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I'm surprised that nobody mentioned the Croatian Opera "Nikola Subic Zrinski" by Ivan Zajc which is now available on BBC Radio3 until May 11, 2019. For those not familiar with the opera, here is some information about the broadcast.

Ivo Lipanović conducts a performance of the Croatian opera Nikola Šubić Zrinski, from the Vatroslav Lisinski Concert Hall in Zagreb.

Written in 1876 by Ivan Zajc, who overhauled musical life in Zagreb during his 30-year reign as director of the city's opera, it tells the true story of the Battle of Szigetvár and Captain Nikola Zrinski who led his forces into a heroic last stand against the Ottoman army and Suleiman the Magnificent. Well received at its premiere its enduring appeal in Croatia is due in large part to its climactic chorus, "U boj, u boj!" ("To battle, to battle!") which has been adopted as a popular patriotic song.

Here is the cast:

Nikola Šubić Zrinski ... Ljubomir Puškarić (baritone)
Eva... Kristina Kolar (soprano)
Jelena... Valentina Fijacko Kobić (soprano)
Mehmed Sokolović... Stjepan Franetović (tenor)
Suleiman the Magnificent ... Ivica Čikeš (bass)
Lovro Juranić... Domagoj Dorotić (tenor)
Suleiman's doctor... Leon Košavić (baritone)
Gašpar Alapić... Ozren Bilušić (bass)
Vuk Paprutović ... Mario Bokun (tenor)
Mustafa... Siniša Galović (tenor)
Ali Portuk... Miroslav Živković (baritone)
Ibrahim Beglerbeg... Vjekoslav Hudeček (bass)
Timoleon... Davor Radić (baritone)

HRT Chorus
HRT Symphony Orchestra
Ivo Lipanović (conductor)

Back in the 1960's it was commercially recorded and available as a 3 LP mono set on the Yugoton label but it is now long out of print and no longer available. I once owned the set but gave it away many years ago when I got rid of my LP's. I remember that the sound was very poor so the BBC Radio3 version is a great improvement.

Unfortunately I do not have the facilities for downloading it so I hope another UC member out there would be able to make a copy and upload it to our website.

The following information was given on the back cover of the March 2019 issue of the UK Opera Magazine.

More than a hundred years after its creation, Saint-Saëns drama lyrique, L'ancêtre, will be staged at the Prinz Regenten Theater in Munich, Germany on March 20 through March 30, 2019 by the August Everding Theater Academy and the Münchner Rundfunkorchester.

More information can be found on the following website <www.theaterakademie.de>. No information was given on any broadcast or recording but lets keep our fingers crossed that there will be.

The website gave a little information in German on the plot of the opera and I have translated it into English below.

The sun is rising over Corsica. A peaceful hum can be heard when the hermit Raphaël sends out his bees for honey-gathering. But this idyll is deceptive. For decades, a bloody family feud rages between the Pietra Neras and the Fabianis, which demands more and more victims. Driven by the hate of the ancestor Nunciata, the young Vanina gets into a murderous conflict between love and loyalty. A love story unfolds between Vanina, her milk sister Margarita and the young Tébaldo from the clan of Pietra Neras. Their outcome seems predetermined.

As one of the founding members of the American Massenet Society back in 1977, Kassya was the only opera that the society did not have a piano vocal score of. Since the society no longer exists here in the USA, I would hope that a download of the Radio France broadcast on Saturday, July 21, 2018 by a European UC member could be made and then uploaded to the UC website for all of us to hear.

In the meantime I have translated into English the Radio France announcement of Kassya and am copying it below. I hope some UC member can do the downloading and uploading as I do not have the facilities to do so.

