I'm so delighted you chose this recording! I bought it over a year ago, when it became available in the UK, just for Jessye Norman. In fact it was Oct 2021! I have the Edinburgh festival DVD from the 80s where she sings the Mezzo role. I was dying to hear her take the soprano part and this speaks to her fabulous range when she was in her prime. The quartet on the whole are fantastic and Muti's conducting is thrilling!

Dear David. Many thanks for your latest video. I can see how this release could well end up being one of the reference recordings, if not the reference recording of the Verdi Requiem. Like you said, there isn't a weak link with the soloists. A year or two ago, I bought Muti's Warner box set after viewing your mostly positive review on its release, so thanks for that as well. As an aside, I spent the day shelving up the last two year's cd purchases after watching you painstakingly organising your overflow room. Believe me it's so much more fun watching you do that and hearing your remarks on each recording than doing it myself!

YES; this is indeed the new reference recording!!

Looking forward to this! It's a dream cast, yes. And Jessye Norman sang the Requiem also for Abbado, but the mezzo part.

What an excellent idea for a series, Dave. Time and again I’m struck by some past reference recording (of whatever genre) simply being obviously outclassed by something more recent to the point where going with the 1960s-80s consensus might be a mistake. Things like the Beaux Arts Schubert or Ravel trios or Giulini’s (again) Don Giovanni. Only trouble is, and I’m fascinated by consensus formation too, whether we can identify new references and whether we should (I’m rather enjoying the proliferation of excellent new versions of things since the supposed crisis in the industry in the late 90s!) I’m thinking of the expression “postwar consensus” that was used in a general way in the wealthier countries, and which is no longer with us. Maybe this applied to consensus formation around “ reference recordings” too - I’m thinking of your Dvorak 9 video also here.

Maestro Muti is returning to Philadelphia to perform the Verdi Requiem this coming October. Looking forward to it.

For me hands down the greatest performance recorded of the Verdi Requiem. Jessye Norman is a goddess in the soprano role.

My favourite part of the Verdi Requiem is the Santus with the brilliant trumpets intro and beautiful choral voices

This, in fact, may be the recording of a truly reference performance but it is NOT readily available on any of the streaming services (which is a HUGE negative) and it is not easy to obtain the physical CD. So, as you were quick to point out, its availability is a real problem to its becoming a new reference recording.

How about Old Reference Recordings? Just wondering. Toscanini's 1940 Verdi Requiem perhaps?

Ah yes I have that one, I love it

This is indeed a magnificent recording, warmer and more lyrical than I had feared. It passes at least one test for a reference recording, namely that anyone who only wanted a single recording of the Verdi Requiem would be thoroughly well-served by it. Alas, I fear a 40-year old radio recording on a small label, involving variously retired and deceased soloists, is unlikely to attain the notoriety it deserves. It will be more of a connoisseur's choice. I suspect Pappano's acclaimed Warner performance with its fine soloists and status as one of the Last Great Studio Recordings, will become the new gold standard for the critic and general listener.

This was issued in 2021, so a consensus ought to be possible!

Speaking of the availability problem as relates to potential consensus building: this recording is not available on any streaming services. I got the CD when I first heard the reviews, and agree with everything said here, but it’s surprising to me that this wouldn’t be more widely available.

The soprano on his Chicago recordng is Frittoli. I do enjoy both that performance and this new release as well. Talk about a night where everything went right. Wow. The other performance that would be in contention for a modern reference of this Requiem (that hasn't been mentioned) is the Abbado EMI recording from Berlin w/ Alagna and Gheorghiu. She's absolutely one of the best sopranos in modern memory to sing the Libera Me, and it's by far Abbado's best performance of the work and worth being considered since he's the other great Verdi conductor from the 70's till his passing. As far as other modern reference recordings go, will the Honneck/Pittsburgh recordings get covered all at once? Or will they go one by one? My conservative estimate is 4 with the Eroica, Bruckner 4, Bruckner 9, and Tchaik 5 but the Brahms 4 and Mahler 3 on Exton could certainly make the cut as well.

Very interesting post. But one question comes to mind: Is availability really still a problem in the age of the Internet? Everything will remain available online forever. Or do you see permanent availability as a palpable product (CD, Vinyl) as independent criterion?

Dave, I'm curious if David Oistrakh and Franz Konwitschny with the Dresdener Staatskapelle, a mono Deutsche Grammophon recording from 1954, is still the reference for the Brahms and Tchaikovsky violin concertos? Or are there new reference recordings? When I started collecting CDs in the eighties, I was really amazed that this was the recording to go for. Thank you Dave for your answer.

This is off topic for Requirm, but about “new” references. I’ve seen Manfred Honeck’s Titan spoken of on boards as deserving of being a new reference recording. Dave do you agree? Or our group do you agree?

Spelling. When the first Shostakovich symphonies came out in the West in the 1930s (thanks to Stokowski) this is how they spelled his name: SZOSTAKOWICZ. Was RCA trying to disguise that he was of them there Bolsheviks and that he was really Polish?

Are you able to offer affiliate links to discs mentioned? Inane no idea how that works, but have searched for and a bought quite a lot of recordings based on your recommendations. If we could do something, however small to generate revenue, it would seemingly be no issue. Ignore, if this has been discussed and/ or too much hassle.

My first thought when it comes to new reference recordings is Igor Levit’s complete Beethoven Piano Sonatas. His attention to detail of the score while having clarity of sound and sonority, even in the bits where he chooses to be more brazen is truly remarkable. Do you think this cycle has been in circulation and ingrained into the discography long enough to be considered a reference?

"Objective reality"??? Dave, you are wonderful. You are a lone warrior against the decaying stench of post-modernism / post-truth.