MASSENET: Esclarmonde and Cendrillon Suites

Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra;
Jean, Kenneth

8.555986

Massenet’s fairy opera Cendrillon, based on Perrault, was first mounted at the Opéra-Comique in Paris in 1899. It follows in general the well known story of Cinderella and her bizarre family, although there is an additional episode in which her father Pandolfe returns with his youngest daughter to the country farm where they had lived before his second marriage. There, in a mysterious dream, Cendrillon meets her Prince Charmant, a vision that precedes the traditional dénouement, when the glass-slipper is found to fit her foot. The spectacular opera has much activity for the fairies at the command of the Fairy Godmother and evokes in the court dances the world of Cendrillon. Something of the magic of the opera is recalled in the concert suite drawn from a work that makes equally heavy demands on singers and on the scenic and financial resources of any opera house, but is hampered by a weak libretto.

CD

Muzyka klasyczna

Naxos

12-06-2002

747313598625