Orfeo ed Euridice is an opera composed by Christoph W. Gluck based on the myth of Orpheus, set to a libretto by Ranieri de' Calzabigi. It is the first of Gluck's "reform" operas, in which he attempted to replace the abstruse plots and overly complex music of opera seria with a "noble simplicity" in both the music and the drama. Though originally set to an Italian libretto, Orfeo ed Euridice owes much to the genre of French opera, particularly in its use of accompanied recitative and a general absence of vocal virtuosity. Indeed, twelve years after the 1762 premiere, Gluck re-adapted the opera to suit the tastes of a Parisian audience at the Academie Royale de Musique with a libretto by Pierre-Louis Moline.

Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky (1839-1881). The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar (1598 to 1605) during the Time of Troubles, and his nemesis, the False Dmitriy (reigned 1605 to 1606). The Russian-language libretto was written by the composer, and is based on the "dramatic chronicle" Boris Godunov by Aleksandr Pushkin, and, in the Revised Version of 1872, on Nikolay Karamzin's History of the Russian State.

In Staging Scenes from the Operas of Mozart: A Guide for Teachers and Singers, opera director William Ferrara offers the perfect resource for the dramatic preparation of opera scenes for directors and student performers. Topics include study and research, rehearsal planning, blocking, characterization, and costuming for four of Mozart s most popular operas. He surveys basic concepts of opera acting and directing and provides a step-by-step guide to the rehearsal process. While much has appeared on the history and musical performance practice of the operas of Mozart, no guide to the directing and acting of his operas with simple, concise staging instructions and practical information concerning casting, props, and costumes has yet seen publication. Featuring over one hundred illustrations, including costume designs by Martha Ferrara, the author breaks new ground for student performers and directors alike, as he walks readers through the process of staging scenes from Mozart s operas. The first part of the guide, which focuses on study and preparation, comprisess five chapters: ideas for organizing the opera class, a description of the job of the director, a step-by-step review of the rehearsal process, a set of five exercises for researching and analyzing the scenes, and a vocabulary for actors and directors. The next four sections of the book consist of detailed staging guides for a selection of scenes from Mozart s most frequently performed operas: Le Nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte, and Die Zauberflote. The introduction to each scene includes a brief discussion of the story and characters, suggestions for costuming, and minimal set and props. The heart of this guide is the text and translation of each scene, embedded with line-by-line acting notes, and blocking directions and diagrams. These are for use by the actors during speaking and blocking rehearsals and are especially valuable when rehearsing recitatives. Intended for college and university voice teachers seeking guidance for developing a scenes program or opera workshop class, this is also the perfect workbook for students studying opera stage direction, as well as graduate and undergraduate students performing opera scenes by Mozart."

Grand palaces of culture, opera theaters marked the center of European cities like the cathedrals of the Middle Ages. As opera cast its spell, almost every European city and society aspired to have its own opera house, and dozens of new theaters were constructed in the course of the "long" nineteenth century. At the time of the French Revolution in 1789, only a few, mostly royal, opera theaters, existed in Europe. However, by the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries nearly every large town possessed a theater in which operas were performed, especially in Central Europe, the region upon which this book concentrates.
This volume, a revised and extended version of two well-reviewed books published in German and Czech, explores the social and political background to this "opera mania" in nineteenth century Central Europe. After tracing the major trends in the opera history of the period, including the emergence of national genres of opera and its various social functions and cultural meanings, the author contrasts the histories of the major houses in Dresden (a court theater), Lemberg (a theater built and sponsored by aristocrats), and Prague (a civic institution). Beyond the operatic institutions and their key stage productions, composers such as Carl Maria von Weber, Richard Wagner, Bedrich Smetana, Stanislaw Moniuszko, Antonin Dvorak, and Richard Strauss are put in their social and political contexts. The concluding chapter, bringing together the different leitmotifs of social and cultural history explored in the rest of the book, explains the specificities of opera life in Central Europe within a wider European and global framework.

Eugene Onegin, Op. 24, is an opera ("lyrical scenes") in 3 acts (7 scenes), composed by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The libretto, organised by the composer and Konstantin Shilovsky, very closely follows certain passages in Alexander Pushkin's novel in verse, retaining much of his poetry. Shilovsky contributed M. Triquet's verses in Act 2, Scene 1, while Tchaikovsky wrote the words for Lensky's arioso in Act 1, Scene 1, and almost all of Prince Gremin's aria in Act 3, Scene 1. 1] Eugene Onegin is a well-known example of lyric opera, to which Tchaikovsky added music of a dramatic nature. The story concerns a selfish hero who lives to regret his blase rejection of a young woman's love and his careless incitement of a fatal duel with his best friend. The opera was first performed in Moscow in 1879. There are several recordings of it, and it is regularly performed. The work's title refers to the protagonist.

This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ++++ The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to ensure edition identification: ++++ La Favorita: Opera En Cuatro Actos Gaetano Donizetti S. Oliveres, 1855

Ombra is the term which applies to an operatic scene involving the appearance of an oracle or demon, witches, or ghosts. Such scenes can be traced back to the early days of opera and were commonplace in the seventeenth century in Italy and France. Operas based on the legends of Orpheus, Iphigenia, and Alcestis provide numerous examples of ombra and extend well into the eighteenth century. Clive McClelland's Ombra: Supernatural Music in the Eighteenth Century is an in-depth examination of ombra and is many influences on classical music performance. McClelland reveals that ombra scenes proved popular with audiences not only because of the special stage effects employed, but also due to increasing use of awe-inspiring musical effects. By the end of the eighteenth century the scenes had come to be associated with an elaborate set of musical features including slow, sustained writing, the use of flat keys, angular melodic lines, chromaticism and dissonance, dotted rhythms and syncopation, tremolando effects, unexpected harmonic progressions, and unusual instrumentation, especially involving trombones. It is clearly distinct from other styles that exhibit some of these characteristics, such as the so-called 'Sturm und Drang' or 'Fantasia.' Futhermore, parallels can be drawn between these features and Edmund Burke's 'sublime of terror,' thus placing ombra music on an important position in the context of eighteenth-century aesthetic theory.