PETITE ARMENIAN SOPRANO FILLS S.F. OPERA’S ‘TOSCA’ WITH HER VOICE: REVIEW
October 29, 2014 – 15:36 AMT
PanARMENIAN.Net – Even though tenor Brian Jagde and baritone Mark
Delavan towered over her, Lianna Haroutounian outsang them at San
Francisco Opera’s matinee of Puccini’s “Tosca,” Janos Gereben said
in a review published at the San Francisco Examiner.
“In her San Francisco and role debuts, the diminutive Armenian soprano
(well-known and acclaimed in Europe) filled the huge War Memorial
Opera House with her lovely, effortless voice. Her projection and
musicality were excellent. Her leap to her death from the top of
Castel Sant’Angelo showed Olympic form,” the review said.
“Tosca” is one of San Francisco Opera’s most frequently performed
operas. This version, from 1997 with Lotfi Mansouri’s staging, is
based on the 1932 production, the very first in the War Memorial.
“Stage director Jose Maria Condemi, also at the helm in 2008 and
2012 at S.F. Opera, has added minor new touches to the proceedings
(which unfold on Thierry Bosquet’s slightly fading sets), but wisely
refrained from changing the staging for the sake of doing something
different – to good effect.”
“The same cannot be said for Riccardo Frizza’s conducting, although the
orchestra did its best. The conductor’s shortcomings were especially
obvious in the snail-paced Act 1 finale, the normally rousing Te Deum,
and even more in the long introductory scene of Act 2, which was slow
and sounded monotonous,” the review said.