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Arias from Lakme, Le roi malgre lui, L'enfant et les sortileges, Le pardon de Ploermel, L'ecole des maris (Bondeville), Hamlet, Medee (Milhaud), Les contes d'Hoffmann, Les mamelles de Tiresias, Mireille, Les caprices de Marianne (Sauguet) Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo Patrick Fournillier, conductor EMI Classics (distributed by EMD) 56159
Natalie Dessay's colorful recital of French coloratura solos is an enterprisingly programmed, well-balanced mix of the familiar and the unfamiliar Arias from nineteenth-century operas by Delibes, Chabrier, Meyerbeer, Thomas, Offenbach, and Gounod are heard alongside excerpts from less hackneyed, twentieth-century fare.
From that disc's opening selection, Lakme's Bell Song, one is immediately struck by the warm core of Dessay's soprano and by the ease with which she negotiates the vocal acrobatics, all sung cleanly and elegantly. Other traditional coloratura numbers on the program include Mireille's "O legere hirondelle" and Dinorah's "Ombre legere." Ophelie's Mad Scene proves a showcase for Dessay's ability to project a text, and she is especially effective in the limpid waltzlike extension of "Pale et blonde dort sous...