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Dec. 28: Tosca

Marty Sohl
/
Metropolitan Opera

The 2013-14 Metropolitan Opera Radio Broadcast season continues with a live broadcast of Puccini’sTosca, Saturday, December 28 on KLRE from noon-3:30 p.m.

Soprano Sondra Radvanovsky stars in the title role. Tenor Marcello Giordani is Tosca’s lover, the artist and revolutionary Cavaradossi, and baritone George Gagnidze is the corrupt police chief, Scarpia. Marco Armiliato leads this performance of Puccini’s celebrated tragedy. Tosca will be heard live over the Toll Brothers-Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network at 12:30 p.m. ET on Saturday, December 28.

Sondra Radvanovsky recently starred to great acclaim in Bellini’s Norma at the Met, her first staged performances of the title role. She made her Met role debut as Tosca in 2011. A graduate of the Met’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program, she has also been acclaimed for her portrayals of numerous Verdi heroines with the company, including Amelia in last season’s new production of Un Ballo in Maschera, Leonora in the 2009 new production premiere of Il Trovatore, Elisabeth de Valois in Don Carlo, Elvira in Ernani, Elena in I Vespri Siciliani, Lina in Stiffelio, and the title characters in Aida and Luisa Miller.

Marcello Giordani's extensive Met repertory comprises 27 roles. He made his house debut in 1995 as Rodolfo in Puccini’s La Bohème, first sang Cavaradossi with the company in 2005, and reprised the role in 2010. His many other appearances include the title roles in the Met premieres of both Bellini’s Il Pirata and Berlioz’s Benvenuto Cellini and starring roles in three other new production premieres: Pinkerton in Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, Edgardo in Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, and the title role in Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust.

George Gagnidze sang Scarpia in the Met's 2009 new production premiere of Tosca and reprised his performance in 2012. He made his Met debut in 2009 in the title role of Verdi’s Rigoletto and has since sung Shaklovity in Mussorgsky’s Khovanshchina, the title role in Verdi’s Macbeth, and Amonasro in Aida with the company.

Marco Armiliato has led performances of 21 operas over the course of his 15-year Met career. In recent seasons, he has conducted the company premiere of Donizetti’s Anna Bolena as well as performances of Verdi’s Ernani, Aida, and Rigoletto. In the spring he will return to the Met to conduct Madama Butterfly and Bellini’s La Sonnambula.

The intermissions will include backstage interviews, the annual “In Memoriam” feature that looks back at Met singers who passed away during 2013, and the Toll Brothers-Metropolitan Opera Singers' Roundtable, featuring sopranos Angela Meade and Susanna Phillips, and tenor Michael Fabiano.