Of the 3 great Tancredi on recordings (Kasarova, Horne, Podles), this is the most humane and dramatically descriptive one, in my opinion.

If you are looking for all out heroic Tancredi who doesn't have a tender side, and swift orchestra tempo to fit the whole opera on 2 discs, then go for the Naxos or the Sony recordings. This RCA version is focused on the quality of interpretation... and it doesn't hurt that the 3 discs set contains both the original Venezia happy ending and the Ferrara tragic ending in full.

Maestro Roberto Abbado is wonderfully supportive and sensitive of his singers, and uses more expanded tempi to allow the scenic quality of the Rossini's orchestration to be appreciated. Nothing is ever rushed, but the opera doesn't drag either.

Vesselina Kasarova is the dream Tancredi. Wonderfully introspective and passionate, heroic and vulnerable, all at once. The voice is amazingly expressive and full of character. She makes the florid music sounds amazingingly effortless. And as great as she is in Tancredi's 2 long solos, she is even better in the duets and ensemble numbers.

Eva Mei is a very good Amenaide. Her rather pinched voice timbre doesn't appeal to me, but she blends very well with Kasarovas voice and sings very well in this music style. Ramon Vargas is a wonderfully noble voiced Argirio as well. He sounds a bit young for that role to me, but he can projects authority and is as good as all the other Argirio on records.

All the minor roles are well sung. Great sound quality. Great packaging with full synopsis, and printed libretto in booklet. I have all the commercial Tancredi recordings (along with some non-commercial ones), and this set is the one I play the most... by a very wide margin. Once you've heard Kasarovas Tancredi, all the others will likely sound 1-dimensional by comparison.... So if you only wanted 1 CD set of this opera, this is the set to buy. None of the others present both alternate endings either.