ENO places Adriana Mater in dialogue with Tosca

English National Opera will present Kaija Saariaho’s Adriana Mater at the London Coliseum from 28 November to 12 December 2026, in a new production that places the work in a thematic conversation with Puccini’s Tosca.

Annilese Miskimmon directs both stagings, connecting their treatment of violence, power and survival through a shared contemporary frame. The pairing is a directorial conception, rather than a claim that the two operas were originally written as a continuous story.

Adriana Mater follows a mother and her son as the consequences of wartime sexual violence reach into the next generation. Amin Maalouf’s libretto will be performed in a newly commissioned English translation by Aleksi Barrière, Saariaho’s son. André de Ridder leads the principal conducting team; the composer’s daughter, Aliisa Neige Barrière, conducts on 5 and 10 December.

Kristina Stanek sings Adriana, with Caspar Singh as Yonas, Leigh Melrose as Tsargo and Lauren Fagan as Refka. The production brings together set designer Rosanna Vize, costume designer Evie Gurney, lighting designer Lee Curran and movement director Imogen Knight.

The strongest practical expression of the pairing comes on 5 December, when a matinee of Tosca is followed by Adriana Mater in the evening. Audiences can therefore test the proposed connection in a single day, hearing how two very different musical languages confront coercion and the possibility of resistance.

Saariaho’s opera places particular weight on the question of what a child inherits from violence, and whether that inheritance must determine his actions. That makes it a demanding companion to Puccini’s drama. The production’s success will depend on giving each work its own theatrical life while allowing the relationship between them to remain audible and visible.