Stephanie Lauricella reviews
Giocomo Puccini's La rondine
There are lovely moments in this live recording of La rondine, a curiously level-headed reworking of La traviata in which hearts are bruised rather than broken. Ivan Repušić coaxes playing with plenty of spring and succulence from the Munich Radio Orchestra. The Act II dance music is glossy and animated, but the dewy scoring at the close of Act III seems unmerited by a dry-eyed situation. Coloristic fragments such as ‘Nella trepida luce d’un mattin’ are more moving in context than ‘Chi il bel sogno di Doretta’.