Puccini: Madama Butterfly Caballé, Martí, Gatto LP 1977

Act2: 00.55.05 Act 3: 01.47.44
This 1977 LP set doesn’t appear to have made it on to CD, but it is Montserrat Caballe’s only studio recording of the title role. The rest of the casting may not be on Caballe’s level, and the original set has side breaks in some odd places, but she is quite wonderful. To quote Edward Greenfield in Opera on Record (1979): “From first to last, Caballe pours out a stream of ravishingly beautiful tone and consistently shows herself able to a remarkable degree to get inside the character… The little-girl exchanges in Act 1 have a delicacy matched only by De Los Angeles… and there is no lack of power when the child-bride emerges as a fully tragic character.