GREAT COMEDY OVERTURES (BLU-RAY AUDIO) - ROYAL SCOTTISH NATIONAL ORCHESTRA; FRIEDEL

Great Comedy Overtures

Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Lance Friedel

Adam: Si j'étais roi - Overture
Auber: Fra Diavolo Overture
Cimarosa: Il matrimonio segreto: Overture
Cornelius: Der Barbier von Baghdad: Overture
Flotow: Overture to Martha
Hérold: Zampa - Overture
Lortzing: Zar und Zimmermann: Overture
Reznicek: Donna Diana Overture
Thomas, Ambroise: Mignon Overture
Wolf-Ferrari: Il segreto di Susanna Overture

The flourishing genre of the comic opera had its roots in eighteenth-century Italian opera buffa, whose irrepressible brio was soon taken up outside the country’s borders. In France it produced opéra comique and operetta, and in German-speaking countries Spieloper and Viennese operetta. Some of the world’s most popular comic opera overtures, filled with gorgeous tunes, brilliant orchestration and race-to-the-finish endings, are presented here. They include staples of the concert repertoire such as Hérold’s dramatic Zampa, the textual delicacy of Wolf-Ferrari’s Il segreto di Susanna and the vivid colour of Lortzing’s Zar und Zimmermann.