Tosca by Giacomo Puccini

Giacomo Puccini died in Brussels a hundred years ago, in November 1924. The Opéra de Monte-Carlo pays him homage by bringing you a glamourous concert performance of "Tosca" with Maria José Siri, Roberto Alagna and Luca Salsi. The great difference in mood and character compared to "La bohème" still surprise us, in spite of them having been written by the same composer and the same librettists – "Tosca" with no less a struggle than "La bohème", which had been conceived at a similar time but premiered four years earlier.

"La bohème", set in Paris, is lyrical with a good portion of humour and romanticism. During "Tosca", on the other hand, we are witness to passionate confrontations between three almost superhuman personalities. Set before a political background and located in sombre stone monuments within the city of Rome, a gory plot about love, sex and violence unfolds before us with a dramatic stringency that leaves no room for digression before it culminates in the final coup-de-théâtre: an execution which turns out to be real instead of fake, and the primadonna’s famous leap into the void from the Castel Sant’Angelo’s balustrade…

Opera in three acts
Music by Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924)
Libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa after the play "La Tosca", by Victorien Sardou
Premiere: Rome, Teatro Costanzi, 14 January 1900

Puccini Centenary Festival

• Musical director: Marco Armiliato
• Choirmaster: Stefano Visconti
• Floria Tosca: Maria José Siri
• Mario Cavaradossi: Roberto Alagna
• Baron Scarpia: Luca Salsi
• A sacristan: Giovanni Romeo
• Cesare Angelotti: Giorgi Manoshvili
• Spoletta: Reinaldo Macias

Choir of the Opéra de Monte-Carlo
Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra