Cecilia Bartoli is one of the wonders of today’s classical music world. Blessed with a rich, warm voice and an innate sense of lyricism, she can essay any normal aria with ease. But Bartoli has more -- she is a coloratura virtuoso who tosses off the most difficult, intricate, rapid passages with wild abandon, making them sound like child’s play. Freed of any technical limitation, Bartoli can pay attention to the texts, and brings great insight and drama to any aria she sings. She can also venture where other singers dare not tread; this DVD contains worthy arias that are obscure only because most singers lack the chops to cut them.

Decca has finally ventured into the realm of DVD-Audio, and The Vivaldi Album presents a most accurate recording of Bartoli’s impressive voice. The chamber orchestra, placed behind her, emerges with great clarity. The plucked strings, harpsichord, and lute at the beginning of "Dite, Oimè" are magical. This delicate passage requires both high resolution and a noise floor of zero, and this disc provides both. The surrounds are used only for ambience -- there is no sense of the orchestra being wrapped around the listener -- but the rear reverb creates wonderful "you are there" presence.

There are a few extras: a badly reproduced photo gallery, a frame-by-frame (not continuous video) interview, a list of other albums by Bartoli, and production credits. Though these features are skimpy, the printed DVD booklet is reasonably complete, including full texts and wonderfully reproduced historic art and artist photos.

Following in the footsteps of other extended-jam bands such as Led Zeppelin and the Grateful Dead, Blues Traveler has survived tragedy to confidently emerge with their best album yet. This amiable set has fewer hard-edged rock influences and more blues inflections. Founder John Popper’s vocals and blues-perfect harmonica solos are still at the center, and that’s good news. The rest of the five-man band is filled out with virtuoso players, and the whole ensemble is tight as can be. The sound is impressive in not calling attention to itself as such. All of the instruments sound extremely natural, and there is an impressive sense of cohesive ensemble. The bass is very tight and clean, and all three front speakers create the vocals. There is some panning to the rear channels, but largely the attention is placed on the front soundstage.

Liszt composed this sprawling, two-movement Dante Symphony while writing the more famous Faust Symphony. Neither work is a "symphony" in the formal sense, but a large-scale symphonic poem that suggests a story in music. Dante was dedicated to one of Liszt’s great musical heroes (and his future son-in-law), Richard Wagner. Its story is that of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy -- of a soul’s progression from Hell to Heaven. The first movement, Inferno, is effectively bombastic in portraying the nether regions of Christian mythology. The second, Purgatorio, deals with the soul’s release from bondage, and contains quieter yet rapturous music that builds to a final climax that adds a chorus to the large orchestra.

The interpretation and playing are first-rate on both this work and the single-movement tone poem Tasso: lamento e trionfo, which fills out the disc. The articulation of rapid passages in both is outstanding, and the sound throughout is of demonstration caliber. The sound of the basses and cellos in the first movement of the Dante is as awesome as the playing. The front soundstage is wide and deep, each instrument clearly defined in its proper position on stage. The surround channels create the impression of a large concert hall with deep reverberation. The frequency range is singularly good, everything from the highest violin note to the lowest growl of basses and bass drum reproduced without a hitch. The higher resolution of the SACD layer gives a graphic sense of presence that the bit-challenged CD layer can’t quite reproduce. All in all, an outstanding release, and the best that conductor Leon Botstein has recorded for Telarc.