Gounod: Faust

Studer, Mahé Leech, Van Dam, Hampson; French Army Chorus, Capitole de Toulouse, Plasson. EMI
CDS7-544228-2 (3)

Cheryl Studer creates a Marguerite of vulnerability and haunting tenderness. Her youthful, clear soprano has agility and warmth, and though it is a little lighter in timbre than Freni's in the excellent 1979 recording with Domingo, it meets all the demands of the role, from innocence and excitability to despair. Happily, Richard Leech reaches similar heights. The resilience and thrust of his tenor project a Faust of heroic cast, and he is no less intense, no less vivid than Domingo in the earlier EMI release, though here too the voice is somewhat lighter and brighter than his predecessor's. José van Dam's Méphistophélés, slightly husky in sound, is suitably sinister without hamming up the part. Thomas Hampson's Valentin musters plenty of anger in his rejection of Marguerite, and Martine Mahé is an ardent Siebel. Both the Wagner of Marc Berrard and the Marthe of Nadine Denize are well handled. So too are the chorus and orchestra under Michel Plasson, who keeps the proceedings in fine, sharp focus.

The set also includes, as an appendix, four excised numbers found in American editions of the score in the Bibliothéque Nationale, recorded for the first time -- a trio for Faust, Siebel and Wagner; a duo for Marguerite and Valentin; a chanson for
Méphistophélés; and a one-minute scene for Siebel, Marthe and Méphistophélés.

- SHIRLEY FLEMING