Puccini had hardly finished his work on 'Tosca' in 1900 and seen its first performances when a new potential opera subject attracted his attention during a theatre visit in London: the play staged was 'Madame Butterfly. Tragedy of a Japanese Woman'. At the beginning of 1904, the musical setting of this subject matter was completed – the work was a failure at the world premiere. Thereupon, Puccini revised it into a three-act version, and it was in this form that the opera about the unhappy Japane...