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Leonard BERNSTEIN (1918-1990) West Side Story (1957) Betsi Morrison (soprano) - Maria Marianne Cooke (soprano) - Anita Mike Eldred (tenor) - Tony Robert Dean - Riff Jeff Whiting - Action Billy Ditty - Baby John A-Rab - Jeff Lewis Big Deal - Greg Schanuel Joanna Chozen - Rosalia Michael San Giovanni - Bernardo Nandita Shenoy - Francisca Winter Gabriel - Consuelo Michelle Prentice - ‘Somewhere’ Neal Richard Lee - Diesel Nashville SO/Kenneth Schermerhorn Rec Ocean Way Studios, Nashville, Tennessee, 17-18 Dec 2001. DDD NAXOS 8.559126 [75.16] |
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While I admit to a shameful weakness for the voice of José Carreras in the famous DG recording of West Side Story the operatic apparatus inherent in that recording suffocated the essential youth of the piece. Perhaps the Dame Kiri of the Salammbo aria (the Herrmann RCA film music collection) might have carried off the eager spirit of the piece but by the time she entered the DG studios her voice had taken on a tone alien to what I take West Side Story to be about. This is not a piece soused in diva vapours or spavine vibrato-ridden operatic drones. The voices should be from the tradition of music theatre with ‘juice’; not too knowing, or ‘used’ or worldly-wise. This is what we get. | Error processing SSI file |
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