Tosca in Full Score (Dover Opera Scores)

About this book

When Giacomo Puccini saw Sarah Bernhardt in a production of La Tosca by French playwright Victorien Sardou he knew immediately that its highly dramatic plot turning on lust revenge and betrayal was made for opera. When he heard that Verdi was interested in the play his own interest in the property deepened. It was Puccini alone who ultimately brought the project to fruition and transformed Sardous work into an operatic tour de force. Tosca with a libretto by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica was first presented in Rome at the Teatro Costanzi in January 1900. Since then audiences drawn by its intense drama (Puccini himself referred to it as a melodrama) sumptuous scoring and two of operas most famous arias Toscas "Vissi darte" and Cavaradossis "E lucevan le stelle" have made Tosca one of the most performed and recorded operas of all time. This finely made edition is reprinted from the authoritative full-score edition printed shortly after the operas premiere.