For those who like their mezzo sopranos intelligent and passionate with a virtuoso technique, a melting tone, a firm top, a strong middle, and a solid bottom, here's American mezzo
Regina Resnik in a collection of most of her best-known roles. She makes a feisty and frisky Carmen; a sweet and sexy
Verdi's heroine; a very convincing man as Orlovsky in
Strauss' Die Fledermaus; a slightly sensous Zo-Zo in
Léhar's Merry Widow; a big, bad broad as Lalume in Kismet; a heartrending
Tchaikovsky heroine in Pique Dame and Maid of Orleans; a restrained and constrained Brangane in Tristan und Isolde; a monstrously furious Fricka in Die Walküre; and a monstrously decadent Clyamnestra in Elektra. Although recorded between 1960 and 1977, Decca's sound is uniformly warm and round. And although the accompanists range from
Mantovani to
von Karajan, they all seem uniformly dedicated to making
Resnik sound good.