-1. Test Adpower

Immediately after completing Gianni Schicchi (88), Puccini started searching for a subject for a new opera (see his letter of 29 June 1918 in Seligman 1938, 278-79). At first, shortly after the first performances of Il Trittico (84), a renewed collaboration with Forzano was promising. Puccini was particularly interested in Forzano’s project for Sly, based on an episode from Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew (later set to music by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari), but he also considered setting some historical subjects or novellas from Lucca.Note: *See Seligman 1938, 303, of 29 July 1919, and Paladini 1961, No. 1 of 11 August 1919. October 1919 is the first date that a collaboration with Adami and Renato Simoni is mentioned in Puccini’s correspondence.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, Nos. 133 and 173 of 18 and 23 October 1919 respectively. Simoni (1875-1952), one of the leading Italian theatre critics, had already written a number of dramas and librettos.Note: *E.g. for Giulio Ricordi’s operetta La secchia rapita (1910) and for Umberto Giordano’s Madame Sans-Gêne (1915).  Puccini was in contact with Simoni for a libretto as early as 1905, but nothing came of that.Note: *See Puccini’s letters Nos. 1–5 published in Lo 1996.
There was already a concrete proposal for a libretto from Adami and Simoni in November/December 1919;Note: *See Epistolario 1982, No. 134, of 14 November and No. 174, probably written on 18 December 1919. although it is not known what it involved, it certainly was not Turandot.Note: *See Lo 1996, no. 7 of 5 January 1920, and Epistolario 1982, no. 175, probably of 4 February 1920. Fraccaroli (whose accounts are not always reliable), drawing on information directly from Puccini,Note: *See Fraccaroli 1957, 248. claimed that it was an adaptation of a play set in London in the 1830s. Two years later, Puccini was still speaking about this “soggetto inglese [English subject]” (Carteggi 1958, no. 819), which might actually have been Dickens’s Oliver Twist.Note: *See Ashbrook and Powers 1991, 60.
At the beginning of March 1920, the idea of a Turandot based on Carlo Gozzi’s drama (1762) crystallized.Note: *See the accounts by Adami in Epistolario 1982, 162-63, and in Fraccaroli 1957, 248-49. On 18 March, Puccini wrote to Simoni (Carteggi 1958, no. 766) that he had read Turandot (in Schiller’s version, re-translated into Italian by Andrea Maffei) and wanted to obtain photographs from Germany of Max Reinhardt’s 1911 production of the play at the Deutsches Theater, Berlin. Shortly thereafter, he told Adami of his enthusiasm for the subject.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 176, certainly written on 21 March 1920. According to the contents of these letters, Puccini had not seen the Reinhardt production, though that would have been possible in early March 1912.Note: *See Schickling 1989, 268, and Carteggi 1958, no. 606, of 5 October 1912. It also is unproven, but probable, that Puccini knew Gozzi’s original play. However, it seems rather doubtful that he knew Ferruccio Busoni’s Turandot (Zurich, 1917),Note: *Busoni also wrote the incidental music for Reinhardt’s production of the play. and the opera Turanda (Milan, 1867) by his teacher, Antonio Bazzini, may have been a distant memory at most.
