A Question of Virtuosity: Michel Dalberto’s Virtus

 by Maureen Buja

Pianist Michel Dalberto’s latest album, Virtus, poses the question of the meaning of the word ‘virtuosity’. The word seems to have changed its meaning between the end of classicism and the height of romanticism. In the 1860s and 1870s, the Dictionnaire Littré (Dictionnaire de la langue française) defined virtuosos as skilled individuals in any field whatsoever, and it goes on to indicate that virtus, from strong man, now meant a man of talent. So, the man of virtue was gradually changed to the man of skill. And so we have today’s virtuosos.

Michel Dalberto

In his new album, Dalberto shows us the differing possibilities of virtuosity through the 19th century. He opens with what has become the basic definition of virtuoso: Franz Liszt’s concert paraphrase of a waltz from Gounod’s Faust (S. 407). Starting with the basic theme, Liszt then adds the emphasis and techniques that only he is capable of to create a virtuoso performance.

As a complete change of pace, this is followed by Mozart’s Piano Sonata No. 15 in C major, K. 545, which carries the name of the Simple Sonata or Sonata facile. This demonstrates virtuosity in another way: Mozart’s ability to create transparent and seemingly simple work, but which, by its very simplicity, speaks of his virtuosity as a composer.

The next work, Brahms’ Variations on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 35 returns us to the idea of the virtuoso performer, but now matched with a virtuoso composer. Written by Brahms for the virtuoso pianist Carl Tausig, it’s a triple hit, since the original theme was by the violin virtuoso Niccolò Paganini. Described variously as ‘fiendish’ and ‘one of the most difficult works in the literature’, and ‘diabolical’. Even Clara Schumann nicknamed them the ‘Witch’s Variations’.

Dalberto plays both books 1 and 2, but joins them in a unique manner. Each book, as written, starts with a statement of Paganini’s theme and then goes into a complete set of 14 variations. Dalberto chooses to play Book 1 through Variation 12, then goes directly to Book 2, Variation 1, skipping the restatement of the theme. This is not unusual, and when the Books are being played back-to-back as they are here, the omission of the restatement of the theme is not unique.

At the end of Book 2, he plays Variation 13, then Variation 13 of Book 1, and closes with Variation 14 from Book 1. He omits Book 2, Variation 14, entirely. He doesn’t explain this decision, but perhaps considers the final Variation of Book 1 a more definitive ending.

Franz Liszt’s Réminiscences de Norma (after Bellini’s opera), S.394, follows, bringing us yet another example of virtuosos creating their own versions of music that everyone knew.

Franz Liszt: Réminiscences de Norma (after Bellini’s opera), S.394

The last virtuoso piece was somewhat of a surprise. We’re familiar with all of Liszt’s versions of Schubert songs, but this is one by Sergei Rachmaninoff. His piano transcription of Wohin? from Schubert’s Die schöne Müllerin is a curious amalgam of Schubert’s original song with extra colouration. Rachmaninoff did some 14 transcriptions, ranging from Fritz Kreisler’s Liebesleid and Liebesfreud to Bach’s Violin Partita in E major, but this Schubert work is unique.

The playing is top-notch, if some of the decisions, particularly about the Brahms, are inexplicable. Virtuoso music in the hands of a virtuoso performer is always impressive.

Michel Dalberto: Virtus

La dolce volta LDV148
Release date: 14 March 2025

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Pianists and Their Composers: Franz Liszt

by Frances Wilson 

Franz Liszt divides opinion. For some he is regarded as one of the greatest pianist-composers of the Romantic era; for others, he is a showman and a charlatan who wrote vulgar, showy music.

3D rendering of Franz Liszt by Hadi Karimi

In fact, he was a remarkable musician and human being. Sure, as a performer he could be flamboyant and extravagant in his gestures, but he helped shape the modern solo piano concert as we know it today and he also brought a great deal of music to the public realm through his transcriptions (he transcribed Beethoven’s symphonies for solo piano, thus making this repertoire accessible to both concert artists and amateur pianists to play at home). He was an advocate of new music and up-and-coming composers and lent his generous support to people like Richard Wagner (who married Liszt’s daughter Cosima).

His piano music combines technical virtuosity and emotional depth. It’s true that some of his output is showy – all virtuosic flourishes for the sake of virtuosity – but his suites such as the Années de Pèlerinage or the Transcendental Etudes, and his transcriptions of Schubert songs demonstrate the absolute apogee of art, poetry, and beauty combined.

