Tosca, Royal Opera, 8 December 2021

Royal Opera House

Cesare Angelotti – Yuriy Yurchuk
Sacristan – Jeremy White
Mario Cavaradossi – Bryan Hymel, Freddie De Tommaso
Floria Tosca – Elena Stikhina
Baron Scarpia – Alexey Markov
Spoletta – Hubert Francis
Sciarrone – Jihoon Kim
Shepherd Boy – Alfie Davis
Gaoler – John Morrissey

Jonathan Kent (director)
Amy Lane (revival director)
Paul Brown (designs)

Mark Henderson (lighting)

Royal Opera Chorus (chorus director: William Spaulding)

Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

Oksana Lviv (conductor)  

Images: Tristam Kenton. Copyright: ROH, 2021.
Tosca (Elena Stikhina) and Scarpia (Alexey Markov)

Tosca is a puzzling opera. It seems to me quite the weakest of those Puccini operas in or at the edge of the repertory. Its characters are nothing more than cardboard cut-outs; there is little in the way of broader dramatic interest; for so generally sophisticated a composer, it is often crude, even drab, though there is perhaps greater interest in aspects of the vocal writing than elsewhere. Then there are the bits that read—and sound—like an especially bad historical novel or television mini-series, undigested pieces of historical record thrown up as if somehow to guarantee veracity. It remains steadfastly unmoving—for who or what might move one here?—compared to the rest of Puccini. And yet, Tosca continues in its bewildering popularity. Perhaps I instead am the problem.

 

Whatever the truth of that, Jonathan Kent’s Royal Opera House production is a serious problem. Quite what Kent or any of his team—there is little to it other than its designs—was thinking, it is difficult to say, for it emerges as something that advances on the late, unlamented Franco Zeffirelli only by providing a sort of Reader’s Digest abridgement to the latter that rids it of its gaudiness and any semblance of internal coherence. One waits for any sense of ironic detachment; then one waits longer; and longer still. The set’s heavy vulgarity—there is little or no production beyond the designs—might have been a wry comment on the work, but wryness seems no more to be at stake here than it is in the airheaded vanity of Tosca herself, neither character nor idea. Characters, for want of a better word, generally seem too far away from one another, reducing still further any prospect for chemistry between caricatures. Quite what the point of having people walk up and down ladders is, I cannot say. It gives them something to do, I suppose, but there seems to be beyond no concept beyond that. Borgesian labyrinth this is not; nor is it Piranesi. The oddly designated ‘revival director’ Amy Lane doubtless does what she can, but you cannot revive something that never had life in the first place.

 

Musically, things were better. Elena Stikhina gave a finely variegated account of the title role, with considerable heft where needed, and considerable range of dynamic and colour contrast. She certainly seemed to believe in the role and would surely have made greater dramatic impact in a more plausible staging. As Cavaradossi, Bryan Hymel did not return after the interval, an announcement made that he had been suffering with a heavy cold. It only seems fair therefore to draw a veil over his performance and to say that his replacement Freddie De Tommaso would have made an excellent impression in any circumstances, let alone these. This was, like Stikhina’s, an unsentimental, idiomatic, and—work and production permitting—involving performance. The production’s crudity did Alexey Markov as Scarpia no favours, but there was no doubting the intelligence of his artistry, nor the blackness of this baron’s intent. Other singers all contributed with excellence, Hubert Francis's Spoletta in particular catching the ear. 

So too did the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, perhaps the greatest star of the evening. The players clearly relished Puccini again and responded with accuracy and style to conductor Oksana Lyniv, whose precision and disinclination to yield prevented any lapse into mere sentimentality, though perhaps it drained a little too much of the sentiment without evident cause that is Puccini’s orchestral stock-in-trade here. The Royal Opera Chorus’s contribution was mostly dependable, if at times a little frayed. I could not find the children’s chorus identified in the programme, though perhaps I missed it.

It will doubtless sell. Some, especially at the moment, will say that that is enough; but is it, really? If institutional opera even gives up the struggle to be anything other than a bad-taste museum piece, why should we struggle on its behalf? As we emerge, fingers crossed, from this wretched pandemic, Covent Garden should set its sights higher than being a faded Met-on-Thames. Give a director such as Calixto Bieito a chance to prove us Tosca-sceptics triumphantly wrong.

