A uniquely authentic recording of this much-loved ballet, tremendous value at budget price.

Manuel Rosenthal was 92 when he made this recording – his third – of Gaîté Parisienne, his ballet for Massine that had produced such a storm of applause in Monte Carlo back in 1938.
He made very clear why he was anxious to do so: not only had there been poor recordings, cut versions and mauled arrangements of his score by others, but in his own previous recordings he had felt obliged to accommodate the dancers' wishes as regards tempos, and now he wanted to treat his work symphonically, with more spacious speeds that would enable details of the orchestration to emerge fully for the first time.
So we can now accept this 45-minute version as authentic, and the more deliberate pace adopted in some places (beautifully and expressively so in the Barcarolle) in no way diminishes the brilliant impact of his treatment of Offenbach's heady tunes. The Monte Carlo orchestra, long familiar with the work, give their all to the aged maestro, with voluptuous string playing in lyrical sections; and the recording is exceptionally vivid.
But the real joy of this disc is Offenbachiana, music drawn from a handful of the stage works arranged by Rosenthal while forced to kick his heels in Berlin for a fortnight owing to a recording equipment breakdown in 1953. This is a subtler, wittier and, if anything, even more scintillating score. Absolutely not to be missed!