Decca Classics will release a newly restored edition of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly on 25 July 2025, to mark fifty years since its first appearance in 1975. The new edition will be issued on vinyl and hybrid SACD, featuring high-definition transfers from the original master tapes.
This release forms part of Decca’s Pavarotti–Puccini series, commemorating the 100th anniversary of Puccini’s death in 1924. This follows the successful 2024 reissue of La bohème, also conducted by Herbert von Karajan, and featuring Mirella Freni and Luciano Pavarotti.
Madama Butterfly was recorded in 1975 by Decca in Vienna with the Vienna Philharmonic and the Wiener Staatsoper under Karajan. It brought together three of the most admired opera figures of the time: conductor Herbert von Karajan, tenor Luciano Pavarotti, and soprano Mirella Freni. They had previously worked together on La bohème in 1972. Pavarotti and Freni, lifelong friends and frequent artistic partners, brought an unmatched vocal chemistry to the recording.
Pavarotti’s Pinkerton was a role he sang only briefly on stage, yet this recording has become one of his most recognised interpretations. It was part of a series of Puccini roles he recorded for Decca, including La bohème, Manon Lescaut, and Tosca. In each case, he was joined by Freni and supported by some of the finest orchestras and conductors of the time.
This is the first new release of the recording on vinyl since the 1980s, and the first time it appears on hybrid SACD. Both formats feature 24-bit audio, transferred from the original 1975 master tapes at 192 kHz resolution.
Each edition is presented in a limited cloth-covered slipcase with a hardback book. The book includes a feature-length essay by opera writer Roger Pines, a specially commissioned article on Mirella Freni, and a personal reflection by tenor Freddie De Tommaso on Puccini, Pavarotti, and Madama Butterfly. It also contains facsimiles from the original 1975 booklet, including the complete libretto in Italian, English and German, as well as contemporary and newly unearthed photographs.
A 1920s-style Madama Butterfly poster is also included.