1.
Carl Van Vechten
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Carl Van Vechten was an American writer and artistic photographer who was a patron of the Harlem Renaissance and the literary executor of Gertrude Stein. Born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, he was the youngest child of Charles and he graduated from Washington High School in 1898, and later the University of Chicago in 1903. In 1906, he moved to New York City and he was hired as the assistant music critic at The New York Times. His interest in opera had him take a leave of absence from the paper in 1907, while in England he married his long-time friend from Cedar Rapids, Anna Snyder. He returned to his job at the New York Times in 1909, at that time, Isadora Duncan, Anna Pavlova, and Loie Fuller were performing in New York City. The marriage to Anna Snyder ended in divorce in 1912 and he wed actress Fania Marinoff in 1914 and their marriage lasted until the end of his life, even while his relationships with men were an open secret. They continued corresponding for the remainder of Steins life, and at her death she appointed Van Vechten her literary executor, several books of Van Vechtens essays on various subjects such as music and literature were published between 1915 and 1920. Van Vechtens controversial novel Nigger Heaven was published in 1926 and his essay Negro Blues Singers was published in Vanity Fair in 1926. Biographer Edward White suggests Van Vechten was convinced that Negro culture was the essence of America, by the start of the 1930s and at age 50, Van Vechten was finished with writing and took up photography, using his apartment at 150 West 55th Street as a studio. After the 1930s Van Vechten published little writing, though he continued writing letters to many correspondents, Van Vechten died in 1964, at the age of 84, in New York City. Most of Van Vechtens personal papers are held by the Beinecke Rare Book, the Beinecke Library also holds a collection titled Living Portraits, Carl Van Vechtens Color Photographs Of African Americans, 1939–1964, a collection of 1,884 color Kodachrome slides. The Library of Congress has a collection of approximately 1,400 photographs, there is also a collection of Van Vechtens photographs in the Prentiss Taylor collection in the Smithsonians Archives of American Art, and a Van Vechten collection at Fisk University. The Museum of the City of New Yorks collection includes 2,174 of Carl Van Vechtens photographs, brandeis Universitys department of Archives & Special Collections holds 1,689 Carl Van Vechten portraits. Van Vechten also donated materials to Fisk University to form the George Gershwin Memorial Collection of Music, the album ’O, Write My Name’, American Portraits, Harlem Heroes was completed in 1983. That year, the National Endowment for the Arts transferred the Eakins Press Foundation’s prototype albums to the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, dust Tracks on a Road, An Autobiography. Guide to the Carl Van Vechten papers, 1833–1965, manuscripts and Archives, New York Public Library. Carl Van Vechten collection of papers, 1911–1964, berg Collection of English and American Literature, New York Public Library
2.
Opera
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Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. In traditional opera, singers do two types of singing, recitative, a style and arias, a more melodic style. Opera incorporates many of the elements of theatre, such as acting, scenery. The performance is given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble. Opera is a key part of the Western classical music tradition, in the 18th century, Italian opera continued to dominate most of Europe, attracting foreign composers such as George Frideric Handel. Opera seria was the most prestigious form of Italian opera, until Christoph Willibald Gluck reacted against its artificiality with his operas in the 1760s. The first third of the 19th century saw the point of the bel canto style, with Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti. It also saw the advent of Grand Opera typified by the works of Auber and Meyerbeer, the mid-to-late 19th century was a golden age of opera, led and dominated by Richard Wagner in Germany and Giuseppe Verdi in Italy. The popularity of opera continued through the era in Italy and contemporary French opera through to Giacomo Puccini. During the 19th century, parallel operatic traditions emerged in central and eastern Europe, the 20th century saw many experiments with modern styles, such as atonality and serialism, Neoclassicism, and Minimalism. With the rise of recording technology, singers such as Enrico Caruso, since the invention of radio and television, operas were also performed on these mediums. Beginning in 2006, a number of opera houses began to present live high-definition video transmissions of their performances in cinemas all over the world. In 2009, an opera company offered a download of a complete performance. The words of an opera are known as the libretto, some composers, notably Wagner, have written their own libretti, others have worked in close collaboration with their librettists, e. g. Mozart with Lorenzo Da Ponte. Vocal duets, trios and other ensembles often occur, and choruses are used to comment on the action, in some forms of opera, such as singspiel, opéra comique, operetta, and semi-opera, the recitative is mostly replaced by spoken dialogue. Melodic or semi-melodic passages occurring in the midst of, or instead of, the terminology of the various kinds of operatic voices is described in detail below. Over the 18th century, arias were accompanied by the orchestra. Subsequent composers have tended to follow Wagners example, though some, the changing role of the orchestra in opera is described in more detail below
3.
Soprano
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A soprano is a type of classical female singing voice and has the highest vocal range of all voice types. The sopranos vocal range is from approximately middle C =261 Hz to high A =880 Hz in choral music, in four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody. The soprano voice type is divided into the coloratura, soubrette, lyric, spinto. The lyric soprano is the most common female singing voice, the word soprano comes from the Italian word sopra, as the soprano is the highest pitch human voice, often given to the leading female roles in operas. The term soprano is also based on the Latin word superius which, like soprano, the word superius was especially used in choral and other multi-part vocal music between the 13th and 16th centuries. The soprano has the highest vocal range of all voice types, a soprano and a mezzo-soprano have a similar range, but their tessituras will lie in different parts of that range. The low extreme for sopranos is roughly A3 or B♭3, within opera, the lowest demanded note for sopranos is F3. Often low notes in higher voices will project less, lack timbre, however, rarely is a soprano simply unable to sing a low note in a song within a soprano role. The high extreme, at a minimum, for non-coloratura sopranos is soprano C, a couple of roles have optional E♭6s, as well. In the coloratura repertoire several roles call for E♭6 on up to F6, in rare cases, some coloratura roles go as high as G6 or G♯6, such as Mozarts concert aria Popoli di Tessaglia. Or the title role of Jules Massenets opera Esclarmonde, while not necessarily within the tessitura, a good soprano will be able to sing her top notes full-throated, with timbre and dynamic control. In opera, the tessitura, vocal weight, and timbre of voices, a singers tessitura is where the voice has the best timbre, easy volume, and most comfort. Within the soprano voice type category are five generally recognized subcategories, coloratura soprano, soubrette, lyric soprano, spinto soprano, the coloratura soprano may be a lyric coloratura or a dramatic coloratura. The lyric coloratura soprano is a very agile light voice with a high upper extension capable of fast vocal coloratura, Light coloraturas have a range of approximately middle C to high F with some coloratura sopranos being able to sing somewhat higher or lower. Dramatic coloraturas have a range of approximately low B to high F with some coloratura sopranos being able to sing higher or lower. In classical music and opera, a soubrette soprano refers to both a type and a particular type of opera role. A soubrette voice is light with a bright, sweet timbre, a tessitura in the mid-range, the soubrette voice is not a weak voice, for it must carry over an orchestra without a microphone like all voices in opera. The voice, however, has a lighter weight than other soprano voices with a brighter timbre
4.
George Frideric Handel
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George Frideric Handel was a German, later British baroque composer who spent the bulk of his career in London, becoming well known for his operas, oratorios, anthems, and organ concertos. Handel received important training in Halle and worked as a composer in Hamburg and Italy before settling in London in 1712 and he was strongly influenced both by the great composers of the Italian Baroque and by the middle-German polyphonic choral tradition. Within fifteen years, Handel had started three commercial opera companies to supply the English nobility with Italian opera, musicologist Winton Dean writes that his operas show that Handel was not only a great composer, he was a dramatic genius of the first order. As Alexanders Feast was well received, Handel made a transition to English choral works, after his success with Messiah he never composed an Italian opera again. Almost blind, and having lived in England for nearly fifty years, he died in 1759 and his funeral was given full state honours, and he was buried in Westminster Abbey in London. Handel was born in 1685 in Halle-on-Saal, Duchy of Magdeburg, to Georg Händel and his father,63 when George Frideric was born, was an eminent barber-surgeon who served the court of Saxe-Weissenfels and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. Georg Händel was the son of a coppersmith, Valentin Händel who had emigrated from Eisleben in 1608 with his first wife Anna Belching and they were Protestants and chose reliably Protestant Saxony over Silesia, a Hapsburg possession as religious tensions mounted in the years before the Thirty Years War. Halle was a prosperous city, home of a salt-mining industry. Even the smaller churches all had able organists and fair choirs, and humanities, the Thirty Years War brought extensive destruction to Halle, and by the 1680s it was impoverished. But since the middle of the war the city was under the administration of the Duke of Saxony, the arts and music, however, flourished only among the higher strata, which did not describe Handels family. Handel was the child of this marriage, the first son died still born. Two younger sisters were born after the birth of George Frideric, Dorthea Sophia, born 6 October 1687 and Johanna Christiana, born 10 January 1690. Early in his life Handel is reported to have attended the gymnasium in Halle, Mainwaring is the source for almost all information of Handels childhood, and much of that information came from J. C. Smith, Jr. Handels confidant and copyist. Whether they came from Smith or elsewhere, Mainwaring frequently relates misinformation and it is from Mainwaring that the portrait of Handels father as implacably opposed to any musical education comes. This did nothing to dampen young Handels inclination, in fact, Mainwaring tells the story of Handels secret attic spinnet, Handel found means to get a little clavichord privately conveyd to a room at the top of the house. To this room he constantly stole when the family was asleep, but Handel had to have had some experience with the keyboard to have made the impression in Weissenfels that resulted in his receiving formal musical training. Somehow Handel made his way to the organ, where he surprised everyone with his playing. Overhearing this performance and noting the youth of the performer caused the Duke to recommend to Georg Händel that Handel be given musical instruction, Handels father engaged the organist at the Halle parish church, the young Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, to instruct Handel
5.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, baptised as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. Born in Salzburg, he showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood, already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty. At 17, Mozart was engaged as a musician at the Salzburg court, while visiting Vienna in 1781, he was dismissed from his Salzburg position. He chose to stay in the capital, where he achieved fame, during his final years in Vienna, he composed many of his best-known symphonies, concertos, and operas, and portions of the Requiem, which was largely unfinished at the time of his death. The circumstances of his death have been much mythologized. He was survived by his wife Constanze and two sons and he composed more than 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, operatic, and choral music. He is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers, Ludwig van Beethoven composed his own early works in the shadow of Mozart, and Joseph Haydn wrote, posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born on 27 January 1756 to Leopold Mozart and Anna Maria, née Pertl and this was the capital of the Archbishopric of Salzburg, an ecclesiastic principality in what is now Austria, then part of the Holy Roman Empire. He was the youngest of seven children, five of whom died in infancy and his elder sister was Maria Anna Mozart, nicknamed Nannerl. Mozart was baptized the day after his birth, at St. Ruperts Cathedral in Salzburg, the baptismal record gives his name in Latinized form, as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. He generally called himself Wolfgang Amadè Mozart as an adult, Leopold Mozart, a native of Augsburg, Germany, was a minor composer and an experienced teacher. In 1743, he was appointed as fourth violinist in the establishment of Count Leopold Anton von Firmian. Four years later, he married Anna Maria in Salzburg, Leopold became the orchestras deputy Kapellmeister in 1763. During the year of his sons birth, Leopold published a textbook, Versuch einer gründlichen Violinschule. When Nannerl was 7, she began lessons with her father. Years later, after her brothers death, she reminisced, He often spent much time at the clavier, picking out thirds, which he was ever striking, and his pleasure showed that it sounded good. In the fourth year of his age his father, for a game as it were, began to teach him a few minuets and he could play it faultlessly and with the greatest delicacy, and keeping exactly in time. At the age of five, he was composing little pieces
6.
