The gods – or at least the A&R gurus at Deutsche Grammophon – were clearly listening when I concluded my favourable review of Jonathan Tetelman’s ‘The Great Puccini’ album (A/23) by wishing for ‘a full Puccini opera recording soon, please’. Those prayers have been answered with the first Tosca issued under the yellow cartouche since Giuseppe Sinopoli’s 1990 account.

And where better to record Tosca than the Eternal City itself, the setting of Puccini’s great operatic thriller? The Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia has featured on a number of Toscas over the decades – Alberto Erede (1952), Francesco Molinari-Pradelli (1959), Lorin Maazel (1966), all for Decca – and they provide the authentic local colour here under their new Music Director, Daniel Harding.

The three performances in late October last year were Harding’s inaugural concerts with his new band (along with a Verdi Requiem). The British conductor doesn’t have a lot of opera on his CV – and barely any trace of Puccini – but opera very much comes with the territory in this job. His predecessor, Antonio Pappano, recorded five complete operas here for Warner – Guillaume Tell, Madama Butterfly, Aida, Otello and Turandot – setting the bar (impossibly?) high.

Harding’s reading tends towards the symphonic rather than theatrical, the rich Santa Cecilia strings nicely heavy on the carbs, with imposing heavyweight brass. His balancing is good, considering that the Parco della Musica is not always a kind venue to voices. Harding lingers in the love duet, which is perfectly fine, but lets the tension sag after ‘Vissi d’arte’, possibly loving the sound of his new band a bit too much. The dawn that breaks in Act 3 is breathtakingly beautiful, especially the solo cello and clarinet contributions before ‘E lucevan le stelle’. Elsewhere, when Harding allows the orchestra to let rip, the results are exciting, and although his tempos are not Pappano-urgent, at 115 minutes we’re not into Sinopoli or Colin Davis territory.

In Tosca, all three main characters wind up dead. And Harding’s principals are all to die for. I’ve enjoyed Tetelman’s Cavaradossi in the theatre before, and his sunny tone and warm vibrato are most appealing. ‘Recondita armonia’ is unforced à la Luciano Pavarotti, with a ringing final phrase. He’s ardent in ‘Qual occhio al mondo’ in the love duet and displays baritonal chest notes in a fabulously sung ‘E lucevan le stelle’. To his credit, in Act 2 he doesn’t hold on to his cries of ‘Vittoria’ too indulgently.

Tetelman was presumably the raison d’être behind this DG project but it’s his two principal colleagues – Eleonora Buratto and Ludovic Tézier – who steal the show. They were both relatively fresh from performing in Kornél Mundruczó’s new production at the Bavarian State Opera last summer, where Buratto stepped in for Lise Davidsen to make her role debut – useful preparation for a major recording.

Buratto is in gorgeous voice but her soprano has steel, too, making a viperish diva who allows her jealous streak to show all too easily in Act 1. After his dramatic initial appearance – those chords send a shiver up the spine – Tézier’s Scarpia is suave and aristocratic in his cat-and-mouse toying with Tosca. You can almost sense a self-satisfied smile as the Attavanti fan does its work. But he can snarl, too – this is a vicious dog of a Scarpia – with a lustful growl on ‘d’amor’ in a leisurely Te Deum, where you can sense Tézier straining to go faster than Harding will permit.

‘Vissi d’arte’ starts slowly, taxing Buratto’s breath control, but then picks up the pace. It’s dramatically sung and Buratto’s intonation spreads a little on ‘Signore’, but she has a lovely sign-off, after which Tézier purrs long and soft over his ‘Ebbene?’ Scarpia’s murder is wonderfully dramatic, Buratto spitting out her ‘bacio di Tosca’ with venom. Buratto and Tetelman sing with winning sincerity in the final act.

From Davide Giangregorio’s youthful Sacristan (less of the usual caricature) to Alice Fiorelli’s charming Shepherd Boy, the supporting cast is very fine. A black mark to DG, though, for not including a libretto in the skimpy booklet.

When I did a Tosca Collection survey (8/22), I plumped for Renata Tebaldi (Molinari-Pradelli) slightly ahead of Leontyne Price (Karajan). Those 1950s recordings remain in pole position but, even given occasional reservations over Harding, this new account boasts the finest Tosca cast of the digital era and is a recording I’ll be returning to often in years to come.