Times’ John Fleming calls St. Pete Opera’s Tosca a “crowd-pleasing melodrama” with great performances. See it tonight.

You can read John Fleming’s review of St. Petersburg Opera’s Tosca by following this link or checking out the excerpt below. Tosca has one more performance tonight at 7:30. For tickets visit www.mypalladium.org or call 727 822-3590.

Here’s the link to the full review: http://www.tampabay.com/features/performingarts/review-local-voices-soar-in-tosca/1273707

Review: Local voices soar in ‘Tosca’

By John Fleming, Times Performing Arts Critic

Published Monday, February 4, 2013

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ST. PETERSBURG: They say you can’t go home again, but don’t tell Stella Zambalis. A soprano who has sung on exalted stages around the world, from La Scala to the Metropolitan Opera, Zambalis grew up in Clearwater, but her only appearances within hailing distance of the bay area in recent years were at Sarasota Opera.

Now Zambalis is back on her home turf, and she was magnificent as the doomed diva in Tosca, bringing down the house in a sold-out Super Bowl Sunday matinee by St. Petersburg Opera at the Palladium Theater. She was joined by another hometown talent, bass-baritone Todd William Donovan from St. Petersburg, who gave a deliciously evil interpretation of the debauched police chief of Rome, Scarpia.

Yes, it’s nice that a pair of singers with local ties are shining in Puccini’s crowd-pleasing melodrama, but these performances would be impressive anywhere.

Zamabalis, who is of Greek descent and has a dark, earthy quality to her voice (which she describes as “Mediterranean”), seems born to play the passionate prima donna. With a rare combination of nuanced expressiveness and plenty of punch, she is able to go from recitative to stirring coloratura in a measure or two, making the freakish transition sound utterly natural, almost conversational. On Sunday, Vissi d’arte, Tosca’s signature aria, was a rich, red-bloooded anthem of despair against her fate in Scarpia’s lair, echoing with the cries of her lover, the artist Cavaradossi, being tortured. This was a stunning contrast with the playful, high-strung coquette she was in better times while jealously teasing Cavaradossi about his portrait of a Madonna that suspiciously resembles a potential rival to her.

Donovan has grown into the role of Scarpia, which sits low in the voice and needs as much bass as baritone. He brought real weight to the powerhouse chords of Te Deum, intoning the chief’s lascivious intentions toward Tosca against the sacred music, a wonderfully lurid moment.