Gershwin – Porgy and Bess / White · Haymon · Blackwell · Baker · LPO · Sir Simon Rattle

An uncut Porgy & Bess may well be too long in the theater. On CD, though, you can play one act at a time, letting Gershwin’s wide-eyed, inexhaustibly inventive score run its course at leisure in the comforts of your rumpus room. Some listeners might find Sir Simon Rattle’s tempos on the draggy side, but he’s got Gershwin’s syncopated idiom down cold. Similarly, the singers fuse Gershwin’s prodigious musical demands with effortless, characterful diction more succesfully than in other recordings, abetted by engineering that is both atmospheric and richly detailed. Full texts and excellent annotations round off this stellar achievement based on the highly acclaimed 1989 Glyndebourne Opera production. –Jed Distler