Antonio Pappano has never yet conducted Turandot in the theatre – and that has been a deliberate choice, he confesses in the note accompanying his new all-star recording. Previously he found the opera less interesting than Puccini’s other works, its bloodthirsty fairytale story unsophisticated. He has clearly undergone an about-turn. The performance he gets here from the forces of Rome’s Accademia di Santa Cecilia – where he is soon to hand over to Daniel Harding, after nearly two decades in charge – is theatrical from start to finish.