Martha Argerich

Martha Argerich

Martha Argerich brings fire and fluency to her interpretations, underpinned by a remarkable technical assuredness. Her 1972 recording of the B-minor Sonata and Hungarian Rhapsody No. 6 is regarded as “legendary”.

Leslie Howard

Leslie Howard

Australian Leslie Howard is the only pianist to have recorded the solo piano music of Liszt, a project which includes some 300 premiere recordings, and he is rightly regarded as a specialist of this repertoire who has brought much of Liszt’s lesser-known music to the fore.  

Lazar Berman

Lazar Berman

Berman’s 1977 recording of the Années de Pèlerinage remains the benchmark recording of this repertoire for many. Berman brings sensibility and grandeur, warm-heartedness, and mastery to this remarkable set of pieces.

Alim Beisembayev

Alim Beisembayev

Winner of the 2021 Leeds International Piano Competition, the young Armenian pianist Alim Beisembayev’s debut recording of the complete Transcendental Etudes is remarkable for its spellbinding polish, precision, and musical maturity, all supported by superb technique.  

Yuja Wang

Yuja Wang

Yuja Wang has been praised for her breath-taking interpretations of Liszt’s First Piano Concerto which combine force and filigree, emotional depth, and technical mastery to create thrilling and insightful performances.

Why Did the Great Composers Rewrite Beethoven?

 by Emily E. Hogstad 

Romantic Era composers had a unique relationship with Ludwig van Beethoven. The man and his music cast a massive shadow over the nineteenth century, especially when it came to orchestral music.

Joseph Willibrord Mähler: Ludwig van Beethoven, ca 1804–1805 (Vienna Museum)

The Beethoven works that loomed the largest were his nine symphonies, especially the Third (composed between 1802 and 1804) and the Ninth (composed between 1822 and 1824).

These works were so revolutionary that many composers found it difficult to write orchestral works after them.

Brahms, for instance, knew that any symphony he’d write would inevitably be compared to Beethoven’s. He struggled for over twenty years to write his first symphony. And even after all that effort, he still couldn’t escape Beethoven’s shadow: Brahms’s First quickly earned the nickname “Beethoven’s Tenth.”

Interestingly, one of the surprising ways that composers engaged with Beethoven’s towering legacy was by completely – and creatively – reimagining his works.

Today, we’re looking at three major composers who rewrote the Beethoven symphonies.

Franz Liszt Rewrites the Symphonies for Piano

Carbon print circa 1869 by photographer Franz Hanfstaengl

Franz Liszt was born in 1811 and apparently met Beethoven as a young prodigy shortly before Beethoven died in 1827.

At the beginning of his career as a daredevil virtuoso pianist, Liszt would transcribe the fifth, sixth, and seventh symphonies for piano. Decades later, he would finally complete the set.

These transcriptions have a frenetic brilliance to them that makes for gripping listening.

In the 1960s, Glenn Gould became the first pianist to record the transcripts of the Fifth and Sixth symphonies. Gould described them before a radio broadcast:  

According to a rather touching paragraph in Grove’s Dictionary, these keyboard extravaganzas were intended for his own use in towns which could boast no municipal orchestra, and before audiences which were otherwise without access to the symphonic milestones of Beethoven.

We have no such access problem these days, but Liszt’s transcription is much more than a tremolo-laden silent movie style period piece.

It’s not just remarkable as an archival curio, nor even as a typically Lisztian object lesson in the deployment of pianistic sonority, for even while it maintains an almost puritanical fidelity to the original text, it captures, I think, Liszt’s view of Beethoven, and, by implication, the attitude of the Romantic Age toward the classicist who unleashed romanticism.   

In his pre-performance remarks, Gould verbalised a couple of reasons for Liszt to take on the project: to increase the symphonies’ accessibility in cities without orchestras, and to capture nineteenth-century ideas about the works for future generations.

Wagner Takes on Beethoven

Richard Wagner

Composer Richard Wagner (1813–1883) was just a boy when Beethoven died.

He had recently fallen in love with music and was devastated by the loss. He later wrote about meeting Beethoven in his dreams, then awakening in tears.

In 1831, when he was still in his teens, Wagner made a transcription of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony for solo piano and voices. (Liszt had circumvented the difficulty of transcribing the choral part in the ninth by adding a second piano to his transcription.)   

