The first reviewer is correct. This album has some of my favorite voices that were singing when I first started to love opera. They are smoother with less vibrato than newer singers on stage today.

Let's see: Mozart. Puccini. Verdi. Bellini. Donizetti. Domingo. Renata Scotto. Covent Garden. With that list of names on display, anyone who appreciates classical music, and certainly anyone who enjoys opera, should be after these recordings if they don't already have them. In that regard, I find it puzzling that the average rating is a frankly pathetic 2.5 stars, after ratings by six separate users we're to believe. I usually prefer full recordings of operas myself but I admit I'm a neophyte as yet and this a good overview of some of the most beautiful and powerful arias in Italian opera. If you like opera, I think you'll enjoy these recordings (unless, perhaps, you more drawn to Wagnerian operas). I'm also doubting that anyone who doesn't like opera would buy and listen to this album. It's clearly not meant for you if you know you don't like opera. That's why the rating puzzles me: if you like opera, what's not to love, or at least like, here, and if you don't like opera, why are you here? If you want an overview of some Italian opera, ignore the low rating and go for it, as I did. Renata Scotto's performances on the selections from Madama Butterfly are transcendent. That recordings is definitely on my list. And I'm particularly an admirer of the works of both Mozart and Puccini, so with selections ranging from La Boheme to Figaro, it's quite interesting to hear how the different composers' styles operate in the operatic mode. I don't like all of the pieces equally and tend to prefer sopranos to male singing parts some of the time. But this is beautiful music, worth the five stars easily.