A Man And His Shadow: “Jonas Kaufmann Wien”
No, this is not scheduled as a mid-summer treat to coincide with the various operetta festival productions in Austria: the
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“Die lustige Witwe” With Marlis Petersen And Iurii Samoilov – Live From Oper Frankfurt
The original composer chosen für Die lustige Witwe by authors Leo Stein and Victor Léon was: Richard Heuberger. After he
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Fritzi Massary Sings “Csardasfürstin” & “Faschingsfee” In 1916/18
There’s a wonderful interview with Elisabeth Schwarzkopf in which she talks about her student days in Berlin. She mentions that
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Kálmán’s “Faschingsfee” Live From Gärtnerplatz Theater Munich
Kálmán’s Faschingsfee started her phenomenal career abroad, to be exact: in Budapest and New York City. First the show premiered
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Jacques Offenbach’s “Folies symphoniques”: Howard Griffiths & Brandenburgisches Staatsorchester Frankfurt
You’ll forgive me for saying this, but provincial Brandenburg and the city of Frankfurt an der Oder (next to the
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Emmerich Kálmán’s “Ein Herbstmanöver” From Gießen With Michael Hofstetter
“The Gay Hussars”? I admit, the title of the 1909 Broadway version of Emmerich Kalman’s first operetta hit Tatájárás caught
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What Is The Best “Fledermaus” On Disc?
Ah yes, another Fledermaus recording. As if there aren’t enough already, right? Well, actually, this one from the NDR Radiophilharmonie
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“Dorothy” By Alfred Cellier: World Premiere Recording
Before the building of railways into London from the rest of south-east England in the third quarter of the nineteenth
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Thank Heaven for Little Girls: André Messager’s “Les p’tites Michu” On Palazzetto Bru Zane
Nature or nurture – that’s the central question in this charming social experiment operetta in three acts by André Messager.
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Kálmán’s “Kaiserin Josephine” (1936) On CPO: Live From The Léhar Festival in Ischl
Kálmán composed Kaiserin Josephine after his ‘regular’ first night theater, the Theater an der Wien, had gone bankrupt as a
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Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s “Das Lied der Liebe” From Leipzig
You know it’s Korngold alright from the very first bars: it’s an explosion of sound, hyper-intense like the opening of
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Ivor Novello’s “The Dancing Years”: The First Complete Recording
The effect of Ivor Novello’s music on me was immediate: I remember the first time I heard his songs on
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Ivor Novello & Kurt Gänzl: “The Dancing Years” On JAY Records
Any week now, John Yap’s company, JAY Records, is going to release a recording of Ivor Novello and Christopher Hassall’s
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“Lächeln trotz Weh und tausend Schmerzen”: Franz Lehárs Rundfunkaufnahmen im Dritten Reich
Yes, they are very famous and widely known: Lehár’s operettas as recorded by the Nazis, often with stellar casts, offering
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Desert Island Disc? “La Périchole” From Montpellier With Marc Minkowski
So here it is, finally: the live broadcast of Marc Minkowski’s performance of La Périchole with his Les Musiciens du
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Johann Strauss’s “Aschenbrödel” (1899): A Modern-Day Cinderella Story Conducted By Ernst Theis
It’s not exactly a secret that Johann Strauss was a great dance music composer. Before he turned to operetta in
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Hommage Mécanique: Jérôme Collomb’s Tribute to Jacques Offenbach
Before the dawn of the phonographic era and before iTunes came along you had to either go to the theater
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“Broadway Sampler: 1915.” Twenty-Five Musicals And Twenty-Six Songs
You might remember the CD series The Broadway Musicals of… created, written and hosted by Scott Siegel. They started, thematically,
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Künneke’s “Herz über Bord”: A New Recording Of The Complete Score With Wayne Marshall
When Eduard Künneke presented his syncopated Der Vetter aus Dingsda in Berlin 1921, it was quite revolutionary to have so
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“Der tapfere Soldat”: What Recordings Are There Of The 1908 Oscar Straus Show?
Munich’s recently renovated and re-opened Gärtnerplatz Theater just offered a brand-new staging of The Chocolate Soldier, in the original German
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“The Mountebanks” By Gilbert And Cellier: A New BBC Recording
After the success of The Gondoliers in December 1889, D’Oyly Carte, Gilbert and Sullivan had a well-publicised disagreement because Gilbert
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Palazzetto Bru-Zane Celebrates Offenbach’s 200th Birthday With New Recordings
Next year the world will celebrate the 200th birthday of Jacques Offenbach. After having dedicated themselves to Hervé and his
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Offenbach And Opera Rara. Or: Waiting For A Recording Of The Original French “Robinson Crusoé”
It’s interesting how you can have a full cast recording sitting on your CD shelf for decades, and it never
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Leo Fall’s “Brüderlein fein”: The Problem With The Cologne Broadcasts
Leo Fall’s one-act operetta Brüderlein fein premiered in the notorious basement cabaret of the Theater an der Wien, called “Die
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“Crazy World”: Anna Bonitatibus’ Collection Of Trousers-Roles From Offenbach To Mancini
Recently, gender and diversity Prof. Simon Dickel gave an interview on Deutschlandfunk talking about his new book Queer Cinema which
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Great Ladies of Wrestling. Or: Early 1840s Offenbach Songs
The sensational success of Jacques Offenbach in Second Empire Paris and internationally, in the 19th century, has many reasons. One
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Csárdás Interruptus: Three Kálmán CDs With Historical Recordings From The USA
Back in 1997, Michael Miller, the chair of the Ohio Light Opera Board of Directors, and president of the Operetta
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Anneliese Rothenberger & Max Hansen In “Orpheus in der Unterwelt” 1958
It’s an unusual coupling, to say the very least: Anneliese Rothenberger and Max Hansen in one recording? The hairspray-star of
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Richard Heuberger’s “Opernball” From Graz: Stylish And Re-Written By Peter Lund
The Austrian composer Richard Heuberger was born in Graz in 1850, trained as a railway engineer, then moved to Vienna
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W. R. Heymann’s “Der Kongress tanzt” from Volksoper Wien
Erik Charell, the director of the original film version of Der Kongress tanzt, labored long and hard to bring his
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Offenbach’s “The Island of Tulipatan” In A World-Premiere English Language Recording
We need to talk about Offenbach, seriously and right now. Is it a sign of our gender-queer times that of
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Kismet Meets Operetta: Nico Dostal’s “Prinzessin Nofretete” From Leipzig
If you like your operettas exotic, grand, over-the-top and as a total blast, you will probably love the overture to
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The Recording Of Edward German’s “Tom Jones” On Naxos
I really don’t listen much, these days, to show recordings. Especially new recordings of my beloved older shows. Those, in
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Pop Art Meets Carl Zeller: “Der Vogelhändler” From The 2017 Mörbisch Festival
You could call this year’s Vogelhändler at the Mörbisch Festival a kick-ass production – or an erect middle-finger in the
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Lehár’s “Der Graf von Luxemburg”: Live-Recording From Frankfurt With Amazing Conductor
Early Lehár operetta seems to be en vogue this season, on record at least. Here is a new release on
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Daring To Be Different: Lehár’s “Die Juxheirat” On CPO
Viennese operetta at the beginning of the 20th century was a genre in transition, claims Stefan Frey in an essay
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