Wagner wrote of his attraction to the symphony:

Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony became the mystical goal of all my strange thoughts and desires about music… It was considered the ‘non plus ultra’ of all that was fantastic and incomprehensible, and this was quite enough to rouse in me a passionate desire to study this mysterious work.

However, unlike Liszt, Wagner didn’t stop at a piano transcription.

In 1846, when he was working as a music director in Dresden, he mounted a performance of Beethoven’s Ninth. He prepared the local population for the performance by writing articles in the local newspaper.

He also altered the score. He believed that Beethoven wrote particular passages in certain ways because of his deafness or the limitations of earlier, more primitive instruments.

For instance, in bars 53-68 of the Scherzo, Wagner doubled a woodwind passage with brass.

Wagner also addressed the tempos of the symphony, encouraging musicians to discard the metronome markings that Beethoven had left behind, and taking the final two movements at almost half the speed of what Beethoven had indicated in the score.

(For a long time, conventional wisdom suggested that Beethoven’s deafness had made him incapable of judging the effects of the metronome markings, which many interpreters believed were too fast.)

Here’s a performance close to Beethoven’s stated metronome mark, as played by the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra under Nicholas McGegan:   

And here’s a Wagnerian tempo, as typified by the Vienna Philharmonic under Wilhelm Furtwängler:  

The difference is stark.

Interestingly, Wagner also moved the chorus from in front of the orchestra to behind it: an arrangement that has been adopted in modern performances today.

Gustav Mahler Takes on Beethoven

Gustav Mahler, 1902

Gustav Mahler (1860–1911) agreed with many of Wagner’s interpretive ideas. He was also in a position to put them into action after he became the conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic in 1898.

Mahler decided he wanted to modernise Beethoven’s symphonies to sound better in larger modern concert halls. Accordingly, he set about tinkering with the scores of all of them, save the Fourth.

Conductor Michael Francis, who has conducted a 2024 recording of these versions, says:

Mahler was concerned that in the turn of the 20th century that Beethoven’s classical language had lost some of the power. You think about some of the pieces that Strauss is writing; think of the pieces that Mahler was writing. So these are huge, big pieces, and he wanted Beethoven’s strength to be heard.

In order to create a bigger sound, Mahler doubled the winds and horns and even added a timpani player and tuba player. 

In February 1900, Mahler debuted his new version of Beethoven’s Ninth.

Audiences were scandalised. Purists claimed they were upset because they valued Beethoven’s original score so highly, but the entire hullabaloo was also a convenient outlet for raging Viennese anti-Semitism.

The outcry became so loud that Mahler was forced to write an explanatory note in the press about his choices!

Judge for yourself; here’s the version of the Ninth Symphony that was so controversial.  

In 2024, we published an article looking at his changes to Beethoven’s Third Symphony.

In 2020, we did an interview with conductor Johannes Vogel about what it’s actually like to perform these Mahler adaptations.

And here’s critic Dave Hurwitz sharing his opinions about the Mahler reorchestrations:  

Conclusion

Every composer has to reckon with the shadow of Beethoven.

These three composers – Liszt, Wagner, and Mahler – did so in an especially intriguing way: by rearranging and rewriting his music, all for their own unique reasons.

Liszt wanted to be able to share Beethoven’s works with a wider audience. Wagner wanted to better understand his composer idol and translate Beethoven’s intentions for a new generation. Mahler continued that same mission where Wagner left off.

Whether you appreciate their work or not, it’s undeniable that each of these men made major contributions to Beethoven’s legacy. In the process, they proved the symphonies’ relevance and timelessness.

Thunder and Trembling Vladimir Horowitz’s Battle with Performance Anxiety (Born October 1, 1903)

by Georg Predota

Vladimir Horowitz, the titan of 20th-century pianists, could silence a hall with a single chord, his fingers conjuring tempests from the keys. Yet, for all his mastery, he was a prisoner of performance anxiety, this crippling dread that drove him to the edge of collapse and forced four dramatic exits from the concert stage.

Vladimir Horowitz

“To tell you the truth, sometimes I’m frightened of myself,” he confessed in 1975, revealing the paradox of a genius who ruled Carnegie Hall but trembled at its threshold. This torment, born of revolution-scarred youth and relentless perfectionism, didn’t just haunt Horowitz.