Giacomo Puccini
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Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian opera composer who has been called the greatest composer of Italian opera after Verdi. Puccinis early work was rooted in traditional late-19th-century romantic Italian opera, later, he successfully developed his work in the realistic verismo style, of which he became one of the leading exponents. Puccinis most renowned works are La bohème, Tosca, and Madama Butterfly, Puccini was born Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini in Lucca in Tuscany, in 1858. He was one of nine children of Michele Puccini and Albina Magi, the Puccini family was established in Lucca as a local musical dynasty by Puccinis great-great grandfather – also named Giacomo. This first Giacomo Puccini was maestro di cappella of the Cattedrale di San Martino in Lucca and he was succeeded in this position by his son, Antonio Puccini, and then by Antonios son Domenico, and Domenicos son Michele. Each of these men studied music at Bologna, and some additional musical studies elsewhere. Domenico Puccini studied for a time under Giovanni Paisiello, each composed music for the church. In addition, Domenico composed several operas, and Michele composed one opera, Puccinis father Michele enjoyed a reputation throughout northern Italy, and his funeral was an occasion of public mourning, at which the then-famed composer Giovanni Pacini conducted a Requiem. However, when Michele Puccini died in 1864, his son Giacomo was only six years old, as a child, he nevertheless participated in the musical life of the Cattedrale di San Martino, as a member of the boys choir and later as a substitute organist. Puccini was given an education at the seminary of San Michele in Lucca. One of Puccinis uncles, Fortunato Magi, supervised his musical education, Puccini got a diploma from the Pacini School of Music in Lucca in 1880, having studied there with his uncle Fortunato, and later with Carlo Angeloni, who had also instructed Alfredo Catalani. Puccini studied at the conservatory for three years, sharing a room with Pietro Mascagni, in 1880, at the age of 21, Puccini composed his Mass, which marks the culmination of his familys long association with church music in his native Lucca. Puccini wrote a piece called the Capriccio sinfonica as a thesis composition for the Milan Conservatory. Puccinis teachers Ponchielli and Bazzini were impressed by the work, and it was performed at a student concert at the conservatory on 14 July 1883, conducted by Franco Faccio. Puccinis work was reviewed in the Milanese publication Perseveranza. After the premiere of the Capriccio sinfonica, Ponchielli and Puccini discussed the possibility that Puccinis next work might be an opera, Ponchielli invited Puccini to stay at his villa, where Puccini was introduced to another young man named Fernando Fontana. Puccini and Fontana agreed to collaborate on an opera, for which Fontana would provide the libretto, the work, Le Villi, was entered into a competition sponsored by the Sozogno music publishing company in 1883. Although it did not win, Le Villi was later staged at the Teatro Dal Verme, G. Ricordi & Co. music publishers assisted with the premier by printing the libretto without charge
7.
Jules Massenet
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Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer of the Romantic era best known for his operas, of which he wrote more than thirty. The two most frequently staged are Manon and Werther and he also composed oratorios, ballets, orchestral works, incidental music, piano pieces, songs and other music. While still a schoolboy, Massenet was admitted to Frances principal music college, there he studied under Ambroise Thomas, whom he greatly admired. After winning the top musical prize, the Prix de Rome, in 1863, he composed prolifically in many genres. Massenet had a sense of the theatre and of what would succeed with the Parisian public. Despite some miscalculations, he produced a series of successes that made him the composer of opera in France in the late 19th. Like many prominent French composers of the period, Massenet became a professor at the Conservatoire and he taught composition there from 1878 until 1896, when he resigned after the death of the director, Ambroise Thomas. Among his students were Gustave Charpentier, Ernest Chausson, Reynaldo Hahn, by the time of his death, Massenet was regarded by many critics as old-fashioned and unadventurous although his two best-known operas remained popular in France and abroad. After a few decades of neglect, his works began to be favourably reassessed during the mid-20th century, Massenet was born at Montaud, then an outlying hamlet and now a part of the city of Saint-Étienne, in the Loire. He was the youngest of the four children of Alexis Massenet and his second wife Eléonore-Adelaïde née Royer de Marancour, Massenet senior was a prosperous ironmonger, his wife was a talented amateur musician who gave Jules his first piano lessons. By early 1848 the family had moved to Paris, where settled in a flat in Saint-Germain-des-Prés. Massenet was educated at the Lycée Saint-Louis and, from either 1851 or 1853 and his biographer Demar Irvine dates the audition and admission as January 1853. Both sources agree that Massenet continued his education at the lycée in tandem with his musical studies. At the Conservatoire Massenet studied solfège with Augustin Savard and the piano with François Laurent and he pursued his studies, with modest distinction, until the beginning of 1855, when family concerns disrupted his education. Alexis Massenets health was poor, and on advice he moved from Paris to Chambéry in the south of France. On his return he lodged with relations in Montmartre and resumed his studies, the familys finances were no longer comfortable, and to support himself Massenet took private piano students and played as a percussionist in theatre orchestras. His work in the pit gave him a good working knowledge of the operas of Gounod and other composers, classic. He gained some work as a piano accompanist, in the course of which he met Wagner who, in 1861 Massenets music was published for the first time, the Grande Fantasie de Concert sur le Pardon de Ploërmel de Meyerbeer, a virtuoso piano work in nine sections
8.
Giuseppe Verdi
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Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian opera composer. Verdi was born near Busseto to a family of moderate means. Verdi came to dominate the Italian opera scene after the era of Bellini, Donizetti and Rossini, whose works influenced him. In his early operas Verdi demonstrated a sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy and he also participated briefly as an elected politician. He surprised the world by returning, after his success with the opera Aida. The baptismal register, prepared on 11 October 1813, lists his parents Carlo, additionally, it lists Verdi as being born yesterday, but since days were often considered to begin at sunset, this could have meant either 9 or 10 October. Verdi himself, following his mother, always celebrated his birthday on 9 October, Verdi had a younger sister, Giuseppa, who died aged 17 in 1833. From the age of four, Verdi was given lessons in Latin and Italian by the village schoolmaster, Baistrocchi. After learning to play the organ, he showed so much interest in music that his parents provided him with a spinet. Verdis gift for music was apparent by 1820–21 when he began his association with the local church, serving in the choir, acting as an altar boy for a while. After Baistrocchis death, Verdi, at the age of eight, Carlo Verdi was energetic in furthering his sons education. something which Verdi tended to hide in later life. He picture emerges of youthful precocity eagerly nurtured by a father and of a sustained, sophisticated. Verdi returned to Busseto regularly to play the organ on Sundays, at age 11, Verdi received schooling in Italian, Latin, the humanities, and rhetoric. By the time he was 12, he began lessons with Ferdinando Provesi, maestro di cappella at San Bartolomeo, director of the music school. This information comes from the Autobiographical Sketch which Verdi dictated to the publisher Giulio Ricordi late in life, in 1879, written, understandably, with the benefit of hindsight, it is not always reliable when dealing with issues more contentious than those of his childhood. The other director of the Philharmonic Society was Antonio Barezzi, a grocer and distiller. The young Verdi did not immediately become involved with the Philharmonic, by June 1827, he had graduated with honours from the Ginnasio and was able to focus solely on music under Provesi. By 1829–30, Verdi had established himself as a leader of the Philharmonic, none of us could rival him reported the secretary of the organisation, Giuseppe Demaldè
9.
