THIS 38 PAGE ARTICLE WAS EXTRACTED FROM THE BOOK: The Grand Opera in America, by Henry C. Lahee. To purchase the entire book, please order ISBN 1417906642.

This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishing's Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

THIS 48 PAGE ARTICLE WAS EXTRACTED FROM THE BOOK: Mysteries of the Great Operas, by Max Heindel. To purchase the entire book, please order ISBN 0766104192.

Marguerite Piazza's autobiography reads more like a popular novel. Pagliacci Has Nothing On Me! recounts her rise to stardom in radio, TV, grand opera and as a Las Vegas headliner from her New Orleans childhood as the grand-daughter of immigrants. Miss Piazza reveals fascinating stories about the very birth of television and the Golden Age of Entertainment. The book delves behind the scenes with celebrities, managers, producers, socialites, her four husbands, six children, President Nixon, the McCarthy era and her near death experience. Variety once wrote that she was "an opera star who knows how to please both the longhairs and the crew cuts." And the broad appeal of her book is no exception. Pagliacci Has Nothing On Me! is a mesmerizing and sometimes harrowing journey through the life and times of an unforgettable Diva.

Long before Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation, long before Barthes explicated his empire of signs, even before Puccini's Madame Butterfly, Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado presented its own distinctive version of Japan. Set in a fictional town called Titipu and populated by characters named Yum-Yum, Nanki-Poo, and Pooh-Bah, the opera has remained popular since its premiere in 1885. Tracing the history of The Mikado's performances from Victorian times to the present, Josephine Lee reveals the continuing viability of the play's surprisingly complex racial dynamics as they have been adapted to different times and settings. Lee connects yellowface performance to blackface minstrelsy, showing how productions of the 1938-39 Swing Mikado and Hot Mikado, among others, were used to promote African American racial uplift. She also looks at a host of contemporary productions and adaptations, including Mike Leigh's film Topsy-Turvy and performances of The Mikado in Japan, to reflect on anxieties about race as they are articulated through new visions of the town of Titipu. The Mikado creates racial fantasies, draws audience members into them, and deftly weaves them into cultural memory. For countless people who had never been to Japan, The Mikado served as the basis for imagining what "Japanese" was.

Offered in two accessible keys suitable for all singers, it is likely to be the first publication a voice teacher will ask a first-time student to purchase. The classic Parisotti realizations result in rich, satisfying accompaniments which allow singers pure musical enjoyment.

First published in 1897, this was among the earliest works about Wagner and his works to come from outside Bayreuth and presented careful and probing analyses of both the poems and the music, touching for the first time on the essential themes and questions of Wagner's life and work, the use of the leit-motif and the universe of his creative work. Contains all of the original illustrations. A work explaining and interpreting Wagner and his music, which is extremely valuable for the French point of view which it presents. This title is cited and recommended by Books for College Libraries and the Catalogue of the Lamont Library, Harvard College.

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

An evocative retelling of the Czech Velvet Revolution using found text, choral music, and scenes inspired by Vaclav Havel's Vanek plays. The work was originally presented at the Walter Bruno Theater at Linclon Center, as part of the New York Public Library of the Performing Arts' Performing Revolution Festival. This book includes the full text of both the scenes and choruses, as well as interviews with the composer and the librettist.

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

George Bernard Shaw was born in Dublin in 1856. Before becoming a playwright he wrote music and literary criticism. Shaw used his writing to attack social problems such as education, marriage, religion, government, health care, and class privilege. Shaw was particularly conscious of the exploitation of the working class. The Perfect Wagnerite is a politically oriented essay. Shaw was a life-long Socialist and one of the earliest Wagner enthusiasts. He praises Wagner's "Ring Cycle" as a denunciation of the evils of capitalism and as a musical triumph.

This book is a facsimile reprint and may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages.

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

George Bernard Shaw was born in Dublin in 1856. Before becoming a playwright he wrote music and literary criticism. Shaw used his writing to attack social problems such as education, marriage, religion, government, health care, and class privilege. Shaw was particularly conscious of the exploitation of the working class. The Perfect Wagnerite is a politically oriented essay. Shaw was a life-long Socialist and one of the earliest Wagner enthusiasts. He praises Wagner's "Ring Cycle" as a denunciation of the evils of capitalism and as a musical triumph.

Susie Gilbert traces the development of ENO from its earliest origins in the darkest Victorian slums of the Cut, where it was conceived as a vehicle of social reform, through two world wars, and via Sadler's Wells to its great glory days at the Coliseum and beyond. Setting the company's artistic achievements within the wider context of social and political attitudes to the arts and the ever-changing theatrical style, Gilbert provides a vivid cultural history of this unique institution's 150 years. Inspired by the idealism of Lilian Baylis, the company has been based on the belief that opera in the vernacular can not only reach out to even the least privileged members of society but also create a potent and immediate communication with its audience. With full access to ENO's archive, Gilbert has unearthed a rich range of material and held numerous interviews with a fascinating array of personalities, to weave an absorbing tale of life both in front and behind the scenes of ENO as it developed over the years.

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

The story of an Australian girl who defied convention and became the most famous singer of her era. Growing up in Melbourne, Nellie Mitchell dreamed of fame, but her devout father disapproved. When a chance arose to go to Paris, she trusted in her musical talent and hoped for a lucky break. Within a few years, reborn as Nellie Melba, she was performing to overflowing concert halls, hobnobbing with European royalty and collaborating with some of the most renowned composers of the age. Audiences swooned over the 'heavenly pleasures' of her voice, while the public showed an insatiable appetite for news of her sometimes passionate private life. Dame Nellie Melba was Australia's first international superstar. In this important biography, enhanced by new research, Ann Blainey captures the exuberance, controversy and pathos of Melba's remarkable career. Shortlisted for the Age Book of the Year Award

Also Contains: The Deserter: A Musical Drama; The Wedding Ring: A Comic Opera; The Waterman Or The First Of August: A Ballad Opera.