Tosca, English National Opera, 3 October 2016

Coliseum

(sung in English)

Tosca (Keri Alkema), Spoletta (Scott Davies), and Scarpia (Craig Colclough)
Images: Richard Hubert Smith

Floria Tosca – Keri Alkerna

Mario Cavaradossi – Gwyn Hughes Jones
Baron Scarpia – Craig Colclough
Cesare Angelotti – Andri Björn Róbertsson
Sacristan – Adrian Powter
Spoletta – Scott Davies
Sciarrone – Graeme Danby
Gaoler – Robert Winslade Anderson
Shepherd Boy – Alessandro MacKinnon
 

Catherine Malfitano (director)

Donna Stirrup (revival director)
Frank Peter Schlössman (set designs)
Gideon Davey (costumes)
David Martin Jacques, Kevin Sleep (lighting)
 

Chorus of the English National Opera (chorus master: James Henshaw)

Orchestra of the English National Opera
Oleg Caetani (conductor)

 

Poor Puccini. He is far too often treated as a ‘box-office hit’ by our ‘major’ opera houses, at least in Anglophone countries. For so consummate a musical dramatist, that is something beyond a pity. Here in London, one is far better advised to go to Holland Park for interesting, intelligent productions, although ENO’s offerings have often had something to be said for them. Catherine Malfitano’s production once had a somewhat literalistic yet straightforward integrity to it; now it seems simply to flounder. When I saw it previously, in 2011, the Personenregie at least proved generally accomplished; here it veers (too little rehearsal time for a revival, perhaps?) between the non-existent and the all-too-local am-dram. The lack of any discernible concept thus matters far more than previously it did. We simply have sets and costumes and wandering around. Quite why the Sacristan looks as though he comes from Shoreditch-cum-Kandahar I have no idea. Nor do I understand the weirdly inter-galactic backdrop for the third act. The rest – well, the rest is unobjectionable, yet nothing more.

Cavaradossi (Gwyn Hughes Jones) and Tosca

The ENO Orchestra, as usual, was on excellent form. Oleg Caetani summoned up some luscious sounds, especially in the third act, although I found the first act a little jocular in tone. There was, in general, a reasonable sense of line, although Caetani fell some way short of the more distinguished ‘symphonic’ realisations. (No, it is not really quite the right word, but we all know what it means in this context.) Greater variegation would also have been welcome; I never felt Caetani was engaging with anything other than the score’s (impressive) surface. Choral singing was also of a high standard; let us never forget the sterling work the chorus undertakes day in, day out.

It was not, however, a vintage night for solo singing. Keri Alkerna offered an alert performance in the title role, but it rarely caught fire until the second act, and only intermittently then. Gwyn Hughes Jones clearly has quite a following at the Coliseum. Although he certainly has vocal heft, I was unable to discern much beyond that in his Cavaradossi: his singing was generalised – far too often a problem in this role, I have found – and his acting at best rudimentary. Craig Colclough’s underpowered Scarpia came across in strangely camp fashion, at least on those occasions when his voice rose above the orchestra and/or chorus. I am all for revisionist readings, but pantomime villain faces are not a satisfactory substitute for true malevolence. The smaller roles, however, tended to impress, Andri Björn Róbertsson’s Angelotti, Scott Davies's Spoletta, and young Alessandro MacKinnon’s Shepherd Boy were all especially well presented.

There was nothing bad here, then, but nor was there much over which to rejoice. Next time, might we have something that engages with the dramatic possibilities of the work, rather than pandering to the reactionary ‘taste’ of an imaginary ‘general’ audience? The Arts Council has behaved disgracefully towards ENO, but timidity never helped anyone, and it certainly does not help Puccini.

 

Tosca, Vienna State Opera, 2 December 2015

Vienna State Opera

Images: Wiener Staatsoper / Michael Pöhn

Floria Tosca – Martina Serafin

Mario Cavaradossi – Roberto Alagna
Baron Scarpia – Michael Volle
Cesare Angelotti – Ryan Speedo Green
Sacristan – Alfred Šramek
Spoletta – Benedikt Kobel
Sciarrone – Hans Peter Kammerer
Gaoler – Il Hong
Shepherd Boy – Bernhard Sengstschmid

Margarethe Wallmann (director)

Nicola Benois (revival director)

Vienna State Opera Chorus (chorus master: Martin Schebesta)

Orchestra of the Vienna State Opera

Dan Ettinger (conductor) 

 

 

 

