is the absolute all-time favorite opera among Croatians. A couple of years ago it celebrated its seven hundredth performance alone at the Zagreb National Theater. The Croatian Jakov Gotovac, one of the most trailblazing composers of the earlier Yugoslavia, premiered the opera in 1935. After its immediate success it toured through what was then the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, and today it continues to be a favorite selection for performance programs in the countries of the former Yugoslavia. In Germany, however, this comic opera brimming with musical wit has to be assigned the status of a rarity. Its last performance prior to this one was in Munich in 1942 – in a German translation. But now back to the original: on Sunday, 19 May 2019, the Munich Radio Orchestra under its principal conductor, the Croatian Ivan Repušic, presented a concert performance of Ero the Joker in Croatian. The lead solo roles are sung by native speakers of Croatian, and for the occasion the Croatian Radio Chorus, with which Repušic has launched a cooperative program, made the trip to Munich. Gotovac’s music sparkles with Eastern European and Mediterranean folkloric influences. The composer is regarded as one of the founders of a Croatian national musical language that in the nineteenth century was fueled by the yearning for national identity. Here we hear music full of lyrical and witty moments and with magnificent arias and choral numbers. And its hero is a joker who challenges fate.

‘It would be difficult to find a simpler and more poignant subject’, Massenet remarked during the composition of Ariane, a vast score in five acts premiered at the Paris Opéra in October 1906. The libretto by Catulle Mendès is part ancient drama, part symbolist poem, and sets Phaedra and Ariadne, two sisters in love with Theseus, in violent conflict with each other. This epic work does not shrink from relating the combat against the Minotaur, from showing a ship tossed by the raging billows, nor even from transporting the audience to the Underworld where Persephone reigns. Despite its flamboyant orchestration, its grandiose scenography and its triumphant premiere, Ariane remains one of the few Massenet operas never recorded until now. The young Egyptian soprano Amina Edris takes the title role with ardour and passion, surrounded by a cast well versed in the specificities of the French style. The Bavarian Radio Chorus provides dedicated support in the epic scenes, under the baton of Laurent Campellone, a great champion of Massenet.

Ivan Repušić made his debut as Chief Conductor of the Münchner Rundfunkorchester on September 24, 2017 at the city’s Prinzregententheater with a concert performance of Giuseppe Verdi's opera "Luisa Miller". The Latvian soprano Marina Rebeka – the orchestra’s Artist in Residence during the 2017/18 season – was successfully engaged for the title role of the tragic opera, based on Friedrich Schiller's "Kabale und Liebe". This highlight of the Munich music scene has now been released by BR-KLASSIK. Verdi's masterpiece was written during the year 1849 in Paris and Busseto, completed in Naples, and first performed there on December 8, 1849 at the city's Teatro San Carlo. Schiller's tragedy tells the story of the calamitous love of the nobleman Ferdinand for the musician's daughter Luisa Miller, who falls victim to a terrible court intrigue that ultimately drives both to their deaths. To turn the play into an opera Verdi worked intensively with his librettist Salvadore Cammarano; both men were fascinated by Schiller's tableau-like dramaturgy, which matched their own ideas of an "epic drama". The tragedy was given three acts, entitled "Amore" (Love), "Intrigo" (Intrigue) and "Veleno" (Poison). After its successful premiere, the work soon established itself and has remained a fixed part of the international opera repertoire to this day. In this concert performance at Munich’s Prinzregententheater, Marina Rebeka made her role debut as Luisa Miller. Marina Rebeka sings the challenging role with technical perfection, giving it a sparkling vocal splendor.

REVIEW:

This recording can’t quite oust my personal favorite recording, Fausto Cleva’s RCA set with Moffo and Bergonzi, but Marina Rebeka is a much more dramatic Luisa and the recording is worth hearing for her contribution alone—and there is so much more to admire. Inveterate Verdians should definitely lend their ears to this latest Luisa Miller, and those contemplating their first recording of this hidden away masterpiece could do much worse than starting here.

–MusicWeb International

On the dark side of fame awaits the slide into obscurity. That’s certainly true for a number of operas that, while popular and highly lucrative during their composers‘ lifetime, soon followed their creators into the shadowy realm of oblivion. Operas, for example, that only ever get mentioned in connection with some much more famous sibling. Giuseppe Gazzaniga’s Don Giovanni – premiered half a year before Mozart’s masterpiece – is such an example, as is Ruggero Leoncavallo’s La Boheme and George Bizet’s Djamileh, widely considered the predecessor of Carmen. Other operas just do not stand out among other works by a composer – Jules Massenet’s operas for example are hardly a footnote of music history, his opera Therese, a thoroughly forgotten work, however, is. Two examples for works that are scarcely performed or even known outside of what is now the Czech Republic are also included in this collection of Opera Rarities on ORFEO: Antonin Dvorak’s last opera Armida and Zdenek Fibich’s Sarka.

