Torre del Lago Viareggio Tuscany

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home of the Puccini Festival, lies between the Lake of Massaciuccoli and the Tyrrhenian Sea, 4 kilometres far from the magnificent beaches of Viareggio on the Tuscan Riviera, 18 kilometres from Lucca and Pisa. The Festival welcomes about 40.000 spectators every year to its open-air theatre, just a few steps from the Villa Mausoleum where Giacomo Puccini lived and worked. His mortal remains are now in a small chapel inside the Villa. Torre del Lago is a favourite destination of opera lovers and tourists who wish to visit the places where the most beloved composer of the 20th century lived.

Festival Puccini
Torre del Lago,

The Puccini Festival was born in 1930 following Puccini’s wishes. “… I always come out here and take a boat to go and shoot snipes … but once I would like to come here and listen to one of my operas in the open air…”. (Puccini in a letter to Giovacchino Forzano in November 1924, before he left to the clinic of Brussels where he died shortly after). The author of La Bohème and Madama Butterfly, expressed his wish to see his creatures come to life in the extraordinary natural stage offered by the Massaciuccoli Lake.

Forzano, librettist of Suor Angelica and Gianni Schicchi, was so impressed by those words that, after Puccini’s death, he decided to realise his dream. In 1930, together with Pietro Mascagni, who had been fellow-student and room-mate to Puccini, Forzano began to carry out the first performances of Puccini’s operas on the lakeshore, in front of the Maestro’s house.

On 24th August 1930, in a provisional theatre with the stage built on piles stuck in the lake, a travelling opera company performed La Bohème directed by Forzano and conducted by Mascagni, with Rosetta Pampanini, Margherita Carosio, Angelo Minghetti and Luigi Montesano.

The same travelling company came back to Torre del Lago in 1931: Beniamino Gigli and Adelaide Saraceni performed in La Bohème, while Rosetta Pampanini and Angelo Michetti performed in Madama Butterfly. One of the world most famous and beloved opera festivals was born.

In 1966 the Festival moved to the reclaimed land just near the small lake harbour. Here the present theatre was built, a large structure enjoying the charming background of Massaciuccoli Lake with the small villages on the opposite shore, whose flickering lights at night assure an unforgettable natural scenery to the performances taking place on the wide stage.

During the over seventy years of the Festival, the stage of Torre del Lago has hosted the most famous and acclaimed names of world opera. Among them Tito Gobbi, who debuted as director in Tosca; the great Mario del Monaco, who chose Torre del Lago to leave the stage with an unforgettable performance in Il Tabarro; Giuseppe Di Stefano, Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, Josè Carreras, who received the Puccini Award in 1997 during the saison final concert; Franco Corelli, Giuseppe Giacomini, Giacomo Aragall and Luis Lima. Finally Josè Cura, whose performance as Cavaradossi in Tosca at 1995 Puccini Festival marked the beginning of his extraordinary career.

Famous baritones as Tito Gobbi, Ingvar Wixell, Sherill Milnes, Rolando Panerai and Giuseppe Taddei played the roles of Scarpia, Jack Rance, Gianni Schicchi and Lescaut, while successful recitals of world-known artists such as Monserrat Caballé and Andrea Bocelli were performed on the stage of Torre del Lago. As for the roles of Puccini’s heroines, the performances of Renata Scotto, Eva Marton, Katia Ricciarelli, Raina Kabaivanska, Olivia Stapp and Ghena Dimitrova are really unforgettable. Among the famous directors, Francesco Molinari Pradelli, Franco Mannino, Nello Santi, Oliviero De Fabritiis, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Yuri Ahronovich, Gian Luigi Gelmetti, Nicola Rescigno, Daniel Oren, Maurizio Arena, Anton Guadagno and Alberto Veronesi, at present Artistic Director of the Festival. Apart from opera, the Grand Theatre of Torre del Lago hosted also other forms of spectacle: ballet, for instance, with important performances of Rudolf Nureyev, Carla Fracci and Georg Iancu.

In 2000, 70th anniversary of Forzano and Mascagni’s courageous initiative, the 46th edition of Puccini Festival proposed two major new productions: Madama Butterfly under the direction of Vivien A. Hewitt, with costumes by Regina Schrecker and scenes by the Japanese sculptor Kan Yasuda debuting as stage-designer, and Beni Montresor’s monumental Tosca. Then La Bohème and Puccini’s first opera, Le Villi, as concert with the performances of Katia Ricciarelli and Josè Cura.