Tosca is pretty much indestructible, although that does not necessarily prevent opera houses from doing their worst to prove me wrong. Where are the Bieitos, the Konwitschnys, the Herheims, the Katy Mitchells, indeed anyone who might think Puccini and indeed his audiences merit something other than condescension? The Berlin State Opera recently signalled the prospect of something a little more interesting with a new production, conducted by Daniel Barenboim (his first Puccini!), directed by Alvis Hermanis, a director with a mixed record, at best, but at least not renowned for pandering to ‘subscription’ tastes. Whether the staging succeeded, I do not know; given Hermanis’s recent pronouncements, I am unlikely ever to find out. Alas, Dominique Meyer decided, rather than to present a new production at the Vienna State Opera, to reproduce the disintegrating sets and costumes of its existing – I am tempted to say, ‘prehistoric’ – production.

 

That, alas, is precisely what it looks like. Indeed, before I was informed by a friend of Meyer’s strange decision, my thought had been that the sets and costumes reminded me of the horrible if understandable restoration of Dresden’s Frauenkirche. (How much more powerful it was when a pile of rubble: an encounter, from my first visit to that city, I will never forget!) Indeed, what the action, if one can call it that, looked and felt like was really rather curious: some people attempting, without much support, less to ape the manners of the 1950s than to have rediscovered an abandoned set from that period, trying to do something, anything, but not too much, within its confines. Margarethe Wallmann’s production, to our eyes, seems strange, not in an intriguing way, but because the years have hollowed it out of what one presumes once to have been its content. Doubtless a revival director does what she can, and can hardly be held responsible, but a piece of theatre this is not.

 

The answer one often hears to such complaints is that great artists can breathe new life into anything. Perhaps, although I think even Herbert von Karajan and Renata Tebaldi, who featured in its 1957 premiere, might have had difficulty here in 2015. This, at any rate, was not a vintage night in performing terms. Dan Ettinger’s conducting was at best plodding, although there were occasional hints form the orchestra – some gorgeous cello playing in particular – that these were players who might, under a conductor such as Daniele Gatti, produce something world-beating. For the most part, Ettinger seemed content to ‘accompany’: a very odd idea for one of the most symphonic of opera composers. When he did try something, it seemed to be merely to repeat a phrase slower and louder than the last time. This score usually flies by; here, one might have thought it a misfire on the composer’s part.

 

There was better news from the singers – at least until the end (on which more shortly). Martina Serafin is not possessed of the most refulgent of voices, but she did a good deal with what she had, and for the most part proved attentive towards words as well as music. ‘Vissi d’arte’ was, alas, plagued by poor intonation. Roberto Alagna suffered similarly when he first came on stage, but his performance improved dramatically – in more than one sense – thereafter. Indeed, as always, he threw his all into what he was doing, vocally and otherwise. His big aria was beautifully sung, without a hint of playing to the gallery. (Alas, the gallery still responded, holding up what action the production permitted.) Michael Volle seemed strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, out of sorts. He is a great artist, but this is perhaps not his role, or at least this is not his production. His Italian was such that even I found it too Teutonic, and, although he offered greater malice and menace in the second act, the first-act Scarpia seemed oddly avuncular. Ryan Speedo Green was an energetic, dark-voiced Angelotti; I should like to hear more from him.

 

Despite my reservations, I was a little surprised when no one came to receive applause. Eventually, a member of staff came forward to make an announcement. Serafin had fallen awkwardly when making her leap from the ramparts and was unable to return onstage. After that, although the rest of the cast then took their curtain calls, the evening fizzled out, a state of affairs which, alas, did not seem at odds with the staging. I do not doubt that, in 1957, when Wallmann’s production, if we can still call it that, was first seen, with Karajan and Tebaldi, there might have been much to enjoy scenically, as well as musically. Now, however, it would surely be kinder to Wallmann, to Puccini, to the singers, to the audience, to grant it an honourable retirement. As another, supremely theatrical composer, alongside Schoenberg (later) surely the most beneficial influence upon Puccini, once put it: ‘Kinder, macht neues!’

 

Tosca, Royal Opera, 10 May 2014

Royal Opera House

Cesare Angelotti – Michel de Souza

Sacristan – Jeremy White

Mario Cavaradossi – Roberto Alagna

Floria Tosca – Oksana Dyka

Baron Scarpia – Marco Vratogna

Spoletta – Martyn Hill

Sciarrone – Jihoon Kim

Shepherd Boy – Michael Clayton-Jolly

Gaoler – Olle Zetterström

Jonathan Kent (director)

Andrew Sinclair (revival director)

Paul Brown (designs)

Mark Henderson (lighting)

Royal Opera Chorus and Extra Chorus (chorus master: Renato Balsadonna)

Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

Oleg Caetani (conductor)

 

Scarpia (Marco Vratogna) and Tosca (Oksana Dyka)
Copyright: ROH/Catherine Ashmore

 

 

All in all, a dispiriting evening, this. Jonathan Kent’s 2006 staging of Tosca, revived again, as last year (!), by Andrew Sinclair, certainly does not reveal greater subtleties of meaning with further acquaintance. Indeed, it makes little or no attempt at conveying meaning at all, be it subtle or otherwise. There is nothing wrong in principle with setting the work when and where specified in the libretto, just as there is nothing wrong with reimagining it, though an over-exposed opera such as this more or less cries out for some element of rethinking. But irrespective of the relatively unimportant question of setting, there needs to be something, or rather a great deal, more to a production than that. Not only is there no sense, as I wrote last time, of dialogue between Puccini’s time, our own, and the time at which the opera is set; there sadly is no sense of drama beyond the gunshots in the third act. Paul Brown’s large scale sets might have imparted a welcome impression of menace, of claustrophobia, but again they could hardly do that on their own. I have no idea how much or how little rehearsal was permitted, but interaction between the singers was often so rudimentary as to suggest none whatsoever (which cannot have been the case).

 

Roberto Alagna at least offered energetic commitment on stage, unlike his Tosca and Scarpia. Alagna’s first act was shaky vocally; indeed his opening suffered from wild intonation and vocal constriction. Later on, however, he improved, though cleaner lines would often have been welcome. Such matters are, however, partly a matter of taste, and on his own terms, the second and third acts were reasonably impressive. Alas, Oksana Dyka’s vibrato was so wide as often to encompass the best part a minor third; her acting skills on this occasion were well-nigh non-existent. Perhaps it was as well that she simply strolled off the battlement rather than attempting anything that would vaguely qualify as a ‘leap’, but it hardly made for much of a climax. Marco Vratogna’s Scarpia also suffered from dryness and constriction in the first act, proving more focused in the second. His acting, however, matched that of his Scarpia; would that the Carry On element of his demise had been born of irony. The smaller parts were generally well taken, however. If only we had seen and heard more from Michel de Souza’s dynamic Angelotti, Jeremy White's characterful, bumbling Sacristan, or Martyn Hill’s nasty Spoletta.

 

The orchestra played well enough, though the strings sometimes tended towards thinness. However, Oleg Caetani’s inconsistent conducting proved a considerable break upon the flowering or, more plainly, the progress of the score. He seemed undecided what he thought of it and therefore unable to make it cohere. The first act’s lack of sentimentality was to be welcomed, but instead it was brutalised; hard-driven rather than riven with menace. Phrasing throughout was short-breathed, instances of a longer line standing out awkwardly, given their lack of relation to what surrounded them. Alas, as with so much of what we saw and heard, what might have passed muster in a small, provincial theatre wedded to the repertory system simply was not good enough for a world stage, upon which this Tosca was presented as a major revival. All with ears to hear will have praised the Royal Opera House to the skies for its recent, superlative performances of Die Frau ohne Schatten; if a work which it performs so incessantly as Tosca is to be performed again any time soon, it needs to be done with similar care and attention. This spoke more of cynicism than of having ‘lived for art’.  

Tosca, Royal Opera, 4 March 2013

Royal Opera House, Covent Garden

Cesare Angelotti – Michel de Souza

Sacristan – Jeremy White
Mario Cavaradossi – Massimo Giordano
Floria Tosca – Amanda Echalaz
Baron Scarpia – Michael Volle
Spoletta – Hubert Francis
Sciarrone – Jihoon Kim
Shepherd Boy – Filippo Turkheimer
Gaoler – John Morrissey

Jonathan Kent (director)

Andrew Sinclair (revival director)
Paul Brown (designs)
Mark Henderson (lighting)

Royal Opera Chorus

Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

Maurizio Benini (conductor)

 

 

