I don’t know who has laid down the definitive best recording of Verdi’s opera “Otello” – not because I have failed to listen to them all in my thirty years on this Earth, but because there are several top contenders. This one, surprisingly, only barely makes the cut for the top five. It does, of course, on the strength of Kiri Te Kanawa and Placido Domingo in the title roles.

Here is “Gia Della Notte Densa” by Domingo and Te Kanawa performed at the Royal Opera, under the excellent baton of Georg Solti:

 

I defy anyone to name a better performance of this particular duet.

And I’m sorry, but not all arts are equal. Dissenters and critics are free to call me out and accuse me of snobbery on my Comments or Contacts pages; but if you took Miley Cyrus’ twerking antics at the VMAs, multiplied it by a million and plated it in gold, you would have, at most, a hundredth of this performance.