Franco Alfano nine months on the following concluding duet and at his death had left behind a whole ream of sketches... Alfano had to reconstruct...according to his best assessment...and with his imagination and magnifying glass" since Puccini's material "had not really been legible." "Alfano's reputation has also suffered [IC:along with Mascagni], understandably, because of his willingness to associate himself closely with Mussolini's Fascist government." Alex Ross, in "The New Yorker", notes that a new ending of "Turandot" composed by Luciano Berio premiered in 2002 is preferred by some critics for making a more satisfactory resolution of Turandot's change of heart, and of
Cyrano de Bergerac (Alfano) the female lead Roxane in her Metropolitan Opera role debut. Notes Sources Cyrano de Bergerac (Alfano) Cyrano de Bergerac is a four-act opera with music by Franco Alfano, and libretto by Henri Caïn, based on Edmond Rostand's drama "Cyrano de Bergerac". The opera received its first performance in Rome on 22 January 1936, conducted by Tullio Serafin, with Maria Caniglia and José Luccioni. The first performance in Paris was on 29 May 1936 at the Opéra-Comique. Although Alfano originally set the text in French, the premiere was sung in Italian, as were many early Italian productions. In recent years, most