Customer Reviews

Verdi: Don Carlos

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This is maybe the only complete french recoding of Verdi's masterpiece! (except probably Pappano's live one of 1996 with Alagna, Mattila ETC). I must say it is more complete than just complete. It also has an appendix of 6 pieces that were cut from the premiere or the later revision of the work by Verdi. And it is all in French, the language in which Verdi composed and revised Don Carlo. Maybe the italian versions sound better and more appropriate but make no mistake, Don Carlos was written as a French grand opera.
Domingo sings wonderfully with a true conviction, despite the fact that he sounds better in his Italian recording of the opera with Cabbale and Giulini in 1971. Ricciarelli is surely no Cabbale, but she does a quite nice work although sometimes she cannot carry out some high notes.
Nucci gives an adequate performance, but is a matter of taste, you either like him or dislike him from the start.
Raimondi is superb as the tormented King, though I would prefer Ghiaurov in the role instead of the role of the Inquisitor. Maybe these two should have exchanged parts. Ghiaurov's voice is huge and ringing and he had enough experience with the role of the King. Well, Raimondi is very good none the matter.
Finally, Valentini-Terrani gives us a magnificent Eboli, though her "Veil song" could be sung (and has been sung) better by other performers.
But on the whole, this IS a definitive Don Carlos and a must have for all Verdi's collectoros!!

The stars of this studio performance are Abbado and the Scala in stunning form, and Domingo in good voice as an involved Carlos. It's easy to nitpick on details: the late Valentini-Terrani a size too small, Nucci too straightforward, Ricciarelli past her prime...but it all doesn't matter. All principals contribute to the energy of this recording, and the performance as a whole is great. The one significant flaw is the too-reverberant recording. Still, this is a better place to start than the beautiful but relatively uninvolved Giulini.

This recording follows the (superior?) 5-act revised version in French, and so presents the French original of the Italian translation recorded by, e.g., Giulini, Solti, Haitink and Levine. The major changes since the orginal version have been recorded as appendices at the end of disc 4.

For an interesting modern alternative of the Italian translation in good sound, I recommend Haitink - beautifully conducted and recorded, good voices, and Hvorostovski as Posa has to be heard to be believed.

At the time of its release and continuing to the present, critics have carpted at this, the first big-label recording of Don Carlos, as the French version of Verdi's masterpiece is known. I find it hard to see why. Almost every0one who needs to be in top form is. Domingo gives a thrilling display, full of conviciton and nuance, exceeding even his own famed account of the title role for Giulini. As Eliisabetta, Katia Ricciarelli is in beaaautiful voice and almsot totally free of wobble. She doesn't have the raw vocal power for her big Tu che le vanita aria in the fifth act, but elsewhere she's wonderful, and thankfully she avoids the languishing melancholy that mars Caballe's portrayal for Giulini. As foor being over-parted, the same could be said of Freni on the Karajan set.

Don Carlos is full of choice roles requiring major singers, and Abbado has supplied them quite successfully: Raimondi as an authoritative Philip II, Ghiaurov as the Grand Inquisitor, and the excellent if not starry Valentini-Terrani in the coloratura mezzo role of Eboli. As is often said, this opera is structured on a Shakespearean scale (Schiller's great drama was deeply influenced by Shakespeare's history plays), and Abbado often rises to that level. This is one of his best Verdi recordings, perhaps his very best, and he raises the La Scala orchestra and chorus far above what I usually expect. In the end, only the prosaic Leo Nucci as Rodrigo is disappointing, and even he is in very good voice.

I've used the Italian names becasue Don Carlo has made its way through the world as an Italian opera, and in any event, none of the singers gives us very good French (Domingo's is the best--his voice thrives in that language, oddly enough). As a supplment, six additional or alternative numbers are given as a suplement on CD 4, a welcome addition even though it stretches the opera to an extra disc, making it the most expensive Verdi set I've ever encountered.

