This is an audio-only (i.e., with no video content) Blu-ray disc playable only on Blu-ray players.

R E V I E W: Up to now, the standard collection of Rossini overtures has been Neville Marriner’s correct but somewhat flat-footed series on Philips. This new project promises to improve on that set considerably. Christian Benda’s Prague Sinfonia has all of the discipline of Marriner’s ensemble, but with an extra sprightliness and vivacity—bright piccolo and wind sonorities plus crisp percussion—that the earlier set doesn’t match. There’s more sheer fun in the music making on this new release, a quality that’s fully in evidence and properly exploited, even in Rossini’s most serious music (The Siege of Corinth, for example).

The selection of works is well chosen for maximum variety. Ermione, one of Rossini’s most remarkable and undervalued masterpieces, has an overture featuring choral interjections that are extremely arresting. The Sinfonia in D ‘al Conventello’ is an early work that predates Rossini’s operatic career, but reveals much of the composer to come. Elisabetta, Regina d’Inghilterra uses the first version of what later became the overture to The Barber of Seville. The Siege of Corinth reveals the sophisticated composer of his last, Parisian period, although Rossini evidently borrowed some of this piece from his contemporary, Mayr.

The only possible criticism that I could level at these performances might be that in the more heavily scored works, such as La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie), the trombones could penetrate the texture with more sharpness; but this is a very small point in what otherwise is a wholly winning, very well engineered disc. I look forward eagerly to the rest of this cycle. It’s sounds like it may well become the series of choice.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com
Review of standard CD Version

L. ROSSI Cleopatra • David Crescenzi, cond; Dimitra Theodossiou ( Cleopatra ); Alessandro Liberatore ( Marco Antonio ); Sebastian Catana ( Diomede ); Paolo Pecchioli ( Ottavio Cesare ); Marchigiana PO/Ch • NAXOS 2.110279 (114:56) Live: Macerata 2008


The article on Lauro Rossi (1812–85) in Grove I was written by the late Julian Budden, who was regarded, rightly, as an expert on Verdi. But as Budden considered all other Italian opera composers during the latter half of the 19th century as engaged in frustrated attempts to escape conventionality, so he does Rossi. “As a creative artist,” we’re told, he “belonged to that generation of minor composers who achieved a certain individuality within the post Rossinian tradition, but whose talent was unable to survive the tradition’s collapse.” There are several matters to dispute here: the casual proscription of the life effort of an entire generation of Italian musicians; an evolutionary theory of music that sees traditions in decline based on the rise of a single composer, a century or more after the fact; and of course, the dismissal of Rossi as a minor talent. One great composer doesn’t render all their good contemporaries less worthy of notice. When Bongiovanni released an admittedly subpar but exciting performance of the comic Il domino nero (2328/29) in 2003, it was apparent that Rossi rated neither this dismissal, nor that the style he wrote in had “collapsed.”


Cleopatra is something else again. It was composed almost three decades after Il domino nero , in 1876, and owes far less to Donizetti than it does to Meyerbeer, Auber—and occasionally, mid-period Verdi. Rossi as the Milan Conservatory’s director had developed over the decades a reputation for open-minded acceptance of stylistic innovation, and despite what Budden writes, it’s apparent he was also capable of moving musically with the times in his own work. This isn’t to say that Cleopatra is a major find. Leaving aside obvious but unfair comparisons with Aida , Rossi’s opera sometimes fails to find enough musical tension, or to match its brilliant orchestral palette with content that is similarly inspired. Nor does the literary merit of his libretto sustain investigation. But the work’s best pages—the act III final ensemble, Cleopatra’s heartfelt act II aria—lack nothing for focus or drama. It has effective part-writing throughout, and attractive thematic material. Cleopatra was worth the revival, even in a production that only intermittently supports the work.


The production problems are in part a matter of money, as you’d expect. The costumes give every impression of being Norma hand-me-downs, with a lot of black robes and no Egyptian cultural motifs in sight. Similarly, Cleopatra ’s sets are a few platforms and a long set of stark stairs. If this were truly historical, we’d have to conclude the New Dynasty got its architecture and fashions courtesy of Walter Gropius. Pier Luigi Pizzi is responsible for both, and for the stage blocking, which is usually competent—save for the act I banquet scene that startlingly poses its chorus indolently about the stage while the music proclaims festive, energetic activity.


