Verdi Arias Dimitri Hovrostovsky

• 1 Otello: Otello, Act II: Vanne ? Credo in un Dio crudel 04:48
• Rigoletto ( excerpts )
• 2 Rigoletto: Act I: Pari siamo! 04:01
• 3 Stiffelio: Stiffelio, Act III: Ei fugge! ? Lina, pensai che un angelo ? Oh gioia inesprimbile 08:10
• 4 Rigoletto: Act II: Cortigiani, vil razza dannata 04:50
• 5 Nabucco: Nabucco, Act IV: Son pur queste mie membra? Ah! fra le selve ? Dio di Guida! 07:58
• Un ballo in maschera ( excerpts )
• 6 Un ballo in maschera: Act I: Alla vita che t'arride 02:28
• 7 Un ballo in maschera: Act III: Alzati! ? Eri tu che macchiavi quell'anima 06:07
• 8 Ernani: Ernani, Act III: Gran' Dio! ? Oh, de' verd'anni miei 06:18
• I masnadleri ( excerpts )
• 9 I masnadieri: Act I: Vecchio! Spiccai ? La sua lampada vitale ? Tremate. o miseri! 08:33
• 10 I masnadieri: Act IV: Tradimento! ? Pareami, che sorto da lauto convito 06:58
• 11 Il trovatore: Il trovatore, Act II: Tutto e deserto ? Il balen del suo sorriso ? Per me ora fatale 08:39
• Total Runtime 01:08:50

Info for Verdi Arias

Delos picked the orchestra and the conductor. In this case the excellent Canadian Mario Bernardi--may not have the same star power as the 'biggies' in the business. But this new disc is a fine effort, due largely to the superlative vocalism of Hvorostovsky. The Siberian baritone is a Verdian born and bred. The voice is a gorgeous, well focused, gleaming instrument, even from top to bottom, with plenty of squillo and reserve of power sufficient to project to the upper reaches of the galleries, accomplished without sacrificing beauty of tone and elegant phrasing. The liner notes mention that the baritone dreamed of singing Rigoletto in his late teens, but it would be another twenty years before he had matured enough vocally to assay the court jester in Moscow in 2000 and later in Houston.

This season, he is adding Count di Luna in Il Trovatore and Renato in Un ballo in maschera to his growing list of Verdi roles, which already include Germont, Rodrigo, Francesco Moor and the aforementioned Rigoletto. It is great to have arias from several roles he has yet to tackle--Iago, Stankar from Stiffelio, Nabucco, and Carlo from Ernani. He is in splendid form on the album, firm and masculine of tone, with his typically resplendent top very much in evidence. And he makes an effort to act with the voice, as in the cabaletta ' Oh gioia inesprimibile ' from Stiffelio. If one were to quibble, his sound is almost too beautiful for some of the nasty characters like Iago and di Luna. The recorded sound is excellent, with fine balance between soloist and orchestra.

Russian Philharmonic Orchestra
Spiritual Revival Choir of Russia, Choir
Mario Bernardi, Conductor
Vsevolod Grivnov, Tenor (Vocal)
Alexander Vinogradov, Bass (Vocal)
Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Baritone (Vocal)

Dmitri Hvorostovsky - Baritone
Internationally acclaimed Russian baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky was born and studied in Krasnoyarsk, Siberia. In 1989, he won the prestigious Cardiff Singer of the World Competition. From the start, audiences were bowled over by his cultivated voice, innate sense of musical line and natural legato. After his Western operatic debut at the Nice Opera in Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame, his career exploded to take in regular engagements at the world’s major opera houses and appearances at renowned international festivals, including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, New York’s Metropolitan Opera, the Paris Opera, the Bavarian State Opera, the Salzburg Festival, the Teatro alla Scala Milan, the Vienna State Opera, and the Chicago Lyric Opera.


A celebrated recitalist in demand in every corner of the globe--from the Far East to the Middle East, from Australia to South America-- Hvorostovsky has appeared at such venues as Wigmore Hall, London; Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh; Carnegie Hall, New York; the Teatro alla Scala, Milan; the Tchaikovsky Conservatoire, Moscow; the Liceu, Barcelona; the Suntory Hall, Tokyo; and the Musikverein, Vienna. The singer regularly performs in concert with top orchestras like the New York Philharmonic and the Rotterdam Philharmonic, and conductors, including James Levine, Bernard Haitink, Claudio Abbado, Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, Yuri Termikanov and Valery Gergiev.