This 1980's Deutsche Grammophone recording has had favorable reviews here on Amazon.com and I don't think there's much more to add but I find that every time I listen to it, it gets better and better. The strength lies in the musicianship of the La Scala forces under Claudio Abbado's baton and the talented principal singers who have no difficulty singing in the original French and French grand opera style that Verdi originally composed for the Paris Opera. The most famous Don Carlo recording is, of course, the EMI 1970 recording under conductor Carlo Maria Giulini starring Placido Domingo, Montserrat Caballe, Sherill Milnes, Shirley Verrett and Ruggero Raimondi. That was the revised Italian version which is far more popular. Only Placido Domingo and Ruggero Raimondi are included in this later recording, though Montserrat Caballe was still capable of some dramatic singing in the 80's and could have also sung the role of Elisabeth in French. Katia Ricciarelli is however a marvelously gifted singer, despite detractors criticizing her for her lack of sturdy high notes and finding fault with what they believe is a voice that is only good from the middle register and downward. Ricciarelli delivers a beautiful, elegant and imperious Queen, and I love her voice. This is probably her finest achievement on recording. On the EMI 1970 Giulini recording, it was interesting to note how for an Italian opera the majority of the singers were non-Italians. On this recording, it is the other way around. The French-singing cast are Italian- Katia Ricciarelli, Luisa Valentini-Terrani and Ruggero Raimondi- and they are conducted by an Italian conductor Claudio Abbado and the La Scala orchestra. For a bunch of Italians, they master the art of French grand opera with aplomb.

Placido Domingo proves his versatility yet again by singing a heck of a Don Carlos in French when we know he is just as capable of singing the role in Italian. His French is sexy, seductive, elegant and exuding with the soulful passion of his Spanish persona. Domingo is my favorite tenor not only for the beauty and dramatic richness of his voice, but for the fact he is the only modern tenor to sing a variety of diverse roles. The ladies are singing superbly. Ricciarelli is simply splendid as the Queen, and she does justice to the part as great as Mirella Freni and Montserrat Caballe did. Alas, if only Leontyne Price had sung Queen Elisabeth Di Valois in its entirety! I think that would have been her best role, perhaps even surpassing her Leonora from Trovatore. Ruggero Raimondi returns to sing the role of King Phillip, though he had sung the Inquisitor in the 1970 Giulini recording. He has the right stuff for the role however. Russian bass Nicolai Ghiuruv is a devilishly frightening Inquisitor and handles the Verdi music with ease. Without a doubt this is the finest recording of Don Carlos you'll ever find in its original French.

Don Carlos recordings in the original French version are not thick on the ground. Abbado's set is the only truly complete recording of the original opera as Verdi intended it to remain. This circumstance is almost as odd as all the Un ballo in maschera productions that are still in this day and age set in Boston and not at the Swedish court.
Habits do indeed die hard.

I love any version of Don Carlo(s) and enjoy the more blood and guts results of having it sung in Italian, it IS different, but in French it is magnificently beautiful as well as powerful. Not that the great recordings of the Italian versions aren't beautiful (Giulini, Haitink, Solti) but they aren't, well, uh... in French. There is a suavity to the music that is more apparent in its original language than there is in Italian. I can't explain it, sorry.

Abbado has cast his characters carefully to suit the French language and its softer edges than the more spiky Italian.
His Eboli is the obsidian-chocolate-velvety voiced Lucia Valentini Terrani. Compare this mezzo to the fire-eater, Agnes Baltsa, who, for Karajan in the 4 act Italian version, is all erupting Vesuvius whereas Terrani is a subtle, intelligent, sensitive woman who is still capable of roaring but not quite like the masonry crackers like Baltsa and Obraztsova.