Two of the three main performances rise above all this. Dimitra Theodossiou sings with an intensity that recalls Gencer. Her voice is dark, and with more than a hint of a beat under pressure, but intonation is accurate, and her control allows for every intended effect to succeed, with the exception of a few attempts at floated tones that remain earthbound. Sebastian Catana’s dark, mellifluous baritone is notable for scoring its dramatic points without leaving the musical line. Among the principals, only Alessandro Liberatore disappoints, with a small lyric tenor that has clearly been pushed throughout its range for volume, resulting in the “blown” sound that often hits singers much later in their careers. David Crescenzi doesn’t lead from the pit; he follows, though competently. In all fairness, he isn’t assisted by the sound engineering, which recesses the orchestra. Rossi makes much of instrumental detail, and it’s admittedly difficult to hear well at times.


Nor does the camerawork help. It suffers from the fidgets—an unwillingness to hold a shot for more than two or three seconds—and an excessive use of close-ups, turning the visuals for many ensembles into a confused mess. The curious thing is that the video director uses diagonal shots of a given singer across the stage for artistic effect, but never once considers employing this to bring multiple cast members who are singing together into a coherent image.


I would be remiss if I didn’t note the negative aspects of this production. Despite these, I do recommend the purchase of Cleopatra to all fans of 19th-century Italian opera. If it lacks the sustained invention of Gomes and the dramatic innovations of Mercadante, it still has enough vitality to sustain a revival, and enough power to triumph despite that production’s limitations.


FANFARE: Barry Brenesal


Dates tell you an awful lot when it comes to opera. Take Lauro Rossi for example. Born two years after Verdi, he died two years before the premiere of the great Italian master’s Otello. His Cleopatra, based on an Egyptian theme, was premiered four and a half years after Verdi’s Aida, also based on an Egyptian theme. Although Rossi seems not to merit even a mention in Michael and Joyce Kennedy’s Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music (Fifth Edition, 2007), he was no operatic or composer ingénue. On the contrary, he was among those chosen by Verdi to compose a section of the proposed Messe per Rossini - in his case the Agnus Dei. It is also true that his name does not feature, along with seven others of the twelve chosen by Verdi for that composition, in the esoteric list of operatic composers found in the Opera Rara catalogue. This is perhaps forgivable as even the vastly experienced Pier Luigi Pizzi, director of this production, claimed not to have heard of him until this production! He should have done more home-work. I have a performance of Rossi’s comic opera Il Domino Nero recorded live with the Orchestra Filarmonica Marchigiana, the same as here, on 28 September 2001. Nor should Pizzi have been surprised given the name of the theatre where this performance of Cleopatra took place, rather than in the open-air arena normally the venue of the large-scale opera performances of the Sferisterio Festival (See reviews of Maria Stuarda, Macbeth and Norma from the 2007 Festival). Meanwhile, we should be grateful that Pizzi’s efforts at fund-raising saved the Festival, albeit with some changes of programme after the withdrawal of state funding; perhaps shadows of things to come nearer home in the UK.

Fortunately the essay in the accompanying leaflet is highly informative. Rossi premiered a shared composition at the San Carlo, Naples, in 1830 after which his compositions came thick and fast . On Donizetti’s recommendation he was offered an appointment at the Teatro Valle in Rome. His tenth opera was premiered at La Scala in 1834 indicating that Rossi composed at a similar pace to Donizetti and Rossini, as was necessary to earn a living in an era when the diva was paid more than the composer. After the failure of a commission for the great diva Maria Malibran in Naples in 1834, Rossi took his talents to North and South America where he was music director and organizer of several opera companies. After a return to Europe Rossi was not short of work, composing both comic and tragic operas. His comic opera Il Domino Nero, presented in Milan in 1849, was a great success. But when the security of an academic post was offered in Milan in 1850 he took it and his pace of composition lessened. Even so six of his works were a success during this period. He moved to Naples Music Conservatory in 1870, working there until 1878 during which time he wrote his penultimate work Cleopatra, and after which he retired to the musical town of Cremona.

