ABOUT THE CONCERT

In 1899 Giacomo Puccini composed his fifth opera based on a French literary source, in this case the play La Tosca  by Victorien Sardou, a historical piece set in the time of the Napoleonic wars. Puccini’s grandiose orchestral language saw him reach a new pinnacle of artistic expression. This staging of Tosca  is directed by Pier Francesco Maestrini, who has staged more than 100 works for the Japan Opera Foundation in Tokyo. The orchestra will be conducted by Simon Krečič, artistic and musical director of SNG Opera Maribor. The cast of this production by the SNG Maribor Opera includes the tenor Dušan Topolovec, the baritone Sebastijan Čelofiga and the bass Valentin Pivovarov. The main roles will be sung by the soprano Rebeka Lokar, who after studying in her native Maribor perfected her singing technique with the Italian baritone Mauro Augustini and then debuted as Clotilde in Vincenzo Bellini’s Norma  with the SNG Maribor Opera in 2005; the American tenor Jonathan Tetelman, who stunned the audience at last year’s festival in a concert with the baritone Ludovic Tézier and who will come to the Ljubljana performance from the New York Metropolitan Opera; and the Serbian baritone Željko Lučić, who trained with the world-famous mezzo-soprano Biserka Cvejić and has appeared in leading roles in numerous operas by Giuseppe Verdi.