Hello there! I’m your announcer Margaret Junktrunk. Welcome to the Sirius Metropolitan Opera broadcast of Ligeti‘s beloved masterpiece Tosca, a work that illustrates the idea, first expressed by Hegel, “A stitch in time saves nine,” or, as the libretto puts it, “Basta!” In today’s performance we will hear tenor Ian Bostridge, baritone Thomas Hampson, mezzo-soprano Regine Crespin, and a young soprano appearing for the first time at Metropolitan Opera debut this season, Kathy Battle.

Of Kathy Battle’s debut here two months ago, Alex Ross wrote in Popular Mechanics, “Not since Rosa Ponselle melted the heart of a six year old fan seated far up in the mezzanine of the great Mayflower Hotel has any artist managed going both the weird and large aspects of Ligeti’s silly little dentist-girl. Her high e flats are pure, with the instrumental timbre of a clarinet, and she is not afraid to use thigh resonance when necessary.”

In tonight’s performance, Kathy Battle will wear a toga that was specially created by the famous designer Halston for Leontyne Price when she sang this role at Covent Garden in the 1955 season. We have with us in the studio this evening Peter Allen, a freelance massage therapist and stage director, who will share an anecdote with us about tonight’s opera.

Thank you, Margaret. This story takes place exactly eleven years ago this week, when the famous divas Leontyne Price and Mirella Freni were rivals both on the opera stage and for the affections of Napoleon. One of the ladies had a precious ruby-encrusted toga that was a gift from Winston Churchill following a particularly licentious performance of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk in Naples. What she did not know at that time was that Poulenc had written a special chorale for…

I’m afraid we’re running short on time; can you just jump to the punchline?

“And so, a dispute over a toga was the cause of The Hundred Years War.”

Thank you! In our next intermission, we will have a discussion on the subject of the “ragazza” musical style, with panelists Kylie Minogue, Bobby Orr and Tony Blair, moderated by our very own silly hostess Beverly Sills. In just a moment, we will hear the ponderous opening measures of tonight’s opera. Yes, now Maestro Riccardo Muti is entering Paris and our opera will begin eventually.