Tosca starts with three thunderously fateful chords and ends with a suicide leap. In between come torture, rape and murder, plus some of the greatest arias and setpieces of any opera. No wonder it's popular. Not everyone can take the sadism which Puccini admitted, perhaps ironically, sprang from his own "Neronic" tendencies. But if the price you pay for off-stage torture-chamber yowls is the bloodied hero's final outpouring, the exquisite "E lucevan le stelle", you can see the point: art has to be worked for.
English National Opera's new staging by Catherine Malfitano, who made her name as an international soprano before becoming a director, is part of ENO's commitment "to refreshing core Puccini repertoire". She sang the role of Tosca many times. Since this is as traditional and copybook a production as any you could wish, with a pillar by pillar recreation of Rome's Sant'Andrea church and even a heroine (Amanda Echalaz) who looks like that ultimate Tosca, Callas herself, it was deja-vu all over again.
However, anyone new to this opera should welcome a chance to see it done straight, as Frank Philipp Schlössmann's designs and the Napoleonic period costumes allow. Others will wonder at the absence of our old opera friend and enemy: concept. This is the all-purpose approach you might have running in your head while listening to a CD in the car: Floria Tosca, the beautiful singer, prettily clutches flowers to her breast; Scarpia, the villain (Anthony Michaels-Moore), smirks and snarls, leaving you in no doubt that he is, indeed, the villain. The climactic Act I Te Deum comes complete with choirboys and birettas, maniples and chasubles. Only the health and safety-approved incense is missing. We blame directors when they have big ego ideas, we chastise them when they don't.
If characterisation was rudimentary, musical standards were high, with Edward Gardner conducting an impassioned, gutsy performance and Julian Gavin in potent voice, with superbly ringing top notes, as the hero Cavaradossi. Echalaz has already been widely praised for her Tosca, following performances at Opera Holland Park in 2008 – evidence that summer festivals, including Grange Park and Garsington, all three bursting in to life soon, do a vital job in spotting and honing new talent. At Tuesday's opening, Echalaz still sounded nervously monochromatic and some of the intonation was pinched, no doubt attributable to first-night nerves. But she's on her way.
The real problem, which may explain the sense of dislocation ungenerously felt all evening, was the clumsy, computerish English translation. Listening to singers cope with bumpy words which often ran counter to the music, then glancing up to read the subtitles for comprehension, dulled the immediacy of this chilling, revolutionary score. Once ENO decided to use surtitles for opera in English, the white flag of surrender could be seen above the Coliseum. Unbeknown it seems to the troops themselves, the battle had been lost. Is it not time for ENO, like everyone else these days, to re-examine its constitution? There may even, as Opera North has demonstrated, be a case for compromise. Some operas work in English, others don't. Be brave. Admit it. Audiences will cheer.
The delicious meringue that is Donizetti's 1840 comedy, La fille du régiment, should be obligatory for curmudgeons or the merely downhearted. The Royal Opera's revival depends on the living doll brilliance of its gamine star, Natalie Dessay. As "daughter of the regiment", she whisks and spins across stage with comedic pell-mell energy and Chaplinesque elfin charm, at once mascot, laundrette and unexplored love interest for the gauche troops.
Laurent Pelly's well-drilled, zany staging, new in 2007 and still almost as funny, gives Dessay's theatrical skills full rein: Piaf without the regrets, Amélie with muscle. She performs every coloratura aria as a physical workout, jumping and pumping on each rapid trill or ornament. When eventually Dessay releases her celebrity fitness DVD, as surely she must, it will involve much immaculately timed, aerobic ironing – an entire regiment has many shirts – while singing "Chacun le Sait, Chacun le Dit" in roof-raising top voice.
As her shy, knobbly-kneed boyfriend Tonio, Juan Diego Flórez returned to wow us with those famous top Cs and pure, unsullied vocal gymnastics. Only Pavarotti, in living memory, could make it all sound so similarly effortless. There's no point complaining that Florez's performances in the bel canto repertoire lack depth or complexity. You may as well blame Fragonard for sweetness and grace.
The rest of the cast matched up. Elaborately layered like a vast lavender profiterole, Dawn French returned to the speaking role of La Duchesse, delivering her Franglais with expert deadpan timing. Alessandro Corbelli brought tender good humour to Sulpice, with Ann Murray wittily imperious as La Marquise de Berkenfeld. Bruno Campanella, conducting, and the ROH orchestra were on sparkling form. This week, the BBC's Passion for Opera season begins. Look out for the Royal Opera's Antonio Pappano in his own TV series, Opera Italia, in which Florez, as well as Donizetti and Puccini, will figure.
The Takacs Quartet reached the end of their superlative Beethoven series with two concerts at the Southbank. I caught the penultimate one, which included a majestic reading of Op 59 No 3. Quartets may rely on the peculiar dynamics of the four personalities who make up the ensemble. As a Sunday afternoon amateur this can be alarming: I have sat between fire-breathing sisters and married couples rehearsing old saws which have nothing to do with bowing technique.
Professional groups of long-standing bring rather more mature finesse to their discourse. Thinking of the Takacs, the pivotal energy of second violinist Károly Schranz always leaps to mind. But an injury has put him temporarily out of action. His excellent replacement, Lina Bahn, was properly discreet in support.
The elegant first violinist Edward Dusinberre, mighty violist Geraldine Walther, and ever-perceptive cellist András Fejér all kept the quartet's hallmark generosity and intelligence intact. They see the joke, they shed the tear and even convey the composer's delight as he surprises himself with wonderful new paths for four stringed instruments, and all music, to take.