REVIEW:

Containing radio performance recordings of six works by Dvorak, Massenet, Leoncavallo, Bizet, Gazzaniga, and Fibich mentioned often in histories of music but almost never on the bill, this is a box certainly precious for those who love opera.

– Classical Music Daily (Giuseppe Pennisi)

When the ORFEO label was established in Munich forty years ago, surely no one with the music scene back then would have predicted that the record company would develop into a firmly established player on the classical music market. One of the label’s main priorities in the early years was vocal music, with opera rarities top of the list and since the mid 1980s the re-use of historic tape recordings. Big names featured on the label’s own productions, while ORFEO also developed into a talent factory by discovering and nurturing young artist. This “ORFEO 40th Anniversary” 2-album sampler well reflects these two sides of the label by combining highlight tracks of historical recordings with today’s global stars.

Hardly any other composer of his epoch was as deeply rooted in the German and European choral traditions as Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. Strongly influenced by the art of Johann Sebastian Bach, which he had encountered in the Berlin Singakademie under his teacher Carl Friedrich Zelter, the young composer wrote a series of eight chorale cantatas, including "Verleih uns Frieden gnädiglich" (“Give us Thy blessed peace”, 1831) - a short prayer for choir and orchestra set to words by Martin Luther. Mendelssohn's five wide-ranging and large-scale psalm settings became even more famous, and three of them can be heard here. The first piece in the group is the multi-part setting of Psalm 115 "Non nobis Domine" (“Not unto us, O Lord”) for soloists, choir and orchestra, op. 31 (1829/30), which was probably begun during the composer’s first stay in England and reveals his fascination for Händel's music. Mendelssohn himself considered “Wie der Hirsch schreit” ("As pants the hart"), a multi-part, cantata-like setting of Psalm 42 for soprano, choir and orchestra, op. 42 (1837/38), to be the best work of this group. Also highly praised by Robert Schumann, it remains one of the composer’s most famous choral works to this day. For the newly-formed Berlin Cathedral Choir, he also wrote a setting of Psalm 98 "Singet dem Herren ein neues Lied” (“Sing to the Lord a new-made song”) for soloists, choir and orchestra, op. 91, and in response to requests from London he composed "Hear my Prayer", a “hymn” based on Psalm 55 for soprano, choir and organ, which he later orchestrated. The piece became one of his most famous sacred works in Victorian England.

REVIEW:

It’s always pleasing to have a new album of Mendelssohn’s exalting psalm settings which sadly are an all too neglected part of his oeuvre. It is sometimes said that the German composer’s greatest accomplishment lies in this field. Here we have a judiciously chosen programme of four psalm settings and a single chorale cantata. Especially gratifying too is that these live performances, from a quartet of soloists, Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks and Münchner Rundfunkorchester under Howard Arman, feel so inspiring.

With utmost conviction from beginning to end the renowned Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks deliver appropriately devout singing, well focused and eminently unified. Conductor Howard Arman pulls everything together with calm assurance, adopting sensible speeds and dynamics. Of high order too is the playing of Münchner Rundfunkorchester such a versatile ensemble that seems completely at home with Mendelssohn’s music.

– MusicWeb International

Joseph Beer was the operetta's rising star during the early 1930's and his Polish Wedding promised to bring him a major breakthrough. However, Nazi rule abruptly and tragically ended his career. Paul Abraham's librettist Fritz Lohner-Beda had taken Beer under his wing and did everything in his power to promote his success. Abrahama nd Beer had a lot in common - Jewish roots, a nervous disposition and above all, a bold stylistic mix combining folklore and jazz. All the characteristics of the operetta genre are united in concentrated form in Beer's music - buffo duets of folk character in the manner of Kalman, operatic finales a la Lehar and "Abrahamic" dance hits with rhythmic pep. An Austrian magazine wrote in 1934, "Surprises in the field of the operetta have become rare. The successes of recent years have been associated with a few names that one can count on the fingers of one hand. And now a young man of twenty-four by the name of Joseph Beer suddenly comes along and presents a work with an extraordinary musical appeal, sumptuous and personal invention, firm execution and an instrumentation that is a delight ot hear." Franz Lehar was forty years older than Beer and only a few months before Giuditta, his last work, had celebrated it's premiere at the Vienna State Opera - the crowning culmination of an operetta epoch that quite noticeably was nearing it's end. The time was ripe for a new generation, and Joseph Beer seemed to be just the right composer to lead it into the future.