Anousha Nazeri, André Schuen & Mozart Lead New CD/DVD Releases

By Francisco Salazar

This week opera lovers will get to see new releases by up-and-coming singers, a rarely performed opera and not just one but two recordings of the same opera.

Here is a look.

The Arching Path 

In a Circle Records releases composer Christopher Cerrone’s latest album, a follow-up to Cerrone’s 2019 GRAMMY-nominated “The Pieces that Fall to Earth.” The new album is a piano-driven, electro-acoustic album of chamber music featuring pianist Timo Andres, percussionist Ian Rosenbaum, soprano Lindsay Kesselman, and clarinetist Mingzhe Wang. The piece is inspired by Cerrone’s travels to Italy and composed between 2010 and 2016.

The album was produced by longtime Cerrone collaborator, Mike Tierney, who also worked on “The Pieces that Fall to Earth.”

Poemas de Bar 

Yana Mann releases her first studio album featuring music by Julián De La Chica. Irreverence Group Music label will release the album on CD and digital and will explore conversations that take place in the early morning hours in a local bar and is a World Premiere of De La Chica’s Cycle Op. 12.

In Umbra Mortis 

Cappella Amsterdam and its Artistic Director Daniel Reuss make their PENTATONE debut in an album that brings together Wolfgang Rihm’s contemporary Sieben Passions-Stücke and Passion-related motets by the Flemish 16th-century polyphonist Giaches de Wert.

Soleil Noir

Tenor Emiliano Gonzalez Toro pays tribute to composer, poet and virtuoso singer Francesco Rasi. Accompanied on viola da gamba, theorbo and harp by members of his ensemble, I Gemelli, Toro brings together great Italian composers and contemporaries of Rasi –  Caccini, Da Gagliano, Del Biado, D’India, Falconieri, Gesualdo, Peri, and Monteverdi – to showcase the art of the tenor.

Sound of Ancestors

Anousha Nazeri releases her solo album presenting seven Persian ballads in collaboration with Jeyran Ghiaee. The album includes works by Mohammad-Saeed Sharifian, Samin Baghtcheban, Samin Baghtcheban, André Aminollah Hossein, and Morteza Hannaneh.

Così fan tutte

London’s Royal Opera releases a recent production of Mozart’s class on Opus Arte. The late Jonathan Miller’s wittily updated staging of “Così fan tutte” was a staple of the Royal Opera’s repertoire for two decades. The 2010 revival was conducted by Thomas Hengelbrock and starred Maria Bengtsson, Jurgita Adamanyé, Pavol Breslik, Stéphane Degout, Rebecca Evans, and Sir Thomas Allen.

The week will also see the release of Vienna’s Theater an der Wien production on Unitel. Nikolaus Harnoncourt achieved a long-held ambition when, over a six-week span, he led semistaged performances of the Mozart/da Ponte “trilogy” of operas. The production stars Mari Eriksmoen, Katija Dragojevic, Mauro Peter, André Schuen, Elisabeth Kulman, and Markus Werba.

The Ghost of Versailles

Château de Versailles Spectacles releases a recording of John Corigliano’s operatic masterpiece from a September 2019 staging. Joseph Colaneri conducted the Orchestre de l’Opéra Royal. On the set of audio CDs and video DVD/Blu-Ray is the colorful new staging by Jay Lesenger, presented at Versailles in its French premiere after its celebrated run at Glimmerglass Festival the previous summer.

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