Bianca e Falliero was commissioned by La Scala, Milan, for its prestigious Carnival season of 1819–20, enjoying a run of no fewer than 39 performances. Rossini responded with a score the virtuosity and expressivity of which outdid even his Neapolitan works. Prevailing tastes at La Scala meant that ensembles predominated over arias but behind the conventional dictates Rossini lavished the utmost care on his work, fashioning an opera full of dramatic coloratura and powerful theatrical craft and notable for its rich and often surprising use of harmony.

Tasso’s masterpiece inherited the entire western literary legacy starting with Homer, and at the same time it comes to constitute the inspiring model of future generations of musicians, painters, and, of course, poets. In sum, working with Tasso allows us to communicate with a vast universe in time and space.

While Pergolesi’s vivacious intermezzo of 1733 – a crucial staging post in the development of opera buffa – has a toehold in the repertoire, Paisiello’s 1781 setting of the same silly libretto for Catherine the Great is virtually unknown. The more sophisticated Paisiello can’t match Pergolesi for verve and unassuming lightness of touch. His fast arias tend to be more emphatic, less melodically catchy. But there is plenty to admire in the polished craftsmanship, the colourful writing for woodwind (including prominent clarinets) and, in two of Serpina’s arias, a vein of soulful lyricism characteristic of the Age of Sentiment.

Farnace was apparently one of Vivaldi's favorite operas, because he mounted numerous productions in various cities, and wrote six versions of the score, more than of any of his other operas. The conventions of operatic vocal characterizations that came to be standard – higher voices in the sympathetic roles, and lower voices in villainous roles – had not yet been established, and Farnace features a baritone and contralto in the heroic roles, with a soprano as the villain. Soprano Adriana Fernández shines as the wicked Berenice, who is redeemed at the very last minute. She has a full, creamy voice that she deploys appealing agility and warmth.

Cavalli composed more than 40 operas. Less than a dozen have been recorded. L'Orione an opera in three acts and a prologue is about No. 27 and was first heard in Milan in 1653 to celebrate the election of Ferdinand IV as King of the Romans. This September 27, 1998 performance (in a new critical edition by Andrea Marcon derived from the manuscript in the Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, Venice) in Venice is the first in the modem era. The plot is derived from the ancient Greek legend of the giant Orion told in Ovid's Fasti, rewritten in Natale Conte's Mythologiae, and finally dramatized in Francesco Meloslo's libretto for Cavalli. The libretto takes the opportunity for humor, using the plight of the blind Orion to make fun of the gods, as was common in so many Venetian librettos of the time.

World Premiere - this is the first ever recorded performance of Rossini’s La Gazzetta.
The Nobel Prize-winning writer Dario Fo applies his inventive genius to Rossini's comic opera in its premiere DVD release. Recorded in 2005 under the musical direction of Maurizio Barbacini, Fo's production brings fresh vitality and colour to the story of Lisetta, and of her father's attempts to find a husband for her through an advertisement in the newspaper La Gazzetta.