Menotti: Amahl and the Night Visitors, Sebastian Suite (1946, 1951)

Mitropoulos, Dimitri;
Studio Orchestra;
Studio chorus;
Philadelphia Robin Hood Dell Orchestra;
Schippers, Thomas;
Aiken, David;
Allen, Chet;
Kuhlmann, Rosemary;
Lishner, Leon;
McKinley, Andrew;
Monachino, Frank

8.111364

The reception for the first television broadcast of Menotti’s opera Amahl and the Night Visitors (also available in an acclaimed modern recording on Naxos 8669019) was overwhelming: an estimated five million viewers, the NBC switchboard jammed with congratulatory calls and an unprecedented front-page review in The New York Times. Quickly recorded for RCA Victor, the album became a best-seller and the opera remains a Christmas evergreen, brimming with memorable tunes for both soloists and chorus. Set in 17th-century Venice, Menotti’s ballet Sebastian, the concert suite from which is heard here, was applauded by The New York Times as an ‘unblushing melodrama…brilliantly effective’.

CD

Muzyka klasyczna

Naxos

07-02-2011

747313336425