Giuseppe Verdi Stabat Mater
Ricardo Muti
A colorful, romantic, almost over-wrought (but hey, can performances of this piece ever really be over-wrought?!) performance of Verdi’s Stabat mater can be found on YouTube. Conducted by Ricardo Muti, and featuring the Chorus and Orchestra of Teatro alla Scala, Milan, tempi are gloriously expansive and phrase-shaping is broadly-conceived and on a grand scale. The playing and singing are equally rich in color — this is not a chorus in which pure, blended tone production is a goal in the same way it is in, say, the Anglican Cathedral tradition! But what a compelling and inviting performance that’s full of drama, angst, and some of the most beautifully rich dolce singing among on-line performances.
Claudio Abbado
The Stabat mater on the YouTube recording with Claudio Abbado conducting the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Wiener Konzertvereinigung and soprano soloist Cheryl Studer is wonderful. Note, however, that this video is of all four of the Sacred Pieces. Colorful but also a more polished choral presentation than Rucardo Muti's. As with Muti, Abbado's tempi are expansive — some might argue (not me!) almost to a fault, but the music-making is so convincing that there are never any lapses in direction, tension, and overwhelming musicality.
John Eliot Gardiner
In a completely different direction is John Eliot Gardiner's performance of the Te Deum with the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique and the Monteverdi Choir. The tempi are brisk — although closer to the tempo indications that Verdi himself preferred. And, there is a verve and trajectory that is mightily convincing here. Choral singing and orchestral playing are superbly polished — probably more so than any other commercial recording available. A very different experience than Ricardo Muti and Claudio Abbado, but definitely worth a listen!
