#OperaPassion Day 2017

We're reaching the end of our #OperaPassion LiveBlog.

It's been an amazing eight-and-a-half hours since curtain up at 11am this morning!

We thank the Victoria and Albert Museum, the British Council, all our opera company partners, and everyone listening, watching, tweeting and posting.

Everything from #OperaPassion remains available online, here and on the websites and social media platforms of our partner organisations.

So we leave you now in the capable hands of Sara Mohr-Pietsch who will introduce the Royal Opera's performance of Puccini's Tosca which Radio 3 listeners voted for.

As Canio sings at the end of Pagliacci, "La commedia è finita!"

Arrivederci!

Catherine Ashmore/ROHCopyright: Catherine Ashmore/ROH

Dubbed a "shabby little shocker" in a 1950s critique, Puccini’s Tosca, after a shaky start at its Rome premiere in January 1900, quickly became a firm audience favourite, and has remained a staple of the repertoire ever since.

It’s not hard to understand why: a passionate affair between an artist and republican, Mario Cavaradossi, and a beautiful, fiery singer, Floria Tosca, is pitted against the lustful designs of an evil, royalist chief of secret police, Baron Scarpia.

When Cavaradossi is arrested, tortured and condemned to death, Tosca agrees to surrender herself to Scarpia in exchange for her lover's free pardon.

After Scarpia authorises a mock execution for Cavaradossi at Rome’s Castel Sant’Angelo, Tosca stabs him to death.

A spectacular posthumous double-cross (spoiler alert!) leads to Cavaradossi’s execution for real, and Tosca’s dramatic suicide by flinging herself off the battlements of the castle.

The Royal Opera’s 2011 production stars Angela Gheorghiu as Tosca, Jonas Kaufmann as Cavaradossi and Bryn Terfel as Scarpia.

Hear Tosca on Radio 3 at 7.30pm

Catherine Ashmore/ROHCopyright: Catherine Ashmore/ROH

It's our last stop of the day and we're at St Pancras station in London as commuters join the Royal Opera Chorus in a sing-a-long of 'Va Pensiero' - the Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves.

BBCCopyright: BBC

BBCCopyright: BBC

BBCCopyright: BBC

BBCCopyright: BBC

... in the Easter Hymn from Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana. Well, St Pancras does look a bit like a cathedral....

ROHCopyright: ROH

Joining in the sing-a-long at St Pancras? Everyone has a range of notes within the natural confines of their voice – broadly, these are soprano and alto (for women, though some men can also sing alto) and tenor and bass (for men).

But which one are you? Find out more

BBCCopyright: BBC

BBCCopyright: BBC

Most of us sing, generally to ourselves in the car or the shower, blissfully unaware of the whole process. It’s as instinctive as talking – we just form the thought, open our mouths and out it comes.

When you sing, you start by taking in breath then sending it up through the larynx into the head and out into the atmosphere.

But to make yourself heard in a large space without amplification, as opera singers do, something else has to happen...

Find out more

Hammering home how good opera is at St Pancras. They wanted to use the train tracks to bang on but Network Rail weren't so keen...

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The Royal Opera Chorus are limbering up at St Pancras Station for this evening's pop-up performance and singalong of the Anvil Chorus from Verdi's Il trovatore and the moving 'Va pensiero' chorus from Nabucco. They'll be at it hammer and tongs from about 640pm...

ROHCopyright: ROH

We'll soon head over to St Pancras train station for a pop up performance by the Royal Opera Chorus. It has been the backbone of The Royal Opera, performing in an average of 20 productions each season, in a wide repertory ranging from Baroque through to newly commissioned works. Find out about the chorus here.

Royal Opera HouseCopyright: Royal Opera House

V&ACopyright: V&A

How does opera work? How has it changed over 400 years? And most importantly, is opera relevant today?

Get the answers to these questions and more with this free online course devised by experts in the field: Kings College London, the Royal Opera House and the V&A.

The course takes you behind opera’s velvet curtain, so if you’ve never been to an opera, or assumed it’s not for you, you’ll learn the basics in a new and exciting way. Or, if you already enjoy opera and want to learn more, this course will enrich your future experiences, helping you to develop a toolkit of operatic concepts to draw on long after you have finished the course.

Find out more

Carla J. Easton from TeenCanteen, who released their debut album in 2016, collaborates with Scottish Opera Emerging Artists Alex Otterburn and Laura Zigmantaite on ‘Impossible Stuff’. One of two special collaborations between Scottish Opera and musicians from Scotland for #OperaPassion day.

We're on a touch tour of Die Fledermaus set at the Mayflower Theatre in Southampton before curtain up tonight. The tour lets visually impaired audience members explore the set ahead of the audio described performance.

BBCCopyright: BBC

BBCCopyright: BBC

The Tomorrow's World team demonstrate how Puccini's aria from Turandot has the power to move the soul - sung by Iain Henderson.

Let Welsh National Opera sort you out. Watch how make-up transforms a chorus member into a Siberian prisoner in their production of Janáček's From the House of the Dead.

Coming up at 6 o'clock we join a Live Touch Tour of Welsh National Opera's Die Fledermaus set at the Mayflower Theatre in Southampton.

For blind and partially sighted audiences this is a part of the overall theatre experience, providing opportunities to touch and explore the set ahead of the performance.

Welsh National OperaCopyright: Welsh National Opera

Merthyr-born comic actor Steve Speirs has had roles in blockbusters such as Star Wars and Pirates of the Caribbean, among other films, but he's taken on a new challenge - appearing for the first time in an opera. As a recent convert, Welsh National Opera asked him to explore some myths around the art form... with hilarious results.