By Anne Midgette [NY Times, 26 September 2005]

Il Giglio d'Oro, the Golden Lily, is the name of the inn where Rossini's "Viaggio a Reims" is set. And Rossini gilded this lily with a vengeance.

An occasional piece written to celebrate the coronation of Charles X of France in 1825, "Il Viaggio" impractically called for 10 or 12 soloists. It is a long and almost plotless excuse for one musical set piece, one star turn, after another.