Glimmerglass Opera Festival 2010 – Puccini's Tosca
Reviewed by Paula Citron
Glimmerglass Opera Festival's Tosca is a winner.
The production sports an American trio of charismatic voices. Soprano Lise Lindstrom as Tosca has a powerful voice that soars into the stratosphere. There is a sharpness there – not the shrill kind but the thrilling kind.
Her Cavaradossi is tenor Adam Diegel who is tall and good-looking, and together they make a handsome couple. Diegel is fearless, taking his money notes at full throttle.
Remember the name of baritone Lester Lynch. He plays Scarpia as the bully and thug that he is. This guy can sing up a storm.
Director Ned Canty plays the emotions to the hilt but never melodramatically. Setting the opera post World War 1 works if one thinks of the rise of Mussolini.
Conductor David Angus is a trifle self-indulgently slow in the quiet bits, but he does crank things up for the dramatic highs.
Tosca continues at the Alice Busch Opera Theatre until Aug. 24.
Tosca
Glimmerglass Opera Festival 2010
Music by Giacomo Puccini
Conducted by David Angus
Directed by Ned Canty
Starring Lise Lindstrom, Adam Diegel and Lester Lynch
Alice Busch Opera Theatre
Cooperstown, New York
Jul. 9 to Aug. 24, 2010
