Puccini had eloped with his former piano student, the married Elvira Gemignani, and Ricordi's associates were willing to turn a blind eye to his life style as long as he was successful.

By 1900, he had acquired land and built a villa on the lake, now known as the " Villa Museo Puccini.

Puccini had been considering an opera on this theme since he saw the play Tosca by Victorien Sardou in 1889, when he wrote to his publisher, Giulio Ricordi, begging him to get Sardou's permission for the work to be made into an opera: " I see in this Tosca the opera I need, with no overblown proportions, no elaborate spectacle, nor will it call for the usual excessive amount of music.

Puccini succeeded in mastering the orchestra as no other Italian had done before him, creating new forms by manipulating structures inherited from the great Italian tradition, loading them with bold harmonic progressions which had little or nothing to do with what was happening then in Italy, though they were in step with the work of French, Austrian and German colleagues.

With his second wife, the actress Carla Maria Puccini, he had a third daughter, Rachele, named after his mother ( Rachele Mussolini ).

That year, he had disputes with Ruggiero Leoncavallo and Giacomo Puccini.

Mascagni had a quarrel regarding the rights of Louise de la Ramée's Two Little Wooden Shoes ( I due Zoccoletti ), that inspired both Puccini and Mascagni.

In 1930, Mascagni conducted La bohème in Torre del Lago, as a homage to Puccini, who had died in 1924.

There are several versions of how Ricordi got Franchetti to surrender the rights so he could recommission Puccini, who had again become interested.

Puccini, however, seems to have had some inkling of the possible seriousness of his condition since, before leaving for Brussels, he visited Toscanini and begged him, " Don't let my Turandot die.

After the severe criticisms by Ricordi and the conductor Arturo Toscanini, he was forced to write a second, strictly censored version that followed Puccini's sketches more closely, to the point where he did not set some of Adami's text to music because Puccini had not indicated how he wanted it to sound.

Ricordi's real concern was not the quality of Alfano's work, but that he wanted the end of Turandot to sound as if it had been written by Puccini, and Alfano's editing had to be seamless.

Puccini had a house there as well.

Some composers, such as Mikhail Glinka, Alexander Serov, Rimsky-Korsakov, Puccini, and Mascagni wrote passages of music without text and subsequently had the librettist add words to the vocal melody lines.

Schonberg surmises that had Bizet lived, he might have revolutionised French opera ; as it is, verismo was taken up mainly by Italians, notably Puccini who, according to Dean, developed the idea " till it became threadbare ".

Apart from Massenet, composers whose works had their first performances at Monte Carlo included: Saint-Saëns ( Hélène, 1904 ); Mascagni ( Amica, 1905 ); and Puccini ( La rondine, 1917 ).

On taking up the conductorship of the Hallé he had less opportunity to work in the opera house, but in the 1950s he conducted productions of works by Verdi, Wagner, Gluck, and Puccini at Covent Garden with such success that he was invited to become the company's permanent musical director, an invitation he declined.

Other critics consider Puccini to have had merely a partial Verismo involvement.

He previously had considered writing a brief operatic piece about the friendship between Giacomo Puccini and Ruggiero Leoncavallo, going so far as to compose the melody that later would become " Memory " for it, but decided it wouldn't fit well with ' the girl's ' saga.

The film had an original score by Sigmund Romberg and reused the popular David Belasco stage plot ( also employed by opera composer Giacomo Puccini for La fanciulla del West ).

Apart from Massenet, composers whose works had their first performances at Monte Carlo included: Saint-Saëns ( Hélène, 1904 ); Mascagni ( Amica, 1905 ); and Puccini ( La rondine, 1917 ).

#[...] it is not his conclusion that is performed in productions of Turandot but only what the premiere conductor Arturo Toscanini included from it ... Puccini had worked for nine months on the following concluding duet and at his death had left behind a whole ream of sketches ... Alfano had to reconstruct ... according to his best assessment ... and with his imagination and magnifying glass " since Puccini's material " had not really been legible.

In 1900, Jerome K. Jerome's Miss Hobbs was staged as well as David Belasco's Madame Butterfly, which was seen by Puccini, who later turned it into the famous opera.

They remained with Puccini for his next three operas and probably his greatest successes: La bohème, Tosca and Madama Butterfly.

Puccini completed La fanciulla del West, based on a play by David Belasco, in 1910.

Puccini completed the score of La rondine, to a libretto by Giuseppe Adami in 1916 after two years of work, and it was premiered at the Grand Théâtre de Monte Carlo on 27 March 1917.

La bohème is an opera in four acts, by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger.

It was rebuilt and reopened on 11 May 1946, with a memorable concert conducted by Arturo Toscanini — twice La Scala's principal conductor and an associate of the composers Giuseppe Verdi and Giacomo Puccini — with a soprano solo by Renata Tebaldi, which created a sensation.

Lucca is the birthplace of composers Giacomo Puccini ( La Bohème and Madama Butterfly ), Nicalao Dorati, Francesco Geminiani, Gioseffo Guami, Luigi Boccherini, and Alfredo Catalani.

* Rodolfo, La bohème ( Puccini )

* Dick Johnson, La fanciulla del West ( Puccini )

** Marcello, La bohème ( Giacomo Puccini )

** Jack Rance, La fanciulla del West ( Giacomo Puccini )

" La dinastia musicale dei Puccini: proposte e quesiti.

* La Principessa, Suor Angelica ( Puccini )

* The Puccini opera " La Bohème ", where the Café Momus is the setting for Act II, in the Latin Quarter, Paris ( although the actual Café Momus described in the original stories by Henri Murger on which the opera is based was located on the Right Bank near the church of Saint-Germain l ' Auxerrois ).

* Puccini: La Bohème Ileana Cotrubaş with Luciano Pavarotti and Piero Cappuccilli, conducted by Carlos Kleiber, live recording at La Scala, Milan 22 March 1979 EX92T01 / 2 CD

* La bohème by Giacomo Puccini – Turin, February 1, 1896

* La fanciulla del West by Puccini – New York, December 10, 1910

* Puccini, La bohème ( 1946 broadcast )

* 1979: Puccini: La Bohéme, La Scala Milan Orchestra & Chorus, Ileana Cotrubas, Luciano Pavarotti, Bel Canto Society

** Richard Mohr ( producer ), Georg Solti ( conductor ), Judith Blegen, Montserrat Caballe, Plácido Domingo, Sherrill Milnes, Ruggero Raimondi & the London Philharmonic for Puccini: La Bohème

*“ Theater an der Wien-Giacomo Puccini, La Boheme, Erstaufführung in Wien ,” Neue Revue, Jahrgang 8, Band 1 ( 1897 ), p. 473ff.