When Giacomo Puccini received an offer from Vienna "to write an opera – yes: similar to Der Rosenkavalier, only more entertaining and more organic," he replied, "An operetta, that for me is out of the question." Two suggestions were submitted to him from Vienna, and he selected La rondine (The Swallow) for his work. The three-act "commedia lirica" premiered in Monte Carlo in 1917, and three years later it made its way to the Volksoper in Vienna. The Munich Radio Orchestra performed La rondine at the Prinzregententheater during its first Sunday Concert of the 2015/16 season. The outstanding Rumanian-Swiss soprano Elena Mosuc sang the title role, and the Munich Radio Orchestra’s new principal conductor Ivan Repusiae introduced himself to the public with an impressive debut. This production is now being released on cpo. The well-known opera love triangle, soprano-tenor-baritone, offers listeners many opportunities to smile with delight. Take, for example, the operetta text by Alfred Maria Willmer and Heinz Reichert on which Giuseppe Adami’s libretto for Puccini’s La rondine is based. Here the banker Rambaldo’s mistress receives a marriage proposal from the student Ruggero. However, Magda de Civry doubts that she will be accepted by his family and prefers to remain the banker’s mistress!