LEO DELIBES  1836-1891

KASSYA

Opéra in 4 Acts and 5 Scenes
Completed and Orchestrated by Jules Massenet  (1842-1912)

Libretto by Henri Meilhac and Philippe Gille
Premiere Performance: Opéra-Comique, 24 March 1893

Concert Version
Saturday, 21 July 2018
Radio France Broadcast from 8:00 PM to 10:00 PM (France Time)

Cast
   Kassya   Véronique Gens, Soprano
   Sonia   Anne-Catherine Gillet, Soprano
   Une Bohémienne   Nora Gubisch, Mezzo-Soprano
   Cyrille   Cyrille Dubois, Ténor
   Le Comte de Zevale   Alexandre Duhamel, Baritone
   Kostska   Renaud Delaigue, Bass
   Kolenati   Jean-Gabriel Saint-Martin, Baritone
   Mochkou   Rémy Mathieu, Ténor
   Un Sergent Recruteur   Anas Seguin, Baritone
   Un Buveur, Un Vieillard   Luc Bertin-Hugault, Bass
   Un Marchand (Soliste Radio Lettone)   Kārlis Rūtentāls, Ténor

Orchestre National Montpellier Occitanie
Chœur Opéra National Montpellier Occitanie, Chorus Master, Noëlle Gény
Chœur de la Radio Lettone, Chorus Master, Sigvards Klava
Michael Schønwandt Conducting

Chef de chant David Zobel

The Man of One Woman? Delibes, from Lakme to Kassya
Unlike Debussy, adored by younger generations, or Massenet, never forgotten performers, the name of Leo Delibes has long been associated with an opera, reduced to demonstrations of bravery sopranos emeritus and a unique heroine: the strange, evanescent Lakmé. It was not until the last part of the twentieth century to weaken stubborn clichés.

Kassya, the opera testament, is exemplary of this half-hearted inheritance: brilliant librettists, a fashionable subject taken from an outrageous author ... And eight performances before a complete disappearance of the opera scenes! Everything was brought together to guarantee the success of the project. But the vagaries of production at the time when European music was undergoing telluric changes explain its status as a cursed work. After Lakmé, the time seems finally come to recognize the subtlety of a musician too often reduced to his taste for coloratura.

From India to the Carpathians
"Where is the young Hindu, daughter of the pariahs, when the moon is played in the big mimosas? In 1883, the creation of Lakmé, a cruel evocation of relations between India and the West, enabled Delibes to establish a brilliant career, crowned by a post of professor of composition at the Paris Conservatoire and by an appointment to the 'Institute. The innumerable recognitions that accompany such a success slow down the genesis of his new project, devoted to Eastern Europe. After India under the domination of the English, Central Europe of Galicia, between Poland and Ukraine, shaken by the class tensions between nobles and peasants. At the end of six years of a difficult genesis, Delibes died brutally in January 1891, leaving Kassya unfinished and his contemporary, Jules Massenet, to complete the orchestration.

The plot takes up the motive of the seductress, to whom Delibes gives an infinitely more cruel character than the innocent Lakmé. The amorous quartet proceeds by mirroring female figures (Kassya's ambivalence in the face of Sonia's loyalty) and social classes (aristocrats and peasants).

Two librettists, one of whom, Henri Meilhac, had made himself known to Carmen, and the other, Philippe Gille, had officiated for Lakmé ... and an unexpected author! Kassya's plot is directly borrowed from Sacher-Masoch's new Frinko Balaban, better known for his Venus fur, and later for being associated by the psychiatrists with the concept of masochism. Nothing sulphurous, however, emanated from Kassya, except the cruelty displayed by the most powerful against the weakest. If the original text was set in Central Europe, it is up to the librettist duo to have made Kassya a gypsy and to have added the character of Sonia in the love quartet. Given such a plot or the notoriety of librettists, no obvious answer to the preliminary questioning: why the long eclipse of Kassya?