I shall doubtless be behind the curve when compared with many readers concerning Jonathan Kent’s Royal Opera staging of Tosca, first seen in 2006 and now revived by Andrew Sinclair, given that this was my first viewing. There is not much to say about it really. It is certainly not radical in any way, nor does it seem to have anything to say about the work. (To be fair, though, when Kent has seemed to have had something to say, for instance, in his dreadful Flying Dutchman for ENO, it has not always seemed coherent or worth saying.) I doubt that there is anything to which even the most hidebound ‘traditionalist’ – by which, I mean a fetishiser of set designs and costumes, who thinks that everything should conform to his or her poor-taste conception of what might be ‘beautiful’ – might object. There was certainly nothing so daring as a spot of updating, let alone any sense of dialogue between Puccini’s time, our own, and the time at which the opera is set. The greatest, arguably the only, dramatic jolt came from the third act gunshots. Relatively heavy set designs (Paul Brown) might have added a sense of dramatic claustrophobia, but that would have required something a little more than simply placing singers in front of them and leaving them to it. I can see why having the Te Deum take place a level above Scarpia might visually have seemed an attractive idea; the problem, however, was that it dulled the aural impact of the chorus to the level of background music, when a degree at least of sensory overload should be experienced.

 

Maurizio Benini, however, delivered a decent account, and sometimes rather more than that, of Puccini’s score. Again, it did not especially challenge, but it brought to life that which remained visually dormant. If my preference would undoubtedly be for something that brought more to the fore the symphonism of which many of Puccini’s contemporaries complained, likewise his modernist anticipations, then that has to remain a preference rather than stipulation. In a relatively straightforward way, Benini, a slightly hard-driven opening aside, supported and shaped the action, the melodramatic dénouement quite thrilling in its way. Turning of the musical screws of torture was accomplished to truly searing effect. A few slips aside, the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House played well for him, if without quite sounding on the very top of its form. I could not help but wonder, though, what more we might have learned from a great conductor such as Daniele Gatti, whose Salzburg Bohème last summer made a more powerful case for the score than any I have otherwise heard. Gatti of course had the signal advantage too of the Vienna Philharmonic playing for a conductor it loves.

 

And yet, if that all sounds a little easy-listening, one was must take into account the singular contribution of Massimo Giordano’s Cavaradossi. If a Konzept were entirely lacking in Kent’s staging, Giordano supplied his own element of deconstruction, offering a brave parody of popular conceptions of the ‘Italian operatic tenor’. There was no Kaufmann-esque mezza voce here. Instead we heard one of the most convincing assumptions of the ‘Just one Cornetto’ style I have experienced since – well, since that advertisement. What do you mean, it was not intended as a parody? Was that ‘authenticity’ too, in terms of ‘what Puccini might have expected,’ in the unfeasibly wide vibrato and portamento comprising a decent sized portion of the chromatic scale? In the immortal words of the Princess Royal, replying to Cherie Blair’s urging, ‘Call me Cherie,’ ‘Let’s not go there.’

 

Amanda Echalaz, however, offered a detailed, beautifully sung account of the title role. If she never thrilled in the way the Greek soprano who shall not be mentioned has unfortunately led us to expect, then such is a more than usually odious comparison. Michael Volle was perhaps better still, presenting an uncommonly intelligent assumption of Baron Scarpia. Hints of Dr Schön – and not just because so many of us associate him with the role – informed this villain’s sadism; if only a plot twist might have been added, in which Jack the Ripper appeared during the third act. Volle’s command of words and musical line was second to none, lifting the melodrama in many cases beyond itself. Many of the smaller roles were very well taken too. Jette Parker Young Artist, Michel de Souza, an attractive, compelling Angelotti, made one eager to hear more of him in the future; doubtless we shall. Hubert Francis’s contribution as Spoletta did likewise. Company stalwart, Jeremy White, presented as rounded a Sacristan as production and work permitted. And let us not forget Filippo Turkheimer, who certainly made one sit up and listen to the Shepherd Boy’s solo, more dramatically telling than I can previously recall.


I am unsure whether this were a matter of 'access', but the audience seemed to be largely made up of the hard of hearing. Not once was the orchestra permitted to complete an act prior to applause. Moreover, barely a bar of the third act passed by without bronchial accompaniment, chattering, throwing keys on the floor (??!!)...

