After the Gramophone Award-winning success of Rusalka (Decca, 11/98), the next collaboration between Renee Fleming and Sir Charles Mackerras ought to have been a recital of scenes and arias from Czech operas. Instead, here is a clutch of popular favourites – any disc that begins with ‘O mio babbino caro’ and includes ‘Casta diva’ shorn of its dramatic recitative and cabaletta is clearly aiming at that mythical easy-listening market.
Skip over the four Puccini encores that start the record and find your way to the Leoncavallo aria. Without exaggeration, Fleming shifts from the fearful-sounding Nedda in the recitative to a really beautiful account of the song about the birds. If any company could afford to cast her in this role, she would be ideal. Adriana, too, is a part that would suit her. Her enunciation of the words ‘io la diffondo ai cor’ is exquisite. At the end the little expressive sob on ‘fedelta’ is a bit overdone, and the sustained pianissimo on the final ‘morra’ is marred by a slight catch in the voice, maybe for effect, but it’s uneasy.
‘Ebben? … Ne andro lontana’ from La Wally conjures up memories of Callas and Tebaldi, and its nostalgic sadness at departure doesn’t require any special interpretation. Fleming includes the final lines, often omitted, and it improves the balance of the aria. Manon is a part she sang recently in Paris and the difference is immediately noticeable; here in Manon’s first aria, she presents a full character, joyous but also with that foreboding of the girl on her way to life in a convent. Micaela’s aria is good, too, again this would be luxury casting. Neither the waltz-song from Romeo et Juliette nor the bolero from Les vepres siciliennes does anything to banish memories of singers with an easier coloratura technique, but Fleming is sure enough in them.
So back to those Puccini show-stoppers. I waited for something individual that would suggest a real reason for her to essay these arias, from roles she is unlikely to sing on stage. Lauretta in Gianni Schicchi sounds too sad, Butterfly too tragic – ‘Un bel di’ is her aria of hope, and that is the emotion that should predominate, here she already sounds suicidal. Musetta’s waltz at least provides a moment’s respite from the heavy melodrama, but one misses the second half of the scene, just the opening waltz is a bit disappointing. Liu’s first aria comes off pretty well, but compare it with Caballe’s EMI recording from 1970 – also conducted by Mackerras – to hear how the end should go. Caballe fines down her voice to an ethereal pianissimo on the final ‘Ah!’ and holds it firmly for 12 seconds, whereas Fleming’s voice develops a beat.
It’s no good saying I’m being unfair: she’s a great singer and deserves to be compared with the supreme artists of the past. The tone is rich and beautiful all the way through the recital, the accompaniments from the LPO and Mackerras discreet and unfussy.'