Aida

The five recordings of complete Verdi operas issued in the 1950s by the small American company Remington Records are among the finest of the 12 complete opera recordings in the company’s catalogue: Un ballo in maschera (with Giorgios Kokolios, Giuliana Dezi, Guido Mazzini, conductor: Marini), two versions of La Traviata (with Schimenti, Arrigo Pola, Walter Monachesi, conductor: Luigi Ricci, as well as Rosetta Noli, Giuseppe Campora, Carlo Tagliabue, conductor: Umberto Berrettoni), Rigoletto (Ivan Petroff, Orlandina Orlandini, Gino Sarri, conductor: Erasmo Ghiglia – re-released as Preiser 200017) and finally Aida (Remington R-199-178/3). The recording date of 1955 usually given for this Aida is certainly incorrect, because the original record box says “Copyright 1953”, meaning that the recording was probably made a year earlier, in 1952. This makes it one of the earliest complete Aida recordings of the LP era alongside the one produced by Cetra in 1951 (conductor: Gui, with Mancini, Filippeschi, Simionato, Panerai) and that of Decca in 1952 (conductor: Erede, with Tebaldi, del Monaco, Stignani, Protti).