Tosca, English National Opera, 26 November 2011

Coliseum

Floria Tosca – Claire Rutter
Mario Cavaradossi – Gwyn Hughes Jones
Baron Scarpia – Anthony Michaels-Moore
Cesare Angelotti – Matthew Hargreaves
Sacristan – Henry Waddington
Spoletta – Scott Davies
Sciarrone – Graeme Danby
Gaoler – Christopher Ross
Shepherd-boy –Jacob Ramsay-Patel

Catherine Malfitano (director)
Frank Schloessmann (set designs)
Gideon Davey (costumes)
David Martin Jacques, Kevin Sleep (lighting)

Chorus of the English National Opera (chorus master: Nicholas Chalmers)
Orchestra of the English National Opera
Stephen Lord (conductor)

Tosca (Claire Rutter) and Cavaradossi (Gwyn
Hughes-Jones)
Images: Mike Hoban

The swift return to the Coliseum of Catherine Malfitano’s production of Tosca, premiered in 2010, contrasts strongly with the increasingly disposable nature of many recent ENO productions. Malfitano’s staging makes a refreshing change both from the likes of the floundering first-time spoken theatre and film directors often recently engaged by the company, and from the ludicrous, dramatically-null vulgarity of the Zeffirelli brigade. It doubtless helps to have someone at the directorial helm who knows the work from the inside, having sung the title-role a good many times herself. There is nothing here – with the possible exception of the third act – to frighten self-appointed ‘traditionalists’, although in such repertoire and with respect the audiences it tends to attract, I cannot help but wish that someone would occasionally shock the horses. (Just imagine what Calixto Bieito might make of Tosca!) Despite the sometimes bizarre specificity of the libretto, there seems to me no reason why intelligent relocation or abstraction could not work: the opera is not in any meaningful sense ‘about’ the experience of the French Revolution in Rome. Malfitano, however, elects successfully to retain the settings and for the most part the attitudes of the work’s creators, respecting as do they the classical unities.

Scarpia (Anthony Michaels-Moore)

The first act is therefore set in S.Andrea della Valle at noon, convincingly represented in realistic fashion by Frank Philipp Schlössmann’s designs. The force of Cavaradossi’s painting registers straightforwardly, but none the worse for that. One strongly feels the menace of the Church as pillar of the (re-)established order at the entrance of clergy and acolytes for the Te Deum. (I cannot help but find the anti-clericalism shallow, verging on the puerile, but that is no fault of the production.) Likewise, the second act is set at evening in Scarpia’s quarters in the Palazzo Farnese, furnished as one might expect, though without excess. The third act therefore comes as a bit of a surprise, at least in terms of designs . Doubtless taking as its cue references in words and stage directions to the stars, perhaps even those to the saints in heaven, we see the skies as if from a space ship, though something akin to the battlements is still present. It did not bother me in the slightest, though nor, by the same token, did I find the image revelatory. Throughout, Malfitano’s direction of the characters on stage proves quietly accomplished, providing neither mishaps nor particular flashes of revelation. I do not mean to imply that it is dull, for it is not, but nor does this in any sense approach reinterpretation, for which many will doubtless be relieved. If I found the final melodrama as difficult to take as ever, a not-entirely-fitting conclusion to so well-crafted a score, then clearly I am in the minority; rightly or wrongly, it receives faithful treatment here.

Stephen Lord’s conducting was impressive. Lord is not a conductor I have previously heard, but I should certainly be interested to do so again. Despite the occasional instance of perhaps driving the score a little hard, the full yet variegated sound conjured from the orchestra was as fine as I have heard at the Coliseum for quite some time. Alert to Puccini’s Wagnerisms without overplaying them, there was a fine continuity to Lord’s traversal of the score, which here in both harmony and orchestration at times sounded, to its great benefit, appreciably more modernistic than one often hears. It was not for nothing that both Schoenberg and Berg were admirers. Even Mahler, in his scathing description of a Meistermachwerk, acknowledged the skill of orchestration – an undoubted advance upon so many of Puccini’s Italian forebears – though added that any cobbler nowadays could merely ‘orchestrate to perfection’.



If the singing did not truly scaled the heights, it was professionally despatched. No one is going to replicate Callas, and Claire Rutter wisely did not attempt to try: hers was an intelligent enough stage portrayal, a little lacking in charisma perhaps, likewise in creation of the diva-status of Floria Tosca as singer, but, despite occasional weakness in sustaining her line, there was nothing grievous to worry about. Gwyn Hughes-Jones’s Cavaradossi was not entirely free of crooning tendencies, nor did it revel in subtleties, but it was well enough sung, and would doubtless have sounded better in Italian. Anthony Michaels-Moore seemed to experience vocal difficulties in the first act but his Scarpia sharpened up in the second, albeit without ever quite capturing the sheer danger and malevolence of the most notable interpreters. The smaller parts were all well taken. Choral singing, not always the strongest point recently at the Coliseum, was similarly accomplished.