An Eventful Genesis
If the official acknowledgments talk about the importance of Lakmé, they probably do not favor the efforts of Delibes to get back to work. Yet it was, as part of an official delegation, that the composer - who already announced his new project through the press - toured Hungary in the summer of 1885, at the invitation of the Hungarian Academy. In the company of the famous explorer Ferdinand de Lesseps, Delibes discovered the Carpathian mountains, those of Kassya, and became familiar with the world of Czardas - which probably explains the choice to make her heroine a bohemian, to facilitate the introduction of popular themes. Massenet was also part of the delegation, who contributed to the influence of France in Hungary. The premiere of Kassya at the Opéra-Comique was announced in the press for the 1887-88 season. But on May 25, the Favart Hall caught fire, canceling all of the musical projects. As the place of creation became uncertain, Delibes' health weakend. When he died, Kassya was completed in a partially orchestrated version for vocals and piano. Jules Massenet took it up again, and finished it but made a substantial change, transforming the spoken dialogue, initially planned by Delibes, into recitatives.

An Aesthetic Shift?
Exotism junk, superficiality of the plot ... The criticisms that fuse during the creation are severe with respect to the ultimate work of Delibes - the point, in a second time, to reflect on Lakmé. Beyond their vehemence, what do these judgments say about the aesthetics of the work?

Planned for the Opéra-Comique, associating spoken dialogues and sung numbers, Kassya is, as we have said, deeply modified by Massenet. This hybridization between two composers with different influences probably contributes to the misunderstanding. Even more profoundly, for the younger generation of musicians, she violently accuses the gap with what was then perceived as the pinnacle of modernity: the total Wagnerian work. "Wagnerism invades us, overwhelms us. In my composition class, at the Conservatoire, my students constantly think about it, talk about it with each other, tell me about it myself. What should we do, we musicians of another generation? Stay indifferent? Insensitive to this universal movement? Or to evolve with our time, to modify our ideas, our manners, our art finally? Thus questioned Edouard Lalo and Delibes in 1886 on the occasion of Le Roi d'Ys of Lalo. And Emmanuel Chabrier to see in a shock formula: "I find horrible everything that comes to me under the pen! I make up my mind to shut up ... Wagner killed me. If, in 1902, Claude Debussy were to bring specifically French solutions to the principle of continuous melody in Pelléas and Mélisande, ten years before the gap displayed by Kassya - whose structure in numbers, divided into recitatives, tunes and ensembles, the pronounced melodic vein is more of an Italian model - is massive. In a generation caught between iconoclastic adhesion to the musician of Bayreuth and desire to challenge the old masters, Delibes, by his inability to defend his Kassya, is an ideal outlet.

Bathed in the imagination of the Consuelo de Georges Sand, fantasy journey in a Europe of the confines, testimony of the pomp of the Opéra-Comique, class reflection on the overthrow of the powerful by the weak ... Such are today some of the many themes that can give Kassya the evidence of great French works.

Charlotte Ginot-Slacik

Brief Synopsis
At the foot of the Carpathian mountains, Kassya, a young gypsy girl, is in love with the peasant Cyrille, but leaves him for the Count of Zevale, who dominates the region. Winner but resentful, the Count forces Cyrille to enlist in the imperial armies. Two years later, on his return, Cyrille finds his father reduced to misery by the tyrannical aristocrat, accompanied by Sonia, who has never ceased to love her childhood friend. Cyrille, the hero, then convinces the peasants to revolt and they overthrow the Count. Kassya, becomes a Countess whose cruelty equals that of her husband. Cyrille saves the young woman, who is in a difficult situation, from being lynched. Kassya tries to revive the flame of her former lover, but the procession of his wedding with Sonia is heard. Faced with the refusal of Cyrille, who prefers onia, his faithful promised, Kassya kills herself.

About a month ago I sent the following Email to John Allison, Editor of the UK 'Opera' magazine:

Dear John,

As a longtime USA subscriber I read, on pages 176 & 177 of the February 2018 issue of Opera, about the Boris Pokrovsky Moscow Chamber Theatre's staging of Rimsky-Korsakov's Servilia, Gennady Rozhdestvensky conducting.
   