Gaetano Donizetti
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Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer. Along with Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini, Donizetti was a composer of the bel canto opera style during the first half of the nineteenth century. Donizettis close association with the bel canto style was undoubtedly an influence on composers such as Giuseppe Verdi. Donizetti was born in Bergamo in Lombardy, there he received detailed training in the arts of fugue and counterpoint. Over the course of his career, Donizetti wrote almost 70 operas, in all, Naples presented 51 of Donizettis operas. Before 1830, success came primarily with his operas, the serious ones failing to attract significant audiences. However, his first notable success came with an opera seria, Zoraida di Granata, significant historical dramas did appear and became successful, they included Lucia di Lammermoor given in Naples in 1835, and one of the most successful Neapolitan operas, Roberto Devereux in 1837. Up to that point, all of his operas had been set to Italian libretti, Donizetti found himself increasingly chafing against the censorial limitations which existed in Italy. From about 1836, he interested in working in Paris. The first opera was a French version of the then-unperformed Poliuto which, two new operas were also given in Paris at that time. As the 1840s progressed, Donizetti moved regularly between Naples, Rome, Paris, and Vienna continuing to compose and stage his own operas as well as those of other composers, but from around 1843, severe illness began to take hold and to limit his activities. Eventually, by early 1846 he was obliged to be confined to an institution for the ill and, by late 1847, friends had him moved back to Bergamo. The youngest of three sons, Donizetti was born in 1797 in Bergamos Borgo Canale quarter located just outside the city walls and his family was very poor and had no tradition of music, his father Andrea being the caretaker of the town pawnshop. Simone Mayr, a German composer of internationally successful operas, had become maestro di cappella at Bergamos principal church in 1802, in 1807, Andrea Donizetti attempted to enroll both his sons, but the elder, Giuseppe, was considered too old. He remained there for nine years, until 1815, however, as Donizetti scholar William Ashbrook notes, in 1809 he was threatened with having to leave because his voice was changing. In 1810 he applied for and was accepted by the art school, the Academia Carrara. Then, in 1811, Mayr once again intervened, as Ashbrook states, this was nothing less than Mayrs argument that Donizetti be allowed to continue his musical studies. The piece was performed on 13 September 1811 and included the character stating the following, Ah, by Bacchus
10.
Lucia di Lammermoor
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Lucia di Lammermoor is a dramma tragico in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvadore Cammarano wrote the Italian language libretto loosely based upon Sir Walter Scotts historical novel The Bride of Lammermoor, Donizetti wrote Lucia di Lammermoor in 1835, a time when several factors led to the height of his reputation as a composer of opera. Gioachino Rossini had recently retired and Vincenzo Bellini had died shortly before the premiere of Lucia leaving Donizetti as the sole reigning genius of Italian opera. Not only were conditions ripe for Donizettis success as a composer, the perceived romance of its violent wars and feuds, as well as its folklore and mythology, intrigued 19th century readers and audiences. Sir Walter Scott made use of stereotypes in his novel The Bride of Lammermoor. The story concerns the emotionally fragile Lucy Ashton who is caught in a feud between her own family and that of the Ravenswoods, the setting is the Lammermuir Hills of Scotland in the 17th century. The opera premiered on 26 September 1835 at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, london saw the opera on 5 April 1838 and, for Paris, Donizetti revised the score for a French version which debuted on 6 August 1839 at the Théâtre de la Renaissance in Paris. It reached the United States with a production in New Orleans on 28 December 1841, the opera was never absent from the repertory of the Metropolitan Opera for more than one season at a time from 1903 until 1972. After World War II, a number of sopranos were instrumental in giving new life to the opera, including Maria Callas and it has remained a staple of the operatic repertoire and ranks 21st on Operabases list of the most-performed operas worldwide from the 2008/09 to 2012/13 seasons. Additionally an off-stage wind band is used, Donizetti did not provide instrumentation, time, Early 18th century Place, Scotland Scene 1, The gardens of Lammermoor Castle Normanno, captain of the castle guard, and other retainers are searching for an intruder. He tells Enrico that he believes that the man is Edgardo of Ravenswood, and it is confirmed that Edgardo is indeed the intruder. Enrico reaffirms his hatred for the Ravenswood family and his determination to end the relationship, Scene 2, By a fountain at the entrance to the park, beside the castle Lucia waits for Edgardo. In her famous aria Regnava nel silenzio, Lucia tells her maid Alisa that she has seen the ghost of a girl killed on the same spot by a jealous Ravenswood ancestor. Alisa tells Lucia that the apparition is a warning and that she must give up her love for Edgardo, Edgardo enters, for political reasons, he must leave immediately for France. He hopes to make his peace with Enrico and marry Lucia, Lucia tells him this is impossible, and instead they take a sworn vow of marriage and exchange rings. Scene 1, Lord Ashtons apartments in Lammermoor Castle Preparations have been made for the imminent wedding of Lucia to Arturo, Enrico worries about whether Lucia will really submit to the wedding. He shows his sister a forged letter seemingly proving that Edgardo has forgotten her, Enrico leaves Lucia to further persuasion this time by Raimondo, Lucias chaplain and tutor, that she should renounce her vow to Edgardo, for the good of the family, and marry Arturo. Scene 2, A hall in the castle Arturo arrives for the marriage, Lucia acts strangely, but Enrico explains that this is due to the death of her mother
11.
Manon
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It was first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 19 January 1884, with sets designed by Eugène Carpezat, Auguste-Alfred Rubé and Philippe Chaperon, and Jean-Baptiste Lavastre. Prior to Massenets work, Halévy and Auber had used the subject for musical stage works, Massenet also wrote a one-act sequel to Manon, Le portrait de Manon, involving the Chevalier des Grieux as an older man. The composer worked at the score of Manon at his home outside Paris. Manon is Massenets most popular and enduring opera and, having conquered the worlds stages. It is the example of the charm and vitality of the music. The opera was a mainstay of the Opéra-Comique in Paris, reaching its 1, 000th performance there in 1919, its 1, 500th in 1931 and 2, due to its heavy vocal demands, the role of Manon was described by Sills as the French Isolde. At the Royal Opera House in London it was first presented 19 May 1891, the Metropolitan Opera gave its first staging on 16 January 1895, and Manon has subsequently been performed there on 266 occasions. Anna Netrebko recently starred in a new production directed by Laurent Pelly, a co-production with the Royal Opera House, the San Francisco Opera gave the opera many stagings beginning on 29 September 1924, the most recent being November 1998. Operabase shows 19 countries presenting a total of 425 performances of 81 productions in 61 cities, the ballet Lhistoire de Manon by Kenneth MacMillan, although using music entirely written by Massenet, does not include any from Manon. While the innkeeper is serving dinner to the party, the townspeople collect to witness the arrival of the coach from Arras, among them is Lescaut, a guardsman, who tells his comrades that he plans to meet a kinswoman. Manon is accosted by the opportunistic Guillot, who tells her that he has a carriage waiting and his heavy-handed seduction is undermined by the return of Lescaut, who then lectures the young woman on proper behavior. He leaves her once more and she admires the three fashionably-dressed actresses, but reproaches herself, unconvincingly vowing to rid herself of all worldly visions. Des Grieux, traveling home to see his father, catches sight of Manon, when he approaches, she is charmed by his chivalrous address, and their exchange rapidly becomes a mutual avowal of love. Both their planned journeys, hers to the convent and des Grieuxs to his home, are swiftly abandoned, but there are hints of incompatible aspirations, while he returns, over and again, to tous les deux, the phrase she fondly repeats is, à Paris. Making good use of the carriage provided by the disappointed Guillot, Manon and des Grieuxs apartment in Paris With little hope, des Grieux writes to his father, imploring permission to marry Manon. Lescaut enters intent on creating a scene and accompanied by de Brétigny, but his concern for offended family honor is only camouflage for his alliance with his friend. Trying to prove his honorable intentions, des Grieux shows Lescaut the letter to his father, after the two visitors depart, Manon appears to vacillate between accepting de Brétignys offer and warning des Grieux. When her lover out to post his letter, her farewell to the humble domesticity she has shared makes clear she has decided to go with de Brétigny
12.
Jacques Offenbach
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Jacques Offenbach was a German-born French composer, cellist and impresario of the romantic period. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and he was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr. and Arthur Sullivan. His best-known works were revived during the 20th century. The Tales of Hoffman remains part of the opera repertory. Born in Cologne, the son of a cantor, Offenbach showed early musical talent. At the age of 14, he was accepted as a student at the Paris Conservatoire but found academic study unfulfilling, from 1835 to 1855 he earned his living as a cellist, achieving international fame, and as a conductor. His ambition, however, was to compose pieces for the musical theatre. Finding the management of Paris Opéra-Comique company uninterested in staging his works, there he presented a series of his own small-scale pieces, many of which became popular. In 1858, Offenbach produced his first full-length operetta, Orphée aux enfers, during the 1860s, he produced at least 18 full-length operettas, as well as more one-act pieces. His works from this period included La belle Hélène, La Vie parisienne, La Grande-Duchesse de Gérolstein, Offenbach became associated with the Second French Empire of Napoleon III, the emperor and his court were genially satirised in many of Offenbachs operettas. Napoleon III personally granted him French citizenship and the Légion dHonneur, with the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, Offenbach found himself out of favour in Paris because of his imperial connections and his German birth. He remained successful in Vienna and London, however and he re-established himself in Paris during the 1870s, with revivals of some of his earlier favourites and a series of new works, and undertook a popular U. S. tour. In his last years he strove to finish The Tales of Hoffmann, but died before the premiere of the opera, Offenbach was born Jacob or Jakob Offenbach to a Jewish family, in the German city of Cologne, which was then a part of Prussia. His birthplace in the Großen Griechenmarkt was a distance from the square that is now named after him. He was the son and the seventh of ten children of Isaac Juda Offenbach né Eberst and his wife Marianne. Isaac, who came from a family, had abandoned his original trade as a bookbinder and earned an itinerant living as a cantor in synagogues. He was generally known as der Offenbacher, after his native town, Offenbach am Main, in 1816 he settled in Cologne, where he became established as a teacher, giving lessons in singing, violin, flute and guitar, and composing both religious and secular music. When Jacob was six years old, his father taught him to play the violin, within two years the boy was composing songs and dances, and at the age of nine he took up the cello
13.
