19 May 2016
Hypnotizing Mastery
An anniversary album in honor of the legendary Argentine composer Alberto Ginastera’s (1916-1983) 100th birthday: Plácido Domingo, celebrating his own 75th birthday this year, is first in line to salute the composer who started his career. After all, it was the US premiere of Ginastera’s opera “Don Rodrigo” at the New York City Opera in 1966 that brought the Spanish tenor his first triumph. Naturally, excerpts from “Don Rodrigo” found their way onto this album (the lovers’ duet “Fortuna …” and the final church scene). Especially the epoch-making “Cinco Canciones Populares Argentinas” and the cantata “Milena” op. 37 (based on Kafka), as performed by Domingo, his Operalia discoveries Ana María Martínez and Virginia Tola and the Santa Barbara Symphony (expertly conducted by Gisèle Ben-Dor), highlight the South American flavor and originality inherent in the work of the Argentine master of sound. The perfect phrases (recorded over a period of 15 years; the excerpts from “Don Rodrigo” being first recordings) practically hypnotize the listener with their intensity.