I love Baltsa for Karajan but I adore Terrani for Abbado. What a beautiful voice she had. Her untimely death from leukemia in her 50s prime deprived us of much great singing from her still to come I have no doubt. She didn't record as much as Marilyn Horne who took most of the great Rossini roles to the studios. Terrani's singing was ultra-feminine which didn't measure up to the trouser roles when compared to the masculine-sounding Horne. So we have to look long and hard for Terrani recordings in opera, and this Eboli is one of her great assumptions.

The entire cast, for Abbado, could not have been improved upon at the time of the sessions (1983-4). Perhaps Margaret Price would have made a more purely beautiful Elisabeth than did Katia Ricciarelli, but the Italian diva was no slouch in the beautiful bel-canto school of singing and her performance here is a fine one. Domingo is a great Carlos, one of his finest performances on record. Ruggero Raimondi is a gruff, depressed Philippe II. He might sound a little too gravelly and dark to some ears but not mine. Leo Nucci is excellent as Rodrigue.

DGG's recorded sound is thrilling. I have heard this recording many times and I invariably set up with goosebumps every time that magnificent and awesome (in the truest sense of the word) brass chorale opens up the Grand Finale of
Act III. And Abbado's conducting of the deeply moving, in terms of pure music, prelude to Rodrigue's death scene in Act IV. Abbado gets everything just right leaving me once again confirmed in my opinion that he is the greatest Verdi conductor since Toscanini. DGG's acoustic is spacious, reverberant when it needs to be and acutely balanced between 'stage and pit'.

The Pappano recording (in French) is a bowdlerization of the several versions of this opera made over a number of years and is NOT the original French version. But it doesn't pay to spend time quibbling about it because it is not a very good recording. Pappano is not in the same league as Abbado and his cast falls well short of Abbado's team who sound more like they are singing live in the house than do Pappano's singers who ARE singing live in the house.

There are several fine recordings of the 4 and 5 act Italian versions of this masterpiece but Abbado's is the only French one you need.

Herbert von Karajan had never recorded the complete 5-Act version of Verdi's Don Carlo. His 1958 Salzburg recording was great in many respects, but it was in mono, and the worst bit of it - incomplete. Some conductors and most modern productions choose the abridged version by Verdi. However, for me at least, the Fontainbleau Act is essential to the opera as a whole.
For the complete versions, Domingo has at least three famous recordings: first one on CD under Giulini, with Caballe, Verrett, Milnes, Raimondi, Ghiaurov and others. Then a DVD version with Freni, Bumbry, Ghiaurov and others. This third set is on CD under Abbado and again Raimondi, but this time, with Katia Ricciarelli as Elisabetta, and this is the complete French version.
For Domingo himself, this one is the least attractive performance of him in the title role. The voice is surprisingly dry and unexpressive. The Rodrigo and Filipo fared no better. Raimondi's dry and used voice comes off pathetically in Filipo's great aria in the Third Act.
The saving aspects are the ladies in this recording. Katia Ricciarelli once owned the best lyrical soprano voice since Monserrat Caballe. In this French version, her performance is only but slightly (very slightly) short of Caballe's illustrious performance in the Italian version under Giulini.
As for conducting, I myself prefer Giulini's to Abbado's in this work.

Si tratta dell'edizione forse più completa fin qui edita, in 4 cd, con l'edizione francese dell'opera in 5 atti. Domingo è in forma spendida, ma anche Ghiaurov e Raimondi offrono due prove eccellenti. Il suono è eccellente (registrato nel 1984 in ddd), e la direzione di Abbado è grandiosa. E' un'edizione da avere assolutamente!

Personally I prefer this set to the more famous one with Alagna and Mattila. The reasons are Placido Domingo who sings the most complex and endearing Don Carlos since the young Carreras in 1977, the mesmerizing Valentini-Terrani who proves that both the florid aria and the dramatic solo can be sung by one and the same voice (Meier never gave me that security), the full lyric and youthful sounding Elisabeth of Ricciarelli and the brilliant Raimondi repeating his role as Philippe (He was on the Italian recording with Domingo as well). It's brilliantly conducted, there are only tiny cuts and the bonus-material on the last CD is worth the money alone. This is a keeper, Verdi would be proud!

