Il Grande Inquisitor

1. Theo Adam & Gerhard Frei (in German, second half only)
2. Raphael Arië & Mark Elyn (in French)
3. Boris Christoff & Glynne Howell
4. Boris Christoff & Manfred Schenk
5. Xavier Depraz & Jacques Mars (in French)
6. Ezio Flagello & Ramón Vinay
7. Nicolae Florei & Valentin Loghin, with Vasile Moldoveanu
   Who'd have thought that two largely unknown Romanians would outdo all those Ghiaurovs and Christoffs and Rossi-Lemenis?
   Nicolae Florei
   
8. Gottlob Frick & Kurt Böhme (in German)
9. Ferruccio Furlanetto & Louis Lebherz
   
   Louis Lebherz
   
10. Nikolai Ghiaurov & Gheorghe Crăsnaru
11. Nikolai Ghiaurov & Giovanni Foiani
12. Nikolai Ghiaurov & Nicola Ghiuselev
    At age 36 and 30, respectively.
13. Nikolai Ghiaurov & Pavel Manolov (in Bulgarian, as far as Manolov is concerned)
14. Nikolai Ghiaurov & Ruggero Raimondi
15. Nikolai Ghiaurov & Luigi Roni
16. Georg Hann & Walter Großmann (in German)
17. Craig Hart & Jerome Hines
    Jerome Hines in his last appearance. He is 80 years old and needs a cane to walk. Craig Hart is one of his students and a baritone.
18. Jerome Hines & Hans Hotter
    
19. Jerome Hines & Nicola Moscona
20. Jerome Hines & William Wildermann
21. Aleksandr Kipnis & Alfred Jerger (in German)
    This is particularly interesting since the most famous couple in this duet was Kipnis and Ludwig Hofmann, who used to alternate in both roles at the Berlin Staatsoper. Both combinations seem to have been great, the one with Kipnis as Filippo and Hofmann as the Inquisitor obviously the greater of the two.
    Evidently, Hofmann's rendition of neither role has been captured by any recording; but by Kipnis, we have at least this fragmentary version where he is Filippo (combined from two actual Vienna Staatsoper performances of December 1936 and January 1937, respectively). Jerger is clearly no Hofmann, but not bad as a substitute either. The fame of those legendary Berlin performances holds true, Kipnis is certainly the best Filippo I've ever heard in this scene.
    Very unfortunately, the end of the duet wasn't obviously recorded in either of the two performances and is thus missing.
22. Jacques Mars & Marc Vento (in French)
23. Arnold van Mill & Rolf Kühne (in German)
24. James Morris with himself
25. Alois Pernerstorfer & Alexander Welitsch (in German)
    Vienna Volksoper 1944
26. Dimiter Petkov & Giovanni Foiani
27. Ivan Petrov & Valerij Jaroslavtsev, with Nikolaj Zakharov (in Russian)
28. Paul Plishka & Gabor Andrasy (in French)
29. Paul Plishka & Jerome Hines
30. Nicola Rossi-Lemeni & Romeo Morisani
31. Nicola Rossi-Lemeni & Giulio Neri, with Manfredi Ponz de Leon
32. Nicola Rossi-Lemeni & Antonio Zerbini
33. Matti Salminen & Paata Burchuladze
    Unfortunately, the sound is noisy due to a flawed microphone.
34. Pierre Savignol & Randolph Symonette (in French)
35. Cesare Siepi & Jerome Hines
36. Cesare Siepi & Giulio Neri
37. Cesare Siepi & Tancredi Pasero
38. Thomas Silverbörg (end only)
39. Harald Stamm & William Dooley, with explanation by conductor Gerd Albrecht (partly in German)
    
    William Dooley and Harald Stamm
    
40. Martti Talvela & Harald Stamm
    
    Harald Stamm
    
41. Richard Van Allan & John Tranter (in English)
42. Ivo Vinco & Giovanni Foiani
    
    Ivo Vinco
    
43. Frangiskos Voutsinos & Jacques Mars
44. Tadeusz Wierzbicki & Christian Portanier (in Dutch)
45. Alfredo Zanazzo & Victor von Halem
    
    Victor von Halem

I wish to thank Claude Ribou for the Mars/Vento, Petkov/Foiani, Savignol/Symonette and Voutsinos/Mars recordings.

I wish to thank Joseph Shore for the Hart/Hines recording.

I wish to thank Tom Silverbörg for his own as well as the Ghiaurov/Ghiuselev recording.

I wish to thank Helmut Krautschneider for the Salminen/Burchuladze recording.

I wish to thank Daniele Godor for the Talvela/Stamm recording.