Tosca clearly defines the theme of Welsh National Opera’s Spring Season: love and passion. This revival of a co-production with the State Opera of South Australia was first performed in Cardiff in 1992, and is a masterly interpretation of the score, the drama and the characterisation. The opera is Puccini’s first real attempt at creating realism in music, and the attention to detail in the score gives rise to a richly portrayed life of the day; Puccini insisted upon particular attention to detail, even researching the actual pitches of the Roman bells used. It is a masterly work of the verismo style dealing with art and morality, ensuring that the dramatic pace is structured and varied, threading through the unfolding developments with relentless foreboding and passion.

Michael Blakemore’s production is a large-scaled, broad canvassed depiction of human tragedy. Blakemore is best known for his straight theatre work, and this is why this interpretation of Tosca rings true and has a directness that can be sometimes lost when the melodrama is allowed to command the action. Benjamin Davis, as revival director, has encouraged the singers to become more than vehicles for the vocal demands of the roles, and despite celebrating the significance of melodrama within the piece, the main joy of this production of Tosca is its ability to transport the audience into Puccini’s world of tugging at the heart; the Italian famously said, in making audiences cry “therein lies everything”.

The enormity of the themes portrayed in the storyline is echoed in the vastness of the oversized, omnipresent statues and large-scale scenes. Each act has excessively dominant sets, creating the impressive architecture of each act’s precise imposing setting. Ashley Martin-Davies has designed a monumental Rome of 1800, embellishing the great church of Sant’Andrea della Valle, the Palazzo Farnese and the Castel Sant’Angelo with imaginative touches but maintaining the grandeur with largesse and visual opulence. The experienced, talented lighting of Mark Henderson as realised for this revival by Paul Woodfield, has a stark dramatic quality, creating a juxtaposition of severe white and shadowy eeriness. Act II also develops a subtle yet threatening tinge of blood-red which pervades the stage through the large doors leading to Cavaradossi’s place of torture. The final scene on the rooftop of the Castel Sant’Angelo has a lingering, terrible beauty as the sun slowly rises over Rome.

The Music Director of WNO, Lothar Koenigs, is at the helm of the WNO Orchestra, and created a dramatic palette of rich colour and drama. Koenigs believes that “in addition to Tosca, Cavaradossi and Scarpia, there is another protagonist, the orchestra.” The intensity of the string writing requires a dramatic cantabile and Koenigs is masterful in drawing out the inner voices of the orchestra,-the clarinets, horns and violas, and creates a striking, complex balance between the action upon the stage and the instrumental drama. The recurring themes are given precedence within the rich orchestral writing, and the Te Deum at the close of Act I is a wealth of sound as the procession on stage adds to the colourful feast.

The male protagonists are strikingly cast and perform with total conviction and immense vocal resources. Geraint Dodd as Cavaradossi is perfectly cast, and his rounded yet strident dramatic tenor weaves through the demanding range with style and commitment. Dodd’s secure upper register is forceful and exciting, ensuring that his set pieces are approached with expression and intensity of timbre, but he also maintains immense stature in the passionate and playful exchanges with his beloved Tosca. His tortured “E lucevan le stelle” contrasted his dramatic resonance with a sustained feeling of loss and deeply charged abandonment.

Robert Hayward as Scarpia excelled in creating a sadistic predator bursting with passionate desires. Hayward oozed determination in his carnal need for Tosca, and developed Scarpia’s Act I prowling, courtly nature into the physical tormentor of Act II before falling prey to the knife he had so physically plunged into a sizeable ham moments before. He is a Scarpia with a vast appetite, and Hayward’s brooding presence sings with vigour and stealth. He has such darkness and power, but his richly coloured baritone adds subtlety to the role to contrast the broad lines of evil.

The experienced Portuguese Tosca, Elisabete Matos sang the role with physicality and impressive security. She is a force to be reckoned with and possesses a vast voice. Matos has an impressive smooth line throughout the range required for this dramatic role, but the overall colour is rather metallic and edgy which does mean that certain intimate moments in the score lose their credulity, especially in her Act III exchanges with Cavaradossi before his execution. Matos is at her greatest in the largesse of Act II, and the dramatic strokes of colour here are particularly suited to her broad, dramatic sound. However, her seated “Vissi d’arte” created pathos, honesty and beauty of tone. Without a shadow of a doubt, this is the only glimpse of this Tosca’s vulnerability, as her characterisation is coloured by Tosca’s celebrated diva status, and all her gestures operatic and stage-worthy within her interpretation. She does have a tendency to seek a down-stage position for all her big moments, and this makes it somewhat difficult for her fellow artists to relate to her at key moments. Matos is always aware of her audience.

Of the smaller roles, Henry Waddington emerged as a finely sung bumbling Sacristan and Julian Close as a sonorous, persecuted Angelotti. The richly voiced Chorus of WNO enabled the remaining roles to be cast from in-house, reflecting what talent lies within the much lauded Chorus. Cárthaigh Quill as Spoletta created an air of voyeurism and awe of his powerful master, and Paula Bradbury’s youthful shepherd boy had an off-stage purity with a fresh legato.

This impressive Tosca succeeds on many levels, and it will be a difficult production to replace when the day comes to embrace a new approach. It is a marvellous combination of accuracy and respect to the score, using vast sets and large characterisation to dramatise the enormous scale of the timeless, monumental themes of love and passion.

Bethan Dudley Fryar
Opera Britannia

Ed: Photographs by Brian Tarr