Manuel Barrueco / Plácido Domingo RODRIGO Concierto de Aranjuez - Fantasia para un Gentilhombre

This CD contains the umpteenth recordings of the Concierto de Aranjuez and Fantasia para an gentilhombre, of which there are already so many versions that the nomination of an all-time best defies my humble capacities. Suffice it to say that these are amongst the very best and, if these works are absent from your collection then [this] will serve you very well. Barrueco and [David] Russell are members of the guitar's top-drawer elite - giving performances of crystalline clarity - and they are both excellently supported by their orchestras... Barrueco adds two solos, neither one yet dulled by overfamiliarity. The Zarabanda lejana, Rodrigo's first solo work for the guitar, is given with the utmost expressivity, and Un tiempo rue Italica famosa, a tribute to the history of a once-famous Roman city near Seville, is delivered with panache; rapid passages in Rodrigo's guitar works are almost invariably scales, here (and elsewhere) appropriately testifying to the influence of flamenco.
Barrueco has one more trump card to play - his partnership with Plácido Domingo in four songs, selected from those for which Rodrigo himself has made adaptations for the guitar of the original piano accompaniments (the texts are given in four languages). Their coming together was no public relations exercise, for both are longstanding devotees of Rodrigo's music, and it shows. The partnership extends through the whole of this recording, in which Domingo also conducts the orchestra, an exercise in which both parties demonstrate their happy meeting of minds. (Gramophone)