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Donald Macleod details the tragic event which created the biggest scandal of Puccini's life, throwing him into despair as he struggled to work on La fanciulla del West.

Giacomo Puccini was man of the theatre to his fingertips. Born in Lucca in 1858, into a distinguished family of church musicians, Puccini was never destined to follow in his forebears鈥� footsteps. His fate was sealed when as a teenager he walked thirty miles to hear Verdi鈥檚 Aida. He knew immediately that theatre was his calling and from that point on he wrote almost exclusively for the stage.

A perfectionist and an often unreasonable taskmaster, Puccini agonised over each of his operas. Beginning with Manon Lescaut, the opera that launched Puccini internationally, this week Donald Macleod follows the off and the on-stage dramas of La Boh猫me, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, La fanciulla del West, Suor Angelica, Gianni Schicchi, Il tabarro and the opera he left incomplete at his death in 1924, his final masterpiece, Turandot. The stories on stage are interleaved with events in his personal life, from an early scandal over his affair with a married woman and some very dodgy skulduggery in his business dealings, to the suicide of one of his servants, a tragedy of such proportion, he was plunged in to a deep depression, haunted by the events for the rest of his life.

In a week celebrating a composer whose music expresses every human emotion, there's a host of landmark recordings, including the voices of Jonas Kaufmann, Angela Gheorghiu, Anna Netrebko and Roberto Alagna, We'll hear Mim矛's touching calling card from La Boh猫me, in the classic Victoria de los Angeles version while Renato Scotto pours all Madam Butterfly's hopes into the heartbreaking Un bel d矛. The raw pain of Sister Angelica mourning her dead son, and the dark desperation of a jealous husband in Il tabarro. On Wednesday Callas and Gobbi鈥檚 anguished, sadistic torture scene in Tosca still has the power to shock us as much as it did on its first night in 1900. It's high stakes and nail-biting tension in La fanciulla del West as Minnie trades the life of her outlaw lover on the outcome of a card game. Joan Sutherland鈥檚 icy Princess Turandot, a magnificent pairing with Luciano Pavarotti鈥檚 Prince Calaf comes on Friday along with a certain aria made famous by the 1990 world cup, heard here in the hands of another Puccini specialist, Jussi Bj枚rling.

After years of enduring her husband's infidelities, Puccini's wife Elvira accused one of the servants of having an affair with him.

Gianni Schicchi
O mio babbino caro
Montserrat Caball茅, soprano, Lauretta
London Symphony Orchestra
Charles Mackerras, conductor

Gianni Schicchi, excerpt
.. Zitte, Obbedite!
... Datemi I panni per verstirmi presto!
Tito Gobbi, baritone, Gianni Schicchi
Leo Pudis, bass, Maestro Spinellocchio
Anna di Stasio, mezzo soprano, Zita
Giancarlo Luccardi, bass, Simone
Alfredo Marriotti, bass-baritone, Betto di Signa
Carlo del Bosco, bass, Marco
Ileana Cotrubas, soprano, Lauretta
London Symphony Orchestra
Lorin Maazel, conductor

Il tabarro
Nulla silenzio!
Carlo Guelfi, baritone, Michele
London Symphony Orchestra
Anthony Pappano, conductor

La fanciulla del West, Act 1
Signor Johnson, siete rimasto indietro
Io non son che una povera fanciulla
Quello che tacete
Come voi, Leggermi in cor non so
Oh, non temete, nessuno ardira
Mara Zampieri, soprano, Minnie
Placido Domingo, tenor, Dick Johnson
Sergio Bertocchi, tenor, Nick
Chorus & Orchestra of La Scala Milan
Lorin Maazel, conductor

La fanciulla del West, Act 2
Una partita a poker!
Sherrill Milnes, baritone, Jack Rance
Carol Neblett, soprano, Minnie
Royal Opera House Orchestra, Covent Garden
Zubin Mehta, conductor

Suor Angelica
Nel silenzio di quei raccoglimenti
Tutto offerto alla Vergine, si, tutto
Senza mamma, o bimbo, tu sei morto!
Cristina Gallardo-Domas, soprano, Sister Angelica
Bernadette Manca di Nissa, soprano, the Aunt Princess
London Symphony Orchestra
Anthony Pappano, conductor