The article also mentioned that a studio recording was made over a 10 day period preceeding the staged performance.
That took place in 2016 but as of today, almost two years later, no one seems to know, even in Russia, when the recording will be released.

I would specifically like to know who the USA distributor will be, on what CD label it will appear and the approximate date of the release. The Opera article was written by Alexandre Matoussevitch but I have no way of contacting him so you are my only source of information at the present time. Any help you can supply me with would be sincerely appreciated.

A few days later, I received the following reply from John after he heard from the Russian author mentioned above:

It was made by the Pokrovsky Chamber Opera on the Mosfilm Cinema studio in 2016. The theatre did not have any definite obligations with any sound recording company, the talks have been carrying out but without any result. So up to now there is no contract with any sound recording firm and it means that no firm is planning to release the recording.

All rights to the recording belong to Gennady Rozhdestvensky (not to the Chamber Opera) and now he stopped any talks concerning this case. It occurred after the decision by the Ministry of Culture in Russia to join Chamber Opera to the Bolshoi Theatre. Maybe you have heard about this scandalous situation. The Chamber Opera works and exists till the June of this year and after that it becomes a part of the Bolshoi. It's the end of this institution with unique repertory and it's very sad.

Perhaps it sounds ridiculous, but it seems to me that Rozhdestvensky has taken offense at the Ministry and at the Bolshoi Theatre. Still his position concerning accession of one theater to another isn't known. He just is silent and doesn't make any contact. That is the difficult situation in general and about Servilia's recording just nobody already remembers.

It was recently announced by Palazzetto Bru-Zane that their 5th Edition Paris Festival will feature 6 fully staged performances of the first opera by Saint-Saëns, "Le timbre d'argent" (The Silver Bell). Also featured is a concert version of the Halevy opera rarity, "La reine de Chypre" (The Queen of Cyprus). It's also rumored that these two operas will be recorded and released on the Ediciones Singulares label in 2018. Dates, times and more information can be found on the following website:

http://www.bru-zane.com/2016/?page_id=17680&lang=en

Back in 2002, or maybe 2003, Gergiev recorded Rubinstein's "Demon" from a live Kirov performance. This version contained the often omitted final scene of Act 2 taking place after Tamara is sent to a monastery and containing the revenge for the murder of Prince Sinodal choral finale. This scene has always been omitted in all of the commercially released recordings of the opera including the Melodiya one (MEL CD 10 02102). The problem with Gergiev's recording is that the exciting act 2 ballet was omitted. I contacted the Kirov staff at that time and they told me that supplementary recording sessions were in progress to restore the ballet music in its proper place and when this was completed the now uncut performance would soon be released on the Philips label. Well, this never happened, probably because of the demise of Philips. The master tape of this uncut "Demon" still exists in the Kirov vaults (so I was told by them) and is awaiting for an enterprising record company to release it on CD, but the chances of this happening are very slim.

I remember that back then, Gergiev brought the Demon to the Paris Opera and I think it was broadcast on Radio France but I don't know if the ballet was included since the reviews did not mention that. Any comments from UC members, who may have recorded the Radio France broadcast, would be appreciated.

Thank you so much for the download and such a prompt reply. I was able to edit the mp3 file to separate the acts and eliminate the talking. Thanks again.

Like you, I also listened to the Oct. 29, 2016 BBC broadcast of the Wexford Opera production of Herculanum and agree with your comments concerning the inclusion by Wexford of several selections from the opera that were missing from the Ediciones Singulares recording which I have. In fact you can still listen to that BBC broadcast from their website up to Nov. 28, 2016 as they keep it available there for 30 days after the original broadcast. This leads me to ask if there is any way I can download the broadcast from the BBC website or is there any UC member out there that has already downloaded the broadcast and could make it available to other UC members? This would be a wonderful treat for UC members, like me, who prefer and collect uncut opera performances.

