The music is dense and the harmonic structure complex. Turandot was Puccini’s last opera, one he did not complete. Morris Robinson as Timur and Nicole Heaston as Liù in ’Turandot.’ Photo by Julian Thomas Photography. Her people are understandably whipped up in frenzy after frenzy. We learn it is revenge, but mixed in there is also, to my mind, psychological trauma and a pathological personality. Called in the opera icy and cruel, she is on a crusade to execute all male suitors who seek her hand. (It’s all too close to the current evening news.) Only the missile in Turandot is the princess herself. This opera rendition brought us right into a community in the midst of missile raids. Many describe Puccini’s opera as a fairy tale. I was especially impressed by the savagery the chorus could convey, howling for death by executioners, and reminding us all too clearly of the terror and potential destruction when citizens run amok. It lent a frantic and urgent tension to the already highly dramatic work.

Salemno built on the fine preparation by Chorus Master Steven Gathman with the singers and challenged them to go full out throughout the evening. If the work was demanding of the orchestral players, Puccini was punishing for the chorus - all 82 of them. Just when you thought one couldn’t get more sound, Salemno would pointedly tap the air and the timpani, cymbals, and brass gongs would crackle and crash and that would set the whole orchestra off to explode through the air like wildfire.

Indeed, the musicians pulled off the pomp-and-circumstance forces the opera requires, but then stepped up both tempi and phrasing to maximize the emotional builds in the work. Maestro Louis Salemno led the full orchestra, which filled not only the stage but spilled over into a second balcony that held an additional banda of trumpets, trombones, and saxophones. Alexandra LoBianco as Turandot in ’Turandot.’ Photo by Julian Thomas Photography.

Each familiar tune was a rediscovery more glorious than the last. Normally, I don’t even like concert operas, but in Strathmore’s glowing wood auditorium with its stellar acoustics, I sat back and let the music roll out over me. Maryland Lyric Opera more than delivers on its mission of “primarily serving the music” in a concert opera rendition of Puccini’s brilliant and musically dense Turandot, and it is sublime.

Lorraine lyric opera house