Search - Three Tenors of the Opera-Comi :: 3 Tenors of the Opera-Comique

Marston's mining of historical recordings of French operas and singers yields hordes of gold, and this CD taps the mother lode of the heyday of French tenors, the early 1920s. The real find is the melting beauty of Louis Cazette's light tenor voice. His sensuous head voice and glorious diction in the Manon arias and the way he caresses the words "cher Mignon" put you in another world of now-lost vocal virtues. Jean Marny, heard in five arias, sings with great textual sensitivity, coloring his voice in Werther's death scene to convey heartbreaking sadness and lending a lilting swing to the Mignon aria. Charles Friant, the best known of the trio, has six selections, displaying a voice with more muscle than his peers, used with flexibility and exquisite sensitivity albeit with a vibrato exaggerated by the acoustic recording process. As always, Marston's transfers make these ancient recordings come alive. Indispensable! --Dan Davis