Now that's what I call singing!

I have two Verdi Requiem recordings on CD beside me that I will get to, but Friday and Saturday I had the pleasure of listening to a recording I had downloaded and forgotten about. This was a 1960 recording under Carlo Maria Giulini with Dame Joan Sutherland, Fiorenza Cossotto, Luigi Ottolini, and Ivo Vinco, with the Philharmonia Chorus and Orchestra. What a joyful experience!

Each recording I hear is different in its own ways, but there is a huge amount of tradition holding most of them together. I might think, "Oh, this conductor uses a healthy bit of rubato there," or, "That conductor is doing more to keep the texture and rhythm on point than another one did."  In the end it's nit-picking.  It's hard to ruin the Verdi Requiem for me. (Believe me, people have tried!)

Now we must discuss the soloists, of course.  This was Dame Joan at her best, before she started listening to advice.  Of course she could float a vocal line like no other, and she had the vocal color and weight to hold her own against an orchestra with three other soloists. "Libera me" was heavenly--the tremendous contrasts of mood, the sublime quiet moments, the dramatic moments.

I've rhapsodized about Fiorenza Cossotto in this role before, and she was just as remarkable as expected. I always love a good "Lux aeterna", and Ms. Cossotto never fails to deliver.  I wasn't very familiar with Luigi Ottolini or Ivo Vinco before, but I quite liked them. Mr. Ottolini has the sound, the vocal heft required for this role, as well as the vocal subtlety it also requires.  "Ingemisco" was just what you want from a tenor, and Mr. Vinco's Mors stupebit section was both beautiful and mostly in tune.

Although this is a fantastic recording, this is a brief post, largely because I'm running out of things to say about the Verdi Requiem. I will never, ever tire of the work--of that I can promise you!--but it's hard to be creative. Since I have more an analytical nature, maybe I'll do a comparison spreadsheet when I've done all the recordings I'm going to do.