Sondra Radvanovsky, in collaboration with Lyric Opera of Chicago and conductor Enrique Mazzola, presents Puccini: Heroines, a live recording from February 2025 featuring an all-Puccini program. Radvanovsky’s voice brings distinct character to each role, from the lyricism of Anna and Mimì to the dramatic intensity of Tosca and Turandot, including roles new to her stage repertoire. The performance showcases Puccini’s mastery of emotionally charged arias and character depth, spanning works from Le Villi and Manon Lescaut to La Bohème and Turandot. Encores include Musetta and Lauretta, highlighting both theatrical flair and expressive nuance, continuing Radvanovsky’s acclaimed collaboration with the Lyric Opera Orchestra and Mazzola.

After almost 40 years on DECCA and over 3 million album sales Riccardo Chailly starts a new chapter in January 2017 as Music Director of Teatro alla Scala, Milan, the world’s most iconic opera house. A Triumphant Homecoming: Milanese by birth, Chailly made his conducting debut at La Scala in 1978, as assistant to Claudio Abbado. Chailly’s father Luciano had also served as Artistic Director at La Scala, completing a family dynasty. The Filarmonica Della Scala CD is a sonically spectacular recording celebrating three centuries of music first performed at the legendary opera house: overtures, preludes and intermezzi from Verdi, Rossini, Puccini and many others. All new to Chailly’s discography.

This is the debut album of Benjamin Bernheim, signed to the Deutsche Grammophon after several sensational appearances with major opera companies. Like many other debuts, it mixes French and Italian arias, with an odd Tchaikovsky item thrown in, but pay attention, and it will be apparent that Bernheim is a cut above. Raised in Switzerland, he has perhaps a natural way with both French and Italian music. You get the feeling, though, that Bernheim could sing almost anything and make it convincing. His voice is not big, but it has many shades, and he falls easily into the grooves of Massenet and Verdi without seeming to shift gears in any way.

On her latest recording for BIS Miah Persson ventures into the fields of bel canto, opéra lyrique and verismo in the company of Daniel Harding and the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. The range of characters is wide, from a teenage Juliet, eager to live life to the full in Gounod’s Je veux vivre, to Verdi’s Violetta, a courtesan at the height of her powers, who in her scene and aria È strano tries to convince herself that her freedom is more valuable than love. The programme includes some of the emotional high points in the opera literature (Bellini’s Oh! quante volte, Puccini’s O mio babbino caro), as well as light relief (Norina’s cavatina So anch’io la virtù magica) and moments of pure, unadulterated beauty, such as the Flower Duet from Lakmé and Offenbach’s Barcarolle. In the two latter pieces, Miah Persson is joined by her Swedish colleague, the mezzo-soprano Katarina Karnéus, while the tenor Andrew Staples makes a cameo appearance in Sempre libera, as Alfredo, singing of his love for Violetta below her window.

To celebrate the epic recording career of cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, Deutsche Grammophon presents a comprehensive box set that brings together for the first time all of his recordings for DG, Decca and Philips; in addition to the Westminster/Melodija recordings from their archives. Presented with the original jackets, this limited edition 37CD box features legendary recordings with Karajan, Argerich, Mutter, Britten, Richter, Serkin and more!

With his first stage work ‘Le Villi’, the young Giacomo Puccini instantly struck a chord with his contemporaries. His unerring instinct for deeply moving melodies made him a beacon of hope for a new generation of Italian opera composers. In this ‘opera ballo’ he masterfully set to music the gruesomely beautiful legend of an unfaithful fiancé who is killed by the frenzied dance of the “Willis” – elemental spirits haunting the Black Forest. On October 13, 2024, a few weeks before the centenary of the composer’s death on November 29, the Munich Radio Orchestra presented a concert performance of the two-act version of ‘Le Villi’ at the city’s Prinzregententheater.

