Title : Italian Songs
Author : Traditional, Italian
Release Date : 20020625
Binding : Audio CD
Regular Price : $17.98
Amazon.com Price : $16.49
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Editorial Reviews : As a follow-up to its Caruso 2000 release, RCA here offers us a remastered, implemented selection of Neapolitan songs recorded by Enrico Caruso between 1906 and 1920. The gimmick is again that the old recordings have been digitally stripped of their oompah, blaring instruments. In their place, the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra has provided modern accompaniment. It's still anachronistic--the voice remains in another acoustical era from the orchestra--but this time, the balance is a little better, and conductor Gottfried Rabl is amazingly sensitive to Caruso's style and phrasing. Moreover, of course, the pops and clicks of the old pre-electrical shellacs are gone. The voice retains its timbre and quality, thank goodness, and one can still marvel at the way the sound grew over the 14 years recorded here. It's always magnificent, but it became more baritonal and muscular with age, without losing any of its thrills. The 'Ideale' from 1906 remains an exquisitely tender piece of singing; elsewhere, the sheer visceral excitement of the voice dazzles. Purists may not approve. Those unfamiliar with the Caruso phenomenon should hear him under any circumstances, and this is as good a chance as any.
Buyer Reviews : Much like the Caruso 2000 CD This Italian Songs CD is a great effort to show us what The Great Caruso actually sounded like. Unfortunately no modern creations can really fix the old recordings to a great extent and give us what He really sounded like; BUT, if you suspend your disbelief, just a little bit, this is not bad at all; and in fact is very good. All the pops and static in the original recording is completely gone, its very clean in that regard, the vocals still sound like they were recorded mono, but with this clearer recording you can get glimpses of how great Caruso was. In Fact at times you just get lost in is powerful and beautiful voice and forget completely the way it was recorded. For Example O Solo Mio is just beautiful. I give this CD a 5 for effort, and for being tied for the best Caruso collection I have ever heard with Caruso 2000. I only wish we could go back in time with Digital recording equipment and record Caruso, then we would all know if he really was the greatest or not. But, I will tell you this, even with the mono sounding vocals hear, if he was not the best, he sure was one of them, the power and emotion are still evident even without being recorded by modern technology. This is a must have for any Caruso fan and any Opera fan as well.
