The golden age for recordings of Mozart's operas was the '50s and '60s. Even Così fan tutte, the last and least popular of his collaborations with librettist Lorenzo da Ponte, received two superlative sets:
Karajan and the
Philharmonia's stylish 1954 EMI recording with
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf,
Nan Merriman,
Rolando Panerai,
Léopold Simoneau,
Sesto Bruscantini, and Lisa Otto and
Karl Böhm and the
Philharmonia's classic 1962 EMI recording with
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf,
Christa Ludwig,
Alfredo Kraus,
Giuseppe Taddei,
Walter Berry, and Hanny Steffek.
The same year as EMI's
Böhm/
Philharmonia recording, Deutsche Grammophon released this set with
Eugen Jochum leading the
Berliner Philharmoniker and the RIAS-Kammerchor with
Irmgard Seefried,
Nan Merriman,
Hermann Prey,
Ernst Haefliger,
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, and
Erika Köth. Unfortunately, while there are many, many fine things about this performance --
Seefried's Fiorgiligi is achingly beautiful,
Prey's Guglielmo is believably naïve, the
Berlin Philharmonic is effortlessly elegant, and
Jochum himself is a master of Mozart's unique balance of the mundane and the sublime -- there are some less than fine things --
Merriman is not quite creditable as Dorabella,
Haefliger is a bit too sweet as Ferrando, and
Fischer-Dieskau is oddly bland as Don Alfonso. In sum, while every listener needs to hear the 1962
Böhm and most listeners need to hear the 1954
Karajan, unless they are deeply devoted to the work, not every listener needs to hear this 1962
Jochum. DG's stereo sound was clear, cool, and crisp in its day, and it sounds as good as ever in this digital remastering.