For this Requiem, the Edinburgh Festival, rather unusually, cast three of the leading British performers of the day. The exception to this was the wonderful mezzo Olga Borodina. She was the sensation of the Kirov Opera's Mussorgsky season at the 1991 Festival and it was wonderful to hear her beautiful, silky-smooth voice once more. Not surprisingly, she was not heard in Scotland again, becoming a great favourite of audiences at the Met.
Jane Eaglen had just completed her sequence of roles with Scottish Opera with her superb Norma. Again, her base was moved to the USA and future visits to Scotland were infrequent. In 1993 her voice soared through all the role's challenges with ease, and her duetting with Borodina was one of the highlights.
The men had already worked together in a concert performance of Verdi's first opera, Oberto, in the Usher Hall. This was rather different and altogether more serious, but as with the early opera they were on majestic form.
Perhaps surprisingly, Carlo Rizzi was little known in Scotland. His British reputation rested on his work as principal conductor with Welsh National Opera, and rightly so. It was rewarding to find that his reputation as a Verdi conductor was entirely justified.
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