World Premiere Recording!
WUTHERING HEIGHTS the album is based on the classic English novel by Emily Brontë. This release is a World Premiere Recording! The Grammy®-winning Florentine Opera Company (based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin), brings American opera composer Carlisle Floyd's 1958 operatic masterpiece to life. Floyd's score takes you to the heart of Catherine and Heathcliff's devastating love story.
Carlisle Floyd wrote a wonderful libretto that is very faithful to the beloved novel. Floyd's melodic and exciting score is extremely accessible and lovely. The engineering team at Soundmirror have made an outstanding quad (256) DSD (Direct Stream Digital) recording, which Reference Recordings' Prof. Keith Johnson endorses highly!
"Maestro Joseph Mechavich leads his Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and the choral forces of the Florentine Opera Company, one of America’s oldest such vocal organizations, in a precedent setting performance that will make listeners unfamiliar with this work sit up and take notice. Composer (Carlisle) Floyd writes beautiful vocal lines and the cast led by stunning soprano Jarman takes full advantage of them. Vocal colleagues Markgraf, Rideout, Buck, and Shelton provide excellent support and credible recreations of their characters. Veteran mezzo-soprano Suzanne Mentzer turns in a great rendition of the old serving woman Nelly Dean... Like Carlisle Floyd’s big hit Susannah, the star soprano gets a virtuosic monologue in Act II that sums up, with an economy of words and music, her deep feelings for Heathcliff: “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” This recorded première may finally set the operatic record straight regarding Wuthering Heights, particularly with a cast as good as this one. Audio values are tops and I doubt that we will get a better recording of this neglected masterpiece any time soon. Highly recommended!” —Lawrence Devoe, TheaterByte
Features:
• 2-Disc
• Super Audio CD
• SACD 5.1 Multi-Channel SACD Layer
• SACD Stereo SACD Layer
• This Hybrid SACD contains a 'Red Book' Stereo CD Layer which is playable on most conventional CD Players!
• Mastered at Soundmirror
• Includes printed libretto
Musicians:
Florentine Opera Company
Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra
Joseph Mechavich, conductor
Selections:
Carlisle Floyd (b.1926)
Wuthering Heights
Disc 1:
1. Prologue
2. Scene One
3. Scene Two
4. Act Two: Scene One
5. Act Two: Interlude
6. Act Two: Scene Two
Disc 2:
1. Act Two: Scene Two - Part II
2. Act Three: Scene One
3. Act Three: Scene Two
4. Act Three: Scene Three
WUTHERING HEIGHTS the album is based on the classic English novel by Emily Brontë. This release is a World Premiere Recording! The Grammy®-winning Florentine Opera Company (based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin), brings American opera composer Carlisle Floyd's 1958 operatic masterpiece to life. Floyd's score takes you to the heart of Catherine and Heathcliff's devastating love story.
Carlisle Floyd wrote a wonderful libretto that is very faithful to the beloved novel. Floyd's melodic and exciting score is extremely accessible and lovely. The engineering team at Soundmirror have made an outstanding quad (256) DSD (Direct Stream Digital) recording, which Reference Recordings' Prof. Keith Johnson endorses highly!
"Maestro Joseph Mechavich leads his Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and the choral forces of the Florentine Opera Company, one of America’s oldest such vocal organizations, in a precedent setting performance that will make listeners unfamiliar with this work sit up and take notice. Composer (Carlisle) Floyd writes beautiful vocal lines and the cast led by stunning soprano Jarman takes full advantage of them. Vocal colleagues Markgraf, Rideout, Buck, and Shelton provide excellent support and credible recreations of their characters. Veteran mezzo-soprano Suzanne Mentzer turns in a great rendition of the old serving woman Nelly Dean... Like Carlisle Floyd’s big hit Susannah, the star soprano gets a virtuosic monologue in Act II that sums up, with an economy of words and music, her deep feelings for Heathcliff: “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” This recorded première may finally set the operatic record straight regarding Wuthering Heights, particularly with a cast as good as this one. Audio values are tops and I doubt that we will get a better recording of this neglected masterpiece any time soon. Highly recommended!” —Lawrence Devoe, TheaterByte
Features:
• 2-Disc
• Super Audio CD
• SACD 5.1 Multi-Channel SACD Layer
• SACD Stereo SACD Layer
• This Hybrid SACD contains a 'Red Book' Stereo CD Layer which is playable on most conventional CD Players!
• Mastered at Soundmirror
• Includes printed libretto
Musicians:
Florentine Opera Company
Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra
Joseph Mechavich, conductor
Selections:
Carlisle Floyd (b.1926)
Wuthering Heights
Disc 1:
1. Prologue
2. Scene One
3. Scene Two
4. Act Two: Scene One
5. Act Two: Interlude
6. Act Two: Scene Two
Disc 2:
1. Act Two: Scene Two - Part II
2. Act Three: Scene One
3. Act Three: Scene Two
4. Act Three: Scene Three