By 15 May 1920, Puccini had already received the libretto of Act 1 (see Epistolario 1982, no. 180), and he thought it was excellent. While he waited for Acts 2 and 3, he still had Forzano working on Sly.Note: *See Puccini 1981, no. 53, of 9 July 1920. Indeed, Puccini’s usual doubts surfaced when the first complete draft of the libretto was ready.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 181, and Paladini 1961, no. 27, both written on 18 July, as well as Puccini's letters to Maria Bianca Ginori-Lisci in Critica 1976, No. 28 of 21 July 1920.  Nonetheless, Puccini already began improvising at the piano at night and searched for harmonies and melodic turns that were as Chinese as possible.Note: *In his own words: “Già incomincio a preludiare la sera — e cerco accordi e mosse più chinesi possibile”; see Carteggi 1958, no. 770, certainly dating from 25 July 1920 (here in the transcription of Lo 1996, no. 11).  At the beginning of August he met the librettists at the summer resort of Bagni di Lucca in order to rework the first version of Turandot.Note: *See Paladini 1961, no. 29 of 5 August and no. 30 of 15 August 1920. There, they visited the baron Fassini Camossi who owned a Chinese music box that played three melodies, which Puccini later used in the opera.Note: *See the details in Lo 1996, 325-30. It was also probably decided in Bagni di Lucca to add the character of Liù.Note: *Puccini mentioned her in a letter to Simoni of 28 August 1920 (see Carteggi 1958, no. 774)
The completion of the revised libretto took longer than Puccini expected, resulting in numerous complaints about his tardy librettists.Note: *See, e.g., Lo 1996, 294, of 17 September 1920 to Ricordi’s director, Renzo Valcarenghi. However, at the same time, Puccini was already composing. By 25 September 1920, he had “filled a number of pages with notes and sources of inspirations, harmonies, and procedures.”Note: *“Ho riempito parecchi fogli di musica con appunti e spunti di idee, di accordi, di procedimenti”; see Epistolario 1982, no. 182. He obtained examples of Chinese music from Ricordi,Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 781, certainly of 19 December 1920. and on 21 December Adami finally brought him the new first act which Puccini did not like at all.Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 783 of 22 December 1920. One month later, on 15 January 1921, he was very much satisfied with the required changes and told Sybil Seligman that he now had a fine first act (see Seligman 1938, 322). Then in Milan, Puccini was able to work closely with the librettists until the text of the first act was ready to be engraved by Ricordi as a printed proof (known in Italian as a “bozza di stampa”) in March 1921.Note: *See Lo 1996, 295, which includes a reproduction of the complete bozza di stampa on pp. 413-63. The copy of that 
proof which Puccini dedicated to Riccardo Schnabl on 8 April 1921 (see Puccini 1981, 133), ought to be in I-Mc, but it is missing. Another copy of the libretto proof mentioned in the Inventario Archivio Puccini in Torre del Lago of 1980, p. 10, but no longer in the Inventory of 1992, is indeed preserved in the museum there (I-TLp).
In the version of the bozza di stampa, Act 1 extended all the way to the end of what is now Act 2 (including the entire riddle scene). Therefore, it is not quite clear what the original plan for the contents of Acts 2 and 3 might have been. Act 2 probably contained further elements of the Gozzi/Schiller play, particularly the dungeon scene, which were later eliminated. Act 3 probably roughly corresponded to the present one. While Puccini was waiting for the remaining large portions of the libretto, he began notating more detailed composition sketches. On 14 April 1921, he told his friend Maria Bianca Ginori Lisci, “Turandot è cominciata! [Turandot has begun!].”Note: *See Puccini's letter to Maria Bianca Ginori-Lisci in Critica 1976, no. 32. By 30 April he had already arrived at the scene for Ping, Pang, and Pong (“alle maschere”) and was even thinking about the riddle scene (see Epistolario 1982, no. 187). Therein, he noticed that the Mandarin’s proclamation (“appello”) was repeated and demanded a different solution from Simoni.Note: *See Lo 1996, no. 26 of 10 May 1921.
