Mary Stuart (Complete Opera in English)

'Dame Janet Baker's mastery of acting with vocal colour and intensity, not histrionics, ensure that… Queen Mary is both moving victim and formidable rival.'
Classic FM Magazine

'This was a role which suited her vocal timbre and personality admirably, and that warm, unique voice was in superb condition. How fortunate we are to have this live recording made at one of the performances.'
BBC Music Magazine

'Here are Janet Baker and Rosalind Plowright firing on all cylinders as the rival queens of Scotland and England… Charles Mackerras is the superb conductor; would that he had given us more Donizetti while at the Coliseum.'
The Times




Dame Janet Baker made her last appearances with English National Opera in this production and this disc, featuring scenes from that celebrated production, demonstrates her to be at the height of her dramatic and vocal powers.

These days Donizetti's setting of Schiller's treatment of the life and death of Mary Queen of Scots is one of his most admired scores, but its genesis was beset by misfortune. During the dress rehearsal, in September 1834, held before a specially invited audience, Queen Maria Cristina fainted and had to be carried back to the palace. The following day, despite the fact that the opera had earlier been passed by the censors, the King of Naples gave orders to suspend any further performances of this opera, which ends with the execution of a monarch. Donizetti therefore adapted the music to a new, less politically inflammatory libretto, Buondel-monte, for its premiere in Naples in October 1834.

Donizetti had not lost faith in his original, and a performance of Mary Stuart took place in Milan in December 1835 (beyond the jurisdiction of the King of Naples). Donizetti was to conduct the premiere but the first scheduled performance was cancelled due to Maria Malibran (Mary) being indisposed. Malibran sang on the second night but she was still out of voice and as a result the work was poorly received. Subsequent performances fared better, but the opera then fell foul of the censors once more. No longer could Mary denounce Elizabeth as the bastard daughter of Anne Boleyn, nor could she kneel in the scene in which Talbot hears her final confession. Malibran refused to accept these changes and thereafter, on four further evenings, only the first act of Mary Stuart was given, in which Malibran did not appear.

For all the bad luck that dogged its early years Mary Stuart has become one of Donizetti's most frequently revived operas, a renewed interest in bel canto opera revealing it to be one of the composer's most persuasive and dramatic scores.

The release of Chandos' complete Mary Stuart received excellent reviews:

'Dame Janet Baker's mastery of acting with vocal colour and intensity, not histrionics, ensure that… Queen Mary is both moving victim and formidable rival.'
Classic FM Magazine

'This was a role which suited her vocal timbre and personality admirably, and that warm, unique voice was in superb condition. How fortunate we are to have this live recording made at one of the performances.'
BBC Music Magazine

'Here are Janet Baker and Rosalind Plowright firing on all cylinders as the rival queens of Scotland and England… Charles Mackerras is the superb conductor; would that he had given us more Donizetti while at the Coliseum.'
The Times