Welcome back as we explore the latest CD and DVD releases from around the opera world.

This week audiences get to hear a Verdi album from a leading soprano as well as a “Carmen” from one of the great interpreters of today. There is also a re-release by one of the foremost popera tenors of our time.

Bizet: Carmen

Aigul Akhmetshina, Piotr Beczała, Kostas Smoriginas, Olga Kulchynska, Blaise Malaba, Grisha Martirosyan, Sarah Dufresne, and Gabrielė Kupšytė star in Damiano Michieletto’s production of “Carmen” from the Royal Opera House under the direction of Antonello Manacorda.Opus Arte releases the performance which OperaWire said, “Akhmetshina is also a fine actress, presenting Carmen with suitable grit, feistiness and independence, yet retaining a touching vulnerability and frailty in key moments.”

Contes

Sandrine Piau and David Kadouch reunite for a project that the French soprano conceived as the second part of a diptych. The ew album on Alpha Classics features works by Hahn, Debussy, Ravel, Wolf, Strauss, Zemlinsky, Poulenc, and Shostakovich as well as female composers such as Jeanne Bernard (1895–1965), Wally Karnevo (1914–2015), Louise Didier (1872–1955) and Ilse Weber (1903–1944).

Machaut

Delos releases Chanticleer’s “Machaut,” which presents music from two facets of the life of Guillaume de Machaut that to modern sensibilities might seem incompatible.

“The Messe de Nostre Dame” is part of the album and it reflects the fact that Machaut spent the last four decades or so of his long life as canon of Reims Cathedral.

Addio Amore

PENTATONE releases Jeanine de Bique and Terry Wey’s new album featuring the Kammerorchester Basel. The program presents World-premiere recordings of works by Nicola Antonio Porpora, Tomaso Albinoni, Geminiano Giacomelli, and Johann Adolph Hasse are also featured.

The Excursions of Mr Brouček

LSO releases Leoš Janáček’s satirical opera “The Excursions of Mr Brouček” with Sir Simon Rattle and London Symphony Orchestra. Peter Hoare, Lucy Crowe, Aleš Briscein, and Gyula Orendt star.

Verdi

Decca Classics has announced the release of Lise Davidsen’s new album “Verdi.”

The album will be released on Sept. 11 and will feature the soprano alongside Edward Gardner and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. The album will feature excerpts from “Macbeth,” “Un ballo in maschera,” “La forza del destino,” “Don Carlo” and “Aida.”

Guys and Dolls

Chandos releases Frank Loesser’s “Guys and Dolls,” continuing conductor John Wilson and Sinfonia of London’s series of complete recordings of musicals from the golden age of Broadway. As with all the previous issues in the series, Wilson has gone back to the original orchestrations of the show’s opening night, which in the case of Guys and Dolls had been lost before a recent painstaking reconstruction by Larry Moore. The album features soloists Sierra Boggess, Nathaniel Hackmann, Louise Dearman, David Seadon-Young, Damien Humbley, Sir Thomas Allen, Nadim Naaman, and Lucca Chadwick-Patel, along with the Guys and Dolls Ensemble.

Sturm und Drang, Volume 4

Ian Page and The Mozartists’ latest recording will be released by Signum Classics. The album is framed by two symphonies; the Symphony in C minor by Kraus and Haydn’s ‘Farewell’ Symphony. In between these two symphonies, Spanish-English soprano Alexandra Lowe sings arias by Traetta and Mozart.

Pergolesi: Stabat Mater; Salve Regina in A Minor

Gillian Fisher and Michael Chance perform Pergolesi’s Stabat mater alongside The King’s Consort, one of Europe’s leading period instrument orchestras.

Romanza/Rarities: Collectors Edition

Legendary tenor Andrea Bocelli releases two deluxe edition collector sets, the 30th anniversary edition of his landmark album.

Released in 1997, “Romanza” launched Bocelli onto the global stage, selling nearly 20 million copies worldwide and becoming one of the best-selling contemporary classical albums of all time. It will be available in both standard and deluxe editions. The deluxe package includes gold-colored vinyl, a signed lithograph by Bocelli, and a coffee table book featuring newly commissioned liner notes by acclaimed journalist Craig McLean. Both editions also feature never-before-seen photographs from the album’s recording sessions. The collection brings together all 16 tracks from the original album, including the timeless global hits “Time to Say Goodbye” with Sarah Brightman and “Vivo per Lei” featuring Giorgia, as well as a previously unreleased extended version of Bocelli’s hit “Con te Partirò.”

Alongside Romanza, Bocelli also releases Rarities: Collectors Edition. The limited-edition box set brings together three previously unreleased albums featuring deeply personal recordings released for the first time. The collection includes “Le Mie Poesie,” featuring brand-new poems written and recited by Bocelli and set to music, alongside the operatic works Torre del Lago and Dall’Archivio.

Giulio Cesare

Linn Records releases The English Concert and Harry Bicket’s recording of Handel’s masterwork.  The unabridged account of his opera written in 1724 for the castrato Senesino and the soprano Cuzzoni, and rarely recorded complete stars, Christophe Dumaux, Louise Alder, Beth Taylor, Paula Murrihy, John Holiday, Morgan Pearse, Meili Li, and Thomas Chenhall. This recording is the culmination of an international tour that included a performance at New York’s Carnegie Hall.

AND NIGHT SHALL BE NO MORE: A YEAR AT DUKE UNIVERSITY CHAPEL

Navona Records releases “AND NIGHT SHALL BE NO MORE: A YEAR AT DUKE UNIVERSITY CHAPEL,” which explores ancient understandings of liturgical time through the medium of choral music, as the Duke Chapel Schola Cantorum, conducted by Zebulon M. Highben, performs a program that travels from darkness into light.

Britten: The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, Les Illuminations, Choral Dances from Gloriana, Sinfonia da Requiem

Julie Roset joins the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo and Lawrence Foster in an album by Alpha Classics that pays tribute to composer Benjamin Britten, who was commemorated in 2026 on the 50th anniversary of his death.

Tekla Griebel Wandall: Songs

Louise McClelland Jacobsen, Sophie Haagen, Kristoffer Appel, Asmus Hanke Frederiksen, and Laurits Dragsted release an album that covers the songs of Tekla Griebel Wandall, the daughter of a German violinist who struggled to make a living.

Irrlichter – Schubert Songs

Sophie Rennert and Joseph Middleton release their album on BIS featuring Schubert songs. This marks the debut of Rennert on BIS.