Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Choose your Figaro

Over on the eMusic boards, a question has been raised by the redoubtable snakespeare about which Nozze di Figaro to download. I know which one I automatically gravitate to, but we all have our particular prejudices (good and bad). So here's some links to samples that will allow us to compare and contrast without knowing who we're listening to. For each of 4 bits from the opera, there's 15 randomly arranged .mp3 samples from 15 Figaro recordings available on eMusic Europe (in a different order for each bit). Answers will appear in the Comments. When I get my PhD in Hard Sums I'll devise a scoring system that will reveal (a) how perceptive a listener you are, (b) how consistent your tastes are, (c) secrets for a perfect love life, and (d) were our ancestors aliens?

Overture:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O

Non piu andrai:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O

Voi, che sapete:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O

Giunse alfin il momento:
(A) B C D E F G (H) I J K L M N O
(the 2 samples in parentheses are for 2 albums that don't start a track with "Giunse alfin..." so in these cases I've used the preceding "Signora, ella mi disse", just for the sake of having something there)

In alphabetical conductor order, these are the albums and their eMusic links:
Bohm; Busch (1934); Busch (1949); Halasz; Jacobs; Karajan (1954); Karajan (1974); Kuijken; Maag; Maazel (discs 2 and 3); Mackerras; Mehta; Parry (in English); Reiner; Rosbaud.

So what I did was listen to each sample in turn and rate each one as "I like it/It's OK/I don't like it", with sound rated as "Good/OK/Poor". Seven recordings proved consistenly likeable, and the others were variable. Call it a bias, but the ones in good sound (generally, modern recordings) usually proved a bigger hit performance-wise than the older (sometimes very obviously live) ones. Jacobs on Harmonia Mundi proved to be my favourite, thus confirming a prejudice! The runner-up was the Naxos recording by Michael Halasz, closely followed by Mackerras on Telarc, (the singers let down a bit by the sound, I thought) then Kujken on Accent, Karajan's 1974 account on Opera d'Oro (though I found the sound quality a drawback), and Maag's on Arts (also not helped by the sound). I liked Parry's Chandos version too, though I'm a little ambivalent about Opera in English in terms of "if you own only one version..."; where would it fit on the list? Possibly between Karajan and Maag. Or possibly not.
These 7 recordings alone can be ranked 5,040 different ways, you know, so I don't expect you to agree with me. Can we make these sorts of decisions based on 30-second samples, anyway? Probably not. Oh well.

5 comments:

Nereffid said...

The 15 albums, in alphabetical order by composer, with their corresponding references to the samples, are:

Bohm L M E C
Busch (1934) N G M I
Busch (1949) O H G L
Halasz C B A F
Jacobs I C B J
Karajan (1954) A N I E
Karajan (1974) E I J A
Kuijken F A O K
Maag M O D M
Maazel D J H O
Mackerras J K K B
Mehta H L F H
Parry (in English) B F N G
Reiner K D L N
Rosbaud G E C D

Nereffid said...

Or, to put it differently, here are the albums corresponding to respective samples A to O for each piece...

Overture:
A Karajan 54
B Parry
C Halasz
D Maazel
E Karajan 74
F Kuijken
G Rosbaud
H Mehta
I Jacobs
J Mackerras
K Reiner
L Bohm
M Maag
N Busch 34
O Busch 49

Non piu andrai:
A Kuijken
B Halasz
C Jacobs
D Reiner
E Rosbaud
F Parry
G Busch 34
H Busch 49
I Karajan 74
J Maazel
K Mackerras
L Mehta
M Bohm
N Karajan 54
O Maag

Voi che sapete:
A Halasz
B Jacobs
C Rosbaud
D Maag
E Bohm
F Mehta
G Busch 49
H Maazel
I Karajan 54
J Karajan 74
K Mackerras
L Reiner
M Busch 34
N Parry
O Kuijken

Giunse alfin...
A Karajan 74
B Mackerras
C Bohm
D Rosbaud
E Karajan 54
F Halasz
G Parry
H Mehta
I Busch 34
J Jacobs
K Kuijken
L Busch 49
M Maag
N Reiner
O Maazel

Anonymous said...

You nutter.

Anonymous said...

Surely that should be:

U Nutter

Anonymous said...

Please. This is a CLASSICAL blog.