Puccini: Turandot (Recorded 1955)

Also available on Blu-ray

PUCCINI Turandot • Giuliano Carella, cond; Maria Guleghina ( Turandot ); Salvatore Licitra ( Calaf ); Tamar Iveri ( Liù ); Luiz-Ottavio Faria ( Timur ); Carlo Bosi ( Emperor ); Leonardo Lòpez Linares ( Ping ); Saverio Fiore ( Pang) ; Gianluca Bocchino ( Pong ); Arena di Verona O & Ch • BELAIR BAC 066 (DVD: 128:00); BAC 466 (Blu-ray: 128: 00) Live: Verona 2010

Turandot was Giacomo Puccini’s last opera and one he did not live to finish. He “laid down his pen,” as the expression goes, for the last time after he had finished the music for the death of Liù and the solemn procession during her ritual removal from the stage. Unfortunately for the composer who eventually finished the work, Franco Alfano, Puccini left more than the unfinished manuscript; he left an untenable dramatic situation as well. With the death of Liù there remains a clueless tenor who has apparently been fatuously pursuing the wrong girl all along, and a cruel, unlikeable dramatic soprano, Turandot. These two are finally to come together as a couple and the audience must feel that a celebratory resolution of the opera’s emotional impetus is occurring with this union. Sorry, it just doesn’t happen. Alfano wrote approximately 14 more minutes of pretty good music, certainly nothing that would embarrass Puccini, much of it based on the older composer’s extensive notes, but he could not dispel the anticlimactic pall of this final bit. One or two other composers have rewritten the completion in the decades since, but have fared no better, I’m not at all sure Puccini could have saved the bacon either had he lived longer. So we are left with a congenitally weak conclusion for the opera, but it is a work that contains much superior material elsewhere as well. The aria “Nessun dorma” alone is a small Puccini miracle and rivals or surpasses anything else he wrote for the tenor voice.

This production from the Arena di Verona is a quite traditional one and uses the standard Alfano ending. As I have said in previous reviews, this particular outdoor venue demands spectacular sets and special effects to make up for the less than ideal acoustics and the distance from audience to stage. It gets plenty of glitz and glitter here with a new celebratory production from that master showman, the Cecil B. DeMille of his day, Franco Zeffirelli. The Arena, Turandot, and Zeffirelli are a near-perfect match, and the Italian stage director vindicates the confidence shown in him with this splendid new production. The new sets are ornate, sumptuously colorful, detailed, and properly large. The production employs a large chorus and many extras, all meticulously dressed, to attend and pay homage at Turandot’s father’s impressive Imperial Palace. We get many close-ups, and the crowd in general is doing more natural things than in some other Zeffirelli efforts. I must admit to a guilty secret: I am a closet Zeffirelli fan. His work is always a visual feast even when it may be drawing attention away from the drama and the singing. I’ll take my chances.

This production was to prove somewhat of a swan song for tenor Salvatore Licitra, at least on video. Licitra was to die almost exactly a year later in a motor scooter accident in Sicily, apparently brought on by a cerebral hemorrhage. It is an unfortunate loss to the artistic community when any artist dies prematurely, but particularly so in the already thin ranks of premier operatic tenors. Licitra sings quite well here as Calaf; he even encores “Nessun dorma,” once a big no-no in Italian opera houses. In my estimation Licitra is the pick of the cast, but fails to bring the last ounce of thrilling vocalism that would rank him alongside a Corelli or a Pavarotti in the role. Dramatic soprano Maria Guleghina has begun competing with herself in recordings of Turandot, much like Eva Marton did back in the ’80s and ’90 s (and stage designer/director Zeffirelli is doing as well). This is Guleghina’s third video performance in the role, and there are quite a few audio recordings of her Turandot as well. Here she is in quite good voice and sings cleanly, if a little passionlessly. Her big voice at times has a steely edge, much like Birgit Nilsson in the role, but then much of Turandot’s music is not meant to charm. The Liù of Tamar Iveri is a bit more problematic. She has a heavy vibrato that distracts from the vocal line, and her tone turns edgy when she pushes in her top range. Beginning back with Anna Moffo and even earlier, the singing of Liù has been of a generally high standard in the recorded history of the opera, so to come up a bit short here is unexpected. Luiz-Ottavio Faria as Timur sings solidly, as do the Ping, Pang, and Pong, especially the baritone Ping of Leonardo Lòpez Linares, who acquits himself with distinction. The sound on video from the Arena orchestra is really much better than it has any right to be, as I have noted before. And the chorus sounds very good as well, thanks to the miracles of modern sound reproduction. Thomas Edison would be amazed.

