This CD is going to provide unexpected delight for lovers of the Late-Romantics. Victor de Sabata is remembered as a remarkably dynamic conductor who made some stunning records with the London Philharmonic Orchestra for Decca in the 1940s and 50s. It is not so well known that he was also a composer. Here are three ravishing symphonic poems from the early 1920s, substantial in length and gorgeously scored for an enormous orchestra. Everybody who responds to Respighi, Rachmaninov, Scriabin, Strauss and Busoni is going to love this disc. The conductor, Aldo Ceccato, is de Sabata's son-in-law and has long championed these scores around the world. Here he directs de Sabata's 'own' orchestra, the LPO, in their first commercial recordings. Sonically, this disc is state-of-the-art.

Maria Stuarda is one third of the so-called "three queen" trilogy that defined much of the career of Beverly Sills (along with Lucia, the three Hoffmann heroines, and Manon) in the early 1970s. It was quite an undertaking, and each–Stuarda, Anna Bolena, and Roberto Devereux–was recorded by the since-disapppeared ABC Audio Treasury Series. For reasons opera lovers have been wondering about for years, the recordings went out of print pretty quickly; but now, handsomely remastered, they are making their first appearance on CD, both individually and as a three-opera set. Stuarda also has been recorded by Joan Sutherland and Janet Baker (in a version Donizetti prepared for the lower-voiced Maria Malibran), and there are at least three "private" sets I know of with Montserrat Caballé in the title role.