In Summer 2001 the production of Madama Butterfly designed by Kan Yasuda toured Japan within the events of “Italy in Japan 2001”: it received a 18-minute-long standing ovation in Tokyo's Bunka Kai Kan Theatre and was received with the same enthusiasm in Kobe and in Nagasaki, where Festival Puccini was the first European opera company ever to perform Butterfly in the places where Puccini had set it. In 2002 this production was displayed in Germany at Wiesbaden May International Festival and in the following Summer was staged again in Torre del Lago with Andrea Bocelli performing as Captain Pinkerton. In May 2003 Madama Butterfly designed by Yasuda moved to the USA and was staged at the Baltimore Opera House.

A new production of Turandot by Roberto Laganà Manoli, staged with great success in Torre del Lago in Summer 2001, toured to the Canaries and to Messina in Spring 2002.

The Puccini Festival is just a few kilometres from Pietrasanta, the "Little Athens" where Michelangelo first based his marble cutting activities and where sculptors from all over the world come to learn a unique technique. This neighbourhood has given birth to a project called "Sculpting the Opera", which sees world-famous artists in the role of opera set designers. Madama Butterfly by Kan Yasuda was followed in 2002 by a new production of Manon Lescaut with scenes and costumes by Igor Mitoraj, and a new production of La Bohème with sets and costumes designed by Jean-Michel Folon received a huge success in Torre del Lago in Summer 2003. For its 2004 edition, the Festival looks again to Pietrasanta to supply the talents of sculptors Pietro Cascella, who brings potent design ideas for an exiting new production of Turandot, and of Arnaldo Pomodoro who will design sets for Madama Butterfly.

54rd Festival Pucciniano

To celebrate its 50th Anniversary, the Puccini Festival is now preparing a rich Summer schedule which will be anticipated in May 2004 by two great special events: Placido Domingo will conduct two performances of a new production of Madama Butterfly celebrating the Centenary of its première in Brescia on May 28, 1904, with Daniela Dessì and Fabio Armiliato in the leading roles; and on May 29 a very special evening dedicated to Puccini’s Heroines will present the most beloved arias from the Maestro’s favourite characters.

Finally, in Summer 2004 the Great Theatre in Torre del Lago will host three of the best known operas by Puccini: Madama Butterfly, Turandot and Tosca.

Exhibition Festival Puccini Tuscany 2008 show the top

The Puccini Festival and biography of Giacomo Puccini

Take one look at the landscape from the banks of Lake Massaciuccoli in the city of Torre del Lago, Tuscany and it is easy to understand Giacomo Puccini’s inspiration for his operas. The great Italian composer, Puccini, once wrote to his friend Forzano, “I always come out here and take a boat to go and shoot snipes … but once I would like to come here and listen to one of my operas in the open air.” Forzano brought alive his friend’s wishes in 1930 when he organized the first Puccini festival celebrating not only Puccini’s operas but also the beautiful landscape that inspired Puccini. The open-air theatre, which hosts about 40,000 opera lovers every year, has the Massaciuccoli Lake in its background, presenting an unforgettable experience to Puccini fans, opera lovers and visitors alike. The incomparable natural scenery, the stage designed by among the most reputed designers, painters and sculptors in the world and Puccini’s music together paint fantastic images in the mind of the viewer. The festival attracts among the biggest names in world opera. Tito Gobbi, Mario del Monaco, Luciano Pavarotti, Giuseppe Di Stefano, Placido Domingo, Josè Cura among other reputed names have performed here. The highlight of the festival is the attention to details invested on it. Each set, costume, opera, ballet and the colors resonate with the Puccinian spirit. The Puccini Prize, an award instituted in 1971, is a statuette resembling Puccini and handed out on the death anniversary of the composer on November 29th. The Puccini festival invites worldwide attention attracting diverse artists. Some of the previous set designers have included the Japanese sculptor Kan Yasuda for Madama Butterfly, the Belgian painter and sculptor Jean-Michel Folon for La Boheme and Igor Mitoraj for Manon Lescaut. Giacomo Puccini