There is nothing wrong with this performance of Turandot, recorded live in Milan in l964, except that the pitch slips up part way through Act 2 and the rest of the opera is performed a half-tone sharp. That having been said, what a show it is! We get Franco Corelli and Birgit Nilsson at their most enflamed and potent, with the ultra-feminine and fascinating (but not as well sung, per se, as many others) Galina Vishnevskaya as Liu. The Ping-Pang-Pong trio is especially mellifluous, and Nicola Zaccaria makes the most of Timur’s music and character. The orchestra plays well and in Gianandrea Gavazzeni’s hands, the score really percolates. But if the pitch issue gets in your way–and eventually you will notice that the opera somehow sounds wrong–it’s a whole other tale. It’s not quite Alvin and the Chipmunks, but it’s also not true to the singers’ timbres. Stick to Nilsson and Corelli on EMI if you want them; otherwise, Sutherland and Pavarotti are pretty great on Decca.
