Thread: What Are The Best and/or Your Favorite Puccini Operas?

We have a poll about Verdi, so why not have one about Puccini also? Please vote for a maximum of three operas ("Il Trittico" counts for one if you would include it).

Very difficult for me. The only ones that I didn't consider voting for are Le Villi and Edgar because I've never heard them and La Rondine because despite a few good moments it's not up to the standard of the others IMO.

I didn't vote for La Fanciulla del West because I'm not sure if I would love it as much as I do without the great Tebaldi recording. I love Manon Lescaut, but I didn't vote for it because despite the great music the last act doesn't make any sense to me (how did they end up in that desert?).

Anyway, I ended up voting for La Boheme, Madama Butterfly and Turandot. If I could have voted for four Tosca would have been one of my choices.

Great idea.

My only concern here is that by voting for Il Trittico, I'm really only voting for Suor Angelica, but that seems inescapable as it would hardly be fair to list the members of the trilogy separately (as well as being very much what Giacomo would not have wanted, I'm sure).

At this exciting stage of the contest, it looks like a runaway victory for La Boheme, which is currently polling twice as many votes as its nearest rivals!

Originally Posted by Elgarian

Great idea.

My only concern here is that by voting for Il Trittico, I'm really only voting for Suor Angelica, but that seems inescapable as it would hardly be fair to list the members of the trilogy separately (as well as being very much what Giacomo would not have wanted, I'm sure).

At this exciting stage of the contest, it looks like a runaway victory for La Boheme, which is currently polling twice as many votes as its nearest rivals!

That's because we're in love with Mirella's Mimi, Elgarian.

I would have listed the Il Trittico operas seperately but we're only allowed a maximum of ten choices in these polls. Listing those three under the Il Trittico banner made it possible to include each one of Puccini's operas in the poll.

I'll cast my vote for La Boheme ... I have only heard two operas in my lifetime - Wagner's Tannhauser was the other. I have La Boheme on a LP from the 60's.

jhar26- If you would like additional choices added, please PM me with the list and I can add them to the current poll

Originally Posted by Krummhorn

jhar26- If you would like additional choices added, please PM me with the list and I can add them to the current poll

No, I guess there's an argument to be made for listing the Il Trittico operas seperately, and if possible I probably would have done so initially - but in hindsight I agree with Elgarian that it's best to respect Puccini's wishes and view them as three chapters of one work. Even though I fail to see any connection between the three, I must say.

Not sure if this is the best place to say this, but it seems relevant to the idea of polling for the top spot.

It's about Tosca. I voted for it in my top three because the music is so utterly ravishing, and yet ... is anyone else troubled by the incongruity between the incredibly beautiful music and the utter bleakness of the events that unfold? In Tosca, everything that could go wrong, does go wrong; it explores cruelty and inhumanity to the utmost, and leaves us with no hope. Scarpia may be dead at the end, but his dreadful influence didn't stop with his death. There was no way out, and never was.

Snigger at my naivete if you must, but ... if the plot of Tosca had permitted some sort of hope at the end (not necessarily a happy ending, but one that allowed even a chink of light into the darkness), I know I would love it to distraction. As it is, my pleasure in it is always tempered by this discrepancy between the beauty of what's being heard, and the horror of what's actually happening. Am I alone in this?

If I could do this after the fashion of the old Illinois legislature "cummulative vote," I would have given two votes for La Bohème and one vote for Turandot. Since I can't, though, it wound up being one each. Turandot joins Verdi's Il Trovatore in really testing the limits of how much plot aggravation I'm willing to tolerate for the sake of great music, however. That, at least as much as anything else, is why I can't regard it quite as highly as Bohème.

Originally Posted by Elgarian

Not sure if this is the best place to say this, but it seems relevant to the idea of polling for the top spot.

It's about Tosca. I voted for it in my top three because the music is so utterly ravishing, and yet ... is anyone else troubled by the incongruity between the incredibly beautiful music and the utter bleakness of the events that unfold? In Tosca, everything that could go wrong, does go wrong; it explores cruelty and inhumanity to the utmost, and leaves us with no hope. Scarpia may be dead at the end, but his dreadful influence didn't stop with his death. There was no way out, and never was.