There has been a plethora of videos of Turandot (though not so many as for some other Puccini operas), but not one has really separated itself from the pack as a clear first choice. The Levine set with Eva Marton and Plácido Domingo has been highly praised over the years and also features a Zeffirelli production, but suffers from 25-year-old video and audio technology. The Gergiev set on TDK offers the novelty of the Luciano Berio ending in place of the Alfano, but the cast is quite pedestrian. An earlier set from the Arena features Ghena Dimitrova and Nicola Martinucci. This one is better, in fact as good a choice as any, and has quite the best cast of singers of the three Guleghina sets.

The booklet contains a synopsis in Italian, English, German, and French. Audio formats are PCM stereo and Dolby 5.1 surround. Subtitles are in all major European languages, no Korean, but Japanese. There are no extras with the opera but it is available in both DVD and Blu-Ray formats. I would recommend the latter if you have the equipment; this production is a visual tour de force and the high-resolution picture is like watching it in a theater. Recommended.

FANFARE: Bill White

Also available on Blu-ray

With Rosario La Spina cast as Calaf, Susan Foster as the icy princess and Hyeseoung Kwon as the loyal slave girl Liù, the singing throughout is superlative. The choreography and direction of Graeme Murphy is visionary, add the set and costume designs of Kristian Fredrikson, and the lighting of John Drummond Montgomery and this production is glorious in its beauty.

Giacomo Puccini
TURANDOT

Turandot – Susan Foster
Calaf – Rosario La Spina
Liù – Hyeseoung Kwon
Timur – Jud Arthur
A Mandarin – Shane Lowrencev
Ping – Andrew Moran
Pong – David Corcoran
Pang – Graeme Macfarlane
Altoum – Benjamin Rasheed

Opera Australia Children’s Chorus
(chorus preparation: Anthony Hunt)
Opera Australia Chorus
(chorus master: Michael Black)
Orchestra Victoria
Andrea Licata, conductor

Graeme Murphy, stage director, choreographer
Kristian Fredrikson, set and costume designer
John Drummond Montgomery, lighting designer

Recorded live at the Arts Centre Melbourne, on 20 and 25 April 2012
Bonus:
- Cast gallery

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: LPCM Stereo / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Korean
Booklet notes: English, French, German
Running time: 124 mins
No. of DVDs: 1 (DVD 9)

PUCCINI: MANON LESCAUT MAAZEL

Susan Foster sings the role of the cruel daughter of the Chinese emperor who demands her suitors correctly answer three riddles, on pain of death, in this Opera Australia production of Puccini's masterpiece. A fabulous production directed and choreographed by Graeme Murphy with a strong cast headed by Australia's answer to Pavarotti, Rosario La Spina.

When Il trittico premiered at New York's Metropolitan Opera in December 1918, Gianni Schicchi became an immediate hit. The libretto is based on an incident mentioned in Dante's Divine Comedy. The action in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi takes place in Buoso Donati’s bedroom in 13th-century Florence, immediately after his death, as his greedy relatives feign grief and search for his will. The mood shifts to anger when the relatives discover that they have been disinherited. They seek out the clever and resourceful Schicchi to make a counterfeit will. Schicchi, however, turns their scheme against them, bequeathing most of the dead man’s fortune to himself while the relatives, all parties to the crime of forgery, are forced to sit by silently. The aria O mio babbino caro is one of Puccini's most popular arias for soprano. Bruno de Simone plays the character of Gianni Schicchi. As Italy's finest basso buffo, he is perfect for this role. Puccini completed the score on 20 April, 1918, eight months before the scheduled premiere. At that performance it was presented as the third part of a trilogy of newly written one-act operas by Puccini billed as Il trittico (The Triptych); the first two were Il tabarro (The Cloak) and Suor Angelica (Sister Angelica). Il tabarro was a dark tragedy and Suor Angelica a sweet one, so by closing with Gianni Schicchi Puccini rounded off the night with a high-spirited comic farce. Critical reaction at the time judged that Gianni Schicchi was “an uproarious delight”, and it was the most favorably received of the three.