The Summer Night Concert of the Vienna Philharmonic is the world's biggest annual classical open-air concert that takes place in the magical setting of the Schönbrunn Palace Baroque park in Vienna. This year marks the first time that Maestro Tugan Sokhiev will conduct the Summer Night Concert. The vocal soloist is world-renowned tenor Piotr Beczała, who will perform three iconic arias from: Georges Bizet’s Carmen, Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot and Emmerich Kálmán’s Gräfin Mariza. With this open-air concert in Schönbrunn, the Vienna Philharmonic wishes to provide all Viennese, as well as visitors to the city, with a special musical experience in the impressive setting of Schönbrunn Palace and its beautiful baroque gardens, a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site.

Chilean-American tenor Jonathan Tetelman and the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia under Musical Director Daniel Harding announce their upcoming album, on which they are joined by an array of performers to present Puccini’s operatic thriller Tosca.

The war over, the Milanese set about the immediate rebuilding of the bombed La Scala. By 1946 the work was complete in time for Toscanini to return – by public demand – to his old house to direct the opening concert, a truly legendary occasion now at last officially available on CD in tolerable enough sound to enjoy its many virtues. Chief among them are the old maestro’s inimitable, indeed unique way of inspiriting singers and orchestra to perform Rossini and Verdi as perhaps never before or since.

This wonderfully re-issued Orchestral Music of Giacomo Puccini - (1858-1924) offers a unique orchestral side of this genius of opera. These orchestral compositions may be divided into two areas: orchestral and operatic. Selections I & II are from Puccini's student days at the Milano Conservatory. Selections III-XI date from his early days as an operatic composer including the truly delightful Minuets - I-III and the lush and haunting Crisantemi of 1892, written for a funeral.

Opera composer Puccini was a young man when he crafted this splendid work. Its text is the old-fashioned Roman Catholic Latin Mass. The title of the work derives from its longest component, the "Gloria." Youthful exuberance and optimism underlie the work.

On October 6, 1953, RCA held experimental stereophonic sessions in New York's Manhattan Center with Leopold Stokowski conducting a group of New York musicians in performances of Enesco's Roumanian Rhapsody No. 1 and the waltz from Tchaikovsky's opera Eugene Onegin. There were additional stereo tests in December, again in the Manhattan Center, this time with Pierre Monteux conducting members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In February 1954, RCA made its first commercial stereophonic recordings, taping the Boston Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Charles Münch, in a performance of The Damnation of Faust by Hector Berlioz.

A greatest-hits album ought to stick to the middle of the road, playing to what an artist does best. Yet it ought not simply wallow in past glories: this collection from Russian soprano Anna Netrebko, arguably the best-known soprano of the present day, hits the spot and can safely be recommended to newcomers. Netrebko is at her best in core Italian repertory like Casta Diva from Bellini's Norma or Libiamo ne 'lieti calici from Verdi's La Traviata.

Earlier this summer, Jonas Kaufmann, The world s greatest tenor (The Telegraph), performed his most popular Italian repertoire live at Waldbühne, Berlin s outdoor amphitheater. The smash-success live concert was recorded for Kaufmann s new album, An Italian Evening. Kaufmann brought-the-house-down with a succession of hits from his extremely popular Dolce Vita album as well as exciting arias and duets (with mezzo-soprano Anita Rachvelishvili) from the Italian opera repertoire including Volare, Non ti scordar di me and Nessun Dorma.

This outstanding concert performance of Manon Lescaut with Anna Netrebko and Yusif Eyvazov was the absolute highlight of the 2016's Salzburg Festival – a moment of operatic glory, captured live for this unique release.
Anna excelled herself and fascinated the audience with the perfection of her exceptional voice, her unrivaled interpretation and her devotion to this very part – she is the Manon Lescaut of our time. While Verismo already features the aria "In quelle trine morbide" and the fourth act of Manon Lescaut in a breathtaking studio-version, documenting her great passion to this work, the complete recording of Manon Lescaut will be a great addition to Anna's fans and opera lovers alike.