The Tales of Hoffmann
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The Tales of Hoffmann is an opéra fantastique by Jacques Offenbach. The French libretto was written by Jules Barbier, based on three stories by E. T. A. Hoffmann, who is the protagonist of the story. It was Offenbachs final work, as he died a year before the premiere, Barbier and Michel Carré had previously written a play, Les contes fantastiques dHoffmann, which was produced at the Odéon Theatre in Paris in 1851, and which Offenbach had seen. After returning from America in 1876 he learned that Barbier had adapted the play, Salomon handed the project to Offenbach. Work proceeded slowly interrupted by the composition of more profitable lighter works, Offenbach himself had a premonition that like Antonia he would die prior to its completion. He continued working on the opera throughout 1880, attending some rehearsals, shortly before he died he had written to Léon Carvalho, Hâtez-vous de monter mon opéra. Il ne me reste plus longtemps à vivre et mon seul désir est dassister à la première, the stories used in the opera were, Der Sandmann,1816. Das verlorene Spiegelbild from Die Abenteuer der Sylvester-Nacht,1814, the opera was first performed in a public venue, at the Opéra-Comique on 10 February 1881, without the third act. Besides Léon Carvalho, director of the Opéra-Comique, the director of the Ringtheater in Vienna, both men requested the rights, but Offenbach granted them to Carvalho. The opera reached its hundredth performance at the Salle Favart on the 15 December 1881, a new production by Albert Carré was mounted at the Opéra-Comique in 1911, with Léon Beyle in the title role and Albert Wolff conducting. This production remained in the repertoire until World War II, receiving 700 performances, following a recording by Opéra-Comique forces in March 1948, Louis Musy created the first post-war production in Paris, conducted by André Cluytens. The Paris Opera first staged the work in October 1974, directed by Patrice Chéreau with Nicolai Gedda in the title role. Outside France, the piece was mounted in Geneva, Budapest, Hamburg, New York, and Mexico in 1882, Vienna, Prague, and Antwerp in 1883, and Lvov and Berlin in 1884. Later local premieres included Buenos Aires in 1894, St Petersburg in 1899, Barcelona in 1905, and London in 1910. The Muse appears and reveals to the audience that her purpose is to draw Hoffmanns attention to herself and she takes the appearance of Hoffmanns closest friend, Nicklausse. The prima donna Stella, currently performing Mozarts Don Giovanni, sends a letter to Hoffmann, the letter and the key to the room are intercepted by Councillor Lindorf, who is the first of the operas incarnations of evil, Hoffmanns nemesis. Lindorf intends to replace Hoffmann at the rendezvous, in the tavern students wait for Hoffmann. He finally arrives and entertains them with the legend of Zaches the dwarf, Lindorf coaxes Hoffmann into telling the audience about his lifes three great loves
14.
Gioachino Rossini
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Gioachino Antonio Rossini was an Italian composer who wrote operas, as well as some sacred music, songs, chamber music and piano pieces. A precocious composer of operas, he made his debut at the age of eighteen. His best-known operas include the Italian comedies Il barbiere di Siviglia, Litaliana in Algeri and he also wrote a string of serious operas in Italian, including works such as Tancredi, Otello and Semiramide. The semi-serious opera La Gazza Ladra has one of Rossinis most celebrated overtures, after moving to Paris in 1824, he eventually started to write in French. His last opera, the epic Guillaume Tell, replete with its iconic overture, after composing thirty-nine significant operas in nineteen years Rossini retired from the theatre in 1829. Later, he was affected by physical and mental illnesses and for decades wrote relatively little apart from a setting of the Stabat Mater. A return to Paris from Italy in 1855 was followed by better health, during these, he presented salon music in the form of songs, piano pieces and small chamber ensembles that he called Sins of Old Age. He considered the last of these Sins to be the unusually scored Petite messe solennelle that he wrote in 1863, Rossini had been the most popular opera composer in history, and he was one of the most renowned public figures of his time. A rapid and prolific composer, he was quoted as joking, Give me the laundress bill, a tendency for inspired, song-like melodies is evident throughout his scores, earning him the nickname The Italian Mozart. Use of a build up of orchestral sound over a repeated phrase—commonly known as a Rossini crescendo—also prompted the nickname Signor Crescendo. Gioachino Antonio Rossini was born into a family of musicians in Pesaro and his father, Giuseppe, was a horn player and inspector of slaughterhouses. His mother, Anna, was a singer and a bakers daughter, Rossinis father was sympathetic to the French Revolution and welcomed Napoleons troops when they arrived in northern Italy. When Austria restored the old regime, Rossinis father was sent to prison in 1799, Rossinis mother took him to Bologna, making a living as leading singer at various theatres of the Romagna region. Her husband would ultimately join her in Bologna, during this time, Rossini was frequently left in the care of his aging grandmother, who had difficulty supervising the boy. He remained at Bologna in the care of a pork butcher while his father played the horn in the orchestras of the theatres at which his wife sang and these qualities made him a subject for ridicule in the eyes of the young Rossini. He was eventually taken from Prinetti and apprenticed to a blacksmith, in Angelo Tesei, he found a congenial music master, and learned to sight-read, play accompaniments on the piano and sing well enough to take solo parts in the church when he was ten years of age. Important products of this period are six sonate a quattro, or string sonatas, the original scores, dating from 1804 when the composer was twelve, were found in the Library of Congress in Washington D. C. In 1805, he appeared at the theatre of the Commune in Ferdinando Paers Camilla and he was also a capable horn player, treading in the footsteps of his father
15.
The Barber of Seville
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The Barber of Seville, or The Futile Precaution is an opera buffa in two acts by Gioachino Rossini with an Italian libretto by Cesare Sterbini. The libretto was based on Pierre Beaumarchaiss French comedy Le Barbier de Séville, the première of Rossinis opera took place on 20 February 1816 at the Teatro Argentina, Rome. Rossinis Barber has proven to be one of the greatest masterpieces of comedy within music, even after two hundred years, it remains a popular work. Rossinis opera recounts the events of the first of the three plays by French playwright Pierre Beaumarchais that revolve around the clever and enterprising character named Figaro. Mozarts opera Le nozze di Figaro, composed 30 years earlier in 1786, is based on the part of the Beaumarchais trilogy. The first Beaumarchais play was conceived as an opéra comique. The play as it is now known was premiered in 1775 by the Comédie-Française at the Théâtre des Tuileries in Paris, other operas based on the first play were composed by Giovanni Paisiello, by Nicolas Isouard in 1796, and then by Francesco Morlacchi in 1816. Though the work of Paisiello triumphed for a time, only Rossinis version has stood the test of time and continues to be a mainstay of operatic repertoire. On 11 November 1868, two days before Rossinis death, the composer Costantino DallArgine premiered an opera based on the libretto as Rossinis work. The premiere was not a failure, but critics condemned the audacity of the young composer, Rossini was well known for being remarkably productive, completing an average of two operas per year for 19 years, and in some years writing as many as four. The premiere of Rossinis opera at the Teatro Argentina in Rome was a failure, the audience hissed and jeered throughout. Furthermore, many of the audience were supporters of one of Rossinis rivals, Giovanni Paisiello, Paisiello had already composed The Barber of Seville and took Rossinis new version to be an affront to his version. In particular, Paisiello and his followers were opposed to the use of basso buffo, the second performance met with quite a different fate, becoming a roaring success. The original French play, Le Barbier de Séville, endured a similar story, poorly received at first and it was first performed in America on 3 May 1819 in English at the Park Theatre in New York. The cast of eight had three members of his family, including the 17-year-old Maria-Felicia, later known as Maria Malibran. The role of Rosina was originally written for a contralto, according to music critic Richard Osborne, writing in The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, it is important to record the degree to which singers have sometimes distorted Rossini’s intentions. The most serious distortion has been the upward transposition of the role of Rosina,1820 at the Théâtre-Italien in Paris, where it was published. The singing lesson in act 2 has often turned into a show-stopping cabaret
16.
