Anita Cerquetti Recital

A famous Decca operatic recital, long unavailable, celebrating the thrilling voice and short-lived career of a soprano who set operatic stages alight in the late 1950s. Anita Cerquetti made only two commercial recordings, both for Decca under the baton of Gianandrea Gavazzeni. In 1957 she sang the title role in a complete La Gioconda with Mario del Monaco and Giulietta Simionato also reissued by Eloquence. From the year before we also have this operatic recital in early stereo sound. There should have been many more recordings, but Cerquetti was forced to retire both from the stage and from singing altogether in 1961, aged only 30, with vocal problems putting paid to an all-too-meteoric career. A projected recording of Norma was begun, but as the story goes, Cerquetti was indisposed and the recording was abandoned. An instantly recognisable fixture within Decca’s ‘Grandi Voci’ series during the 1990s, the recital then gained considerable second-hand value once deleted. Its reissue on Eloquence makes available once more the astonishing sound of Cerquetti in full flood. Recorded at the peak of her career, the recital mixes repertoire she would never sing on stage (Spontini’s Agnes von Hohenstaufen – a premiere on record – as well as Verdi’s Ernani and Vespri siciliani) with signature roles such as Tosca, Aida and Abigaille in Nabucco. Leonora’s last-act Prayer from La Forza del destino has the urgent immediacy befitting the heroine’s plight, and the performance catches the sorr

Tracks

1~1~Giuseppe Verdi (18131901) - Aida: Qui Radames Verrà... O Patria Mia
1~2~Giuseppe Verdi (18131901) - I Vespri Siciliani: Mercè, Dilette Amiche
1~3~Vincenzo Bellini (18011835) - Norma: Casta Diva
1~4~Gaspare Spontini (17741851) - Agnes Von Hohenstaufen: O Rei Dei Cieli
1~5~Giuseppe Verdi (18131901) - Nabucco: Ben Io T'invenni... Anch'io Dischuiso Un Giorno
1~6~Giuseppe Verdi (18131901) - Ernani: Surta È La Notte... Ernani! Ernani Involami
1~7~Giacomo Puccini (18581924) - Tosca: Vissi D'Arte, Vissi D'Amore
1~8~Giuseppe Verdi (18131901) - La Forza Del Destino: Pace, Pace, Mio Dio
1~9~Amilcare Ponchielli (18341886) - La Gioconda: Suicidio!
1~10~Amilcare Ponchielli (18341886) - La Gioconda: E Un Anatema!... Il Mio Braccia T'afferra!

Details

Format: CD
Artist: Anita Cerquetti
Release Date: 12 April 2019
Genre: Classical Music
Label: ELOQUENCE / DECCA
Distributor: Universal Music