Performance anxiety actually shaped his volcanic artistry, forging a legacy where fear and brilliance were inseparable. To celebrate his birthday on 1 October, let us honour the legacy of a pianist who transformed terror into transcendence.   

Paradox of Genius and Fear

Born on 1 October 1903 in the shadowed streets of Berdichev, near Kyiv in what was then the Russian Empire, Horowitz emerged as a prodigy whose fingers danced across the piano with a ferocity that could coax thunder from ivory. His mother, Sophie, a conservatory-trained pianist, recognised his gift early, and by age 12, he was enrolled at the Kyiv Conservatory under masters like Felix Blumenfeld, a student of Tchaikovsky himself.

Felix Blumenfeld

Horowitz’s early career was a blaze of triumphs. Debuts in Leningrad and Kharkov in 1920, a European tour that stunned audiences in Berlin and Paris, and a New York recital in 1928 that prompted The New York Times critic Olin Downes to hail him as displaying “most if not all the traits of a great interpreter.”

Yet, beneath this virtuosic facade lurked a profound vulnerability. Stage fright, that spectral adversary, would hound him for decades. That insidious cocktail of adrenaline and dread afflicted Horowitz like a recurring fever. It manifested not as mere butterflies but as a paralysing panic.   

Rituals of Dread

As biographer Glenn Plaskin recounts in Horowitz: A Biography, the pianist often arrived at venues in the eleventh hour, demanding silence from all around him, his anxiety so acute that aides sometimes had to physically nudge him toward the stage.

“Such was his stage fright that he often had to be pushed physically onto the stage,” notes music historian Robert Greenberg, underscoring how this neurotic ritual became as much a part of Horowitz’s lore as his octave-spanning arpeggios.

Incredibly, this man who commanded sold-out halls and fees that made him the highest-paid artist of the 1940s chronically doubted his own adequacy, whispering to himself that he was “inferior and inadequate” even as ovat

Murmurs of Assurance

The roots of Horowitz’s affliction might well be traced back to his tumultuous youth.

The 1917 Russian Revolution ravaged his family, as his father’s electrical engineering firm was seized, and relatives were imprisoned or executed. By 1925, the family had fled to Paris, leaving Vladimir to perform ragtime in silent-film theatres for survival.

This upheaval instilled a deep-seated insecurity, compounded by his innate perfectionism. “His consistent need to be perfect… drove his stage fright in a big way,” observed a scholar, also noting that the young pianist’s early acclaim only amplified his fear of failure.

Horowitz himself hinted at this inner turmoil in rare interviews, though direct quotes on stage fright are elusive. Instead, he channelled it into mantras of reassurance. Before performances, he would murmur, “I know my pieces,” a self-soothing litany affirming his meticulous preparation as a bulwark against the void.   

A Vanishing Act

Vladimir Horowitz in 1931

This ritual, born of desperation, revealed a man wrestling not just with notes but with the terror of exposure. Horowitz’s first major retreat came in 1936, a seismic event that rippled through the music world. At the peak of his powers, fresh off collaborations with Toscanini and recordings that refined the Rachmaninoff concertos, he succumbed to “nervous exhaustion.”

Married since 1933 to Wanda Toscanini, daughter of the imperious conductor Arturo, Horowitz faced mounting pressures. The stormy union was marked by Wanda’s infidelities and Vladimir’s alleged homosexuality, with colitis twisting his gut.

Vladimir and Wanda Horowitz

He vanished from the stage for 13 months, retreating to Italy and then New York, where therapy and rest barely quelled the storm. Biographer Harold C. Schonberg, in Horowitz: His Life and Music, describes this period as one where “the heartbreaking destruction of his family combined with… professional frustrations to bring on the first of several breakdowns.”   

Electric Return and Enduring Shadows

Upon return in 1938, his playing was electric, but the fright lingered like a shadow. The post-World War II years amplified the torment. By 1953, after a separation from Wanda and rumours of institutionalisation, Horowitz hit rock bottom.

He underwent electroshock therapy for depression, a brutal intervention that left him catatonic at the piano. “For months, for years, he was incapable of performing in public,” recounts author Lea Singer in a 2021 interview about Horowitz’s hidden life.

The mere thoughts of the stage triggered panic attacks so severe that rumours started to fly that he could no longer touch the keys. This hiatus lasted 12 years, the longest of his four periods of retirement. During these silences, Horowitz turned to recordings, a much safer harbour where he could edit out imperfections.