La traviata
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La traviata is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La Dame aux Camélias, an adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas. The opera was originally titled Violetta, after the main character and it was first performed on 6 March 1853 at the La Fenice opera house in Venice. Piave and Verdi wanted to follow Dumas in giving the opera a contemporary setting and it was not until the 1880s that the composer and librettists original wishes were carried out and realistic productions were staged. For Verdi, the years 1851 to 1853 were filled with operatic activity, in addition, personal affairs in his home town limited his activities that spring, but after Rigolettos success in Venice, an additional commission was offered by Brenna, the secretary of La Fenice. After Verdis return from Paris a contract was signed in May 1852, with performances scheduled for March 1853, Verdi sees The Lady of the Camellias play Verdi and Giuseppina Strepponi had visited Paris from late 1851 and into March 1852. In February the couple attended a performance of Alexander Dumas filss The Lady of the Camellias, as a result of this, Verdi biographer Mary Jane Phillips-Matz reports, the composer immediately began to compose music for what would later become La traviata. Writing to Piave, he added that I dont want any of those subjects that one can find by the hundreds. But at the time, the composer expressed concern about censorship in Venice. As the months dragged on into October, it was agreed that Piave would come to SantAgata, one subject was chosen, Piave set to work, and then Verdi threw in another idea, which may have been La traviata. However, within a time, a synopsis was dispatched to Venice under the title of Amore e morte. However, as Budden reveals, Verdi writes to his friend De Sanctis telling him that for Venice Im doing La Dame aux camélias which will probably be called La traviata, a subject for our own age. Although still bogged down at SantAgata, Piave was sanguine, Everything will turn out fine, Verdi was filled with premonitions of disaster upon his arrival in Venice on 21 February for rehearsals and he made his unhappiness clear to the singers. 19th century The audience jeered at times during the premiere, directing some of their scorn at the casting of soprano Fanny Salvini-Donatelli in the role of Violetta. Though she was a singer, they considered her to be too old. The next day, Verdi wrote to his friend Emanuele Muzio in what has now become perhaps his most famous letter, was the fault mine or the singers. Coincidentally, as Philips-Matz points out, an Italian translation of the play La Dame aux camélias was being presented just a short distance from La Fenice. As Budden notes, it came to be Venice that made an honest woman of Violetta when Verdi allowed a performance at the Teatro San Benedetto, then it was a fiasco, now it has created a furore
17.
Roberto Devereux
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Roberto Devereux is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, by Gaetano Donizetti. The opera is based on the life of Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex. The plot of Roberto Devereux was hardly original, mainly derived from Felice Romanis libretto Il Conte dEssex of 1833, Romanis widow charged Cammarano with plagiarism, although the practice of stealing plots was very common between rival Italian opera houses. It is one of a number of operas by Donizetti which deal with the Tudor period in English history and include Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda, the lead female characters of the operas Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda, and Elisabetta are often referred to as the Three Donizetti Queens. They earned some degree of fame in the 1970s, when the American soprano Beverly Sills promoted them as a series at New York City Opera. It has been noted that, although the plot plays fast and loose with history, the contract for a new opera seria for the Teatro San Carlo in Naples was concluded in spring 1837. The generation of Roberto Devereux was overshadowed by a crisis in the life of the composer. During the previous year, Donizetti had lost both his parents and then his wife Virginia Vaselli delivered a stillborn baby, in June 1837, another child died during birth. On July 30, his wife died at the age of 28, therefore, the rehearsals for the premier began at the end of August 1837, and consequently most of the score had to be written in the month following his wifes death. Additionally, a cholera epidemic delayed again the start of rehearsals, 19th century Roberto Devereux was first performed on 29 October 1837 at the Teatro di San Carlo, Naples. Also, it was given in New York on 15 January 1849, 20th century and beyond The beginning of the 20th century revivals of Roberto Devereux started at the San Carlo in Naples in 1964, the revival starring Leyla Gencer. Montserrat Caballé appeared in a combination of performances and staged productions between December 1965 and 1978. Roberto Devereux was first performed by the New York City Opera in October 1970 as the first part of the Three Queens trilogy, starring Placido Domingo, in 2005 the Bavarian State Operas Munich production starring Edita Gruberová was recorded on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon. In 2013, Opera Seria UK presented concert performances in Manchester, welsh National Opera presented this opera in succession over three evenings beginning in October 2013. In 2015 she performed it onstage at the Teatro Real de Madrid, following an attempted uprising, he is awaiting his trial for high treason in London. She is in love with Robert Devereux, her husbands closest friend, the Ladies of the court express concern, but she replies that she is happy, while privately revealing her sadness. Elizabeth enters and states that, at the insistence of Nottingham, she has agreed to see Robert once again, the Queen is willing to release him without charges if she can be sure of his continued loyalty. To Saras gradual dismay, the Queen reveals her love for Robert, Robert enters and, in a conversation overheard by the increasingly distraught Sara, Elizabeth declares her love for him
18.
New York City Opera
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The New York City Opera is an American opera company located in Manhattan in New York City. The company has been active from 1943 through 2013, and again since 2016 when it was revived, the opera company, dubbed the peoples opera by New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, was founded in 1943. The companys stated purpose was to make accessible to a wide audience at a reasonable ticket price. It also sought to produce an innovative choice of repertory, the company was originally housed at the New York City Center theater on West 55th Street in Manhattan. It later became part of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts at the New York State Theater from 1966 to 2010, in 2011, the company left Lincoln Center due to financial difficulties and moved its offices to 75 Broad Street in Lower Manhattan. In the 2011−12 and 2012−13 seasons, NYCO performed four operas at various venues in New York City, on October 1,2013, following an unsuccessful emergency fund-raising campaign, the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The group, led by Roy Niederhoffer, a fund manager and former board member of the NYCO. The first opera was Puccinis Tosca, presented at the Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center in January 2016, Sills later served as the companys director from 1979 until 1989. More recent acclaimed American singers who have called NYCO home include David Daniels, Mark Delavan, Mary Dunleavy, Lauren Flanigan, Elizabeth Futral, Bejun Mehta, Robert Brubaker and Carl Tanner. NYCO has similarly championed the work of American composers, approximately one-third of its repertoire has traditionally been American opera, the companys American repertoire has ranged from established works to new works. The company has occasionally produced musicals and operettas, including works by Stephen Sondheim and Gilbert. The NYCO was founded as the New York City Center Opera, laszlo Halasz was the companys first director, serving in that position from 1943 until 1951. To this end, ticket prices during the companys first season were priced at just 75 cents to $2, at such prices the company was unable to afford the star billing enjoyed by the Metropolitan Opera. Halasz, however, was able to turn fact into a virtue by making the company an important platform for young singers. The companys first season opened in February 1944, and included productions of Giacomo Puccinis Tosca, Friedrich von Flotows Martha and Georges Bizets Carmen, all of them conducted by Halasz. Several notable singers performed with the company in the first season, including Jennie Tourel and Martha Lipton, in 1945, the company became the first major opera company to have an African American performer. This was in the production of Leoncavallos Pagliacci, with Todd Duncans performance as Tonio, lawrence Winters and Robert McFerrin were other notable African American opera pioneers to sing with the company during this period. The first African American woman to sing with the company was soprano Camilla Williams, Winters and Williams later went on to sing the title roles in the most complete recording made up to that time of Gershwins Porgy and Bess, for Columbia Masterworks Records in 1951
19.
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
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Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts is a 16. 3-acre complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood of the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It hosts many notable performing arts organizations, which are nationally and internationally renowned, including the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera, and the New York City Ballet. Respected architects were contracted to design the buildings on the site. Rockefeller was Lincoln Centers inaugural president from 1956 and became its chairman in 1961, the centers three buildings, David Geffen Hall, David H. Koch Theater and the Metropolitan Opera House were opened in 1962,1964 and 1966, respectively. While the center may have been named because it was located in the Lincoln Square neighborhood, the name was bestowed on the area in 1906 by the New York City Board of Aldermen, but records give no reason for choosing that name. There has long been speculation that the name came from a local landowner, City records from the time show only the names Johannes van Bruch, Thomas Hall, Stephan de Lancey, James de Lancey, James de Lancey, Jr. and John Somerindyck as area property owners. One speculation is that references to President Lincoln were omitted from the records because the mayor in 1906 was George B, mcClellan, Jr. son of General George B. McClellan, who was general-in-chief of the Union Army early in the American Civil War, Architects who designed buildings at the center include, Max Abramovitz, David Geffen Hall Pietro Belluschi, The Juilliard School. Koch Theater Eero Saarinen, Vivian Beaumont Theater Davis, Brody and Associates, The Samuel B. the centers cultural institutions also make use of facilities located away from the main campus. In 2004, the center was expanded through the addition of Jazz at Lincoln Centers newly built facilities, in March 2006, the center launched construction on a major redevelopment plan that modernized, renovated, and opened up its campus. Redevelopment was completed in 2012 with the completion of the Presidents Bridge over West 65th Street, when it was first announced in 1999, Lincoln Centers campuswide redevelopment was to cost $1.5 billion over 10 years and radically transform the campus. Among the architects that have been involved were Frank Gehry, Cooper, Robertson & Partners, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Beyer Blinder Belle, Fox & Fowle, Olin Partnership, and Diller & Scofidio. Additionally, Alice Tully Hall was modernized and reopened to critical and popular acclaim in 2009, topped by a sloping lawn roof, the film center is part of a new pavilion that also houses a destination restaurant named Lincoln, as well as offices. Subsequent projects were added which addressed improvements to the main plazas, under the direction of the Lincoln Center Development Project, Diller Scofidio + Renfro in association with FXFOWLE Architects and Beyer Blinder Belle Architects provided the design services. Additionally, Turner Construction Company and RCDolner, LLC were the managers for the projects. April 21,1955, Lincoln Square designated for urban renewal, june 22,1956, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc. incorporated. May 14,1959, Ground-breaking ceremony with U. S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower September 23,1962, a two-hour live CBS special, Opening Night at Lincoln Center, preserved the event on videotape. April 6,1964, Lincoln Center Fountain opened, renamed the Revson Fountain April 23,1964, New York State Theater opened
20.
