DomStufen-Festspiele in Erfurt 2016
Puccini's fifth opera centers on the tragic love affair between the singer Floria Tosca and her lover, the painter Mario Cavaradossi. The two help the politically persecuted Cesare Angelotti escape and thus fall into the clutches of the notorious police chief Scarpia. From this constellation, a gripping drama of love and betrayal, church and state, murder and suicide develops against the historical backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars.
"I'm thinking of Tosca. I implore you to take the necessary steps to obtain Sardou's permission," wrote Giacomo Puccini to his friend and publisher Giulio Ricordi in 1899. "Because in this Tosca, I see the opera tailor-made for me." Puccini had seen Victorien Sardou's play La Tosca (1887), with the legendary Sarah Bernhardt in the title role, and was fascinated by the material. Puccini and his librettists Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa worked on the operatic version for four years. On January 14, 1900, Puccini's Tosca was first performed to great acclaim at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome.
Premiere / August 11, 2016
Cast
Floria Tosca Kelly God, Elena Stikhina | Mario Cavaradossi Thomas Paul, Andrea Shin | Baron Scarpia Yuri Batukov, Andrey Maslakov | Casare Angelotti Siyabulela Ntlale, Máté Sólyom-Nagy | The Sexton Vazgen Gazaryan, Gregor Loebel, Lukas Schmid | Spoletta Ks. Jörg Rathmann, Alexander Voigt | Scarrione Gergor Loebel, Lukas Schmid | A Turner Vazgen Gazaryan, Gregor Loebel | A Shepherd Nicole Enßle, Ibolya Rudas