Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, telling sumptuous stories, and Mussorgsky’s Night on Bald Mountain, graphically chilling, are two of the most popular works in the Russian repertoire. Programming them together, as Music Director of the Orchestra and Chorus dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Sir Antonio Pappano reminds us of the links between the two composers. At the same time he provides a rare opportunity to hear both of Mussorgsky’s versions of Night on Bald Mountain – one for orchestra and one for orchestra and vocal forces.

More than 25 years after his first EMI album, Antonio Pappano has established himself as a leading figure of conducting, particularly in music from his native Italy. This collection includes excerpts from all his EMI and Warner Italian recordings, from the famous Verdi and Puccini cycles with Roberto Alagna and Angela Gheorghiu to the recent praised versions of Turandot and Rossini’s sacred works.

On stage they’re usually rivals, but in real life Jonas Kaufmann and Ludovic Tézier share a close friendship. After many live performances together these two extraordinary artists have recorded their first duet album: “Insieme”, meaning “together” in Italian, to be released on Sony Classical. Accompanied by the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia under Antonio Pappano, they present duets they’ve sung together on stage, plus works specially chosen for the album.

Angela Gheorghiu stars as Marguerite alongside a divine cast of operatic superstars, including Roberto Alagna, Bryn Terfel, Simon Keenlyside and Sophie Koch, in David McVicar's spectacular 2004 production of Gounod's best known opera, Faust, for the Royal Opera House in London. This production was the Royal Opera Company's first performance of Gounod's Faust in 18 years. Gounod's Faust is the story of a scholar who sells his soul to the Devil in exchange for unlimited knowledge and worldly indulgences. McVicar's innovative production sets this story around the time of the Franco-Prussian War (1870) in the gothic, seamy underbelly of Paris. He characterizes Faust, performed by Roberto Alagna, as a man both torn between the theater and religion, and grappling with his own sexuality.

This is a 1996 all-star-cast version from Paris of the original French version of Verdi's epic five-act opera, Don Carlos. First produced in 1867, only Wagner would write musical drama on a grander scale, and due to the three-and-a-half-hour running time most subsequent productions have made substantial cuts. This is therefore a rare opportunity to witness Verdi's tragedy in its entirety.

This recording of Turandot, Puccini’s spectacular final opera marks a number of important firsts. Before the recording sessions in Rome in March 2022, Sir Antonio Pappano had never conducted Turandot; neither Sondra Radvanovsky, who takes soaring title role, nor Jonas Kaufmann as Turandot’s suitor, Calaf – who sings ‘Nessun dorma’ – had previously performed the opera. It is also the first studio recording of Turandot to include the entire, crucial final scene as completed after Puccini’s death in 1925 by Franco Alfano.

The Verdi Messa da Requiem is probably the best known Requiem in the repertoire. Many great conductors have recorded it. I’m thinking of Toscanini at New York/1951, Victor De Sabata at Milan/1954 and probably the best known of all Carlo-Maria Giulini at London/1964-65. Some more recent versions have proved popular notably John Eliot Gardiner using period instruments in London/1992, Claudio Abbado at Berlin/2001 and also Nikolaus Harnoncourt at Vienna/2004.

This is a fine recording of two vastly under-appreciated works by young cello virtuoso Han-Na Chang. She has the extraordinary technique to play the excruciatingly difficult cadenza in the central movement of the Sinfonia Concertante and the sustained tone to play the long, lyrical melodies in the opening movement of the cello sonata. Antonio Pappano is a faithful accompanist whether he's directing the London Symphony Orchestra in the Sinfonia Concertante or playing the piano in the cello sonata.

Soprano Diana Damrau assumes the crowns of three different Tudor queens, the central characters in operas by Donizetti: Anne Boleyn (Anna Bolena), Mary, Queen of Scots (Maria Stuarda), and Elizabeth I (Roberto Devereux). With Antonio Pappano and the Orchestra and Chorus of Rome’s Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, she performs the substantial and climactic final scene of each work. When Damrau sang Maria Stuarda at the Zurich Opera, the Neue Zürcher Zeitung wrote: “She commands a voice that seems to have no limits. Her coloratura is stunning, her vocal range impressive, and her dynamic shadings are breath-taking. Damrau is in a class of her own.”

This 2005 recording of Han-Na Chang performing Shostakovich's Cello Concerto No. 1 and Cello Sonata is a follow-up to her 2003 recording of Prokofiev's Cello Concerto and Cello Sonata. In both cases, Chang is accompanied by Antonio Pappano either leading the London Symphony Orchestra or playing the piano. As on the earlier disc, Chang is primarily a soloist with a strong arm and a dazzling technique, and her performances sparkle with energy and twinkle with enthusiasm.

National Theatre director Nicholas Hytner’s new staging of Verdi’s grandest – and arguably greatest – opera, Don Carlo, was the highlight of the 2007/2008 Royal Opera House season. This new production marked Rolando Villazón’s much anticipated, triumphant return to the house.

Kasper Holten’s production (The Royal Opera’s first) of Król Roger (King Roger) brought the opera back to the London stage after an absence of almost 40 years. Karol Szymanowski’s masterpiece powerfully presents the dilemmas of culture versus nature and man versus beast, and movingly depicts King Roger’s inner struggles as he moves from an impossible life of repressed desires to the other extreme, giving in to his own demons. Meanwhile, Roger’s people, seduced by the promises of the mysterious Shepherd, are drawn towards totalitarianism and repression. Antonio Pappano conducts Szymanowksi’s opulent and beautiful score, with a cast including Mariusz Kwiecień as Roger (one of the greatest interpreters of the role today), Saimir Pirgu as the Shepherd, and Georgia Jarman in her Royal Opera debut as Roger’s loving queen Roxana.

Janine Jansen embarks on a journey recording on 12 of the world's most precious instruments. "All 12 violins are by the master Italian luthier Antonio Stradivari and have been played by an encyclopedic list of great violinists. Each of them has its own distinctive sound and character which violinists normally have months, if not years, to respond to and make their own. Jansen had only a matter of days with these violins before going into the recording studio accompanied by Sir Antonio Pappano.

This studio recording finds Kaufmann and Pappano reunited after their 2017 staged run at Covent Garden—the tenor’s first Otello. It’s an elegant performance: Pappano follows the letter of the score with great attention to detail, drawing magnificent playing from his Roman orchestra, with lyricism the defining quality. Kaufmann’s Otello matches his conductor’s approach and his baritonal tenor easily embraces the full range of this formidable role. It’s a well-thought-out performance that gives much pleasure. Federica Lombardi’s Desdemona develops convincingly throughout the opera and truly touches the heart. Carlos Álvarez makes Iago an introspective schemer. Well worth your attention.