Appearing on CD for the first time, Lamberto Gardelli"s Pizzetti recording has been one of the most venerated in the Decca catalogue, not only because the music is comparatively rare, but because the recording is true state-of-the-art. The music has Gallic charm and a Stravinskian sense of razor-sharp wit, not to mention a fascinating storyline in which the heroine in the incidental music for La Pisanella, Sainte Aletis (a courtesan) is killed at the end of the play by being smothered by a downpour of rose petals! The couplings return to the catalogue two other Italian orchestral works, Heltay"s energetic Botticelli Pictures and the little-known and utterly charming Concerto for Strings by a composer otherwise exclusively known for his soundtracks to films, Nino Rota.