Season :2014-2015 Length :3h30
Song language: Italian
Conductor :Paolo Arrivabeni, Cyril Englebert
Choirmaster :Marcel Seminara
Artist: Barbara Haveman, Isabelle Kabatu, Marc Laho, Ruggero Raimondi, Roger Joakim, Laurent Kubla, Giovanni Iovino
Number of performances:9
Dates :Sat, 20/12/2014 to Fri, 02/01/2015
Last performance at the Opera : Novembre 2007.
About the cast
Ten performances will be dedicated to this monumental work by Puccini, with a textbook Scarpia on stage: Ruggero Raimondi returns to us for one of his favourite roles!
In the role of Floria Tosca, we will find in alternation two exceptional artists of refined emotion and sensitivity: Barbara Haveman and Isabelle Kabatu.
As for Marc Laho and Calin Bratescu, they will both portray to perfection the full range of emotions that run through Cavaradossi.
The story of Tosca
In Rome, in 1800, security is enforced by the baron Scarpia, the chief of police.
He calls for the arrest of the painter Cavaradossi, who is concealing Cesare Angelotti, a fugitive prisoner.
Tosca, the painter’s lover, is courted by Scarpia.
He makes her a terrible bargain: to give herself to him if she wants to save the condemned Cavaradossi.
She accepts and prepares herself for a faked execution.
However, when Cavaradossi falls under the bullets, Tosca throws herself off a terrace of Castel Sant-Angelo…
Libretto: Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica,
after the play by Victorien Sardou
Production: Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège
On the 10th of January, this opera will be played at the Palais des Beaux Arts de Charleroi
Cast
Conductor: Paolo Arrivabeni et Cyril Englebert (10/01)
Director: Claire Servais
Director Assistant: Rodrigue André
Set designs: Carlo Centolavigna
Costume designs: Michel Fresnay
Lighting designs: Olivier Wéry
Choirmaster: Marcel Seminara
Orchestra, Choirs & Mastery: Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège
Floria Tosca: Barbara Haveman • / Isabelle Kabatu •
Mario Cavaradossi: Marc Laho • / Calin Bratescu •
Il Barone Scarpia: Ruggero Raimondi • / Pierre-Yves Pruvot •
Cesare Angelotti: Roger Joakim
Il Sagrestano: Laurent Kubla
Spoletta: Giovanni Iovino
Sciarrone: Marc Tisson
Un Carceriere: Pierre Gathier
• 20-23-27-30 December and 2 January / • 21-26-28-31 December and 10 January
• 20-23-27-30 December / • 21-26-28-31 December and 2-10 January
About the opera
Initially cold-shouldered by audiences then rapidly finding appreciation, Tosca is without contest the most attractive work by Puccini.
Alongside a plot of formidable effectiveness, one finds three roles that are simultaneously fascinating and balanced, with very deep inner lives.
Puccini devoted all his talent to it, playing admirably with the different orchestrations according to arias, choruses and purely musical passages.
He reveals his personal tastes in terms of harmony too, for, by turns, one hears a hint of the orchestration and the play of harmonies of Ravel, the lyricism of Debussy, or, by contrast, the grandeur of Wagner, with denser, more highly-charged scoring.
Incorporated more deeply in the realist tradition, Tosca remains a dense work where the historical and political situation produces a horrific drama, something which distinguishes it from the other operas by Puccini.
Maria Callas launched and ended her career on stage by playing the role of Floria Tosca…
Opera, My Love Magazine 