Also available on Blu-ray

Premiered in 1900 with huge success, Puccini’s “melodramma” Tosca is a political thriller with a heart-breaking love story. With his gripping opening scene, stage director Michael Sturminger sets the tone for a cinematic, richly detailed Tosca which is set in the Mafiosi world of modern day Rome and which is “the perfect thriller … reminiscent of Scorsese’s ‘Goodfellas’” (Kleine Zeitung), a “film noir” (FAZ). In this production soprano Anja Harteros is “a phenomenal Tosca!” (Kurier), “unparalleled in the world” (Der Standard) and Aleksandrs Antonenko is “a Cavaradossi of superlatives” (Kieler Nachrichten). The Staatskapelle Dresden under Christian Thielemann „show again that he is not only a master of German repertoire but also strikes the right note in Italian repertoire.“ (Focus)

Born out of a great orchestral tradition, the Streichquartett der Staatskapelle Berlin began its life in 2017, on the judicious advice of Daniel Barenboim. Since then the four string section leaders of the famed Staatskapelle Berlin have been performing on many of the world’s most famous stages. Building on its familiarity with the world of opera, the quartet’s first album highlights three operatic heavyweights. Verdi’s string quartet, his only surviving chamber music work, was composed in 1873 while the composer was at the height of his creative powers. Although written in a matter of weeks, it is a piece replete with beautiful melodies and idiomatic writing. Composed two years earlier, Tchaikovsky’s first string quartet harks back to Schubert and Beethoven and embraces their ideals of beauty and perfect form. Taking its inspiration from the chrysanthemum flowers associated with Italian funeral ceremonies, Puccini’s Crisantemi, dedicated to the memory of Amadeo I of Spain, completes the trio of works.

The Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and conductor Carlo Montanaro present a powerful interpretation of Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca, together with a cast of soloists including Melody Moore (Tosca), Stefan Pop (Cavaradossi) and Lester Lynch (Scarpia). Tosca has been an audience favourite from the onset. Premiered in 1900, it marks the beginning of twentieth- century opera, in which sex, violence and the uncanny abysses of the human psyche would be explored, inspiring composers to expand the musical means of expression in all thinkable ways. Until today, Tosca has lost little of its expressive power, and Puccini’s intricate score deserves to be taken seriously. Its symphonic qualities are fully brought out by the inspired playing of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, led by the seasoned maestro Carlo Montanaro.

Melody Moore, Stefan Pop and Lester Lynch bring the passionate, electrifying score to life with performances of dazzling power. The splendid cast is completed by Kevin Short (Angelotti), Alexander Köpeczi (Un Sagrestano), Colin Judson (Spoletta), Georg Streuber (Sciarrone), Axel Scheidig (Un Carceriere), and Lean Miray Yüksel (Un Pastore). The members of Rundfunkchor Berlin and Kinderchor der Deutschen Oper Berlin add their marvelous choral sound to the recording, culminating in the famous Te Deum. Melody Moore and Lester Lynch both have a vast Pentatone discography, including complete opera recordings as well as solo recitals. The Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin also has a long history with the label, having recorded multiple orchestral works, as well as Wagner’s ten mature operas, often in collaboration with the Rundfunkchor Berlin. Stefan Pop makes his Pentatone debut.

It is an event that attracts thousands of music lovers to Verona every summer: the opera season in the ancient Roman Arena. Nearly 22,000 spectators regularly fill the amphitheater for the performances. The Arena di Verona honours Italian stage director and filmmaker Franco Zeffirelli and his legendary production of Turandot. His imposing cinematographic production reproduces imperial China thanks to it's impressive scenery and scenes, enriched by the sumptuous costumes of the Oscar-winning Japanese costume designer EMI Wada. Everything helps to highlight the atmosphere of the drama of enigma per excellence, where life itself is in danger and the answer lies in love, which melts the protagonist's icy heart. "Netrebko does not merely sing it: she interprets it. What emerges is a character much more human and ultimately truer than usual" (La Stampa)

It is an event that attracts thousands of music lovers to Verona every summer: the opera season in the ancient Roman Arena. Nearly 22,000 spectators regularly fill the amphitheater for the performances. The Arena di Verona honours Italian stage director and filmmaker Franco Zeffirelli and his legendary production of Turandot. His imposing cinematographic production reproduces imperial China thanks to it's impressive scenery and scenes, enriched by the sumptuous costumes of the Oscar-winning Japanese costume designer EMI Wada. Everything helps to highlight the atmosphere of the drama of enigma per excellence, where life itself is in danger and the answer lies in love, which melts the protagonist's icy heart. "Netrebko does not merely sing it: she interprets it. What emerges is a character much more human and ultimately truer than usual" (La Stampa)

It is an event that attracts thousands of music lovers to Verona every summer: the opera season in the ancient Roman Arena. Nearly 22,000 spectators regularly fill the amphitheater for the performances. The dream couple of opera, Sonya Yoncheva and Vittorio Grigolo, returns to the breathtaking open-air stage, to perform Giacomo Puccini's Tosca. Bulgarian soprano Sonya Yoncheva is "one of the best Toscas currently singing" and Vittorio Grigolo "the most Italian Cavaradossi we know. With lots of wonderful melting, elegant and nonchalant full of triumphant greatness a triumph all along the line" (Online Merker). The captivating staging by Argentine director Hugo de Ana, who masterfully exploits the amphitheatre's vast space by placing huge elements on the stage that are reminiscent of or borrowed from the locations of the action, makes the opera a "spectacle of monumental opulence" (Online Merker). "A Tosca to relish!" (Artesnews. It) "standing ovation Tosca at the Arena di Verona" (Operalife).

