Customer Reviews

Mario Del Monaco : Decca Recitals 1952-1969 - Decca Masters

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This 5 CD set of DelMonaco Decca recordings is an outstanding compendium of this great Italian tenor's work during the period 1952-1969. What is outstanding about this collection is that it includes not only operatic arias but Neapolitan songs and other popular songs as well. The only downside to these recordings is that DelMonaco's stentorian style did not fit well with the recording studio sound limitations and therefore do not do justice to the beauty of his voice. The recording of Otello under Von Karajan is perhaps one exception. There are also other historical recordings of DelMonaco on CD singing live performances and one can immediately hear and sense the dramatic power and vocal ability that has in my opinion not been heard since. I saw and heard DelMonaco live at the old Metropolitan Opera and in particular recall a 1957 performance of Otello with Renata Tebaldi and Leonard Warren. DelMonaco's voice, crystal clear, filled the house with ringing tones that easily reached to the "standees" who were positioned behind the Family Circle, almost at the ceiling of the Met. Critics of DelMonaco's recordings always miss the point that a falsetto tone that is used to great effect on a recording cannot often be heard over an orchestra in a live performance. Furthermore, his stentorian style did not interfere with his seriousness as an artist and his insightful interpretations. I have had the priviledge of hearing Corelli, Pavarotti and Domingo live and quite simply none of these great tenors matched DelMonaco for the intensity of his vocal and dramatic ability.

In this CDs you are going to find a treasure of Opera!!!

You can here a special Mario del Monaco, his is not singing Otello, he is singing Napolitanas, and another opera arias!! in different years of his life.

For me it is one of the best pieces in my own collection!!! you can here Del Monaco in a good shape (vocal) in 1952-59 an then in 1962 with a different technique for sure he was proving but it wasnt to nice the sound then in 1963 he had an car accident (he was in hospital for a year) and then he record again in 1964 and you can heard Del Monacos different sound, as the begining of his career, a little light voice but going again as the dramatic and heroic that we know about him. Then in 1969 you can heard mature Del Monaco with a perfect high notes and good center voice, a little open notes (not much) more than in his beginig but very good sound, i think the worst period of Del Monaco was 1961-62 cause he was trying different technique but he came back to his original technique and he was outstanding!! For sure he was one of the best singers ever!!! until this days.
You must have this CDs in your collection!!!!!

This summary of Del Monaco activity with Decca is a veritable historical document.
It encompasses his vocal parabole from the start to the end, via crisis and resurrection. The early recordings show a voice that had (and has) no equal in terms of ring and volume. His interpreations were accurate and insightful as the first 2 reviewers appropriately noted. Listen to the almost wispering start of
"Vesti la giubba" from Pagliacci, he is the only one to do it, showing a total respect for the drama of Canio, or the dynamics of "O tu che in seno agli angeli" from Forza del Destino, or the very accurate account of " Cielo a mar" from Gioconda
this to say that he was very insightful in his approach. Certainly he was a son of his time and some things (sighs and laughters) are now looking obsolete, but the artist was a serious one. He suffered a vocal crisis around 1962-1964 period
(the recital with Mantovani and the Italian and German Arias, original LP title,with Isabeau and Francesca da Rimini etc were both frankly terrible)worsened by the road accident he was involved with, that kept him away from vocal exercise quite a while. During that period that started showing its first signs in Otello with Karajan (see my review there in case of interest)his vocality was a shadow of itself. A(for him) disastrous Carmen (1963, with Resnik, Sutherland, Schippers) bears also testimony. During this period he recorded also Adriana Lecouvreur with Tebaldi and Tabarro (again with Tebaldi)but the troubles were luckily far less noticeable. He finally resurrected in 1965 with the Sacred Music recital when his voice turned again to the voice of the past if somewhat "heavier" but never the less "recognizable". His last effort Verdi Arias was commendable for the discovery of less famous pieces of the composer but the voice (he was approaching 55) shows more of the same heaviness, still the volume and the ring are there but age was there too. During this period he recorded Cavalleria and Norma with Suliotis, Wally with Tebaldi and Fedora with Olivero and the voice is exactly as I mentioned, clearly "recognizable" but heavier less agile than in his prime. In the end a commendable issue by Decca for one of their top sellers (with his beloved Renata) before the arrival of Sutherland / Pavarotti era. Incidentally Decca had quite a run with Tebaldi/Del Monaco and Sutherland/Pavarotti, lucky people.

I can easily say that Mario del Monaco is the greatest tenor ever. He was the only Otello, the only Chenier, the only Radamès and a legendary Canio! This new box set represents perfectly his whole career. Congratulations to DECCA.
I'm very glad I could buy it at amazon.com

This is definetely a must have!

Leaping into the flames here, I have to admit that I am not a particular fan of Del Monaco (whom we used to call Mario del Maniac when I was a teenager) but I am sure that in the House he was a very exciting singer, and very sure I would have loved hearing this unique instrument "live". Voices this large seldom record very happily, and surely his live recordings present him in a better light. He even surprises a few times in these many hours by singing quietly, and for that I was always grateful. The recitals up to 1960 are much better than the later ones, but my Lord, the man blasts everything in sight, there is really only one color to the voice and no vocal acting to speak of, he sounds mad as hell almost all the time, and despite the glory of this huge bronze sound, it simply bores me. Loud, loud, loud, and not the standard Italian tenor criticism of "always mf", our hero seldom sings less than ff. For variation he gives us fff. In the theater, as another reviewer here says rightly, a crooning falsetto that a conductor may demand in the studio will not be heard (although a well-placed and supported pp, such as those for which Chaliapin was famous, *will*). But this is more like a boxing match than music making, with the listener the tenor's sparring partner. Unfortunately, the set includes a uniquely dreadful recital with Montovani, and saccharine, soupy swill it is, diabetics beware. I believe this is absolutely the worst recital disc I have ever heard, and I've heard a lot. It would be funny if it weren't in such appaling taste. His earlier recital of lighter music is not nearly so offensive, but it's still like shooting bunches of plastic flowers out of a cannon. The Wagner offers poor German, and the songs in what seems to be English, much worse. The religious songs, accompanied only by organ, sound, perhaps appropriately, as if they were recorded in a church, and very funereal they are. After 1960, the voice increasingly takes on a very unpleasant glare and sounds almost white. There is no question del Monaco was one of the most important tenors of the post-war period, but these recitals are for hard-core fans only. A little goes a very long way. Still, I played them through from first to last, paid attention to recording dates and venues. I do not expect to play them again.