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Picture Format: 1080i High Definition
Sound Format: PCM Stereo / DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Region Code: 0 (All Region)
Duration: 141 minutes
Language: French
Subtitles: English French, Spanish
Filmed: at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia Valencia February, 2007

Cyrano – Plácido Domingo
Roxane – Sondra Radvanovsky
Christian – Arturo Chacón-Cruz
De Guiche – Rod Gilfry
Ragueneau – Corrado Carmelo Caruso
De Valvert – Roberto Accurso
Carbon – Javier Franco
La Duègne / Sister Marthe – Itxaro Mentxaka
Le Bret – Nahuel di Pierro
Lise / A Nun – Silvia Vázquez
Lignière – Miguel Sola
The Musketeer – Juan José Navarro

Valencia Regional Government Choir (Cor de la Generalitat Valenciana) Valencian Community Orchestra (Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana)
Patrick Fournillier, conductor
Michal Znaniecki, stage director and stage designer
Isabelle Comte, costume design

R E V I E W:

A rare post-verismo Italian opera gets an excellent performance in convincing sets and costumes.

Alfano? I hear you ask, yet with a slight wrinkle of the brow as if somewhere in the distant memory bank there is a file. Rightly so, at least for any opera enthusiast. Alfano is mainly remembered as the man eventually chosen by the publisher, Ricordi, and Toscanini, the resident conductor at La Scala, to complete Puccini’s Turandot. It will be remembered that at the composer’s death part of the last act remained unscored.

Born near Naples, Alfano completed his first opera, still unpublished, in 1896. He had difficulty in getting later works performed in Italy, finding more success abroad. Ricordi supported his opera Risurrezione, based on Tolstoy; it was successful in Turin in 1905. It was very much in the Puccinian style and reached over one thousand performances. Later operas were only modestly received. He took up teaching at the Liceo Musicale in Bologna becoming director in 1916. It was from the Liceo that he presented his successful Sakuntala. This was an opera in a completely different idiom the orientalism of which must have been influential in Ricordi’s decision that Alfano was the man to complete Turandot. The completed Turandot, was presented at La Scala in April 1926. Alfano’s completion was abbreviated by Toscanini and in its shortened form involves around fifteen minutes of music.

Alfano wrote several orchestral works. His opera Madonna Imperia reached the Metropolitan Opera, New York in 1928, a year after its premiere. By this time his work was more influenced by the likes of Richard Strauss and Debussy rather than having its own particular distinctive patina.

Alfano took up the story of Cyrano de Bergerac as the basis for an opera in 1933. Founded on the novel by Edmond Rostand the opera was premiered in Rome in January 1936 under the baton of Tulio Serafin. It was performed in Paris in May that year in the French translation that is used in this performance. Like other artists in Italy in that inter-war period, Alfano was forced to become associated with the Fascist regime. This has tended to sully his reputation somewhat.

Cyrano de Bergerac tells the story of the proboscally challenged Cyrano. He is infatuated with Roxanne, who is also loved by Christian. Cyrano has the heroic skills as a swordsman and fighter denied to his rival. More importantly, he is also a skilful poet, well able to express his love for a woman. After various battles and duels Cyrano meets Roxanne only to discover she is in love with the young and handsome Christian. Resigned to the fact that his own disfigurement makes him unacceptable to Roxanne, Cyrano realises his own inspirational eloquence and poetry are what Christian needs and determines to help him become Roxanne’s perfect suitor. He reads with ardour his own poetry below her balcony as Christian stands by, giving the impression that it is his. Cyrano agonizes as she declares her love for the young man who climbs to the balcony and embraces her (Chs. 13-15).

Unbeknown to Christian, Cyrano writes other ardent letters in his name that are smuggled across the lines during the battle of Arras where Christian is killed. For many years Cyrano keeps this information secret so as not to sully Christian’s name. He then meets Roxanne, now in a convent. Cyrano has been mortally wounded as Roxanne asks him to read what she believes to be Christian’s last letter. Cyrano does so and she at last realises the truth. Cyrano dies as Roxanne declared her love for him despite his nose (Ch. 26).