Immediately after that, Puccini began the continuous composition draft.Note: *See Seligman 1938, 328, of 13 May 1921. At the same time, he ordered music paper for the orchestration of the full score from Ricordi.Note: *See Lo 1996, 305 (“Torre del Lago, martedi”), probably written on 17 May 1921; discussions about the format for the music paper dragged on until the late summer (see Lo 1996, 305-06). On 22 May, Puccini had finished the executioner’s sequence, which he called the “tremenda canzone del Boja,” and arrived at the choral scene for the rising of the moon and the funeral march for the Prince of Persia (“la luna e la marcia funebre”).Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 797 of 22 May 1921, referring to pp. 5-8 in the bozza di stampa of the libretto. On 7 June, the draft 

for the Ping, Pang, and Pong scene was ready (= bozza, 10-14), along with the music for the spectres and the arias of Calaf and Liù (“i fantasmi e i 2 pezzi Calaf e Liù” = bozza, 14-17).Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 189, and Carteggi 1958, no. 799. On 11 June Puccini was composing the riddles (“agli Enigmi” = bozza, from p. 19),Note: *See Lo 1996, no. 30. but suddenly he no longer made such good progress.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 191, of 20 June; Carteggi 1958, no. 804 of 21 June; Lo 1996, no. 33, of 9 July; Carteggi 1958, no. 808, of 17 July 1921. Near the end of June, Puccini had Carlo Clausetti obtain the book entitled Chinese Music by J. A. van Aalst (Shanghai, 1884), from which Puccini adapted the Confucian hymn for the priests’ music in the same funeral march he had already composed. He often made further use of van Aalst’s book in the course of composing Turandot.Note: *For further details, see Lo 1996, 307 and 330-34. On 1 August Puccini finally and succinctly communicated: “Ho finito I° atto Turandot [I have finished the first act of Turandot].”Note: *See Puccini 1981, no. 84, as well as the unpublished portion of a letter to Sybil Seligman of 8 August 1921 in MEL, no. 262.
Around the same time, he finally received the libretto of Act 2 which he had awaited for such a long time. Adami brought it to Torre del Lago, and Puccini considered it to be very beautiful.Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 811, certainly of 9 August; Adami’s account in Carteggi 1958, no. 812, of 10 August; and Puccini’s unpublished letter to Sybil Seligman of 10 August 1921 in MEL.  Then, typically, and to the amazement of his librettists, Puccini soon found fault with so many things about itNote: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 814 of 16 August and No. 815 of 21 August 1921. which he considered fundamentally wrong that he suddenly proposed to do the opera in two acts. This meant the nearly total cancellation of the planned second act.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 192, probably of 11 September, and Carteggi 1958, no. 816 of 13 September 1921. Ever since the extensive revisions of Manon Lescaut (64), Puccini had often used this practice of abruptly shortening the dramaturgy.
On 14 September, Puccini explained to the librettists how he imagined the new Act 2 as a combination of the former second and third acts.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 193, and Carteggi 1958, no. 777. In order to make the best use of the fairly long interruption that was to be expected while Adami and Simoni realized the necessary new conception, Puccini obviously began with the orchestration of Act 1. (In an unpublished letter to Zuccoli of 17 SeptemberNote: *Sold by the music antiquarian J. Voerster, Stuttgart, some time ago. he asked for some double leaves of the music paper, if it already existed at Ricordi, so the complicated autograph pagination at the beginning of Act 1 in 91.B.1 could have been caused by Puccini’s use of pages of the full score that already existed from the autumn of 1921.)
In the next weeks, the new scenario was developed in detail.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 194 of 21 September and no. 196, probably of 24 October; Carteggi 1958, no. 818 of 30 October; Epistolario 1982, no. 206 of 3 November, nos. 197-199 of 8, 11, and 17 November 1921. For the very important letter Epistolario 1982, no. 206, Adami gives the year 1922 (an error repeated by all commentators who followed that source). However, the contents of the letter suggest that it was actually written one year earlier.  But it was not until the beginning of December that a new and definite solution was determined, after Puccini finally resolved the even more important issue of continuing work on the opera at all: “Turandot sarà in 3 atti — Il primo che ho fatto saranno due — e così il terzo sarà il mio secondo [Turandot will be in 3 acts — The first one I wrote will become two — and so the third will be my second]” (Puccini 1981, no. 90). Puccini documented this solution in annotations he made in the margins of the bozza di stampa of the libretto, in which he specified “il Terzetto Finale I° [the Trio (in the) first act Finale]” after the “due brani [two pieces]” for Calaf and Liù (“Non piangere, Liù” and “Per quel sorriso”, which later became “Signore, ascolta!”). He then planned the scene for Ping, Pang, and Pong in front of the curtain as the first scene of the new second act.Note: *See the facsimile in Marchetti 1968, no. 302. Towards the end of 1921, Puccini explained to Adami how he imagined the end of the new Act 1, in approximately the same form we know today (see Epistolario 1982, no. 201).