A Phoenix Rises

Vladimir Horowitz in 1986

Yet, from these ashes rose phoenix-like comebacks, each a testament to resilience. The most mythic unfolded on 9 May 1965, at Carnegie Hall. Backstage, Horowitz paced like a caged tiger, his wife and daughter, Sonia, imploring him to move forward. When he finally emerged, the ovation was deafening.

His program, scarred on showpieces and heavy on Bach, Clementi and Mozart, unleashed a Horowitz reborn. His playing was introspective, crystalline, with rubato that breathed like wind through willows. Pianist André Watts captured the onstage atmosphere, stating, “Horowitz was like a demon barely under control.” (Read more about “Vladimir Horowitz’s Legendary 1965 Carnegie Hall Comeback Concert“.)

The eminent musicologist Charles Rosen elaborated further, dubbing performance anxiety “a divine ailment, a sacred madness. It’s a Promethean curse where the artist suffers to deliver the divine spark.”    

Imperfect Perfection

Horowitz transmuted performance anxiety into daring, as the fear of errors became the edge that sharpened his interpretations. As he explained in 1975, “I must tell you I take terrible risks. Because my playing is very clear, when I make a mistake, you hear it… Never be afraid to dare.”

Yet, Horowitz disdained mechanical perfection. “Perfection itself is imperfection,” he quipped, instead favouring “a little mistake here and there” to infuse music with human warmth.

Lea Singer described his offstage demeanour as a “shy penguin”, noting his 1986 Moscow bow tie, and grinning through “great sadness.” Pianist Oscar Levant, another anxiety-plagued musician, jested that Horowitz should advertise “for a limited number of cancellations.”   

Tears and Triumph

Vladimir Horowitz in 1986

Critics and peers dissected Horowitz’s affliction with awe and empathy. In The Guardian, a 2015 reflection on overcoming anxiety likened stage fright to “an untamed horse. We have to try to harness it, let it out, pull it back,” an apt metaphor for Horowitz’s volatile command.

Even in later years, as recordings supplanted tours, his influence endured. His late-career resurgences, in 1978 in Cleveland after a nine-year absence, and the 1986 historic Moscow return amid Gorbachev’s glasnost, were defiant rebuttals to his demons.

As he plays Schumann’s Träumerei with tears in his eyes, an encore that bridges across 61 years of exile, he once declared, “without false modesty, I feel that, when I’m on the stage, I’m the king, the boss of the situation.” Yet, as Classical Music magazine reflected in 2025, his “success… came at a heavy price, with electroshock scars and pill bottles as collateral.”  

Chasing the Sublime

Vladimir Horowitz died on 5 November 1989, in New York, felled by a heart attack at the age of 86. His legacy, etched in 25 Grammys and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, transcends the man. Performance anxiety for Horowitz was no mere malady but the crucible of his art.

It forced retirements that honed his depth, risks that electrified his touch, and returns that redefined triumph. In an era when beta-blockers offered chemical relief, as proposed in a 1979 Times article, Horowitz reminds us that the raw edge of fear can give birth to the sublime.

As Joan Acocella, in her 2015 The New Yorker essay on performance anxiety, wrote, “Horowitz played from the other side of the score, looking back.” And maybe that’s how we should gaze at him as well. A demon tamed, a king enthroned, forever chasing the music behind the notes.

John Rutter - Celebrating 80 Years of Choral Legacy

by Georg Predota  October 3rd, 2025

On the occasion of John Rutter’s 80th birthday on 24 September 2025, choral communities across the globe join in a formal celebration of his extraordinary contributions to the world of music. His compositions have enriched the repertoire of choirs worldwide, gracing sacred spaces, concert halls, and festivals with their profound beauty and emotional depth.

John Rutter

Rutter’s artistry has inspired generations of singers, conductors, and audiences, fostering a shared sense of unity and reverence through the power of choral music. As we reflect on this milestone, it is fitting to explore Rutter’s life, his artistic contributions, and the enduring impact of his work 

Igniting a Lifelong Passion

John Rutter’s early life was steeped in the sounds of London’s vibrant cultural landscape. Growing up above the Globe pub on Marylebone Road, the son of an industrial chemist, he discovered music’s enchanting world through an out-of-tune upright piano.

