Puccini Tosca - Herbert von Karajan Vienna Philharmonic - Leontyne Price

This is first for me listening to the entire opera alongside an English translation. I have listened to excerpts of other performances as well as excerpts of lower definition of this performance Continuing with my conclusion that if you can store and play DSD at higher levels of resolution, you should do so. With proper playback system, there is little basis to conclude vinyl or other lower levels of resolution are superior. They may have their sonic signature, but the dynamic and tonal range along with the separation and clarity of this production is without equal except perhaps the tape master itself

Drama, elegance, nearly perfect Tosca

Karajan was one of the great operatic conductors - Wagner, Verdi, Mozart, Strauss, Puccini - but the latter composer really suited his amazing sense of orchestral colour, transparent textures and gorgeously refined sound. With the Vienna Philharmonic playing at its best, even if this recording didn't feature a legendary cast, it would still be something to marvel at. But it happily has a great cast. Tosca requires more than a heroine but starting with the title character, Leontyne Price is every inch the diva in sound and temperament with effortless high notes that must have made Callas jealous. While DiStefano's marvelous instrument was already showing signs of dangerous and sadly vocally reckless wear and tear, he is still a major league Cavaradossi and his singing when he is not pushing the voice reminiscent of his glory days. The mezza voce singing is still extraordinarily beautiful. Taddei is nearly as good as Gobbi and has more velvet in the voice to boot. The small parts - so important to this opera - are well done with Corena doing yet another great Sagrestano and fine Spoletta and Angelotti. Tosca has fared well on recordings. While the perfect recording has eluded the microphones - at least for those of us allergic to Callas' astringent voice - and sad that Tebaldi didn't have either a better recording for her mono first outing or better partners for her stereo version - Karajan for me gets closest to the mark. The sound of this recording was always great but HDTT adds a measure of richness and detail that has added significantly to my enjoyment of this set. (Did I hear some very faint and very occasional print-through but not enough to distract or disturb.)

Puccini Tosca - Herbert von Karajan

The sense of space in the recording is wonderful.

The Great Tosca

First, and most important, a big thank you to HDTT for another terrific opera surprise. I came to know this performance in its first incarnation on RCA Red Seal SORIA Series lp in the early 60’s. It has never lost its luster, but it has lost a bit of brightness. But in compensation, the amount of information captured in this new release is almost staggering. This is not to be missed, and it is THE Tosca to own.

Something of a classic

When in 1953 Br Columbia recorded Callas, di Stefano, Gobbi and de Sabata at La Scala they created what has remained the definitive Tosca, but this Decca, John Culshaw, Gordon Parry production for RCA is probably best-of-the-rest. Leontyne Price is in magnificent voice and portrays every facet of Tosca’s passionate, jealous, but essentially vulnerable, loving nature and Taddei uses vivid word-painting to portray the vile, murderous, would-be rapist. In 1962 di Stefano was well past his best and, alas, unlike in 1953 doesn’t spin a web of gorgeous pianissimo sound in E lucevan le stelle, but his singing still has tremendous face. The VPO play magnificently, although the savagery de Sabata drew from his players is missing and sometimes there is a touch of Mantovani in the string phrasing. This was down to Karajan, who also occasionally indulged his liking for very slow tempo in Italian opera, nevertheless for most of the time his tempo variation, drive and dramatic timing are superb. For comparative purposes first label RCA LPs and a Universal 24/96 download were used. The latter is excellent with depth and the voices have retained much of their analogue timbre (although there is some digital glare). With the DSD the image has more space between and around the instruments, the bells in the Te Deum are more realistic, the brass rasp, the strings sing, like the wonderful LPs, the singers are in front of you and digital remastering really doesn’t come any better than this.