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Tebaldi is a far more lyrically beautiful Tosca than most, yet sacrifices nothing in terms of character.

This 1958 recording strikes a good balance between sheer vocal beauty and a vivid sense of drama. It is at once exciting and moving to hear a performance that is so old yet so vividly alive. Caniglia exudes taut anger and the fatal confrontation between her and Armando Borgioli – an unusually lyrical Scarpia – is brilliantly acted. Beniamino Gigli, lighter-toned than the later heavyweight Cavaradossis, sings with tremendous emotional immediacy. The flexible approach conductor Oliviero de Fabritiis takes to tempos may not be what we’re used to nowadays, but it gives an insight into what Puccini might have heard, in this recording made in 1938, only 14 years after his death. Having a Scarpia no older than Tosca changes the dynamic of the piece and the stand-off between Sherrill Milnes’s suave, smiling villain and the lovers is truly thrilling. Kabaivanska’s lyrical Tosca – more coquettish than vixen-like – is unusually sympathetic and Plácido Domingo as Cavaradossi is virile, ardent and vocally at the top of his game. What a package! This 1976 film boasts superb singer-actors, ravishing orchestral playing, and the real locations in Rome. Ra ina Kabaivanska (Tosca) ( Deutsche Grammophon 073 4038 DVD) Three other great recordings of Puccini’s Tosca To put this recording at the top of the list may not be an original choice – it’s regularly lauded as one of the greatest opera recordings of all time – but frankly, will it ever be bettered? But what makes this recording stand out is the attention to detail, the careful crafting of small moments in Puccini’s score that are easily overlooked: the way, for instance, in which Tosca fronts up to Scarpia like an insolent hooker on a street corner and asks for his price or the icy chill followed by a blast of fire in those long held notes at the end of Act Two. O languide carezze indeed.Īll the big numbers are superlatively done: a ‘Vissi d’arte’ aria in which every note is a sob a spine-tingling Te Deum an Act One love duet of searing intensity. But in Di Stefano we get the whole package: convincing characterisation and the most gloriously bright-timbred Italianate voice. Too often with Tosca one gets a soprano and baritone who act their socks off and a tenor who is only there for the top notes. Gobbi, meanwhile, exudes cruelty without playing the pantomime villain: within the space of a short soliloquy in Act Two he is transformed from dull functionary to snarling animal.

What is the difference between a musical and an opera?Ĭallas is in her element here, a prowling tiger from her first offstage cry of ‘Mario’, the intrinsic rawness to her voice just right for this heroine on the edge.

The result is a performance that is all-consuming, which will take you on an exhilarating ride and spit you out emotionally ragged at the other end. Though the musical merits are numerous, it’s the acting that really impresses here, all three principals – soprano Maria Callas as Tosca, tenor Giuseppe di Stefano as Cavaradossi and baritone Tito Gobbi as Baron Scarpia – adapting their vocal colour by the bar to capture the twists and turns of the drama.

Puccini’s Tosca: A guide to when and why it was composed, and its dramatic storyline.

Conductor Victor de Sabata and producer Walter Legge were notorious perfectionists, insisting on countless takes, but boy, was it worth it.

It’s a no-holds-barred performance, made in the days of big-budget studio recordings when there was both time and money to get absolutely everything just right. Recorded in August 1953, in the middle of a Milanese heatwave, this classic set exudes all the white-hot passion one could wish for from this most hyper-theatrical of operas.