Latvian mezzo soprano Elina Garanca has a voice that's miraculously creamy yet smoky. The voice, by itself, can stand the comparison in this collection of mostly French Romantic arias.
These are for the most part lesser-known numbers, and Garanca makes them her own musically; she picks pieces that optimize her range, with its impressive power in the top mezzo registers.
In the pieces where it's sheer consistency and long-lasting energy that's called for, most of all the stops-out finale "Me voila seule, enfin," from Gounod's La Reine de Saba (a rare work outside of France), Garanca is impressive indeed. At times in the more emotionally subtle pieces, such as "Mon coeur s'ouvre a ta voix," from Saint-SaensSamson et Delila, she lacks the emotional involvement in the music that would keep her voice from seeming to be slightly too much of a good thing.
Nor are she and the Filarmonica del Teatro Comunale di Bologna well served by Deutsche Grammophon's engineers, who provide a colorless, washed-out sound. But there is no shortage of vocal aficionados for whom the voice itself is paramount, and they are definitely going to find a young singer to watch here: as she matures and the lower parts of her range take on new shades, the results could be spectacular.