After languishing in neglect for many years, Alfano’s Cyrano was seen in a production at Montpellier in 2003 with Roberto Alagna in the title role. This has appeared on DVD. Plàcido Domingo took up the role, as his one hundred and twenty first, and a production was mounted at the Metropolitan Opera, New York in May 2005, by Francesca Zambello with designs by Peter J Davidson. This production has since transferred to Covent Garden where it was seen in May 2006 and onwards to La Scala. It should have been the basis of these performances celebrating the new theatre Reina Sofia, in Valencia whose impressive, futuristic, exterior is seen in the introduction (Ch. 1). It seems there were problems with a collapse of part of the theatre stage-machinery required for the sets. The upshot was a new, simpler but affective staging by Michail Zananiecki. Its main focus is a central rotunda with steps and openings through which entrances and activities take place. His staging may not be as spectacular as reports of the Zambello production indicate, but like his direction, aided by drapes and lighting, it is effective. My only question is as to the relevance of what appear to be acrobats descending on ropes and drapes from time to time. The costumes are in period.

Above anything else what Cyrano de Bergerac needs beyond even an accomplished production and sets, are two committed and affecting singing actors in the title role and that of Roxanne. As far as the eponymous role is concerned it has an outstanding protagonist in Plàcido Domingo. His acting is fully integrated into his singing to add a further histrionic portrayal to his many others. The tessitura of the music suits his now baritonal tenor perfectly, with no demanding high Cs or the like and plenty of opportunity for dramatic involvement. His portrayal of the death of Cyrano, after hearing Roxanne’s true thoughts (Ch. 26), is as powerfully sung as his well known reading of the death of Otello in act four of Verdi’s opera. In this histrionic tour de force Domingo is aided, as in the Verdi, by the composer’s music. This ending, in the manner of its portrayal and its poignancy, reminded me also of the death of Boris in Mussorgsky’s opera. As Roxanne, Sondra Radvanovsky matches Domingo in dramatic involvement - no mean feat. Her lustrous soprano is warm and vibrant and allied to her vocal and dramatic capacity it is an instrument to savour. Radvanovsky lacks some clarity of diction to convince me that she is a major force in the operatic firmament. Her outburst of love to Christian (Ch. 20) is delivered via powerful and committed singing of a high order.

Cyrano de Bergerac also depends on a cluster of lesser parts the most important of which, along with Christian, is De Guiche. This vital role is sung with strong even tones and dramatic involvement (Ch. 17) by North American baritone Rodney Gilfry; not ‘Rod’ as the booklet refers to him, I must note. In the cameo role of Ragueneau, Corrado Carmelo Caruso’s well tuned bass is a virtue. The Christian of Arturo Chacón Cruz lacks the qualities of persona and vitality that could be seen as appropriate to that of the role. I rather doubt that Cruz had anything better to offer being unpoetic not only in his acting and inflections but also in his singing.

-- Robert J Farr, MusicWeb International Reviewing DVD version

With 'Rio Abajo', Venezuelan singer and percussionist Rebecca Roger Cruz bares her soul, unveiling a debut solo album that lies at the confluence of everything that defines her. Birdsong, poetic incantations, baroque orchestrations, magnetic textures, percussive trance... 'Rio Abajo' is an album deeply rooted in the elements and the spirits of the living world. Born in Caracas, Rebecca Roger Cruz grew up in a country where music-spanning from the Atlantic coast to the plains, from lush rainforests to Andean peaks-reflects the exceptional richness of a human and cultural melting pot at the crossroads of the Caribbean, Latin America, Africa, and Europe. Yet it was the classics of psychedelic rock and symphonic metal that electrified her as a teenager! This passion led her to study classical singing and early music. A precocious talent, she joined the prestigious Camerata Barroca de Caracas as a soprano at the age of just 17. For the 10 tracks of 'Rio Abajo', Rebecca brought together a close-knit ensemble who together summon seeds, strings, and bamboo into a percussive trance - repertoire from beyond-worlds and deeply connected to the elements and spirits of the living earth.

GÁL Cello Concerto. ELGAR Cello Concerto • Antonio Meneses (vc); Claudio Cruz, cond; Northern Sinf • AVIE 2237 (61:48)

Receiving two very fine recordings of my favorite cello concerto, the Elgar, two issues in a row (see Fanfare 36:1 for review of Paul Watkins’s Chandos release) is enough treat in itself. But the real news here is the first-ever recording of Hans Gál’s Cello Concerto, composed in 1944 under very trying circumstances.

It’s not surprising, I suppose, that the booklet cover that displays through the jewel case’s front window lists the Elgar first, no doubt a lure based on name recognition. But it’s the Gál that comes first on the disc and is so confirmed by the booklet’s backplate that displays through the rear window.

Hans Gál (1890–1987) lived a long life but one filled with tragedy for a good part of it. An Austrian Jew, he was caught up in the Nazi vise, believing he’d be safe back in Austria after being dismissed from his post as director of the Mainz Conservatory in Germany. But the Anschluss soon brought Hitler’s storm troopers to Austria to round up and deport the Jews there as well. Gál and his immediate family were able to escape to the U.K. in 1938 before they were conveyed to a concentration camp, but trouble followed them across the Channel.