Premiered at the Teatro Regio, Turin, on 5 March 1876, Rossi’s Cleopatra caught the public’s imagination. Whether or not Verdi’s Aïda premiered five years earlier influenced his composition, or its reception , is conjectural. Whilst the musical style lacks the bravura of Verdi’s creation it is composed with the dramatic situations well supported by the music, be that in aria, duet or ensemble. Despite the well-known nature of the love of Anthony, Antonio here, and the eponymous heroine, Rossi’s Cleopatra requires a clear and easily comprehensible production. In this respect none does that better than the vastly experienced Pier Luigi Pizzi, especially as - his norm these days - he also designs the sets and costumes. The costumes of the Roman contingent are very much in period with bare knees and togas for the men and long decorous red dresses for the women; the colour differentiating them from the white of the Egyptians. Cleopatra herself is dressed wholly in a black, somewhat voluminous dress. Her admirer, Diomede is also dressed in all black but with an ornament. The single set is very much standard Pizzi mainly comprising wide-stepped stairs with the odd black flat surface downstage where the eponymous heroine has some of her dramatic moments in clear focus.

I do not know which came first, the signing of Dimitra Theodossiou or the choice of opera. They certainly go well together. The work requires a big dramatic-voiced Cleopatra who can throw her voice and whole being into the portrayal. The downside of Dimitra Theodossiou in any repertoire of this type is an intrusive vibrato at dramatic climaxes. I would not wish to overstate this, as the impact is less than it might be. Her vocal contribution is significantly superior to that of her colleagues, most notably in Cleopatra’s act two-aria sequence starting with Lieto in raggio (Chs.9-11) as bereft in her palace Cleopatra yearns for Antonio. As her advisor and would-be suitor Diomede, Sebastian Catana, more bass than baritone, is among the best of a variable supporting cast (Chs.4, 5,12,13). The tenor Antonio, Alessandro Liberatore, is musical but lacks the required heft and clear ping to his voice (Chs.24-26). As Ottavio Cesare, who wishes Antonio to marry his sister in order that he can wage a successful war in the east, Paolo Pecchioli’s bass has more cover than clarity and the role loses some dramatic impact as a consequence (Chs.9, 28); one senses a good voice trying to escape. With her strong contraltoish tones Tiziana Carraro, as Cesare’s sister Ottavia, has too much dramatic impact than the role really calls for (Chs.16-18). David Crescenzi, the chorus master, conducts the performance. He stepped in at the very last minute and as a consequence the extant overture was not performed. Like the chorus he prepared, his achievement in Rossi’s little known opera is considerable.

The music itself falls somewhere between that of the Italian bel canto and the verismo composers. You will look in vain for the fibre and character of Verdi’s Aida, let alone of Otello. Nonetheless it is melodic and contains several dramatic confrontations and some notable scenes, including the thrilling ensemble that closes Act 3.

The DVD direction shows a little of the intimate theatre. During the opera itself not much is seen of the whole of the stage, the director focusing on close-ups or mid-shots. The sound and picture quality are good.

-- Robert J Farr, MusicWeb International

RIMSKY-KORSAKOV The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevronya • Vitaly Panfilov ( Prince Vsevolod ); Tatiana Monogarova ( Fevronya ); Mikhail Gubsky ( Grishka Kuterma ); Mikhail Kazakov ( Prince Yury ); Gevorg Hakobyan ( Fyodor Poyarok ); Marika Gulordava ( Page ); Valery Gilmanov ( Bedyay ); Alexander Naumenko ( Burunday ); Alexander Vedernikov, cond; Cagliari Th O & Ch • NAXOS 2.110277/78 (2 DVDs: 187:28) Live: Cagliari 5/2–4/2008


I wanted to see this video because, for many years, I’ve heard exorbitant praise from certain critics regarding Kitezh , yet in listening to the commercial recording conducted by Valery Gergiev I felt let down. The music seemed to me flat and characterless, lacking drama, development, and momentum. Surely, I said to myself, a good stage production would change my mind, as it did with Mussorgsky’s Khovanschina.


Yet opinions on The Invisible City of Kitezh (to abbreviate its title) are divided. Although many critics wax ecstatic over Rimsky-Korsakov’s magnificent orchestration for this work, few outside Russia are very impressed by the opera as a whole. It is an overlong, derivative grand opera in which two old tales of magic were welded together by librettist Vladimir Belsky, and finally presented intact in 1908. Even the first Russian audiences didn’t care much for it, finding it very old-fashioned in concept and musical style as well as overly rambling, though it is still periodically revived, mostly within Russia.


This production gives us a rare glimpse of the opera as performed in Italy. The audience reaction is not enthusiastic; on the contrary, when the applause comes at the ends of acts, it sounds like perhaps 80 to 100 people half-heartedly clapping.


