Tosca Performed By New York Opera Forum at Bronx Library Center on Saturday

Opera in the Bronx!

The New York Opera Forum will perform their rendition of Giacomo Puccini’s classic opera Tosca on Saturday afternoon at 2:30 p.m at the Bronx Library Center, located at Kingsbridge Road and Fordham Road, accessible by the BX 12 and BX 9 buses.

The cast includes Melinda Griswold (Tosca), Kevin Courtemanche (Cavaradossi), Ted Labow (Scarpia), Martin Broms (Angelotti/Sacristan), Victor Ziccardi (Spoletta) and Isabella Florin (Shepherdess).

The NYPL has given this description of the opera:

The action of Tosca takes place in Rome in June 1800. Angelotti, a former consul of the Roman republic, has escaped from prison and takes refuge in the Church of Sant’Andrea della Valle. There hefinds a sympathizer, the painter Mario Cavaradossi, who offers to help him. Just then Cavaradossi, thelover of the singer Floria Tosca, hears Tosca’s voice outside. She enters and accuses Cavaradossi ofhaving been in conversation with a woman but leaves reassured. A cannon shot announces that Angelotti’s escape is known, and Cavaradossi leaves with the fugitive. The dreaded chief of police,Baron Scarpia, traces Angelotti to the church and decides to use Tosca to trap Angelotti. Cavaradossi is arrested and tortured at the Farnese Palace within her hearing, and she breaks down and reveals Angelotti’s hiding place. Scarpia orders Cavaradossi to be shot, but Tosca bargains for her lover’s life; Scarpia then arranges a mock execution. When Scarpia tries to embrace Tosca in fulfillment of her bargain, she stabs him to death, then hurries to the mock execution on the roof of Sant’Angelo castle. But Scarpia has tricked her—the bullets are real. Realizing that Cavaradossi is dead, Tosca hurls herself to death from the battlements.
—Rosenthal, Harold. “Tosca.” Encyclopedia Americana. Grolier Online, 2014. Web. Accessed 18 Jan. 2014 –c/o http://www.nypl.org/events/programs/2014/02/15/music-tosca-giacomo-puccini-performed-new-york-opera-forum