Name: Puccini’s Tosca
Start: 2026-07-26T18:00:00
Location: West Green House Opera

Alice Farnham

Suzanne Chaundy

West Green House Gardens

For the third year running, West Green House Opera will present a Gala Evening with the thrill of a full orchestra showcasing a programme of great opera highlights, with guest soloists of international standing.

Opera Gala Concert

West Green House Opera

Mozart’s dazzling masterpiece is a fairy tale which takes place in a mystical land lying between the sun and the moon. An adventurous Prince Tamino is rescued by three mysterious ladies and ordered by their mistress, the vengeful Queen of the Night, to rescue her daughter, Pamina, from the evil Sarastro. Prince Tamino, armed with a magic flute and accompanied by a reluctant bird catcher, Papageno, ventures forth to find the Princess.

Mozart’s The Magic Flute

This was the young Puccini’s very first opera which he wrote for a competition in Italy long before he became the operatic giant we all know and love. Sadly, his entry didn’t win and so he later returned to it, re-wrote certain parts  and relaunched it to considerable acclaim in Milan. Unfortunately, being a relatively short opera, this early gem was soon eclipsed by the titanic successes of “La Boheme”, “Tosca” and “Turandot”. As a result, this Gothic, Central European story of an unfaithful mortal who is forced to dance himself to death by vengeful fairies (and yes, this is indeed the same story as the much more well known ballet, “Giselle” by Adolphe Adam!), all but disappeared, unjustly, from the verismo repertoire. It remained rarely performed until a few years ago when our friends at Opera Rara made an award winning recording starring the famous Albanian soprano, Ermonela Jaho, who many of you will have seen bringing down the house in our Silver Anniversary Gala Concert with the BBC in July 2025.

Puccini’s Le Villi

Perhaps opera’s most gripping thriller, Puccini’s masterpiece, “Tosca” is a tale of passion, power, jealousy and betrayal where the action unfolds in Rome over a period of just twenty four hours.