One glance at the production tells you why. Although it is not Regietheater —the characters are, thankfully, clad in traditional-looking costumes—Eimuntas Nekro?ius’s idiotic staging has too much symbolism and too little that resembles reality. The first act, set in the “woods,” presents a stage littered with “wooden” structures, bird houses and the like. Get it? Woods. The presentation of Little Kitezh, where the maiden Fevronya is to marry Prince Vsevolod, is cluttered with giant, tinfoil-covered bell-like objects with people popping out of their tops. Get it? Bells. This kind of idiocy continues throughout a production of a work in which the music itself is also static and rarely wedded to the text. In act IV, scene 1, where Fevronya and Grishka are supposed to be wandering in the woods, what you see is a plain blue-tiled floor with two Erector-set structures in the background. Apparently, Nekro?ius ran out of birdhouses, but not to despair! When Grishka runs off into the woods and Fevronya is left alone, two giant, hideous bird creatures sneak out of the woods and behind her as she sleeps. Perhaps Nekro?ius has seen too many of the Alien movies. In the final scene, supposed to represent Kitezh triumphant, the stage is filled with objects that look like rocket silos.


Musically, many passages sound like leavings from Boris Godunov, and not good leavings at that, so even when the singers are excellent the plot crawls along. It is an opera more about characters who stand there and sing than about characters creating a musical drama. Compare, for instance, the first act to the similar situation in Verdi’s Don Carlo. A prince meets a beautiful woman in the woods, and they fall in love. Verdi miraculously manages to wed lovely music, some of it even memorable, to a flexible musical structure in which the orchestra comments on or moves the action. Rimsky-Korsakov creates a static structure wedded to pretty but undistinguished melodies that just toodle along, and do so for half an hour.


Moreover, the plot is remarkably dismal and depressing for a magic or fairy-tale opera. Everyone sings about death even before the Tartars invade Russia, and several characters die except Fevronya and the seedy drunkard Grishka Kuterma, who becomes a traitor, willing to turn Kitezh over to invading Tartars and finger Fevronya as the snitch just to save his own worthless hide. Prince Vsevolod goes off to battle for Kitezh, not to win it but to die in it. (I’m guessing he flunked military school.) He does so, but returns in the second half of act IV as a ghost, and at the end of the opera Fevronya marries the ghost. And you talk about overlong … each of the first two acts runs over a half hour, but each of the last two acts runs more than an hour apiece.


Getting to the performance, Tatiana Monogarova is simply magnificent as Fevronya, not only vocally but histrionically, which is important because this is a rare Russian opera in that the soprano dominates everything. Here is a woman who fully understands how to inhabit a role. You come to believe wholeheartedly in her character within the first five minutes she is onstage, and she holds you in her thrall to the end. As for her voice, it is a remarkably rich lyric soprano, close to spinto in power, exactly the kind of voice Rimsky wanted for this part. Her midrange, in fact, reminds me strongly of Mirella Freni at her best, only with more power. The top range is not as lovely as Freni’s, but it has its own interesting luster and more metal. Monogarova made her American debut as Lisa in Pique Dame in Houston in 2010, and also began singing Cio-Cio-San around the same time in Europe. She is signed with IMG, and I really do wish her well in what I hope will be a major career.


Vitaly Panfilov, as Prince Vsevolod, is neither an interesting actor nor a particularly fine singer. The voice is fluttery, dry, and percussive. He sings on pitch and phrases well, but that is all one can say of him. His stage presence registers somewhere between nil and mediocre. On the other hand, Mikhail Gubsky as the nefarious Grishka Kuterma is a superb stage actor, though his voice is strictly that of a good comprimario. Nevertheless, the world needs good comprimarios, and he is certainly one of them. His pathetic wheedling is completely believable.


A word of praise is also due Marika Gulordava in the somewhat thankless role of the Page. The Page is analogous to Cassandra in Les Troyens or the Simpleton in Boris, someone who warns of danger to come. Though her role is important it is not as long as either of the other two, yet Gulordava is simply stunning in her one big scene. Her voice is not as beautiful as Monogarova’s, but it has a laser-beam focus with a bright, perhaps over-brilliant top. As a musician and singing actress she is first-rate. I also hope for her to have a good career. Mikhail Kazakov, singing the role of Vesvolod’s father, Prince Yury, has a nice voice but an uneven flutter and a constricted low range, a real detriment for a Russian bass.


