Awards 2009: Opera

Shostakovich: The Nose
soloists, chorus, and orchestra of the Mariinsky Theatre/Valery Gergiev
Mariinsky

This is the debut release from the Mariinsky Theatre's own label, a performance of what Calum MacDonald tells us in BBC Music is the "most brilliantly anarchic of all Shostakovich's works". "Where does one start in discussing Shostakovich's The Nose?", Robert Levine asks on Classics Today. "Funnier than the last quartet, more laden with irony than Babi Yar? Well, it's a start... Valery Gergiev, obviously in his element and with his own orchestra and (spectacular) chorus, gives the work form and pathos while making certain that absurdity and satire reign supreme".

Runners-up:
Bellini: I Capuleti e I Montecchi. Elina Garanca; Anna Netrebko; Wiener Symphoniker/Fabio Luisi [DG]
Mozart: Idomeneo. Richard Croft, et al.; Freiburger Barockorchester/René Jacobs [Harmonia Mundi]
Terradellas: Artaserse. Anna Maria Panzarella, et al.; La Real Compañía Ópera de Cámara/Juan Bautista Otero [RCOC]
Wagner: Lohengrin. Johan Botha, et al.; WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln/Semyon Bychkov [Profil]