Dmitri retains a strong musical and personal contact with Russia. He became the first opera singer to give a solo concert with orchestra and chorus on Red Square in Moscow; this concert was televised in over 25 countries. Dmitri has gone on to sing a number of prestigious concerts in Moscow as a part of his own special series, ‘Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Friends’. He has invited such celebrated artists as Renee Fleming, Sumi Jo and Sondra Radvonosky. In 2005 he gave an historic tour throughout the cities of Russia at the invitation of President Putin, singing to crowds of hundreds of thousands of people to commemorate the soldiers of the Second World War. Dmitri now tours the cities of Russia and Eastern Europe on an annual basis.


Dmitri Hvorostovsky’s extensive discography spans recitals and complete operas. He has also starred in Don Giovanni Unmasked, an award-winning film (by Rhombus Media) based on the Mozart opera, tackling the dual roles of Don Giovanni and Leporello.

The Russian Philharmonic Orchestra
The Russian Philharmonic Orchestra is firmly rooted in Russia’s rich musical traditions, and has achieved an impressive and outstanding musical quality by drawing its musicians from the highest ranks of Russia’s most famous orchestras such as the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Russian National Orchestra and the State Symphony Orchestra. The Russian Philharmonic Orchestra was originally formed as a recording ensemble and has gone on to receive high acclaim for its concert performances. In addition to regular recordings for leading international companies, the orchestra has undertaken tours to Turkey, Austria, Germany, China, Taiwan, Finland and elsewhere. Dmitry Yablonsky was appointed Music Advisor to the orchestra in 2003. In 2006 the orchestra won a Gramophone Award for their recording of Shostakovich on Deutsche Grammophon.

Mario Bernardi - Conductor
Despite his Italian name, Mario Bernardi was a native-born Canadian and one of his country's leading conductors. His family sent him back to the Old Country to study music as a child, though, and this was through the entirety of World War II. He studied piano, organ, and composition at the Manzato Conservatory in Treviso (1938 - 1945) and the Benedetto Marcello Conservatory in Venice (1945). Young Bernardi returned to Canada after the war to complete his studies in piano and conducting at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto (1948 - 1951). He began his career as a church organist and concert pianist, working part-time as an opera coach and conductor at the Royal Conservatory's opera school. His debut as an opera conductor came in the 1956 - 1957 season with the Canadian Opera Company's Hänsel und Gretel. In 1959, he polished off his conducting studies with Erich Leinsdorf at the Salzburg Mozarteum and eased into a career as a full-time conductor, initially in opera. He joined the conducting staff of London's Sadler's Wells Opera in the 1963 - 1964 season and in 1966, became the company's music director. He didn't make his U.S. debut until 1967, with a San Francisco Opera production of La bohème. Bernardi left Sadler's Wells in 1969 to become the founding music director of the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, where he honed the group into a highly proficient orchestra and ran a summer opera festival through it from 1971 until he left in 1982. It was in 1982 that he became principal conductor of the CBC Vancouver Orchestra and in 1984, he took on the Calgary Philharmonic, which he directed until 1994. During this period, he guest-conducted nearly every professional orchestra in Canada and many in the United States, and frequently appeared in the opera houses of Montreal, Houston, Chicago, St. Louis, Santa Fe, and New York. Bernardi's departure from Calgary was not exactly a retirement; among other things, he led Canada's National Youth Orchestra on a coast-to-coast tour during the 1997 - 1998 season.

Vsevolod Grivnov - Tenor
was born in Russia. His repertoire includes Alfredo in La traviata, Rodolfo in Luisa Miller, Renato in Un ballo in maschera (Verdi), Maurizio in Adriana Lecouvreur (Cilea), Levko in May Night (Rimsky Korsakov), Fernando in La favorita (Donizetti), Prince Guidon in The Golden Cockerel (Rimsky Korsakov), the title role in Oedipus Rex (Stravinsky), Lensky in Yevgeni Onegin (Tchaikovsky), Kuragin in War and Peace (Prokofiev), Macduff in Macbeth (Verdi), Dmitry in Boris Godunov (Mussorgsky), Don Jose in Carmen (Bizet), the Prince in Rusalka (Dvorak) and many others. He performs regularly at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, La Scala and the opera houses of Nice, Houston, Copenhagen, Paris, Bologna, Warsaw, Valencia, Berlin, Geneva, Palermo, San Francisco, Lisbon, Brussels, Madrid, Florence and the opera houses of Russia. At the Israeli Opera he performed Fenton in Falstaff (Verdi).

Booklet for Verdi Arias