Alexander Vedernikov is a fine conductor who obviously loves and understands this music. He brings out all of the wonderful orchestral subtleties of the score and moves the opera about as well as can be expected under the circumstances. Indeed, his conducting here is finer for this particular work than Gergiev’s.


My copy of the DVD may have been defective, but all through the first two acts the video is out of synch with the audio, as if one were watching something in which the video was on a two-second tape delay. On the second DVD, most of it is in synch, yet there are still strange moments when the picture freezes for a couple of seconds, only to jump ahead and eventually catch up with the audio.


Thus there are good and bad points to be taken into consideration in approaching both the work and the performance, but if you are fond of Kitezh I would recommend this for the excellent acting of a handful of participants and the excellent singing of the two sopranos.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley


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THE LEGEND OF THE INVISIBLE CITY OF KITEZH AND THE MAIDEN FEVRONYA

Opera in 4 Acts. Sung in Russian
Libretto by Vladimir I. Belsky

Prince Yuri Vsevolodovich – Mikhail Kazakov
Hereditary prince Vsevolod Yuryevich – Vitaly Panfilov
Fevronya – Tatiana Monogarova
Grishka Kuterma – Mikhail Gubsky
Fyodor Poyarok – Gevorg Hakobyan
Page – Marika Gulordava
Two notables – Gianluca Floris, Marek Kalbus
Bedyay – Valery Gilmanov
Burunday – Alexander Naumenko

Orchestra e Coro del Teatro Lirico di Cagliari
(chorus master: Fulvio Fogliazza)
Alexander Vedernikov, conductor

Eimuntas Nekrošius, stage director
Marius Nekrošius, set designer
Nadezhda Gultiayeva, costume designer
Audrius Jankauskas, lighting designer

Recorded live from the Teatro Lirico di Cagliari, Sardinia, 2 and 4 May 2008

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM Stereo / Dolby Digital 5.0 / DTS 5.0
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: English
Running time: 187 mins
No. of DVDs: 2 (DVD 5 + DVD 9)

This Blu-ray Disc is only playable on Blu-ray Disc players and not compatible with standard DVD players.

Also available on standard DVD

The opera La campana sommersa (‘The Sunken Bell’) is Respighi’s operatic masterpiece. A symbolist drama on a supernatural theme, it is steeped in beauty, mystery and foreboding, and orchestrated with the Romantic opulence familiar from his sumptuous trilogy of Roman tone poems. Its triumph at the New York Metropolitan Opera in 1928 was repeated at La Scala, Milan, and this most recent production at the Teatro Lirico di Cagliari, world-renowned for its staging of rarities, was hailed for its ‘brilliant production’ and magnificent performances. Directed by Pier Francesco Maestrini, this production features a lineup of modern opera stars including Valentina Farcas, Maria Luigia Borsi, Agostina Smimmero, Angelo Villari, and more.

This is an audio-only (i.e., with no video content) Blu-ray disc playable only on Blu-ray players.

It is also available on standard CD.

Maurice Ravel’s Valses nobles et sentimentales present a vivid mixture of atmospheric impressionism, intense expression and modernist wit, his fascination with the waltz further explored in La valse, a mysterious evocation of a vanished imperial epoch. Heard here in an orchestration by Marius Constant, Gaspard de la nuit is Ravel’s response to the other-worldly poems of Aloysius Bertrand, and the dance suite Le tombeau de Couperin is a tribute to friends who fell in the war of 1914–18 as well as a great 18th-century musical forbear. ‘It is a delightful and assorted collection…presented in splendid performances by the Orchestre National de Lyon led by their music director, the venerable American conductor Leonard Slatkin.’

This is an audio-only (i.e., with no video content) Blu-ray disc playable only on Blu-ray players.

Also available on standard CD

RAVEL Alborada del gracioso. Pavane pour une infante défunte. Rapsodie espagnole. Pièce en forme de habanera. Shéhérazade: Ouverture de féerie. Menuet antique. Boléro • Leonard Slatkin, cond; Lyon Natl O • NAXOS 8.572887 (67:37); NAXOS NBD0030 (Blu-ray audio: 67:38)


In the last issue, I found myself enormously impressed by Slatkin’s Berlioz Symphonie fantastique , so when I received his latest CD labeled Ravel Orchestral Works 1, I was expecting him to do as right by one French composer as he did by another. That must sound pretty silly, I know, but in the event, Slatkin doesn’t disappoint. He now presides over a French orchestra, but to listen to these performances, you wouldn’t know that it wasn’t the Philharmonic of London, Berlin, or New York. That’s very high praise for both the Lyon National Orchestra and for what Slatkin has achieved with the ensemble in so short a time. But it doesn’t necessarily make his Ravel special or more desirable than that by other conductors and orchestras.


