A wide-ranging look at the interplay of opera and political ideas
through the centuries The Politics of Opera takes readers on a
fascinating journey into the entwined development of opera and
politics, from the Renaissance through the turn of the nineteenth
century. What political backdrops have shaped opera? How has opera
conveyed the political ideas of its times? Delving into European
history and thought and an array of music by such greats as Lully,
Rameau, and Mozart, Mitchell Cohen reveals how politics--through
story lines, symbols, harmonies, and musical motifs--has played an
operatic role both robust and sotto voce. Cohen begins with opera's
emergence under Medici absolutism in Florence during the late
Renaissance--where debates by humanists, including Galileo's
father, led to the first operas in the late sixteenth century.
Taking readers to Mantua and Venice, where composer Claudio
Monteverdi flourished, Cohen examines how early operatic works like
Orfeo used mythology to reflect on governance and policy issues of
the day, such as state jurisdictions and immigration. Cohen
explores France in the ages of Louis XIV and the Enlightenment and
Vienna before and during the French Revolution, where the deceptive
lightness of Mozart's masterpieces touched on the havoc of misrule
and hidden abuses of power. Cohen also looks at smaller works,
including a one-act opera written and composed by philosopher
Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Essential characters, ancient and modern,
make appearances throughout: Nero, Seneca, Machiavelli, Mazarin,
Fenelon, Metastasio, Beaumarchais, da Ponte, and many more. An
engrossing book that will interest all who love opera and are
intrigued by politics, The Politics of Opera offers a compelling
investigation into the intersections of music and the state.
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