It was just announced by Palazzetto Bru-Zane that the following 3 Operas will be performed (and hopefully recorded) at their June 2017 Festival

Halévy: La Reine de Chypre (1841) Concert Version
Saint-Saëns: Le Timbre d'argent (1877) Fully Staged
Lemoyne: Phèdre (1786) Fully Staged

For further information and dates go to http://www.bru-zane.com/2016/?page_id=17680&lang=en

Back on March 25, 2016 UC Member Christopher posted a message about an April 15, 2016 performance by the Moscow Chamber Musical Theatre of Rimsky-Korsakov's Servilia preceded by the opera's first CD recording. The message in part stated as follows:

"The  little-known opera occupies a special place in the artistic heritage of the famous Russian composer. Quite atypical for Rimsky-Korsakov's theme, era and genre, as well as the unsuccessful premiere of the opera was originally given an unusual status, and as a result it has always stood apart among the many masterpieces of its author. Since "Servilia" still remains the only unrecorded opera by Rimsky-Korsakov, the theatrical premiere will be preceded by a full recording in a studio under the direction of Gennady Rozhdestvensky."

Does any UC member know something about this planned recording? Has it been issued in Russia? If so, on what label and catalog number? If not, has it been postponed or even canceled? And what about the April 15 performance? Did it take place and, if so, has it been reviewed?

Any information would be helpful and appreciated.                                 

The long promised commercial recording of Herold's "Le Pré Aux Clercs" is scheduled to be released on October 17, 2016 on the Ediciones Singulares label (ES 1025). It will be their standard 2 CD book format set with a complete French/English libretto and the following cast: Marie-Eve Munger, Marie Lenormand, Jeanne Crousaud, Michael Spyres, Eric Huchet & Christian Helmer, with the Chorus and Gulbenkian Symphony Orchestra of Lisbon, Paul McCreesh conducting. It will be performed in the original French Opéra Comique version with spoken dialogue. More information can be found at the following website:

https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/louis-joseph-ferdinand-herold-le-pre-aux-clercs/hnum/4898991

Marbecks Record Store in Auckland, New Zealand has recently posted information on its website about the future Ediciones Singulares release of Lalo's "La Jacquerie" completed by Arthur Coquard. It will be their standard 2 CD Set/Book format and the release date is listed as September 16, 2016.

For more information go to:  http://www.marbecks.co.nz/detail/552474/Lalo-La-Jacquerie

I just listened to the "World of Opera" broadcast of Macbeth from the Vienna State Opera Orchestra and Chorus conducted by Alain Altinoglu. It's one of my favorite Verdi operas and I was wondering, are there any commercial recordings, CD or DVD, of the complete opera available which include the Act 3 ballet music in its proper location, not as an added supplement? If there are, please let me know their label and catalog number.

On another subject, I just received an announcement from Opera Rara on their future recording plans in 2016 through 2018.  The following works were listed:

BELLINI - Adelson e Salvini (May 2016 Recording);
ROSSINI - Semiramide (August 2016 Uncut Recording);
GOUNOD - Le Médecin Malgré Lui (February 2017 Recording);
OFFENBACH - La Princesse de Trébizonde (December 2017 Recording);
DONIZETTI - L'ange de Nisida (July 2018 Recording);
LEONCAVALLO - Gli Zingari (No Recording Date Given);
DONIZETTI - Il Paria (No Recording Date Given);
MASSENET - Don César de Bazan (No Recording Date Given);
OFFENBACH - Maître Péronilla (No Recording Date Given);
PUCCINI - Le Villi (No Recording Date Given)

Plus a host of other long lost gems. No titles or composers were mentioned.

Thank you for the download of Le Pré aux clercs. I would like a French-English libretto for the opera. I have searched the Internet and all I could find is a French-English piano vocal score which is no good for me since I can't read music. Do you or any other member have a source? If so, please upload a PDF version. If not, can you tell me where i could purchase a copy.

Thank you,

Collrec