Kategoria BISAC: Music >> Genres & Styles - Opera

Mathilde Marchesi (1821-1913) was probably the most renowned singing teacher of the late nineteenth century. Herself the pupil of the great Manuel Garcia the Second and the associate of the unsurpassable divas of the middle nineteenth century, she also linked the traditional bel canto teaching method to the beginning of the twentieth century. Early in her career her work was praised enthusiastically by Rossini, who was for a time officially in charge of voice training in France; and toward the end of her career she prepared such superstars as Melba, Calve, Eames, Aida, and others.
This...

"He Wagner] has been much criticized for this strongly personal statement of a religious subject, which mingles the concepts of sacred and profane love; but in the light of modern knowledge, his insight into the relationship between religious and sexual experience can only seem much in advance of his time." "Encylopaedia Britannica"
Completed in 1882, "Parsifal" is Wagner's last opera and one of his finest, renowned for its splendid music and glowing orchestration. With its deeply personal treatment of the legend of the Holy Grail, and the subtle intensity and depth of compassion of...

-La Boheme is perhaps Puccini's most nearly perfect opera.- -- Hughes, Famous Puccini Operas.
It has long been one of the world's most beloved musical works -- an instantly enchanting blend of charm, warmth, gaiety, and pathos, brought to vibrant life by Puccini's sparkling, lighthearted score. La Boheme, based on Henri Murger's novel Scenes de la Vie de Boheme, was first performed at the Teatro Regio, Turin, in 1896. It soon became a staple of the operatic repertoire and has remained so ever since. Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians notes...

In The Flying Dutchman, finished in 1841 and first presented at Dresden in 1843, Wagner achieved the first true representation of his mature style as a German Romantic composer. As in his later works, the opera is based on legend, with a simple outline and a small number of profoundly significant characters. There is also a greater reliance on the use of leitmotivs than in his previous operas, and a textual and musical unity new to the composer's work.
This edition has been directly reproduced from a limited edition prepared by the great conductor Felix Weingartner in 1896. It...

The book describes the cultural environment around the turn of the century from which Pierrot emerged and discusses Schoenberg's working methods and intentions in its composition. The composer's artistic development up to 1912 is contemplated as a backdrop to this extraordinarily original creative act, and the significance of Pierrot in the unfolding of twentieth-century music is a recurrent...

Wagner is one of the most controversial of composers, and much that has been written about him--including his autobiography--is misleading. Barry Millington draws on the best previous scholarship and his own original research to set the record straight. The first part of this book is devoted to biography; the second, to a detailed study of the operas. Millington offers a historical review of the critical interpretation of each opera, including a discussion of recent methods of formal analysis. In this revised edition, two chapters, those on Tannhauser and Die Meistersinger, include...

While no one would dispute Wagner's ranking among the most significant composers in the history of Western music, his works have been more fiercely attacked than those of any other composer. Alleged to be an unscrupulous womanizer and megalomaniac, undeniably a racist, Wagner's personal qualities and attitudes have often provoked, and continue to provoke, intense hostility that has translated into a mistrust and abhorrence of his music.

In this emphatic, lucid book, Michael Tanner discusses why people feel so passionately about Wagner, for or against, in a way that they do not...