Customer Reviews

Rossini - Stabat Mater / Orgonasova, Bartoli, Giménez, Scandiuzzi, Wiener Phil., Chung

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Rossini's Stabart Mater is a wonderfully tuneful work veering more towards opera than religious music,this superlative version under the excellent conducting and superb playing of Chung and the Wiener Philarmoniker has assembled a worthy quartet of singers,Gimenez a true Rossini tenor sings the "Cujus animan" with flowing ease,confident with the high D flat,Bartoli is in exuberant,rich voice particularly in the Cavatina,Orgonasova's top C's positively ring out in "Inflammatus et accensus" and Scandiuzzi has a rich,firm bass,the chorus (very important in this work) are in great form and the singers all magnificent soloists prove well capable of combining their voices beautifully especially in the quartet "Sancta mater". This version beats the rest!

Even though Rossini was not interested in producing a setting of the Stabat Mater (he wrote it solely at the insistence of a client who thankfully applied the needed pressure) and it was not fully completed for almost 10 years, this work has a remarkable sense of continuity, not to mention beauty. The opening 'Stabat mater dolorosa' is a terrific, tour de force for chorus and soloists. It perfectly captures the aching grief central to the Stabat Mater poem. After the dire opening chords of 'Cujus animam gementem', a lilting Rossini aria blossoms in which Raul Gimenez demonstrates his enviable bel canto tenor. He is without a doubt the highlight of the disk, shining again during the quartetto for soloists 'Sancta Mater'. The Soprano/Alto Duetto 'Quis est homo' undulates with gorgeous sonorities. The chorus makes a big comeback during the 'Inflammatus et accensus' with its Berliozesque explosions. The finale is ripe with melody and texture. All in all, a great choral experience and a great setting of the Stabat Mater. Chung's directing is tight and the sound quality is crisp. A must own choral disc.

Usually I might write a review on this in more depth. However, on delivering this peice Rossini wrote: "Here it is then, this poor little Mass. Have I written truly sacred music, or just damn bad music? I was born for opera buffa, as you well know. Not much skill, but quite a bit of feeling - that's how I'd sum it up. Blessed be thy name, and grant me a place in Paradise". - and it shows. If you are in a slightly emotional mood as I was when I last listened to it, and are playing close attention to the music I swore a tear actually came to my eye. Rossini should get his place in Paradise for this piece that is truly sublime at its peak. It is certainly heavily operatic, and at times does verge away from the beautifully tragic to the buffa but only slightly as he manages on the whole to remain faithful to the intent of the Stabat Mater.

After listening to this, I did some more reasearch on the piece and apparently, Heine wrote on hearing this that the theatre had become "a vestibule of heaven". Definitely add this great quality recording to your collection and get your own piece of heaven. Cliched, but so true!

The chief glory of this recording is soprano Luba Orgonasova, who sings with commanding ease and gorgeous tone her difficult music, she is one of the top sopranos of our time and it's a scandal that we don't have many more recordings with her. Cecilia Bartoli needless to say, is also excellent and so are the tenor and the bass. All in all this is the finest quartet in any recording. Myung-Whun Chung proves a natural rossinian, his reading is stylish and exciting, and the Vienna Philharmonic play like gods for him. There are other good recordings of the Stabat Mater, the Marcus Creed version in Harmonia Mundi with period instruments is most interesting, and very well sung too, and the beefy Semyon Bychkov version with the marvelous Bavarian Radio Symphony orchestra and chorus should be considered too. But Luba Orgonasova is so special, so unique that this recording gets my top recommendation.

Rossini's Stabat Mater was written in two spurts, once in 1831 when the composer had finished "William Tell" and was about to take early retirement from the music world (mvts 1, 6-9), and again in 1840-41, when he went back to the work and completed the remaining five sections (mvts 2-5, 10). It is an appealing, sometimes powerful work. The contrast between the long (10') opening "Stabat mater" and the tenor aria that follows, "Cujus animam", illustrates some of the contrasts within the work. The opening is a gloomy and harmonically-complex piece centered on the choir & orchestra with relatively few solos. The "Cujus" could have come straight out of an 1830s opera, with an almost jaunty, catchy hook. I found the soprano duet "Quis est homo" (track 3) and the interesting soprano and a capella choir (no orchestra) "Quando corpus" (track 9) to be particularly intriguing. The entire piece ends with a powerful fugal "Amen". This piece makes it especially disappointing that Rossini decided to stop composing. It shows his talent in full flower and in the process of developing into something new and worthwhile.

The performance, led by Myung-Whun Chung, is terrific. The soloists range from the very good (bass Roberto Scanduzzi) to the excellent (the star mezzo Cecilia Bartoli in her second recording of this work and tenor Raul Gimenez) to the, well, wow (the Slovak soprano Luba Orgonasova). Orgonasova has a big, accurate voice with incredible range and complete control at all times. If you are interested in classical singing, you are going to want to hear this recording just for her work on the Stabat Mater. I will be getting more of her CDs. The orchestra and chorus are excellent. The performance throughout is technically accurate while being emotionally involved and expressive.

My only caveat is a mediocre job by the DG engineers. The recording dates from the mid-1990s and isn't a model of clarity, with the sound being "fuzzy", which means that all the details aren't as clearly audible as they should be.

But all in all, a wonderful recording and one you'll listen to with great pleasure.