Adami and Simoni required a long time to prepare the new passages of the libretto to divide the former first act into two separate acts to Puccini’s satisfaction. In March 1922, he began composing the new beginning of Act 2,Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 828 of 5 March 1922, not of 7 March, as is erroneously indicated there.  but he interrupted this work after the trio for Ping, Pang, and Pong was finished.Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 830, of 28 March 1922. Instead, on 21 March 1922, Puccini began the continuous orchestration of Act 1 (see 91.B.1). While working on it laboriously but full of hope, around 20 June he finally received the eagerly awaited libretto of Act 3.Note: *See Puccini 1981, no. 101 of 16 June, and Carteggi 1958, no. 833, of 25 June 1922. It is also possible that the revisions in the text for the new ending of the first act also arrived by this time, for he apparently now turned to its composition. On 9 July he reported to Schnabl that he had made “un buon finale I° nuovo [a good new finale of Act 1]” (see Puccini 1981, no. 102). However, he was so dissatisfied with the new Act 3 that in the autumn of 1922 he once again seriously considered abandoning his work on the opera. Even though Turandot was already at such a very advanced stage, Puccini considered taking up a totally different light-hearted Venetian-style libretto (“altro libretto leggero — Veneziano stilizzato”) with Adami and Simoni.Note: *See Puccini 1981, no. 108, of 28 September 1922.
But in October 1922, Puccini resumed work on Turandot. The plan arose to have a great aria for Turandot to sing in Act 2. That obviously became “In questa Reggia.”Note: *See Puccini 1981, no. 111, of 8 October 1922. At Puccini’s request, Adami soon was at work on new verses for the Act 1 finale.Note: *See Epistolario, no. 224, probably of 19 October, no. 204 of 30 October, no. 207 of 11 November; Carteggi 1958,no.
848 of 14 November, no. 849 of 16 November; and Epistolario 1982, no. 205, certainly as well of 16 November 1922. Around 20 November, Puccini finally completed the instrumentation of Act 1Note: *See Lo 1996, no. 56, of 21 November, and Carteggi 1958, no. 850, of 22 November 1922. and sent it to Ricordi to be copied. Since Carlo Carignani was dead (previously, it was he who made all of the piano-vocal scores for Puccini’s operas since Edgar (62), often working right alongside of the composer), Ricordi wanted to have the piano-vocal score of Turandot prepared by the director of their office of copying and engraving, Guido Zuccoli. For this purpose, a working copy of the full score was necessary for the corrections and revisions Puccini was certain to make. This work took nearly a year to accomplish before the copyist’s full score could be delivered to Puccini.Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 868 of 17 June 1923, written before the copyist’s full score was finished.
Then there was another even longer hiatus in Puccini’s involvement with the opera, which almost drove him to despair.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, nos. 208-210 of 11 December 1922 as well as 6 and 12 March 1923. It was only in March 1923 that he was able to return to the composition of Turandot, resuming with the first scene of Act 2 begun the previous year,Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 211, certainly of 13 March 1923. which he still considered to be problematic. On 25 March he was right before Turandot’s new aria (see 91.A.II.42.a). Three weeks later, it was nearly finished.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 213 of 14 April 1923. At the end of April, Adami came to Viareggio, where he and Puccini completed the libretto of Act 3.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 215, of 19 April 1923. Puccini was initially so satisfied with it that he authorized Ricordi to prepare the complete libretto as a printed proof, which he wanted to be sent to him in Vienna to be shown to Alfred Roller, the famous director of stage design at the Vienna Staatsoper.Note: *See Puccini’s unpublished letter to Clausetti of 5 May 1923, I-Mr, Carteggio Puccini-Clausetti. In letters from Vienna, he informed close friends that the libretto of Turandot was ready.Note: *See Seligman 1938, 347, of 17 May, Puccini 1981, no. 120 of 20 May, and Puccini’s unpublished letter to Margit Vészi of 21 May 1923, US-NYpm.
