ARIAS OF ROSSINI, VERDI, BIZET AND GERSHWIN:...

ARIAS OF ROSSINI, VERDI, BIZET AND GERSHWIN: Lawrence Tibbett, baritone, with various orchestras. RCA 7808-2-RG. Tibbett is remembered today as a matinee idol who came to Hollywood via the Met, and whose long career was blemished at the end by severe vocal as well as alcoholic problems. In his prime, he was an artist of extraordinary energy, power and elegance, as these re-issues--spanning 1926 and 1939--attest.

Few Fords in “Falstaff” have sung the “Vengeance” aria with such luxurious point. Few Simon Boccanegras have sung the Recognition Scene with such arching pathos (Tibbett is complemented here by the radiant Rose Bampton). The prayer from Gruenberg’s “Emperor Jones” remains a historic memento.

Most impressive, however, and perhaps most surprising, is Tibbett’s Wagner: a grandiose yet extraordinarily sensitive performance of the “Abschied” from “Die Walkure,” ravishingly accompanied by Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra. This great American baritone never ventured Wotan in the opera house. He should have.