Talk about last minute replacements: Terfel saves Tosca

Well, of course, he didn't because she stabbed him first, and then forgot to read the small print on the safe-conduct papers; but that's another story. Meanwhile at the Met…

Is there a great bass-baritone in the house? This desperate cry was answered with a resounding yes at the Metropolitan Opera in New York on Saturday, said The Times.

The Met's managers were tearing their hair out trying to find a late replacement for an ailing James Morris, who was due to sing Scarpia in Tosca that evening. Then someone saw Bryn Terfel quietly sitting in the audience for a matinee performance of Wozzeck. Terfel is in New York to play Wotan in the Met's new production of Die Walküre, which opens on Friday.

A whispered message was passed to the Welshman during a scene- change. He rushed back to his apartment with a score of Tosca, brushed up on a role that he had sung earlier this season, and burst on stage as Puccini's malevolent sadist a few hours later.

Photo: Bryn as Baron Scarpia in Tosca, ROH June 2006 by Brian Tarr

Gramilano( Editor )

Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano') about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.

His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman's Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia' column for Dancing Times magazine.