No-one could really say that Meyerbeer's Le Prophète boasts an ample discography: two recordings with Marilyn Horne, one in 1970 alongside Gedda, the other in 1976 with a different distributor — both directed by Harry Lewis, and both available on Qobuz of course — but apart from that, and a few isolated airs that can be dug up here or there, it is a total desert. What a tragedy! So let's raise a hearty cheer for this new recording from Giuliano Carella, who leads the Essen Philharmonic. And regardless of the oblivion that the score fell into in the late 19th century, it was an unlikely international hit in the decades after its first outing in 1849, gracing all the biggest stages of Europe (600 performances in Paris, 300 in Berlin, 180 in Vienna, 150 in London, etc.), North America, South America, Oceania, Russia... It was performed at state occasions; a thousand composers took the themes as the basis for their own fantasias, variations, paraphrases and whatever took their fancy. And then Wagner and Verdi flooded the market: and even if both bore a heavy debt to Meyerbeer, the work was eclipsed and never really resurfaced. And yet: what orchestral richness, what dramatic and lyrical imagination! For the coronation scene, the composer brought eighteen saxhorns onto the stage; endless timbales, percussion in every corner, and scene after scene, Meyerbeer invents shed loads of truly Berliozian orchestral effects: a deluge of special sound effects worthy of a Hollywood studio. Note also that the recording was made at a public concert. © SM/Qobuz