This week’s new release is Gounod’s Faust in its celebrated 1930 Paris recording, with César Vezzani as Faust, Mireille Berthon as Marguerite and Marcel Journet as Méphistophélès. Henri Büsser, a pupil of Gounod himself, conducts the Orchestra and Chorus of the Paris Opéra in a performance steeped in the language, elegance and dramatic instincts of the French operatic tradition.
Originally issued across forty 78 rpm sides, this unusually expansive recording preserves not only the principal scenes but also the Walpurgis Night music and ballet. Mark Obert-Thorn’s new restoration draws together sessions made over ten months, taming their very different recording characteristics while revealing the vocal colour, theatrical immediacy and extraordinary authority of this historic performance.
To mark the anniversary of Herbert von Karajan’s death on 16 July 1989, all Pristine recordings conducted by Karajan are currently reduced by 10%. The saving is applied automatically at checkout, with highlights ranging from Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony and Puccini’s Tosca to his vivid recordings of French orchestral music.