Metropolitan Opera
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The Metropolitan Opera, commonly referred to as The Met, is a company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager, the music director position is in transition as of 2016. The music director designate is Yannick Nézet-Séguin and the director emeritus is James Levine. The Met was founded in 1880 as an alternative to the previously established Academy of Music opera house, the Metropolitan Opera is the largest classical music organization in North America. It presents about 27 different operas each year in a season lasts from late September through May. The operas are presented in a rotating schedule with up to seven performances of four different works staged each week. Moving to the new Lincoln Center location in 1966, performances are given in the evening Monday through Saturday with a matinée on Saturday, several operas are presented in new productions each season. Sometimes these are borrowed from or shared with other opera houses, the rest of the years operas are given in revivals of productions from previous seasons. The 2015-16 season comprised 227 performances of 25 operas, the operas in the Mets repertoire consist of a wide range of works, from 18th-century Baroque and 19th-century Bel canto to the Minimalism of the late 20th century. These operas are presented in staged productions that range in style from those with elaborate traditional decors to others that feature modern conceptual designs, the Mets performing company consists of a large symphony-sized orchestra, a chorus, childrens choir, and many supporting and leading solo singers. The company also employs numerous free-lance dancers, actors, musicians, the Mets roster of singers includes both international and American artists, some of whose careers have been developed through the Mets young artists programs. The Metropolitan Opera Company was founded in 1880 to create an alternative to New Yorks old established Academy of Music opera house, the subscribers to the Academys limited number of private boxes represented the highest stratum in New York society. By 1880, these old families were loath to admit New Yorks newly wealthy industrialists into their long-established social circle. Frustrated with being excluded, the Metropolitan Operas founding subscribers determined to build a new house that would outshine the old Academy in every way. A group of some 22 men assembled at Delmonicos restaurant on April 28,1880 and they elected officers and established subscriptions for ownership in the new company. The first Met subscribers included members of the Morgan, Roosevelt, the new Metropolitan Opera House opened on October 22,1883, and was an immediate success, both socially and artistically. The Academy of Musics opera season folded just three years after the Met opened, in its early decades the Met did not produce the opera performances itself but hired prominent manager/impresarios to stage a season of opera at the new Metropolitan Opera House. Henry Abbey served as manager for the season, 1883–84
21.
Crown Heights, Brooklyn
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Crown Heights is a neighborhood in the central portion of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The main thoroughfare through this neighborhood is Eastern Parkway, a tree-lined boulevard designed by Frederick Law Olmsted extending 2 miles east–west, originally, the area was known as Crow Hill. It was a succession of hills running east and west from Utica Avenue to Washington Avenue, the name was changed when Crown Street was cut through in 1916. Crown Heights is bounded by Washington Avenue to the west, Atlantic Avenue to the north, Ralph Avenue to the east and it is about 1 mile wide and 2 miles long. Neighborhoods bordering Crown Heights include Prospect Heights to the west, Flatbush and Prospect Lefferts Gardens to the south, Brownsville to the east, the neighborhood extends through much of Brooklyn Community Board 8 and 9. It is under the jurisdiction of two precincts of the New York City Police Department, the 77th Precinct is part of Brooklyn North, which covers Crown Heights, Prospect Heights and Weeksville. The 71st Precinct is part of Brooklyn South and covers the end of Crown Heights. Although no known physical remains in the Crown Heights vicinity. There he was visited by a party of Lenape. The next contact was in 1609 when the explorer Henry Hudson arrived in what is now New York Harbor aboard a Dutch East India Company ship, the Halve Maen commissioned by the Dutch Republic. European habitation in the New York City area began in earnest with the founding of a Dutch fur trading settlement, later called Nieuw Amsterdam, on the southern tip of Manhattan in 1614. By 1630, Dutch and English colonists started moving into the end of Long Island. ”Crown Heights had begun as a posh residential neighborhood. The area benefited by having its rapid transit in a configuration, the IRT Eastern Parkway Line, in contrast to many other Brooklyn neighborhoods. Conversion to a town also included tearing down the 19th century Kings County Penitentiary at Carroll Street. Beginning in the early 1900s, many residences, including characteristic brownstone buildings, were erected along Eastern Parkway. Away from the parkway were a mixture of lower middle-class residences and this development peaked in the 1920s. From the early 1920s through the 1960s, Crown Heights was a white neighborhood. Population changes began in the 1920s with newcomers from Jamaica and the West Indies, as well as African Americans from the South
22.
Jews
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The Jews, also known as the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group originating from the Israelites, or Hebrews, of the Ancient Near East. Jews originated as a national and religious group in the Middle East during the second millennium BCE, the Merneptah Stele appears to confirm the existence of a people of Israel, associated with the god El, somewhere in Canaan as far back as the 13th century BCE. The Israelites, as an outgrowth of the Canaanite population, consolidated their hold with the emergence of the Kingdom of Israel, some consider that these Canaanite sedentary Israelites melded with incoming nomadic groups known as Hebrews. The worldwide Jewish population reached a peak of 16.7 million prior to World War II, but approximately 6 million Jews were systematically murdered during the Holocaust. Since then the population has risen again, and as of 2015 was estimated at 14.3 million by the Berman Jewish DataBank. According to the report, about 43% of all Jews reside in Israel and these numbers include all those who self-identified as Jews in a socio-demographic study or were identified as such by a respondent in the same household. The exact world Jewish population, however, is difficult to measure, Israel is the only country where Jews form a majority of the population. The modern State of Israel was established as a Jewish state and defines itself as such in its Declaration of Independence and its Law of Return grants the right of citizenship to any Jew who requests it. The English word Jew continues Middle English Gyw, Iewe, according to the Hebrew Bible, the name of both the tribe and kingdom derive from Judah, the fourth son of Jacob. The Hebrew word for Jew, יְהוּדִי ISO 259-3 Yhudi, is pronounced, with the stress on the syllable, in Israeli Hebrew. The Ladino name is ג׳ודיו, Djudio, ג׳ודיוס, Djudios, Yiddish, ייִד Yid, ייִדן, Yidn. The etymological equivalent is in use in languages, e. g. but derivations of the word Hebrew are also in use to describe a Jew, e. g. in Italian. The German word Jude is pronounced, the corresponding adjective jüdisch is the origin of the word Yiddish, in such contexts Jewish is the only acceptable possibility. Some people, however, have become so wary of this construction that they have extended the stigma to any use of Jew as a noun, a factual reconstruction for the origin of the Jews is a difficult and complex endeavor. It requires examining at least 3,000 years of ancient human history using documents in vast quantities, as archaeological discovery relies upon researchers and scholars from diverse disciplines, the goal is to interpret all of the factual data, focusing on the most consistent theory. In this case, it is complicated by long standing politics and religious, Jacob and his family migrated to Ancient Egypt after being invited to live with Jacobs son Joseph by the Pharaoh himself. The patriarchs descendants were later enslaved until the Exodus led by Moses, traditionally dated to the 13th century BCE, Modern archaeology has largely discarded the historicity of the Patriarchs and of the Exodus story, with it being reframed as constituting the Israelites inspiring national myth narrative. The growth of Yahweh-centric belief, along with a number of practices, gradually gave rise to a distinct Israelite ethnic group
23.
Odessa
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Odessa or Odesa is the third most populous city of Ukraine and a major seaport and transportation hub located on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. Odessa is also a center of the Odessa Oblast and a multiethnic cultural center. Odessa is sometimes called the pearl of the Black Sea, the South Capital, the predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement, was founded by Hacı I Giray, the Khan of Crimea, in 1440 and originally named after him as Hacıbey. After a period of Lithuanian control, it passed into the domain of the Ottoman Sultan in 1529, in 1794, the city of Odessa was founded by a decree of the Empress Catherine the Great. From 1819 to 1858, Odessa was a free port, during the Soviet period it was the most important port of trade in the Soviet Union and a Soviet naval base. On 1 January 2000, the Quarantine Pier at Odessa Commercial Sea Port was declared a free port, during the 19th century, it was the fourth largest city of Imperial Russia, after Moscow, Saint Petersburg and Warsaw. Its historical architecture has a style more Mediterranean than Russian, having heavily influenced by French. Some buildings are built in a mixture of different styles, including Art Nouveau, Renaissance, the city of Odessa hosts both the Port of Odessa and Port Yuzhne, a significant oil terminal situated in the citys suburbs. Another notable port, Chornomorsk, is located in the same oblast, together they represent a major transport hub integrating with railways. Odessas oil and chemical processing facilities are connected to Russian and European networks by strategic pipelines, the city was named in compliance with the Greek Plan of Catherine the Great. It was named after the ancient Greek city of Odessos, which was believed to have been located here. Although Odessa is located in between the ancient Greek cities of Tyras and Olbia, Odessos is believed to be the predecessor of the present day city of Varna, Catherines secretary of state Adrian Gribovsky claimed in his memoirs that the name was his suggestion. Some expressed doubts about this claim, while others noted the reputation of Gribovsky as an honest and modest man, Odessa was the site of a large Greek settlement not later than the middle of the 6th century BC. Some scholars believe it to be a settlement established by Histria. Whether the Bay of Odessa is the ancient Port of the Histrians cannot yet be considered a settled question based on the available evidence, archaeological artifacts confirm extensive links between the Odessa area and the eastern Mediterranean. In the Middle Ages successive rulers of the Odessa region included various nomadic tribes, the Golden Horde, the Crimean Khanate, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Yedisan Crimean Tatars traded there in the 14th century. During the reign of Khan Hacı I Giray of Crimea, the Khanate was endangered by the Golden Horde and the Ottoman Turks and, in search of allies, the site of present-day Odessa was then a fortress known as Khadjibey. It was part of the Dykra region, however, most of the rest of the area remained largely uninhabited in this period
24.