Snigger at my naivete if you must, but ... if the plot of Tosca had permitted some sort of hope at the end (not necessarily a happy ending, but one that allowed even a chink of light into the darkness), I know I would love it to distraction. As it is, my pleasure in it is always tempered by this discrepancy between the beauty of what's being heard, and the horror of what's actually happening. Am I alone in this?

To me most of the music in Tosca sounds dark and gloomy and seems to predict an unhappy ending. Puccini is no stranger to unhappy endings of course. Manon Lescaut, La Boheme, Suor Angelica and Madama Butterfly all end with the death of the prima donna. Turandot lives, but the sweet girl Liu dies. Puccini is a bit of a sadist really. He really pulls out all the stops in Tosca though - I agree.

Originally Posted by jhar26

To me most of the music in Tosca sounds dark and gloomy and seems to predict an unhappy ending. Puccini is no stranger to unhappy endings of course. Manon Lescaut, La Boheme, Suor Angelica and Madama Butterfly all end with the death of the prima donna. Turandot lives, but the sweet girl Liu dies. Puccini is a bit of a sadist really. He really pulls out all the stops in Tosca though - I agree.

It's not the unhappy ending that troubles me - most operas end badly, after all. But the plots of La Boheme, Manon Lescaut, and Butterfly are tragic, not horrible; and Suor Angelica may not really be tragic at all, depending on how we interpret Angelica's experiences at the end. Tosca, though, isn't tragic in the same bittersweet way. It's actually horrible. It's about betrayal and vicious self-centred cruelty, and the failure of all hope. The Tosca music does indeed suggest an unhappy ending, but it's still exquisitely beautiful. I think I'm talking about a failure of artistic unity. The music, magnificent though it is, doesn't reflect the sheer brutality of the unfolding events.

Originally Posted by Elgarian

It's not the unhappy ending that troubles me - most operas end badly, after all. But the plots of La Boheme, Manon Lescaut, and Butterfly are tragic, not horrible; and Suor Angelica may not really be tragic at all, depending on how we interpret Angelica's experiences at the end. Tosca, though, isn't tragic in the same bittersweet way. It's actually horrible. It's about betrayal and vicious self-centred cruelty, and the failure of all hope. The Tosca music does indeed suggest an unhappy ending, but it's still exquisitely beautiful.

I agree with everything you say here.

I think I'm talking about a failure of artistic unity. The music, magnificent though it is, doesn't reflect the sheer brutality of the unfolding events.

I see Scarpia as the central character of this opera - he's always a sinister presence even when he's not on stage. There's a feeling of impending doom throughout the opera. So in that sense it prepares the listener for the worst IMO.

Originally Posted by jhar26

I see Scarpia as the central character of this opera - he's always a sinister presence even when he's not on stage. There's a feeling of impending doom throughout the opera. So in that sense it prepares the listener for the worst IMO.

In the recent Opera North production of Tosca, Scarpia's body is never cleared off the stage. It remains there right through to the end, with everyone wandering around as if they can't see it even though we (the audience) can. I presume the idea is to suggest the continuing presence of his malevolence, though it seems a bit odd!

I agree about all the sinister implications in the music; but still, even at its most doom-laden it never stops being magnificent, and that does bother me.

Originally Posted by Elgarian

In the recent Opera North production of Tosca, Scarpia's body is never cleared off the stage. It remains there right through to the end, with everyone wandering around as if they can't see it even though we (the audience) can. I presume the idea is to suggest the continuing presence of his malevolence, though it seems a bit odd!

Well, 'odd' is the right word to use in relation to many modern opera productions IMO.

Turandot seems to be the most innovative, so it gets my vote.

I went for La Boheme mainly for two great soprano roles....

However ignoring the libretto, much like classic FM seem to do , Madama Butterfly or Tosca would be my favorites purely on the music alone.