When Puccini returned from Vienna, he continued with the composition of the third act. On 28 June 1923, the beginning of that act and Calaf’s aria (“Nessun dorma”) were finished.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 217, in which Puccini referred to this aria as the “famosa romanza.” By the beginning of July, he had written what he modestly termed “un canto di Liù che non è male [a song for Liù, which isn’t bad]”— presum- ably “Tanto amore segreto.”Note: *See Puccini’s unpublished letter to Angelo Magrini of 6 July 1923, US-NH (Koch 994). As of 7 October 1923, he had written everything up to Liù’s death,Note: *See Puccini’s unpublished letter to Clausetti, I-Mr, Carteggio Puccini-Clausetti. which still 

would occupy him for several weeks. He even provided some of his own new lyrics for that episode.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 219, of 12 November 1923. By the middle of November, he completed the funeral music after the death of Liù,Note: *See Lo 1996, no. 57, of 18 November 1923. and asked Adami and Simoni for a new version of the final duet.
While awaiting the new text of the duet, on 10 December 1923 Puccini began orchestrating Act 2 (see 91.B.1)Note: *Confirmed in several of Puccini’s letters written shortly thereafter. and made some corrections in the copyist’s full score of Act 1.Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 881 of 11 January 1924 and Puccini’s unpublished letter to Guido Zuccoli of 14 January 1924  (sold by the music antiquarian J. Voerster, Stuttgart, some time ago), in which Puccini intimated his desire to make some changes in the first scene of the opera (from fig. 8) and in the Act 1 finale (from fig. 42).  Again, he requested new changes in the text for the Ping, Pang, and Pong trio at the beginning of Act 2. Without even having the new lyrics for the final duet of Calaf and Turandot, he was able to work on the music for it.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, nos. 222, of 19 January 1924. By the middle of February, he received the new text for the duet as proposed by the librettists, but the verses were completely unsatisfactory,Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 882, of 14 February 1924. and the relevant discussions dragged on for weeks. Meanwhile, Puccini finished orchestrating Act 2 on 22 February 1924.Note: *See 91.B.1 and the confirmation in Carteggi 1958, no. 884 of 21 February 1924, in which Puccini stated that he wanted to transpose the finale of Act 1 one half-tone lower (from E to E flat minor), which indeed was carried out by the publisher.Puccini immediately proceeded to orchestrate Act 3Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 225, which according to the context certainly dates from 23 February and not from 23 January 1924. and finished it one month later (except, of course, for the duet and finale, which had not yet been composed). He sent it, together with the full score of Act 2, to Ricordi (so 91.B.1 was, therefore, completely at the publisher’s by that time).Note: *See Carteggi 1958, nos. 886 and 887, of 25 March 1924. Shortly before that, Puccini again reworked the text of the duet with Adami, in a way that pleased Puccini (despite the fact that in his correspondence of the following weeks, he always mentioned the compositional work on the duet with distinct skepticism). By the end of May, Simoni submitted yet another new prose version of the duet.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 230 of 31 May 1924. While awaiting its versification, Puccini returned to correcting the existing portions of the score and requested that the librettists also provide some new lines “per il finale I°” and “per l’aria”,Note: *See Carteggi 1958, no. 892, of 31 May 1924 (the aria is probably Turandot’s “In questa Reggia” in Act 2). as well as “per i sacerdoti, fine marcia principe persiano [for the priests, at the end of the Persian prince’s march]” a few weeks later.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 231, of 4 July 1924. He told Adami that he had the full score at hand to make the respective changes.Note: *Puccini had asked for the copyist’s score in an unpublished letter to Zuccoli of 17 June 1924 (some time ago, that
letter was sold by the music antiquarian J. Voerster, Stuttgart). Puccini was certainly referring to the copyist’s score in that letter, since the new text for the priests is not present in the autograph manuscript (91.B.1).