Unlike Debussy, whose orchestral output is fairly limited, Ravel actually wrote a good deal of original music for orchestra, but no small volume of it is bound up in his early vocal and choral works, and is therefore not usually included in complete collections of scores that are exclusively for orchestra. But then any collection of Ravel’s purely orchestral works, which were originally conceived for orchestra, are mainly ballet and choreographed scores that can be counted on the fingers of one hand, and only one of them is on this disc— Boléro . But what of the other famous pieces included here?


Alborada del gracioso is the fourth movement from Miroirs , originally a suite for solo piano. It and two other numbers from the five-movement suite were subsequently orchestrated by Ravel himself. Pavane pour une infante défunte is a student piece Ravel wrote for solo piano in 1899 while under the tutelage of Fauré at the Paris Conservatory. Ravel orchestrated the Pavane himself, but not until 1910. Rapsodie espagnole was originally composed as a piece for piano duet in 1907, then orchestrated a year later. Ravel probably projected this to be an orchestral work from the start, but wanted to take his time working out the orchestration. Pièce en forme de habanera is, and was, as far as Ravel was concerned, a wordless vocalise for voice and piano. It exists in a number of instrumental arrangements—the present one is adapted for violin—none of which is by Ravel. Shéhérazade: Ouverture de féerie , like the Rapsodie espagnole , was originally sketched for piano, but intended for orchestra. It was destined to become the overture to an opera by the same name which Ravel worked on in 1898 but never completed. Menuet antique is another piece composed for solo piano, this one in 1895. Ravel did get around to orchestrating it himself, but not until 1929. And finally, Boléro . This is the one piece on Volume 1 of Slatkin’s Ravel survey, which, as far as we know, went straight to its orchestral form without passing through a piano version. Interestingly though, it made a backward migration to piano when Ravel subsequently produced two keyboard arrangements, one for two pianos and one for piano four-hands. The piece was commissioned by the famous dancer, Ida Rubinstein—she who played the saint in Debussy’s The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian and scandalized the Parisian archdiocese. It was bad enough to cast a woman in the role of a male saint, but a Jewish woman, and a lesbian to boot, went too far.


It seems that Ravel’s Boléro caused a flap of its own, but it wasn’t an ecclesiastical one. The work was wildly successful from its very first performance at the Paris Opéra in 1928. But not long after, Ravel and Toscanini got into a dispute over the conductor’s tempo when he led the New York Philharmonic in the piece in Paris during the orchestra’s European tour. The two men exchanged heated words backstage, Ravel criticizing Toscanini for taking the piece too fast and not following his indicated tempo. Toscanini is alleged to have replied, “When I play it at your tempo, it’s not effective.” To which Ravel shot back, “Then don’t play it.” I’m afraid I’m with Toscanini on this one. For me, Boléro can’t be played too fast, the faster the better. Much as I take pleasure in most of Ravel’s music and can appreciate Boléro ’s mechanics, it’s one of those few works, like Orff’s Carmina Burana , that induces in me a feeling of revulsion. So, by all means, get it over with as quickly as possible.


Those who prefer their Boléro drawn out will no doubt like Slatkin’s reading of it, but Ravel might have the opposite complaint he voiced to Toscanini. The score is marked 72 to the quarter note. I tested the current performance against my metronome and found that Slatkin begins at 67 and gradually speeds up, finally reaching 72 about 30 seconds from the end. But this is not what Ravel wanted; he was clear that he wanted a steady beat maintained throughout.


As indicated at the outset, this is a finely performed program of Ravel favorites. The Lyon orchestra has the full measure of this music in its DNA, producing the veritable kaleidoscope of colors, both bright and pastel, that Ravel calls for. And unless you’re a Boléro fanatic, I wouldn’t be too hard on Slatkin for his slight deviation from the composer’s explicit instructions. A conductor’s job, after all, is to offer an interpretation. The recording, too, is quite good, though not as dynamic as the Berlioz Fantastique I reviewed from this same source. I’m inclined to recommend this release, but as a nicety rather than a necessity, to those in the market for a new sampler of Ravel favorites.


FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Although one of his most consistently lyrical operas, La rondine (The Swallow) remains one of Puccini’s least known. Dissatisfied with the result of his work, Puccini wrote three versions, with two different endings, and continued to make further revisions up to his death in 1924. The innovative 2007 production at the Torre del Lago Giacomo Puccini Festival, presented on this DVD, is in effect a fourth version, which combines Acts I and II of the first version (1917), with Lorenzo Ferrero’s 1994 orchestration of parts of the Finale of Act III of the incomplete third version (1921), some of which had survived only in piano score, as well as Ruggero’s Act I romanza, Parigi è la città dei desideri, from the second version (1920).

With a sparkling score reminiscent of Franz Lehár and Richard Strauss, La rondine, set in mid-19th century Paris, tells the story of Magda de Civry, a young courtesan who falls in love one evening with Ruggero Lastouc, the handsome son of a childhood friend of her protector, Rambaldo Fernandez. Although Magda believes that her compromised social position prevents their marrying, in Puccini’s third version it is Ruggero who leaves Magda when he discovers that she is the mistress of Rambaldo. - Naxos

Giacomo Puccini
LA RONDINE

Magda – Svetla Vassileva
Lisette – Maya Dashuk
Ruggero – Fabio Sartori
Prunier – Emanuele Giannino
Rambaldo – Marzio Giossi
Périchaud – Fernando Ciuffo
Gobin – Giorgio Berrugi
Crébillon – Andrea Patucelli
Yvette – Polina Volfson
Bianca – Alessandra Meozzi
Suzy – Annunziata Vestri
Fleury – Katia De Sarlo
Mariette – Chang Chiung Wen
Roro – Elisabetta Lombardo
Un maggiordomo – Alessando Manghesi

Puccini Festival Chorus and Orchestra
Alberto Veronesi, conductor

Recorded live from the 53rd Puccini Festival, Torre del Lago, Italy, on 8, 10 and 16 August 2007

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: Dolby Digital 2.0 / Dolby Surround 5.0
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: English, Italian
Running time: 111 mins

This is an audio-only (i.e., with no video content) Blu-ray disc playable only on Blu-ray players.

It is also available on standard CD



PROKOFIEV Symphony No. 4 (revised version); op. 112. The Prodigal Son, op. 46 • Marin Alsop, cond; São Paulo SO • NAXOS 0038 (Blu-ray Audio: 78:18)

Of Prokofiev’s seven symphonies, the Fourth has the most unassuming demeanor. Less sparkling than the First, less violent than the acidic Second and Third, less monumental than the Fifth and Sixth, and less magical than the nostalgic Seventh, its lack of distinctive character has kept it (especially in its baggier revised version) on the edge of the repertoire. Still, despite its relatively anodyne character, it has its fair share of charm, and its virtues are brought to the fore in this graceful performance, the second installment in Alsop’s symphony cycle.

Granted, at first, the performance seems slightly distracted. But within a minute or two, it comes into focus, and from then on, Alsop shows consistent sensitivity to the score’s harmonic flavor (the more mournful harmonies are especially well conveyed), its lyrical pull (especially in the more regretful moments—try the melancholy of the second movement), and its rhythmic stride. Alsop never tries to push the score into a grandeur it doesn’t possess—this is a fairly laid-back performance. But while it’s low in pressure, it’s never inattentive. She has a good sense of balance, so the passages with superimposed ideas (especially in the Finale) have enviable transparency. Details carry well, too (listen, for instance, to the marcato chatter on the bass lines at the beginning of the Finale). And while São Paulo is not quite a super-virtuoso ensemble, its members (especially the busy solo winds) play deftly. If the Symphony still sometimes seems to meander or sag (especially in the second movement and the Finale), the fault is really with the composer, not the performers.

Just as Prokofiev fashioned his Third from his opera The Fiery Angel, so he filched most of the musical material of the Fourth from his ballet The Prodigal Son. Putting the Symphony and its source material together on a single disc will seem either revelatory or redundant, depending on whether you are more interested getting insight into Prokofiev’s compositional methods or getting some musical variety. In any case, the original ballet is as pale as the Symphony (and formally a lot looser): You’ve rarely heard a less violent robbery scene than the seventh movement here, or, for that matter, a more anemic seductress than the one Prokofiev introduces in the third. Still, it too has its beauties (or, most of the time, the same beauties), and the interpretive grace that serves the Symphony so well has the same effect here. The sound is excellent, with plenty of timbral clarity (timpani have exceptional presence); the surround speakers on the 5.1 tracks offer an appropriate warmth to the total aural experience. Recommended.

