Lucca – Puccini and Mozart Concert

At 7:00 this evening a group of us attended a wonderful concert of music written by Mozart and Puccini. Puccini was born in Lucca to a poor family in the 1850s. Apparently, he and his work were dismissed by the people who ran the town (because of his humble beginnings), even as he became world famous. However, he is now Lucca's favorite son and there are signs of him everywhere - - after all, his operas have been presented more often than those of any other composer. Since 2004, a different concert, such as the one we saw, has been presented every night, 365 days per year. Hundreds of thousand of tourists have attended, although only only .01% of the audience are either Luccese or Italian. The setting was wonderful - - in the nave of a very old church and the pictures of Puccii shown as a stage backdrop were wonderful. He had such a brooding romantic look to him. The night that we were there, the performers consisted of a pianist and two young singers, a soprano and a tenor.