It was only at the beginning of July 1924 that Puccini received the versification of the latest version of the final duet, which still was unsatisfactory.Note: *See Puccini’s letter to Clausetti of 19 July 1924 in Lo 1996, 303. Months had passed since Puccini last worked on the unfinished final part of the opera. He was only able to return to it in September,Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 232, of 1 September 1924. probably by attempting to make a draft of the continuous composition, to which the first leaves of 91.A.III.35.b probably belong. Nevertheless, the September edition of Musica d’oggi (290) announced the première of Turandot for the following winter (in the 1924- 1925 season at La Scala).
In the first days of September, Toscanini visited Puccini to discuss the opera and also did not like the final duet.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 233, of 7 September 1924. After that, Puccini again desired to make changes in the duet.Note: *See Epistolario 1982, no. 234, of 14 September 1924. He even called it “maledettissimo [the most accursed].”Note: *sadfads  Immediately Note: *retyertye afterwards, Simoni was able to supply some new verses for the duet that met with Puccini’s approval.87 At the same time, however, he spoke of the small work remaining to be done on a few missing lines of the duet.88 Puccini’s final correspondence before his journey to Brussels for the fatal operation make it clear that he did not consider the text as definitive.89
When Puccini went to Brussels (on 4 November 1924) for treatment to cure his cancer of the larynx, parts of a continuous composition draft for the final duet existed, along with several other leaves of sketches (some of which dated back to the spring of 1924).90 It is rather unlikely that Puccini himself collated the 22 leaves (now preserved in I-Mr, see 91.A.III.35.b) which later formed the basis for Franco Alfano’s completion of the opera. It is, however, possible that Puccini took the sketches to Brussels and that he even worked on the unfinished end of the opera there in the three weeks preceding the operation.
Two first-hand accounts have asserted that Puccini played the missing conclusion of the opera to visitors he received at Torre del Lago, namely the stage designer Galileo Chini (at the end of September 1924)91 and Puccini’s friend, Guido Marotti (in October of that year)92. However, according to the wording in Puccini’s letters dating from that time, the often recounted story that Toscanini also heard Puccini play the ending is probably not correct.93 Given his reputation as a rather poor pianist, Puccini could only have rendered improvised impressions of his ideas at the keyboard. In any event, it is very unlikely that a fully executed continuous composition draft of the final scenes of the opera ever existed.
After Puccini’s death, at first it was unclear to what extent the opera was finished. On 9 December 1924, Ricordi maintained that it could still be performed during the imminent season at La Scala, just as Puccini left it.94 Even though Tito Ricordi was no longer in charge of the company, he apparently had proposed to Puccini’s family that the composer Franco Vittadini (1884-1948) should be the person to make the music in Puccini’s sketches performable.95 Even Pietro Mascagni was asked if he would like to finish the opera, but he indignantly rejected the proposal.96
Guido Zuccoli was of crucial importance for all of this. As the person from Ricordi responsible for preparing the piano-vocal score of the opera, he certainly was the best living expert on the subject. It was Zuccoli who retrieved the extant sketches for the final duet and closing scene from Puccini’s family, and he probably put together a selection of them (i.e. 91.A.III.35.b) for Alfano, which were later returned to the Ricordi archives. It appears that Zuccoli arranged the passages that were close to being finalized according to their order in the libretto and incorporated some additional sketches that Puccini possibly intended for later use in the opera. However, judging from the various manuscripts that have recently been offered for sale by various antiquarians and auctions, Zuccoli obviously retained several other remaining leaves (see the sketches in section A).
