Da Vinci Ensemble - Alfano: Concerto for Violin, Cello & Piano, Piano Quintet (2025)

Franco Alfano was born in Naples on 8 March 1875 and soon showed musical aptitude, studying piano with Alessandro Longo at the Conservatorio San Pietro a Majella in Naples and composition with Camillo De Nardis. In 1895 he moved to Leipzig to study with Salomon Jadassohn, where he was able to undertake deeper study of Bach and Wagner, as well as Busoni, Richard Strauss and other composers still little known in Italy. In the summer of 1899 he moved to Paris, encountering an even more stimulating environment where musical debate between such names as Massenet, Bizet, Charpentier and Debussy aroused his curiosity. His long career saw its greatest successes in the field of opera, his most successful being 1904’s Resurrection, based on Leo Tolstoy’s novel of the same name, L’ombra di Don Giovanni (1913 rev. 1941), La leggenda di Sakùntala (1921 rev. 1952, his masterpiece) and Cyrano de Bergerac (1936), along with eight other operas. In spite of this prolific operatic output, Alfano owes his fame today mainly to his completion of Puccini’s Turandot on the basis of notes left by the deceased composer. The decision to have Alfano complete the opera was taken by Arturo Toscanini and the publisher Ricordi because of affinities that Alfano’s Sakùntala had with the unfinished finale of Turandot. Alfano died in San Remo on 17 October 1954.

TRACKLIST

1. Da Vinci Ensemble - Alfano: Concerto in A Major for Violin, Cello & Piano: I. Con Dolce Malinconia
2. Da Vinci Ensemble - Alfano: Concerto in A Major for Violin, Cello & Piano: II. Allegretto Fantastico
3. Da Vinci Ensemble - Alfano: Concerto in A Major for Violin, Cello & Piano: III. Presto, Con Grande Vigoria
4. Da Vinci Ensemble - Alfano: Piano Quintet in A-Flat Major: I. Largo
5. Da Vinci Ensemble - Alfano: Piano Quintet in A-Flat Major: II. Moderato Con Grazia
6. Da Vinci Ensemble - Alfano: Piano Quintet in A-Flat Major: III. Allegro