Customer Rating: 
Summary: An Evening of Joy
Comment: There can't be much dispute about the quality of this work. The staging, the singing, the technical brilliance of the hidef experience both visually and aurally are impeccable. A group of us gathered to experience La Cenerentola in my home. We laughed, we applauded, we smiled to each other sharing the delight.
As the review above noted, no magic is involved in this rendering of the Cinderella story. Everything is worked out through the wisdom of Alidoro, the Prince's old sage counselor (sung brilliantly and with all due gravitas by Nathan Berg). This makes it a comedy well within the human domain. The moral lessons are clear: vanity is illusive and will not serve us well, all of us must treat each other with kindness, virtue is rewarded, and forgiveness and love heal all.
The characters are beautifully played and sung. Angelina (la cenerentola herself--Cinderella-sung by Ruxandra Donose)appropriately plays a somewhat withdrawn role at first but grows in vocal power and confidence throughout the opera . She emerges at the end as a shimmering beauty of brilliant voice. The "evil" stepsisters, Clorinda and Tisbe (Raquela Sheeran and Lucia Cirillo) are presented as very distinguishable comedic personalities whose voices often combine in bell-like harmonies. Don Magnifico, the wicked stepfather, is played to great comedic effect (Luciano Di Pasquale)as a buffoon who is cruel, fearful, and self-delusive at the same time. His is a gem of a performance. (It is with this that we see one of the drawbacks of such high visual resolution: one can easily see where the scalp cover is joined to his temples. But then again, the characters and sets seem almost three-dimensional, so it is a definite plus). The Prince, Don Ramiro, (Maxim Mironov) is carefully constructed as a major character who must be less prominent than Cinderella herself, so he is a Rossini tenor, somewhere between tenor and counter-tenor. He is young, handsome, recognizes virtue and responds to it honorably, and sings well. Yet it is the other characters who dominate, including Dandini,(Simone Alberghini) the valet the Prince has commissioned to play him while the Prince stays in the background to observe the reactions of the stepdaughters and anyone else hoping to be his bride.
Certainly this production shows off the glories of high definition BluRay, but it is the quality of the performances that should really sell this version to the public. For opera lovers, this Opus Arte presentation of the Glyndebourne production (almost always high quality from Glyndebourne and Opus Arte)is truly a must. It is not possible not to revel in this 3-hour delight. Do yourself a favor and get it; you'll love it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Treasure
Comment: What a treasure. The technical quality of this Blu-ray is magnificent. I am a tech. perfection freak... this one has it. Video and audio revealed no flaws to me. The performances were excellent all around. Lead singers were knock-outs. The theater felt intimate. Fantastic lighting. I could not believe how super fine the sound was and the video is stunning. But... the direction of the thing was what worked me over. I connected immediately. There were no fairies... no magic of any kind... except the magic of an all around perfect show. This version of the story ultimately yanks away the worship of royalty and gives us a good and decent woman and man. The hero is Cinderella. I think that a Blu-ray disc like this would be an eye opener of an equipment sales tool. This is the reason I have Blu-ray. More please....
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![Rossini: La Cenerentola [Blu-ray]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51lTeVBY7VL._SL160_.jpg)