After a delay of many months, in the summer of 1925 the combined initiative of the composer’s son, Antonio Puccini, and Ricordi (encouraged by a recommendation from Toscanini) resulted in the selection of Franco Alfano to complete Turandot.97 One of the reasons for the delay might have been the fact that Toscanini is said to have preferred Riccardo Zandonai (1883-1944), but Antonio Puccini rejected that composer for being too well-known.98
Alfano (1875–1954) was perhaps regarded as particularly well-suited to work on Turandot because his own opera, La leggenda di Sakùntala (successfully performed for the first time in 1921), was set in the Far East as well — albeit in India.99 In September, Alfano reported on his new assignment in a long interview with an American journalist.100 It took Alfano an unexpectedly long time to arrive at something performable; an eye disease was partly responsible for the delay. In December 1925, Ricordi sent Guido Zuccoli to Alfano in Turin to prepare the piano-vocal score of the final scenes. The first 19 pages, comprising approximately one half of it (probably through Turandot’s aria “Del primo pianto”), were sent to Milan on 14 December. When Toscanini saw Alfano’s completion (or only a part of it), he thoroughly disapproved of it, believing that Alfano’s work disregarded many of Puccini’s final intentions. Consequently, after Toscanini had left for a concert tour to North America on 28 December (see Barblan 1972, 216), Ricordi compelled Alfano to revise his first completion extensively, incorporating additional sketches by Puccini and changing numerous passages. In all, Alfano shortened his first attempt by more than 100 bars (more than one quarter of its original extent).101

In spite of all the criticism, Alfano was undaunted and continued with the orchestration of his original version. He finished it on 28 January 1926 (see 91.B.2). Even though the original production at La Scala did not reflect Alfano’s first completion of the opera, Ricordi printed the piano vocal-score (91.E.1) in its original form.102 Since the changes obviously were late and the La Scala production was imminent, Ricordi delivered the score to the most important libraries in March. They even offered it as sales copies to the public after the first performance, though Ricordi had already informed their office in Rome in the middle of February of the forthcoming production of new piano-vocal scores with a different ending (91.E.2). The German edition (91.E.1a) was prepared for the productions of the opera in Germany and Austria still given in 1926.103 It was also completely printed (even after the La Scala première with the revised Alfano ending) from the plates of 91.E.1 — except, of course, for the German translation — so it likewise contains Alfano’s first version.104

The first performance on 25 April 1926 at the Teatro alla Scala ended with the funeral chorus after the death of Liù, without any version of Alfano’s completion. Contrary to the current claims in most of the literature pertaining to Puccini and to Turandot, Toscanini conducted not only this first performance, but also the second and the third as well,105 both with the revised Alfano ending (of 91.E.2) and not in the original version that Toscanini rejected.

Four contemporary recordings of Turandot’s aria “Del primo pianto” from Alfano’s ending make it appear very probable that the early performances of the opera sung in German were given in Alfano’s original completion of the score (according to 91.E.1a). Two of the recordings were made by the soprano Anne Roselle; Lotte Lehmann and Mafalda Salvatini made the others.106 They sang the title role in the first productions of Turandot in Dresden, Vienna, and Berlin. All of those singers cut the aria considerably, but none of the recorded versions are the same. Interestingly, they all contain passages from Alfano’s first version, which signifies that 

the three singers knew and obviously studied their part from the first German edition (91.E.1a). But for the recordings, which were probably made between 1926 and 1928, they made use of the cuts published in Alfano’s revised definitive version, which was also available at that time in the second German edition (91.E.2c).

The authenticity of the numerous variants in the expression marks and (even more importantly) the compositional changes in 91.E.2, which were also retained in subsequent editions of the score, is questionable. If, indeed, they all originated with Puccini, that can only be explained by the fact that they had been inadvertently omitted in 91.E.1, even though this edition was published one and a half years after Puccini’s death.

In recent years, there have been several attempts to improve the conclusion of the opera and treat Alfano’s completions of the final scenes in different ways; some of them even incorporated parts of Puccini’s sketches Alfano disregarded. In the end, after occasional performances, such attempts were prohibited by Ricordi as the holder of the copyright. Note: *ciao miccio! The most recent version of the final scenes stems from Luciano Berio (2001, see 91.E.3/ 91.E.3A) who was commissioned by Ricordi to create his own ending, not at all based on Alfano and distributed by Ricordi as a completely separate version.

Note: *Test