San Francisco has always embraced "Tosca." It was on the SF Opera's first
season, in 1923 (Merola; Saroya; Martinelli, De Luca), and it opened the
War Memorial on Oct.  15, 1932 (Merola; Muzio, Borgioli, Gandolfi).  I
don't go back all the way to those days, but I heard a good dozen
productions here - none like the one tonight.

This was the first of a seven-performance run of the revival of the
handsome (if now-fading) 1997 Thierry Bosquet production, itself a
recreation of the 1932 house-dedicating event.

What was so special about tonight? Nothing.  And there's the rub.
San Francisco and much of the world love "Tosca" because it's such an
intense, perfectly-crafted, all-of-one-piece work.  It was not that on
this occasion, thanks mostly to the US opera debut of Paolo Carignani,
advertised as a native of Milan but in fact coming from the extreme north
of Italy, a place near the Arctic Circle.

The newly appointed music director of the Frankfurt Opera - judging
by tonight's performance - has ice flowing in his veins.  He took the
magnificent racehorse the SFO Orchestra has lately become and led it
through a leisurely, even, dull gallop. There was no intensity, no
passion, no storming of heaven, no grief, no exultation - just
Lawrence-Welk champagne music, well played, but amazingly devoid of drama.

If short on passion, the performance at least presented superb musical
intelligence in Franz Grundheber's Scarpia.  There is no bigger singer
with a small voice than he or anyone who uses what he has better.  Although
definitely not from Milan, Grundheber's Italian is a thing of wonder, ditto
the way he sustains musical lines.

This was Eva Urbanova's house debut, and I wish it came 10 years ago.
Never a singing actress, the Czech soprano emoted mechanically, both in
singing and acting - no surprise, but after Act 1, that big voice started
buckling, she went shrill at times, even in undemanding phrases.  By
"Vissi d'arte," Urbanova was just treading water (successfully), getting
a virtually unprecedented small round of applause as her reward - although
she, and the rest of the cast, received some bravos at the end.

Richard Leech was far more impressive as Cavaradossi tonight than in
his other appearances here, meaning that he produced some spectacular
sounds (especially the "Vittoria!"), but not singing particularly well.
Grundheber' s ability to sustain phrases and lines is not in Leech's
universe.

The decent-enough Lotfi Mansouri production was handled by Sandra Bernhard
this time, and she moved the cast around efficiently, but for some strange
reason decided to hide the entire ensemble during the Te Deum behind
Scarpia, challenging and eventually defeating the chorus.

Let me modify the opening claim that this was a uniformly dull "Tosca."
The opera, in fact, opened like gangbusters: Stanislaw Schwets burst on
the scene, singing an Angelotti as a combination Boris Godunov and Filippo
II.  The young Russian, who made his debut here last year as Masetto and
sang a memorable Monterone recently, has voice and talent galore.  For the
couple of minutes he is allowed on stage, Schwets set an example - which
was immediately and permanently disregarded by Carignani.

Janos Gereben/SF
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