Bucharest
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Bucharest is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, at 44°25′57″N 26°06′14″E, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than 60 km north of the Danube River, Bucharest was first mentioned in documents in 1459. It became the capital of Romania in 1862 and is the centre of Romanian media, culture and its architecture is a mix of historical, interbellum, communist-era and modern. In the period between the two World Wars, the citys elegant architecture and the sophistication of its elite earned Bucharest the nickname of Little Paris. Although buildings and districts in the city centre were heavily damaged or destroyed by war, earthquakes. In recent years, the city has been experiencing an economic, in 2016, the historical city centre was listed as endangered by the World Monuments Watch. According to the 2011 census,1,883,425 inhabitants live within the city limits, the urban area extends beyond the limits of Bucharest proper and has a population of about 1.9 million people. Adding the satellite towns around the area, the proposed metropolitan area of Bucharest would have a population of 2.27 million people. According to Eurostat, Bucharest has an urban zone of 2,183,091 residents. According to unofficial data, the population is more than 3 million, Bucharest is the sixth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits, after London, Berlin, Madrid, Rome, and Paris. Economically, Bucharest is the most prosperous city in Romania and is one of the industrial centres. The city has big convention facilities, educational institutes, cultural venues, traditional shopping arcades, the Romanian name București has an uncertain origin. Tradition connects the founding of Bucharest with the name of Bucur, who was a prince, an outlaw, a fisherman, in Romanian, the word stem bucurie means joy, and it is believed to be of Dacian origin. Other etymologies are given by scholars, including the one of an Ottoman traveler, Evliya Çelebi. A native or resident of Bucharest is called a Bucharester, Bucharests history alternated periods of development and decline from the early settlements in antiquity until its consolidation as the national capital of Romania late in the 19th century. First mentioned as the Citadel of București in 1459, it became the residence of the famous Wallachian prince Vlad III the Impaler, the Ottomans appointed Greek administrators to run the town from the 18th century. A short-lived revolt initiated by Tudor Vladimirescu in 1821 led to the end of the rule of Constantinople Greeks in Bucharest, the Old Princely Court was erected by Mircea Ciobanul in the mid-16th century. Under subsequent rulers, Bucharest was established as the residence of the royal court
25.
Yiddish
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Yiddish is the historical language of the Ashkenazi Jews. Yiddish is written with a fully vocalized alphabet based on the Hebrew script, the earliest surviving references date from the 12th century and call the language לשון־אַשכּנז or טײַטש, a variant of tiutsch, the contemporary name for Middle High German. Colloquially, the language is sometimes called מאַמע־לשון, distinguishing it from לשון־קדש, the term Yiddish, short for Yiddish-Teitsch, did not become the most frequently used designation in the literature until the 18th century. In the late 19th and into the 20th century the language was commonly called Jewish, especially in non-Jewish contexts. Modern Yiddish has two major forms, Eastern Yiddish is far more common today. It includes Southeastern, Mideastern, and Northeastern dialects, Eastern Yiddish differs from Western both by its far greater size and by the extensive inclusion of words of Slavic origin. Western Yiddish is divided into Southwestern, Midwestern, and Northwestern dialects, the term Yiddish is also used in the adjectival sense, synonymously with Jewish, to designate attributes of Ashkenazi culture. Prior to the Holocaust, there were over 10 million speakers of Yiddish, 85% of the Jews who died in the Holocaust were Yiddish speakers, assimilation following World War II further decreased the use of Yiddish both among survivors and Yiddish-speakers from other countries. However, the number of speakers is increasing in global Hasidic communities, the established view is that, as with other Jewish languages, Jews speaking distinct languages learned new co-territorial vernaculars, which they then Judaized. Exactly what German base lies behind the earliest form of Yiddish is disputed, both Weinreich and Solomon Birnbaum developed this model further in the mid-1950s. In Weinreichs view, this Old Yiddish substrate later bifurcated into two versions of the language, Western and Eastern Yiddish. They retained the Semitic vocabulary needed for religious purposes and created a Judeo-German form of speech, recent linguistic research has finessed, contested, or challenged the Weinreich model, providing alternative approaches to the origins of Yiddish. Some theorists argue that the fusion occurred with a Bavarian dialect base, the two main candidates for the germinal matrix of Yiddish, the Rhineland and Bavaria, are not necessarily incompatible. There may have been developments in the two regions, seeding the Western and Eastern dialects of Modern Yiddish. Dovid Katz proposes that Yiddish emerged from contact between speakers of High German and Aramaic-speaking Jews from the Middle East, wexlers model has met with little academic support, and strong critical challenges, especially among historical linguists. Alternative theories recognize the extent of Yiddishs Germanic vocabulary. Ashkenaz was centered on the Rhineland and the Palatinate, in what is now the westernmost part of Germany and its geographic extent did not coincide with the German principalities of the time, and it included northern France. Ashkenaz bordered on the inhabited by another distinctive Jewish cultural group, the Sephardim or Spanish Jews
26.
Erasmus Hall High School
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Erasmus Hall High School was a four-year public high school located at 899-925 Flatbush Avenue between Church and Snyder Avenues in the Flatbush neighborhood of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. It was founded in 1786 as Erasmus Hall Academy, an institution of higher learning named for the scholar Desiderius Erasmus. The school was the first secondary school chartered by the New York State Regents, the clapboard-sided, Georgian-Federal-style building, constructed on land donated by the Flatbush Reformed Dutch Church, was turned over to the public school system in 1896. In 1904, the Board of Education began a new building campaign to meet the needs of the student population. The original Academy building, which stands in the courtyard of the current school. Now a designated New York City Landmark and listed in the National Register of Historic Places, a statue of Erasmus, cast from the 1622 original in Rotterdam by Hendrick de Keyser and donated by Richard Young, an alumnus of the school, stands in the school’s courtyard. Due to poor scores, the city closed Erasmus Hall High School in 1994, turning the building into Erasmus Hall Educational Campus. The wood-framed, clapboard-sided, Georgian and Federal style school building, through the years, various wings were added to the Academy building and later removed. Erasmus Hall Academy began accepting students in 1801, and in 1803 it incorporated the village school of Flatbush. The village evolved into a city, and started a school system that competed with Erasmus for its student body. As a result, there was a decline in its enrollment until in 1896 enrollment was reduced to 150 boys and girls. Following the agreement with the Erasmus Hall Board of Trustees, the Board of Education of the City of Brooklyn requested proposals for a design for a new school building, twenty architects responded with plans, several of which were published in contemporary architectural periodicals. It soon became clear that none of these plans could be erected for less than a million dollars, and since that was considered too expensive, the project was dropped. With the consolidation of the City of New York in 1898, at the same time, New York City was experiencing a huge influx of immigrants, and the schools were expected to help Americanize these new students. They also used classrooms in other schools, such as P. S, the modern high school was designed in the Collegiate Gothic style that Snyder used on many of his buildings. On August 17,1904, the New York City School Board’s Committee on Buildings presented its plans for a new campus for Erasmus Hall High School. It was designed to be constructed around the existing, centrally-located buildings, the plan called for a full quadrangle of buildings along the perimeter of the large lot. It was constructed during four periods, 1905-1906, 1909-1911, 1924-1925, the first buildings would be constructed along Flatbush Avenue, with others added over time, as the need became clear and funds became available
27.
Manhattan
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Manhattan is the most densely populated borough of New York City, its economic and administrative center, and the citys historical birthplace. The borough is coextensive with New York County, founded on November 1,1683, Manhattan is often described as the cultural and financial capital of the world and hosts the United Nations Headquarters. Many multinational media conglomerates are based in the borough and it is historically documented to have been purchased by Dutch colonists from Native Americans in 1626 for 60 guilders which equals US$1062 today. New York County is the United States second-smallest county by land area, on business days, the influx of commuters increases that number to over 3.9 million, or more than 170,000 people per square mile. Manhattan has the third-largest population of New York Citys five boroughs, after Brooklyn and Queens, the City of New York was founded at the southern tip of Manhattan, and the borough houses New York City Hall, the seat of the citys government. The name Manhattan derives from the word Manna-hata, as written in the 1609 logbook of Robert Juet, a 1610 map depicts the name as Manna-hata, twice, on both the west and east sides of the Mauritius River. The word Manhattan has been translated as island of hills from the Lenape language. The United States Postal Service prefers that mail addressed to Manhattan use New York, NY rather than Manhattan, the area that is now Manhattan was long inhabited by the Lenape Native Americans. In 1524, Florentine explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano – sailing in service of King Francis I of France – was the first European to visit the area that would become New York City. It was not until the voyage of Henry Hudson, an Englishman who worked for the Dutch East India Company, a permanent European presence in New Netherland began in 1624 with the founding of a Dutch fur trading settlement on Governors Island. In 1625, construction was started on the citadel of Fort Amsterdam on Manhattan Island, later called New Amsterdam, the 1625 establishment of Fort Amsterdam at the southern tip of Manhattan Island is recognized as the birth of New York City. In 1846, New York historian John Romeyn Brodhead converted the figure of Fl 60 to US$23, variable-rate myth being a contradiction in terms, the purchase price remains forever frozen at twenty-four dollars, as Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace remarked in their history of New York. Sixty guilders in 1626 was valued at approximately $1,000 in 2006, based on the price of silver, Straight Dope author Cecil Adams calculated an equivalent of $72 in 1992. In 1647, Peter Stuyvesant was appointed as the last Dutch Director General of the colony, New Amsterdam was formally incorporated as a city on February 2,1653. In 1664, the English conquered New Netherland and renamed it New York after the English Duke of York and Albany, the Dutch Republic regained it in August 1673 with a fleet of 21 ships, renaming the city New Orange. Manhattan was at the heart of the New York Campaign, a series of battles in the early American Revolutionary War. The Continental Army was forced to abandon Manhattan after the Battle of Fort Washington on November 16,1776. The city, greatly damaged by the Great Fire of New York during the campaign, became the British political, British occupation lasted until November 25,1783, when George Washington returned to Manhattan, as the last British forces left the city
28.
