Angela Gheorghiu’s releases first studio recording in six years: Eternamente – The Verismo Album

The studio recording – her first in six years – explores the generation of Italian composers that followed Verdi, including three duets with tenor Joseph Calleja

Eternamente – The Verismo Album, Angela Gheorghiu‘s first studio recording in six years, will be released on 20 October 2017, and will feature performances of opera and song by Italian composers of the generation that followed Verdi. Gheorghiu’s repertoire on this album is almost all new to her, including the three duets with tenor Joseph Calleja.

While it was with Verdi’s La traviata that Gheorghiu made her international breakthrough in the 1990s, she has become most closely identified with the operas of Puccini and his contemporaries, especially Tosca, La rondine, Madama Butterfly (a role she has not performed on stage) and Adriana Lecouvreur. Cilea does not feature on Eternamente, but Puccini does, along with Mascagni, Leoncavallo, Giordano, Ponchielli, Boito and lesser-known composers Donaudy, Refice and Mascheroni.

In an interview with Opera magazine, Gheorghiu said of the music on the album,

It is like my soul, it is something different, it is not the voice… The voice is also there, it has to be there, and it has had to be prepared, but at that moment of the performance, there is more. The response is never a conscious exaggeration – it is a natural expression. I am never pretending. It is just how I am at that moment.

Among the selections on Eternamente are three sections from Cavalleria rusticana, including the climactic duet in which Santuzza begs Turiddu to stay with her, and the glorious final duet from Andrea Chénier; an aria from Giordano’s seldom-heard Siberia is also included.

Tosca’s ‘Vissi d’arte’ is complemented by an aria from another of Gheorghiu’s signature Puccini operas, La rondine, though here she appropriates a tenor showpiece, ‘Parigi! È la città dei desideri’.

Leoncavallo is represented not by Pagliacci, but by his version of La bohème,which was eclipsed by Puccini’s, and also by another rarity, I zingari.

The composers Stefano Donaudy, Licinio Refice and Angelo Mascheroni are today known almost exclusively for the touching songs heard on this album, which were favoured by singers of the early 20^th century such as the Enrico Caruso and Claudia Muzio: ‘O del mio amato ben’; ‘Ombra di nube’ and the song that gives the album its name, ‘Eternamente’.

I want to be remembered eternally through my voice – says Gheorghiu – and I want this album to give pleasure to many audiences now and in the future.

The album will be released by Warner Classics on CD and Digital, as well as limited-edition vinyl LP

TRACKLIST CD and DIGITAL

1. Pietro Mascagni: “Regina coeli” from Cavalleria Rusticana           
2. Pietro Mascagni: “Voi Lo Sapete O Mamma” from Cavalleria Rusticana with Prague Philharmonic Choir
3. Pietro Mascagni: “Tu qui, Santuzza” from Cavalleria Rusticana (duet)* with Joseph Calleja (tenor)
4. Stefano Donaudy: “O Del Mio Amato Ben”                                                
5. Giacomo Puccini: “Vissi d’arte” from Tosca                                                       
6. Arrigo Boito: “Spunta l’aurora pallida” from Mefistofele* with Joseph Calleja (tenor), Richard Novak (bass) and Prague Philharmonic Choir
7. Angelo Mascheroni: “Eternamente”                                                          
8. Licinio Refice: “Ombra di Nube”                                                            
9. Amilcare Ponchielli: “Suicidio” from La Gioconda                          
10. Umberto Giordano: “No! se un pensier torture” from Siberia                       
    Ruggiero Leoncavallo: “Ed Ora Conoscetela” from La Boheme      
11. Ruggiero Leoncavallo: “La Canzone di Fleana” from I Zingari        
12. Giacomo Puccini: “Parigi” from La Rondine                                                
13. Umberto Giordano: “Vicino a te s’acqueta” from Andrea Chenier (duet)*with Joseph Calleja (tenor)  and Emmanuel Villaume (spoken voice)   

TRACKLIST LP vinyl

SIDE A

1. Pietro Mascagni:  “Regina coeli” from Cavalleria Rusticana  
2. Pietro Mascagni: “Voi Lo Sapete O Mamma” from Cavalleria Rusticana  
3. Pietro Mascagni: “Tu qui, Santuzza” from Cavalleria Rusticana (duet)*   
4. Stefano Donaudy: “O Del Mio Amato Ben”            
5. Giacomo Puccini: “Vissi d’arte” from Tosca                             

SIDE B

1. Arrigo Boito: “Spunta l’aurora pallida” from Mefistofele*
2. Angelo Mascheroni: “Eternamente” 
3. Licinio Refice: “Ombra di Nube”                         
4. Amilcare Ponchielli: “Suicidio” from La Gioconda               
5. Ruggiero Leoncavallo: “La Canzone di Fleana” from I Zingari        
6. Umberto Giordano: “Vicino a te s’acqueta” from Andrea Chenier (duet)* 

Photos courtesy of Warner Classics & Erato

Gramilano Editor

Graham Spicer, aka ‘Gramilano’, is a writer, director and photographer based in Milan. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy. His articles have appeared in various publications from Woman’s Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the Danza in Italia column for Dancing Times magazine. Graham was the historical advisor on Codice Carla, the 2023 documentary on Carla Fracci.

Graham also works as a dance photographer, and his photos have appeared in many books, theatre programmes, and magazines, including Dancing Times, Dance Spirit and Ballet2000, as well as all the major Italian newspapers.

He is a member of the Dance Section of The Critics’ Circle.