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Enthused by rave reviews I purchased the Blu Ray of this opera and viewed it last night with friends.
Yes the production is very good and not Euro trash, demonstrating a more playful approach than most, particularly with the relationship between Don Giovanni and Leporello. Myrto Papatanasiu (new artist to me) was a pleasure to look at and had an extraordinary voice to listen to. The rest of the cast was not far behind although Enrico Iori was not as commanding as we would have liked in the role of Il Commendatore.
So far so good but overall it was spoiled by poor orchestral reproduction. It not only took a back seat acoustically but lacked weight with minimal bass. This was a major disappointment as DTS-HD audio is usually great. In the end the system was reverted to stereo with the Onkyo processor adding a little extra ambience. That audio was better, but still relatively thin and unbalanced making one wonder if the subs were working at all. They were, but had nothing much to do! Yet the review this purchase was based on (BBC Music Mag.December 2014) gave the recording a misleading 4/5 stars.
So, I agree with the review’s high rating of the artistry but warn prospective purchasers that the orchestral audio sound is poor and severely impacts on the effectiveness of the great singing. Yes, we did appreciate this disc but it was not as awe inspiring for us as the review would lead us to believe.
Enjoying 12,000 mostly classical CDs via Sennheiser HD800 headphones & M2TECH Vaughan DAC -> HeadRoom BlockHead headphone amplifier fed from a Meridian (Sooloos) server system.
The main 7.1 MC electrostatic speaker system is for A/V at night.
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Moreover, Don Giovanni is my wife's favorite opera. However, she's so in love with that 90's James Levine Met DVD (with Terfel, Fleming, Kringelborn, et al) that she's VERY critical of any other performance, even though she's not all that happy with Fleming. For instance, I got the blu-ray of the Mackerras-conducted Royal Opera House performance, with Simon Keenleyside as the Don. I thought it was pretty good (even though I still liked the Levine better), but Madeline was not won over at all, and at one point echoed one of the comments from one of the Amazon posters, viz., "Why does he have to keep taking off his shirt all the time??". ;-)
BTW, sorry to hear about the problems with the multi-channel SQ of the Pizzi production. That would be kind of a deal breaker for me, so I don't know if I'll spring for it.
Strange -- I've not yet heard any performance that recommends itself to me more than that of Giulini from the early '60s. But I haven't (yet) listened to them all -- my favourite opera.
Jeremy
I was confining myself to video performances just because John in his OP was talking about a new blu-ray release. I agree that the (audio only) Giulini/EMI performance sounds very good, although I have to admit that I was not listening carefully enough during the single occasion I heard it.
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