It is an event that attracts thousands of music lovers to Verona every summer: the opera season in the ancient Roman Arena. Nearly 22,000 spectators regularly fill the amphitheater for the performances. The dream couple of opera, Sonya Yoncheva and Vittorio Grigolo, returns to the breathtaking open-air stage, to perform Giacomo Puccini's Tosca. Bulgarian soprano Sonya Yoncheva is "one of the best Toscas currently singing" and Vittorio Grigolo "the most Italian Cavaradossi we know. With lots of wonderful melting, elegant and nonchalant full of triumphant greatness a triumph all along the line" (Online Merker). The captivating staging by Argentine director Hugo de Ana, who masterfully exploits the amphitheatre's vast space by placing huge elements on the stage that are reminiscent of or borrowed from the locations of the action, makes the opera a "spectacle of monumental opulence" (Online Merker). "A Tosca to relish!" (Artesnews. It) "standing ovation Tosca at the Arena di Verona" (Operalife).

This new production of Tosca from Maggio Musicale Fiorentino is set in the late 1920s. Puccini's 'Roman Opera' sees a city bathed in majesty but also curdled by eroticism and sadism, where sartorial elegance and pathological violence co-exist. Taking visual clues from Bernardo Bertolucci's cinematic masterpiece, Il conformista, the cast is led by the passionate Vanessa Goikoetxea and features the magnetic Alexey Markov in the role of Scarpia. Daniele Gatti directs a performance praised for it's 'courageous and surprising' impact.

Tosca is a melodrama of love, betrayal and death set in the revolutionary unrest of 1800. The story concerns the opera singer Floria Tosca who tries to save her lover, the painter Mario Cavaradossi, from the brutal chief of police, Scarpia. Through-composed and expertly orchestrated it contains some of Puccini’s best-known lyrical arias and remains one of his most performed operas. In this 2022 production, an eminent cast is directed by the acclaimed Australian director Barrie Kosky – ‘the Amsterdam audience was completely swept off its feet by Kosky’s stunning production’ (Opera News).

Puccini is renowned as one of the greatest opera composers of all time, and his early works - before Manon Lescaut catapulted him to international fame - offer a fascinating insight into his development as a composer. John Wilson and Sinfonia of London explore this repertoire with characteristic style and commitment, leading us on a journey through student compositions and orchestral extracts from his earliest operas. Studying under Amilcare Ponchielli at the Milan Conservatory from 1880 to 1883, he created the Preludio sinfonico (loosely based on Wagner's Prelude to Lohengrin), the Scherzo, Trio, and Adagetto, and Capriccio sinfonico, his graduation piece, which famously pre-echoes the opening of La boh�me by a decade. The one-act opera Le villi was composed for a competition launched by the publisher Sonzogno (Puccini didn't win), whilst themes from the contemporaneous Tre minuetti and Crisantemi (both for string quartet) were subsequently re-cycled in Manon Lescaut. Verdi's publisher, Ricordi, bought the rights to Le villi, and commissioned a new work at the same time: Edgar, which, largely owing to the absurd plot, is arguably Puccini's only failure, despite some fully mature music easily the match of the more celebrated scores.

This new production of Tosca from Maggio Musicale Fiorentino is set in the late 1920s. Puccini's 'Roman Opera' sees a city bathed in majesty but also curdled by eroticism and sadism, where sartorial elegance and pathological violence co-exist. Taking visual clues from Bernardo Bertolucci's cinematic masterpiece, Il conformista, the cast is led by the passionate Vanessa Goikoetxea and features the magnetic Alexey Markov in the role of Scarpia. Daniele Gatti directs a performance praised for it's 'courageous and surprising' impact.

