Il trittico, Royal Opera House

It can sometimes be difficult to find variety in opera. Between doomed love stories, rompish love comedies and historical sagas, the genre’s plotting can seem far less diverse than it should be. But in Puccini’s Il trittico, first performed in 1918, thrives on diversity. A triptych of one act operas, it ranges across the whole gamut of styles and emotions, from brutal tragedy to relentless farce.

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Director Richard Jones (Meistersingers of Nuremberg) was once the controversial enfant terrible of British opera, but since the turn of the century he has steadily grown into one of the most widely admired. His production of Il trittico, first performed in 2011 and now revived for the Royal Opera House’s winter season, is fast becoming a beloved standard. Forsaking the completely different settings of the libretto, Jones updates the action to the crumbling post-war Europe of neo-realist cinema.
The triad starts begins at its most wrenching, with the verismo tragedy Il tabarro, set on the river Seine. It surrounds the simple story of infidelity with economic business concerns, leading to a bloody climax and ambiguous end. It is like one of Puccini’s great tragedies in miniature. Lucio Gallo, baritone, returns in the lead role of the barge-owner Michele, joined by Martina Serafin (Tosca) as his unfaithful wife Giorgetti and tenor Carl Tanner as her lover Luigi.
Suor Angelica is the part of the trio least performed, although it was Puccini’s favourite. Set in a convent, it shows a nun’s struggle with her past and with fully embracing her faith. As well as being one of opera’s psychological triumphs, it is a marvelous account of the quotidian of religious life. And although tragic in form, it does offer some redemptive hope. Soprano Ermonela Jaho (La traviata, La rondine) stars in the title role.
The final piece, Gianni Schicchi, is the jig after the bloodbath. Based on a character fleetingly mentioned in Dante’s Divine Comedy, it sees a Florentine noble family turn to a less blue-blooded trickster to falsify a dead man’s will. If not quite the blackest of comedies, this is certainly a macabre treat. Lucio Gallo takes the title role, supported by soprano Susanna Hurrell and tenor Paolo Fanale as his daughter and her lover.