FANFARE: Peter J. Rabinowitz

This is an audio-only (i.e., with no video content) Blu-ray disc playable only on Blu-ray players.

It is also available on standard CD.

This fourth volume in Marin Alsop’s acclaimed Prokofiev symphonic cycle features two of his most viscerally exciting works. Using material salvaged from his opera The Fiery Angel, the Third Symphony was hailed by Serge Koussevitzky at its 1929 première as ‘the best symphony since Tchaikovsky’s Sixth’. Originally commissioned as a ballet by Sergey Dyagilev but rejected as un-danceable, the Scythian Suite has become a popular orchestral showpiece, while Prokofiev retained a lifelong fondness for his dark-hued early symphonic sketch Autumn.

Prokofiev had written two symphonies as a student but his first numbered work in the genre was the Classical Symphony, completed in 1917. This evokes, melodically though not necessarily harmonically, the world of Haydn and Mozart, and it has remained one of his most popular works. The Second Symphony, by contrast, is a work of ‘iron and steel’ (in the composer’s words), a symphony of conscious modernity and visceral power. Dreams, a ‘symphonic tableau’, reveals the potent, early influence on Prokofiev of Scriabin. Of Marin Alsop and the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra’s recording of the Fourth Symphony and The Prodigal Son [8.573186], International Record Review wrote: ‘Conductor and orchestra both shine with the excitement of a special relationship in the ascendant’.

This series of DVDs features travel scenes accompanied by classical music.

This series of DVDs features travel scenes accompanied by classical music.

The Places

Mozart’s father Leopold settled in Salzburg in 1737 and in 1744 entered the service of the city’s ruling Prince-Archbishop as a violinist. The city underwent various changes of regime in the first years of the nineteenth century, but in 1825 Schubert could express his wonder at the fine churches and palaces of the place.

The Music

The music includes movements directly connected with Salzburg, compositions for distinguished local families, members of the Mozarts’ social circle, and works resulting from his visit in 1777-78 to Mannheim. Other compositions come from the remarkable final decade of Mozart’s life, when he was living in Vienna, culminating in the Lacrimosa from the unfinished Requiem of 1791, a movement that he is said to have tried to sing, with his friends, on his death-bed.

This series of DVDs features travel scenes accompanied by classical music.

The Places
Our tour of Russia starts in St. Petersburg, including churches and palaces, and, above all, the River Neva, on the banks of which Peter the Great's city stands. We visit Tchaikovsky's house at Klin, near Moscow, and travel south to Ukraine to see Sebastopol in the Crimea and Odessa. Finally we return to St. Petersburg, seeing the surrounding countryside, the city by night, the bridges and the people.

The Music
Pyotr Il'yich Tchaikovsky succeeded in uniting strands of Russian musical nationalism with music in the cosmopolitan forms of his training. He spent his childhood and adolescence in St. Petersburg, later moving to Moscow and finally finding some refuge in the country at Klin, where his house is preserved. The music accompanying our tour is Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto and his Serenade for Strings.

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: Dolby Digital / DTS Surround
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 70 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

This series of DVDs features travel scenes accompanied by classical music.

The Places

Florence grew rich and powerful on the silk-trade and banking, evidenced by an incredible wealth of cultural history preserved in its buildings and other works of art. The city is dominated by its great cathedral and adjacent bell-tower and the famous Baptistery. Running through it is the River Arno, crossed by the old bridge, the Ponte Vecchio, and around rise the Tuscan hills.

The Music

Ranging from Palestrina to Puccini, the music includes an excerpt from the latter’s opera Gianni Schicchi, set in Florence, and arias from Verdi, instrumental excerpts by Rossini, a poignant extract from Mozart’s Concerto for Flute and Harp and his mock-serenade from Don Giovanni, ending with a transcription for guitar of a Caprice by the Demon violinist Paganini.

This series of DVDs features travel scenes accompanied by classical music.

The Places
The tour of London takes us to the best known parts of the British capital, with views of the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, the Tower of London, Hampton Court and down river to Greenwich.

The Music
The music for this tour of London is taken from the last two of Joseph Haydn's twelve London Symphonies, the last such works that he would write, composed specially for a series of concerts he gave in London in the 1790s, during two extended visits.

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: Dolby Digital / DTS Surround
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 60 mins
No. of DVDs: 1