Don Carlo — HDVDARTS

Verdi Don Carlo opera to a 4-act libretto by Joseph Méry and Camille du Locle. Directed 2016 by Cesare Lievi as part of the Verdi Festival, Teatro Regio Parma. Stars Michele Pertusi (Philip II, King of Spain), José Bros (Don Carlo, Infante of Spain), Vladimir Stoyanov (Rodrigo, Marchese di Posa), Ievghen Orlov (Grand Inquisitor), Serena Farnocchia (Elisabetta di Valois), Marianne Cornetti (Princess Eboli), Lavinia Bini (Tebaldo, Elisabetta’s Page), Gregory Bonfatti (Conte di Lerma), and Marina Bucciarelli (Celestial Voice). Daniel Oren conducts the Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini and the Chorus of the Teatro Regio Parma (Chorus Master Martino Faggini). Sets and costumes designed by Maurizio Balò; lighting by Andrea Borelli. TV Director not credited. Sung in Italian. Released 2017, disc has 5.1 dts-HD Master Audio sound. Grade: NA

Hugo Shirley, writing in the October 2017 Gramophone (pages 100-101), condemns this recording to the limbo of "a solid performance" offering evidence that the Parma festival, "which seemed to be in trouble a few years ago, might be back on an even keel."

Here is the official YouTube clip:

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Here's news about high-definition video disc ("HDVD") recordings of opera, ballet, classical music, plays, fine-art documentaries, and paintings. In the journal below are independent (and hard-to-find critical) reports on hundreds of HDVDs. Pick the best titles for your excelsisphere.

Feb 25. We have just completed one of our most ambitious reviews: Einstein on the Beach opera, the surreal 4 and 1/2 hour cult legend. Kudos, encomiums, and accolades to Opus Arte for giving us this authoritative and weirdly fascinating recording, which we grade A+. Absorbing and learning Einstein is uniquely challenging. We try to help out by providing aids not included in the keepcase materials: an accurate libretto and a list of segments in the opera with correct Opus Arte time stamps. Good luck!

We have some other good grades with an A for the recent Met The Pearl Fishers (Les pêcheurs de perles) and a B- for an earlier The Pearl Fishers from Naples. Also, we recently gave an A- for the new Don Quixote from the Vienna State Ballet.