Franco Alfano Franco Alfano Franco Alfano (8 March 1875 in Posillipo, Naples – 27 October 1954 in Sanremo) was an Italian composer and pianist, best known today for his opera "Risurrezione" (1904) and above all for having completed Puccini's opera "Turandot" in 1926. He had considerable success with several of his own works during his lifetime. Alfano was born in Posillipo, Naples. He attended piano lessons given privately by Alessandro Longo, and harmony and composition respectively under Camillo de Nardis (1857–1951) and Paolo Serrao at the conservatory San Pietro a Majella in Naples. Later, after graduating, he pursued further composition studies with
Messa (Puccini) in 1878 and was initially conceived by Puccini as a self-contained work. Puccini never published the full manuscript of the "Messa", and although well received at the time, it was not performed again until 1952 (first in Chicago and then in Naples). However, he re-used some of its themes in other works, such as the Agnus Dei in his opera "Manon Lescaut" and the Kyrie in "Edgar". At the end of World War II, Fr. Dante Del Fiorentino purchased an old copy of the manuscript of the Messa from the Vandini family in Lucca, imagining it was the original score.