Puccini's Opera Tosca

The opera Tosca was based on a play written in 1887, La Tosca by Victorien Sardou, a play in five acts with more subplots than the opera. Arguably, the opera is an improvement over the complex play (Plotkin 207-208). However, the opera aroused more opposition than any of Puccini's works "by reason of its alleged coarseness and brutality" (Sadie, The New Grove Book of Operas 621), though at the same time, Tosca remains one of Giacomo Puccini's most popular operas. The libretto has a political plot, with the evil Scarpia on the side of the bourbons who were ruling Rome at the time, while the conspirators Angelotti and Mario support Napoleon, whom they hope will be successful and will free Rome from is oppressors. On one level, the opera is about the failure of processes of assimilation as the Bourbons indeed ruled with an iron hand rather than trying to fit into the social or political structures of Rome. Scarpia is the representative of the Bourbons who enforces their decrees and does so through brutality and torture, just as he uses these things against Angelotti and others in the opera, seeing any means as acceptable to achieve his ends.

Giacomo Puccini was born in Lucca on December 22, 1858 and died in Brussels on November 29, 1924. He first studied music with his uncle, Fortunato Magi, and with the director of the Istituto Musicale Pacini, Carlo Angeloni, and he then started his career at the age of 14 as an organist at St. Martino and S

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o, the first of three oneact operas performed as Il trittico. The three follow the scheme of the Parisian Grand Guignol, with the pattern being a horrific episode, a sentimental tragedy (Suor Angelica), and a comedy or farce (Gianni Schicchi). The last of the three has proved to be the most enduring part of the triptych and is often performed without the others, usually in a double bill (Sadie The Grove Concise Dictionary of Music). Now in his early sixties, Puccini wanted to move in a new direction and so started work on Turandot It was based on a Gozzi play and satisfied Puccini's desire for a subject with a fantastic, fairytale atmosphere but also with fleshandblood characters. It was while working on this piece that Puccini moved to Viareggio and developed cancer of the throat. This was in 1923, and he was treated at a Brussels clinic. The treatment seemed successful, but Puccini's heart could not stand the strain and he died, leaving Turandot unfinished (Sadie The Grove Concise Dictionary of Music). TOSCA The libretto takes place in three acts. The opera takes place in Rome in June 1800. The first act is set in the Church of Sant'Andrea della Valle where Cesare Angelotti, Consul of the fallen "Repubblica Rom

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