His formal education at Highgate School, where he sang as a chorister alongside future luminaries like John Tavener, ignited a passion for composition. At just 18, Rutter penned his “Shepherd’s Pipe Carol,” a piece that captured the ethereal innocence of pastoral imagery and foreshadowed his affinity for Christmas carols.

This early work, published during his undergraduate years at Clare College, Cambridge, marked the beginning of a prolific output that blended English choral traditions with innovative textures. At Cambridge, Rutter not only studied music but also served as Director of Music at Clare College Chapel from 1975 to 1979, elevating the choir to an international standing.  

Crafting Choral Classics

John Rutter

John Rutter played a pivotal role in the Carols of Choir series, particularly from 1970 onward. As co-editor alongside Sir David Willcocks, Rutter contributed original works and arrangements, which blended traditional folk elements with vibrant rhythms and luminous harmonies.

Earning praise for their “joyful qualities” and “musical polish,” Rutter’s work on subsequent volumes further showcases his versatility. In fact, Willcocks called him “the most gifted composer of his generation.”

Rutter decided to leave Academia in 1979 to focus on composition. This decision was pivotal as it allowed him to establish the Cambridge Singers in 1981. This professional choir became his creative laboratory, recording sacred repertoire on his Collegium Records label and touring globally.   

Mourning and Majesty

Yet, Rutter’s path was not without adversity as he battled health problems from 1985 to 1992, a period that curtailed commissions and forced a re-evaluation of his creative process. Emerging from this trial, Rutter’s music gained deeper emotional layers, as evident in works like the Requiem, which balances mourning with consolation.

Rutter’s sacred choral music is rooted in a harmonic language that favours modal shifts and lush tertian sonorities to facilitate emotional accessibility. Demanding vocal precision, these works blend simplicity and sophistication, appealing to both amateur and professional ensembles alike.

John Rutter’s influence extends to secular realms as well. His “This is the Day,” composed for the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton, fuses psalmic joy with contemporary resonance. We also find orchestral works, such as the Suite Antique, stimulated by Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, and two Beatles-themed piano concertos inspired by the American songbook tradition. 

Uniting Voices

John Rutter with the Cambridge Singers

John Rutter’s contributions to choral music have left an enduring mark on the global choral landscape, blending accessibility with harmonic sophistication to create works that resonate across sacred and secular contexts.

Rutter’s ability to infuse traditional texts with modern sensibilities, often through luminous tonal palettes and subtle rhythmic vitality, has been praised as “a gift for melody and an instinctive understanding of the voice.”

As we celebrate his 80th birthday, we honour John Rutter’s enduring legacy as a defining figure in contemporary choral music. His lasting impact stems from his unique ability to craft music that is both emotionally immediate and technically refined. In other words, Rutter’s music unites singers and listeners in shared emotional experiences.

Madame Butterfly by Puccini - Love Duet (Opera Movie, 1995 - subtitled)

Madama Butterfly (Madame Butterfly) is an opera in three acts (originally two acts) by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. Puccini based his opera in part on the short story "Madame Butterfly" (1898) by John Luther Long, which was dramatized by David Belasco. Puccini also based it on the novel Madame Chrysanthème (1887) by Pierre Loti. According to one scholar, the opera was based on events that actually occurred in Nagasaki in the early 1890s. The original version of the opera, in two acts, premiered on February 17, 1904, at La Scala in Milan. It was very poorly received despite the presence of such notable singers as soprano Rosina Storchio, tenor Giovanni Zenatello and baritone Giuseppe De Luca in the lead roles. This was due in large part to the late completion and inadequate time for rehearsals. Puccini revised the opera, splitting the second act into two acts and making other changes. On May 28, 1904, this version was performed in Brescia and was a huge success. The opera is set in the city of Nagasaki. Japan's best-known opera singer Tamaki Miura won international fame for her performances as Cio-Cio San; her statue, along with that of Puccini, can be found in Nagasaki's Glover Garden. Butterfly is a staple of the standard operatic repertoire for companies around the world and it is the most-performed opera in the United States, where it ranks as Number 1 in Opera America's list of the 20 most-performed operas in North America.

5 songs that will make you feel nostalgic (Filipino songs Editon)

10,258,517 views Aug 15, 2023 #nostalgic #hits #lyrics

5 Filipino songs that will make you feel nostalgic. We do not own the music or photos, and no copyright is intended. The original creator receives full credit. #filipinosongs #lyrics #nostalgic #hits