Puccini ≡ Passion
This audio CD will be released on January 24, 2012
Cheryl Barker first broke the hearts of audiences worldwide as Mimì in the imaginative production of La Bohème. In this CD titled “Puccini ≡ Passion” the excellent Australian soprano delivers some amazing performances in a series of Puccini’s heroines in favorite arias, accompanied by the State Orchestra of Victoria under the baton of Richard Bonynge.
If you love Giacomo Puccini, then this CD is for you! The selections are as follows:
Puccini:
- Se come voi piccina io fossi (from Le Villi)
- Addio, addio mio dolce amor! (from Edgar)
- In quelle trine morbide (from Manon Lescaut)
- Sola, perduta, abbandonata (from Manon Lescaut)
- Si, mi chiamano Mimi (from La Bohème)
- Quando me’n vo (from La Bohème)
- Donde lieta usci (from La Bohème)
- Vissi d’arte (from Tosca)
- Un bel di vedremo (from Madama Butterfly)
- Che tua madre dovrà prenderti in braccio (from Madama Butterfly)
- Con onor muore (from Madama Butterfly)
- Chi il bel sogno di Doretta (from La Rondine)
- Ore dolci e divine (from La Rondine)
- Senza mamma, o bimbo (from Suor Angelica)
- Tu che di gel sei cinta (from Turandot)
- E l’uccellino
- Sole e Amore
- O mio babbino caro (from Gianni Schicchi)
- Signore, ascolta! (from Turandot)
Performed by Cheryl Barker, soprano, and the State Orchestra of Victoria, conducted by Richard Bonynge
Opera expert Rodney Milnes comments in the CD booklet:
“Puccini famously liked to write about “little women”, but he gave them “big” music, which is one thing that makes Cheryl Barker so ideal an interpreter of his soprano roles … her lyric soprano, with an indefinably sweet vibrancy built in to the tone, adds immeasurably to her appeal. With that vibrancy comes a sense of vulnerability, which helps her bring the characters alive in both vocal and dramatic terms … This most welcome disc allows her to present an overview of Puccini’s women from the very beginning.”
Ms. Barker ends with two little known treasures, the folksong-like ‘E l’uccellino’, and ‘Sole e amore’, an 1888 song whose melody Puccini later re-used in La Bohème. And conductor Richard Bonynge brings excellent fun and sparkle to Puccini’s masterful orchestral sounds.
Here is a video of Cheryl Barker, in Madama Butterfly: Un bel di, vedremo
And finally, here are Cheryl Barker and David Hobson in the final duet and heartbreaking finale of Puccini’s La Bohème
Tags: Cheryl Barker, Giacomo Puccini, Passion