Verdi's Don Carlo is mostly performed in its Italian version, but its roots lie in 19th century Paris "Grand Opera" style, which for Verdi meant producing a showy, big stage spectacle with huge crowd scenes (the Spanish court, the auto-de-fe scene), choruses, a ballet (La Ballet De La Reine) and virtuosic arias for all the lead singers- tenor, soprano, baritone, mezzo-soprano and bass. This is the best existing studio recording of Don Carlos, thanks to the musicianship and master conducting of Claudio Abbado and his orchestral forces, Placido Domingo singing the hell out of Don Carlos, Katia Ricciarelli soars as Queen Elisabeth De Valois, Terazzi as a very scheming and jealous Princess Eboli, Ruggero Raimondi as King Phillip giving it is usual flair and the devilish bass Nicolai Ghiarouv makes a terrifying Grand Inquisitor. Claudio Abbado must be given credit for putting together these outstanding singers, who in addition can act with supreme dramatic integrity. This is the dream cast for Don Carlos, make no mistake.

Placido Domingo: He IS the melancholy idealistic Prince Don Carlos to the letter, note for note, embodying the spirit of the man vicariously in his Shakespearean dramatic prowess and his rich, lyric French voice. Domingo (to me) sang at his best in French!! Listen to other French roles of his and you'll see what I mean, pure gold!! (Gounod's Faust, Don Jose in Bizet's Carmen, Hoffman in Offenbach's Tales of Hoffman). Perhaps because Don Carlos is a Spanish character (if you really think about it) as is Don Jose in Carmen, and Domingo can indeed express his Spanish blood in his voice and mannered dramatic interpretations. He is every bit the noble and discreet revolutionary that is Don Carlos.

Katia Ricciarelli: Wow. She blew me away in the role of Queen Elisabeth of Valois. I have always enjoyed Mirella Freni as the Queen (her Italian is impeccable) but she falls victim to the sweet, "weak victim" mode and doesn't exude some of the Queen's inner passions. The poised and dignified Queen is actually quite a passionate and intense woman (like Dona Ana in Mozart's Don Giovanni) hiding a secret, hiding her love for her stepson Don Carlos while having to deal with being the ever faithful and subservient wife to King Phillip, trapped between the woman of public notoriety and private desire. Ricciarelli not only has a radiant high register and flowing lyric technique, but she can darken her voice, coloring it so we can clearly see the fire inside her. This is why lyric -spinto-dramatic voices suit the Queen, but very few sopranos can do this. Ricciarelli and Domingo (in duets and scenes) are of course quite thrilling to hear and see. They worked together in the 1986 Zefferelli film of Verdi's Otello, and they are on fire in that version.

Ruggero Raimondi: R.R. as I call him. He's not only one of the most colorful baritones, but a terrific actor. Raimondi also felt the acting bug and appeared in Jospeh Losey's film of Don Giovanni, this being his best role. Raimondi can definately get into character in any role. A baritone career is harder work than a tenor (any baritone or bass will tell you that) not just because there are only a few star roles for baritones (these voices are usually the villain or a father figure) but because a baritone, confined to the lower levels of the male singing voice, must also sound as dramatic and powerful as the tenor, with whom he inevitably collides with in duets. There are also many virtuosic, difficult arias written for baritones, whose character's psychologytend to be more complex and shadier than the purely heroic tenors. Raimondi has it all- a big top and generous bottom, and manages to sound masculine, grand, evil, good, and every color in the actor's palette. Here he plays the conflicted King Phillip who realizes leadership is the hardest responsibility.

