Yuri Simonov - Mikhail Glinka: Ruslan and Lyudmila (1996)

The sprightly, familiar overture, taken by conductor Yuri Simonov at an amazing pace, sets the tone for this "magic opera in five acts." Not really so much an opera as a pageant--Glinka composed it in fragments and then put them all together, which doesn't do much for dramatic unity--and hindered by an inept libretto, it still has many beautiful moments. This is a remastered edition of a 1979 recording by artists of the Bolshoi; unfortunately, Soviet sound--even cleaned-up Soviet sound--is always problematic at best. Most of the singing is by vocalists who sound as though they were perhaps beyond their best days, and while this set offers idiomatic performances, the Valery Gergiev version on Philips is a better bet overall. -- Sarah Bryan Miller