Giacomo Puccini achieved global renown as an opera composer, but the choral, vocal and orchestral works recorded here reveal little-known aspects of his output, including several rarities. Puccini's early training was in church music, with the Messa di Gloria a clear indication of his great talent. The recently discovered Preludio a orchestra shows his wider ambitions, with the Germanic influences of the Capriccio sinfonico resulting in music destined to reappear in operas such as La Boheme. The elegiac and prescient aria Ad una morta contrasts with the celebratory Inno a Roma, a rousing occasional piece that features plenty of Puccini's characteristic melodic flourishes. A digital EP of the Preludio sinfonico and the Requiem is also available for download and streaming (9.70398)

Hans-Christoph Rademann presents sacred vocal works from the pens of two of the most important Italian opera composers. The occasion and time of composition could not be more different. Puccini's so-called Messa di Gloria is an ambitious, large-scale youthful work that was composed for the annual festival of the patron saint of his home town of Lucca. The Quattro pezzi sacri, on the other hand, are Verdi's mature works, composed over a period of ten years and not originally intended for publication by the composer.

Set in the artistic but impoverished milieu of early 19th-century Paris, the tragic love of the poet Rodolfo and seamstress Mimì is one of the most affecting in all opera. La Bohème’s arias are also some of the most intensely passionate Puccini ever wrote, making it is one of the best-loved of all his works. In what Opera News called a ‘thorough rethinking and brilliant re-creation’ this exceptional Oslo production, strongly cast and conducted, and staged by internationally acclaimed director Stefan Herheim, explores the work as never before to create what The New York Times called an ‘ultimately haunting’ experience.

Review

The impressive cast includes Diego Torre as Rodolfo and the luscious-voiced Marita Sølberg, acting and singing beautifully as Mimi…This is a bold, innovative and thought-provoking production that challenges more conventional interpretations of Puccini’s best-loved opera.

--New Classics

Anyone who hears about Giacomo Puccini today is instinctively led to think of his most famous operatic compositions. However, not everyone knows that his production during his Milanese training years, which ended in 1883, was exclusively instrumental. The pieces included in this album belong to this artistic challenge, except for Crisantemi, which came later and will contribute with its two main themes to the last act of Manon Lescaut (1893).

Signum Classics is proud to present Romanian-born soprano Angela Gheorghiu’s first album on the Grammy award winning label. Described as “the world’s most glamorous and gifted opera star” (New York Sun), Ms. Gheorghiu’s magnificent voice and dazzling stage presence have established her as a unique international opera superstar.

Her new album, released to mark the anniversary of celebrated composer Giacomo Puccini, brings together a collection of well-known arias and songs spanning many years of his career. The album features a World Premiere Recording of the recently rediscovered aria “Melanconia”, which is most probably from 1883 and not 1881 as previously thought. Other notable works on the recording are “Salve Regina” from Le villi, “Storiella d’amore” as well as the title track “A te,” composed by Puccini at just 16 years old.

In Puccini’s anniversary year, Chief Conductor of Welsh National Opera Carlo Rizzi has created new, purely orchestral versions of some of his most well-known and beloved works. Staying pure and faithful to Puccini’s original orchestration without anything added to ‘cover’ any perceivable lack of vocal line the brilliance of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, Tosca and other works shine through in this album of world premiere recordings.

REVIEW:

This fabulous album of world premiere recordings is just exhilarating from start to finish. I do hope that by the end of the year Maestro Rizzi will give us other orchestral suites, say, from La bohème or Turandot. I am sure they will be welcomed most enthusiastically.

This is an irresistible programme full of shimmering melodies that help us to really discover Puccini’s orchestral mastery which is often overshadowed by the singing and heartwrenching drama of the stories. This exceptionally innovative music that strongly enhances the total mastery of Puccini’s art is not to be missed.

-- Classical Music Daily

Less is more: true to this motto, nine orchestra musicians who were friends founded the Ensemble Minui in 2016. Active in renowned orchestras such as the Carinthian Symphony Orchestra, the Slovenian National Opera, and the Vienna State Opera, they devote themselves here to exquisite minimalism with elegance and sophistication. Homogeneous and balanced, the five string players and four wind players offer previously unheard, sonically differentiated perspectives on large-scale operas such as Wagner's Die Walk�re, Puccini's Manon Lescaut, and Strauss's Die Frau ohne Schatten.

Among Puccini's great operas, Madama Butterfly is the one that had reference recordings relatively later. Among them, the first to represent the most modern and innovative side of the composer was this stereo recording from 1957 edited by Richard Moore for the American RCA. It is indisputable that the fundamental interpretative approach was that of a great non-Italian conductor such as Erich Leinsdorf, who would later record all of Puccini's most important operas. Leinsdorf's interpretative modernity was magnificently assisted by the participation of a lyric soprano like Anna Moffo and an impeccable tenor like Cesare Valletti. After many years, and also thanks to the splendid quality of the recording, the production of Butterfly remains among those of absolute reference.