(I don't have much to say abou the mezzo soprano Terrazi ? In the role of Princess Eboli. She is the weakest in the bunch and I would have enjoyed it if Shirley Verrett or Grace Bumbry were cast in this recording. Eboli is not just a mean, nasty, jealous bitch, she is a woman who, like the Queen, suffers. She is proud and dignified, also must keep her emotions in check, but burns with them anyhow. The voice must express this far more than the image of the villain).

And Finally Nicolai Ghiaurov. What more can one say about this incredible and powerful bass ? He conquered all the "devilish" roles in the bass arsenal- Faust, Boris Gudonov, Mephistopheles, and in this case, the Grand Inquisitor. Just listen to his dramatic entrance in the Auto De Fe scene and the wicked snarl in his voice. He is no good, despite hiding beneath the mantle of religion. Ghiaurov's voice is powerful, dark and mesmerizing. I am always hypnotized by his voice, far more than any other bass- Samuel Ramey actually sounds lovely more than he does evil, and can even "heal" one with his voice, as does Kurt Moll. Only a few basses have truly mastered the wicked men of opera- among these are Justino Diaz, Dietrich Fischer Dieskau and my favorite, Norman Treigle. Go and get this recording. Let it be your preferred choice for the French version of Don Carlos. The best Italian version is both the recording on (Great Recordings of the Century- with Domingo, Caballe, Verrett, Raimondi, and the staged performance captured on video/DVD at the Met in which Domingo stars opposite Mirella Freni.

The opera "Don Carlos" (1867) by Giuseppe Verdi(1813-1901) is the best historic opera that I have heard: It`s about the conflict between the King Philipp II of Spain (1527-1598) and his son, the Prince Don Carlos (1545-1568), who wanted to free the flamands from the spanish yoke. It`s incredible how the Great Inquisitor justifies the crime against Don Carlos, by saying that God had given His proper Son to save the world and that then the King Philipp II could sacrify his son, because he had broken the law through the betrayal.
Plácido Domingo as Don Carlos is superb in this production. His arias "Je l`ai vue" and "O bien perdu, trésor sans prix" have a great beauty. His duetto with Isabelle de Valois (Katia Ricciarelli)in the fifth act: "Au revoir dans un monde" got almost me to weep. The love between Don Carlos and Isabelle was already impossible and the thought about that could have happened, but the destiny didn`t want is the gist of this masterwork.
Katia Ricciarelli as the Princess Isabelle de Valois was outstanding, too. Her voice is tender. Her aria "Toi, qui sus le néant" in the fifth act is superb. Her powerful voice is charming.
Lucia Valentini Terrani as the Princess of Eboli represents her role of a jealous woman very well. The "Chanson du voile" is a good proof of her talent.
Ruggero Raimondi as Philipp II of Spain is great. When I heard his first intervention "Pour quoi seule, madame?", I feel my body to shake because of his powerful voice. I almost imagined that I was listening to the voice of a great King. By this way you could imagine that you are face to face with Philipp II of Spain. His aria "Elle ne m`aime pas" about the refuse that Isabelle de Valois had against him is very human. We can understand how the love can make suffer the great men, too.
Leo Nucci as Don Rodrigo, Marquis de Posa has a great intervention, too. His aria "Ah, je meurs l`ame joyeuse" is very dramatic and the gist of his relationship with Don Carlos is the friendship that got Don Rodrigo to refuse his proper life to save Don Carlos.
Nikolai Ghiaurov as the Great Inquisitor is outstanding. His aria "Dans ce beau pays" makes to shake your body. If you have the opportunity to acquire Don Carlo in DVD with Domingo, Freni, Ghiaurov and Furlanetto you can realize that Nikolai Ghiaurov in the role of Philipp II of Spain is wonderful and that he is a great actor, too.
This opera is a sea of feelings: the love, the loyalty, the friendship, the death. I recommend to acquire the version of Don Carlos in DVD with Domingo, Freni, Ghiaurov and others to complete the idea of this great opera. I dare to say: the best opera that I have heard in my life!