At first, Gál’s prospects brightened. Francis Donald Tovey invited him to Edinburgh to work as an archivist cataloging the Reid Music Library. But when Tovey was suddenly incapacitated by a stroke, Gál returned to London just in time for the outbreak of the war. Citing national security concerns, the Brits began rounding up German and Austrian nationals and sequestering them in detention camps. Gál was caught up in the sweeps and found himself interned in a camp on the Isle of Man, perversely incarcerated side by side with those from whom he’d fled. Upon his release four months later, he returned to Edinburgh. But by now, Hitler’s death camps, mostly in Poland, were working overtime, and members of Gál’s extended family who were still in Germany were at grave risk.

Gál’s mother, thankfully for her, died on her own in 1942, but in Weimar his sister and an aunt took their own lives to avoid deportation to Auschwitz, and that same year, Gál’s youngest son, Peter, who was physically out of harm’s way with the family in Edinburgh, committed suicide at the age of 18. Gál remained in Edinburgh where he was appointed lecturer at the city’s university, founded the Edinburgh Festival, and was eventually awarded the Order of the British Empire. He was also honored by the nations that would almost certainly have killed him had he remained. His cantata De Profundis was premiered in Wiesbaden, and he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Mainz and the Literis et Artibus medal by Austria.

Gál’s Cello Concerto is a work purely of the heart and soul, for no commission or even remote prospect of performance prompted it. Six years would pass before the work was first heard at a concert by the Göteborg Orchestra in 1950 with cellist Guido Vecchi playing the solo part.

Despite its 1944 date of composition, the concerto is as romantic a score as anyone could have made to order. Considering the circumstances under which it was written, it’s not as dark a work as Elgar’s World War I Cello Concerto. There are passages, however, of lament and exquisite, soaring lyrical beauty, and from time to time an exotic Middle Eastern element in the music comes to the surface that distantly echoes Bloch’s Schelomo and Voice in the Wilderness. The solo part in Gál’s concerto requires a good deal of virtuosic skill, but the work is not what you would call a virtuoso showpiece. For much of the score’s first two movements, the cello plays an almost obbligato role, dialoging with instruments in the orchestra in a pretty much equal engagement. It’s not until the concluding movement, in which the cello has an extended and technically challenging cadenza, that the writing highlights the soloist in a more traditional virtuoso concerto role.

This is a most magnificent addition to the cello repertoire, a work that, in my opinion, deserves to take its place beside the Schumann, Dvo?ák, and Elgar concertos as one of the cello’s great repertoire works. Antonio Meneses, unquestionably one of the instrument’s great players on the world stage, performs Gál’s concerto with breathtaking sweep.

Elgar’s Cello Concerto is well known and has been covered extensively in these pages. Therefore, I will restrict myself to telling you that Meneses’s deeply penetrating, intensely passionate, throbbing reading, supported by some of the most sympathetic orchestral playing from Claudio Cruz and the Northern Sinfonia I’ve heard in this score, goes straight to my 2012 Want List without passing GO.

This is an absolutely must-have disc, assuredly for the Gál, but also for one of the most beautiful performances of the Elgar you may ever hear.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Following the critical acclaim of The Talisman (SCCD 31955), alto saxophonist Dave Pietro returns with The Butterfly Effect, his second release on SteepleChase—a label that has become a vital platform for his richly inventive voice. A veteran of ensembles led by Maria Schneider, Toshiko Akiyoshi, and Gil Evans, Pietro continues to command attention as a composer and bandleader whose work is both intellectually rigorous and emotionally resonant. Returning collaborators include pianist Gary Versace, whose kaleidoscopic soloing adds depth and color, and bassist Jay Anderson, whose expressive lines anchor the group with elegance. Trumpeter Scott Wendholt and drummer Adam Cruz round out the lineup, each contributing dynamic performances that elevate Pietro’s compositions. His writing is marked by intricate counterpoint, unexpected harmonic shifts, and a deep sensitivity to ensemble interplay. Pietro’s music balances complexity with clarity. The Butterfly Effect is more than a follow-up—it’s a statement of artistic evolution. Where The Talisman introduced Pietro’s voice to a broader audience, this new release deepens the narrative, offering a compelling blend of lyrical beauty, structural sophistication, and improvisational fire. “Pietro has great chops and a profound imagination, and possesses a warm, accessible, lyrical sound...” ( Lee Lowenfish - New York Jazz Newsletter)