Educational Pictures
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Educational Pictures was an American film distribution company founded in 1916 by Earle Hammons. The studio also distributed short comedies starring Lloyd Hamilton, who employed the blacklisted Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle as a writer-director under the pseudonym William Goodrich, Earle Hammons originally established the company to make instructional films for schools, but making comedies for theatrical release proved more lucrative. Educational did indeed issue many educational, travelogue, and novelty shorts, Educational also released silent cartoons including the Felix the Cat series. In 1930, cartoonist Paul Terry signed with Educational to distribute his Terrytoons animated cartoons in America, Educational made a smooth transition to sound movies by handling the early talking comedies of pioneer producer Mack Sennett. Sennett also introduced singing star Bing Crosby to movie audiences, but Sennett soon became plagued by financial problems, and he left Educational in 1932. Most of Educationals silent stars made only a few talkies for the studio, Lupino Lane left the company in 1930, followed by Lloyd Hamilton in 1931. Most of the earliest Educational talkies feature silent-comedy veterans with stage experience, Vernon Dent, Harry Gribbon, Raymond McKee, Edward Everett Horton, Daphne Pollard, Educationals most prolific comedian in the 1930s was undoubtedly the Sennett star Andy Clyde, who made 54 comedies. Educational replaced the Sennett films with star-name comedians, Andy Clyde and Harry Langdon led Educationals release schedule for a few years, then Buster Keaton headlined a series that yielded 16 popular two-reel comedies. For a time Educational maintained studios on both coasts, the Hollywood productions, in addition to those of Clyde, Langdon, and Keaton, hosted comedy stars Moran and Mack, Edgar Kennedy, and Ernest Truex. Twentieth Century-Fox and its predecessor, Fox Film Corporation, had been distributing Educational product to theaters, in 1937 Fox dropped its line of short comedies and withdrew its support from Educational. Earle Hammons tried to keep his company going while trying to enter the market with the financially troubled Grand National Pictures. The drain on his finances forced both companies into bankruptcy, the final Educational comedies were released in January 1939, and the film library was sold at auction in 1940. Most were obtained by Astor Pictures, which shrewdly timed its re-releases to cash in on certain performers popularity, Astor compiled four feature-length comedies showcasing Shirley Temple, Danny Kaye, Bing Crosby, and Bob Hope and Milton Berle. Much of Educationals silent film library was lost in a fire in 1937. Like other short-subject producers, Educational Pictures marketed its assorted offerings in individual series, Buster Keatons career suffered a major downturn in the early 1930s and he was fired by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1933, after which he embarked to Europe. Upon his return to Hollywood, he made a comeback in a series of 16 two-reel comedies for Educational Pictures. Most of these are simple visual comedies, with many of the gags supplied by Keaton himself, often recycling ideas from his vaudeville act. The high point in the Educational series is Grand Slam Opera, when the series lapsed in 1937, Keaton returned to MGM as a gag writer
29.
CBS
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CBS is an American commercial broadcast television network that is a flagship property of CBS Corporation. The company is headquartered at the CBS Building in New York City with major facilities and operations in New York City. CBS is sometimes referred to as the Eye Network, in reference to the iconic logo. It has also called the Tiffany Network, alluding to the perceived high quality of CBS programming during the tenure of William S. Paley. It can also refer to some of CBSs first demonstrations of color television, the network has its origins in United Independent Broadcasters Inc. a collection of 16 radio stations that was purchased by Paley in 1928 and renamed the Columbia Broadcasting System. Under Paleys guidance, CBS would first become one of the largest radio networks in the United States, in 1974, CBS dropped its former full name and became known simply as CBS, Inc. In 2000, CBS came under the control of Viacom, which was formed as a spin-off of CBS in 1971, CBS Corporation is controlled by Sumner Redstone through National Amusements, which also controls the current Viacom. The television network has more than 240 owned-and-operated and affiliated stations throughout the United States. The origins of CBS date back to January 27,1927, Columbia Phonographic went on the air on September 18,1927, with a presentation by the Howard Barlow Orchestra from flagship station WOR in Newark, New Jersey, and fifteen affiliates. Operational costs were steep, particularly the payments to AT&T for use of its land lines, in early 1928 Judson sold the network to brothers Isaac and Leon Levy, owners of the networks Philadelphia affiliate WCAU, and their partner Jerome Louchenheim. With the record out of the picture, Paley quickly streamlined the corporate name to Columbia Broadcasting System. He believed in the power of advertising since his familys La Palina cigars had doubled their sales after young William convinced his elders to advertise on radio. By September 1928, Paley bought out the Louchenheim share of CBS, during Louchenheims brief regime, Columbia paid $410,000 to A. H. Grebes Atlantic Broadcasting Company for a small Brooklyn station, WABC, which would become the networks flagship station. WABC was quickly upgraded, and the relocated to 860 kHz. The physical plant was relocated also – to Steinway Hall on West 57th Street in Manhattan, by the turn of 1929, the network could boast to sponsors of having 47 affiliates. Paley moved right away to put his network on a financial footing. In the fall of 1928, he entered talks with Adolph Zukor of Paramount Pictures. The deal came to fruition in September 1929, Paramount acquired 49% of CBS in return for a block of its stock worth $3.8 million at the time
30.
Gilbert and Sullivan
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Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan and to the works they jointly created. The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H. M. S, Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado are among the best known. Sullivan, six years Gilberts junior, composed the music, contributing memorable melodies that could convey both humour and pathos and their operas have enjoyed broad and enduring international success and are still performed frequently throughout the English-speaking world. Gilbert and Sullivan introduced innovations in content and form that influenced the development of musical theatre through the 20th century. The operas have influenced political discourse, literature, film. Producer Richard DOyly Carte brought Gilbert and Sullivan together and nurtured their collaboration and he built the Savoy Theatre in 1881 to present their joint works and founded the DOyly Carte Opera Company, which performed and promoted Gilbert and Sullivans works for over a century. Gilbert was born in London on 18 November 1836 and his father, William, was a naval surgeon who later wrote novels and short stories, some of which included illustrations by his son. Director and playwright Mike Leigh described the Gilbertian style as follows, With great fluidity and freedom, First, within the framework of the story, he makes bizarre things happen, and turns the world on its head. Thus the Learned Judge marries the Plaintiff, the soldiers metamorphose into aesthetes, and so on and his genius is to fuse opposites with an imperceptible sleight of hand, to blend the surreal with the real, and the caricature with the natural. In other words, to tell a perfectly outrageous story in a deadpan way. Gilbert developed his theories on the art of stage direction. At the time Gilbert began writing, theatre in Britain was in disrepute, Gilbert helped to reform and elevate the respectability of the theatre, especially beginning with his six short family-friendly comic operas, or entertainments, for Thomas German Reed. At a rehearsal for one of these entertainments, Ages Ago, the composer Frederic Clay introduced Gilbert to his friend, two years later, Gilbert and Sullivan would write their first work together. Those two intervening years continued to shape Gilberts theatrical style, Sullivan was born in London on 13 May 1842. His father was a bandmaster, and by the time Arthur had reached the age of eight. In school he began to compose anthems and songs, in 1856, he received the first Mendelssohn Scholarship and studied at the Royal Academy of Music and then at Leipzig, where he also took up conducting. His graduation piece, completed in 1861, was a suite of music to Shakespeares The Tempest. Revised and expanded, it was performed at the Crystal Palace in 1862 and was an immediate sensation and he began building a reputation as Englands most promising young composer, composing a symphony, a concerto, and several overtures, among them the Overture di Ballo, in 1870
31.
Patience (opera)
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Patience, or, Bunthornes Bride, is a comic opera in two acts with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. Henceforth, the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas would be known as the Savoy Operas, Patience was the sixth operatic collaboration of fourteen between Gilbert and Sullivan. It ran for a total of 578 performances, which was seven more than the earlier work. Pinafore, and the second longest run of any work of theatre up to that time. Called Art for Arts Sake, the movement valued its ideals of beauty above any pragmatic concerns, although the output of poets, painters and designers was prolific, some argued that the movements art, poetry and fashion was empty and self-indulgent. That the movement was so popular and also so easy to ridicule as a meaningless fad helped make Patience a big hit, the same factors made a hit out of The Colonel, a play by F. C. Burnand based partly on the cartoons of George du Maurier in Punch magazine. The Colonel beat Patience to the stage by several weeks, modern productions of Patience have sometimes updated the setting of the opera to an analogous era such as the hippie 1960s, making a flower-child poet the rival of a beat poet. The two poets in the opera are given to reciting their own verses aloud, principally to the chorus of rapturous maidens. The style of poetry Bunthorne declaims strongly contrasts with Grosvenors, the formers, emphatic and obscure, bears a marked resemblance to Swinburnes poetry in its structure, style and heavy use of alliteration. The latters, simpler and pastoral, echoes elements of Coventry Patmore, Gilbert scholar Andrew Crowther comments, Bunthorne was the creature of Gilberts brain, not just a caricature of particular Aesthetes, but an original character in his own right. According to Gilberts biographer Edith Browne, the character, Patience, was made up. Patience was not the first satire of the movement played by Richard DOyly Cartes company at the Opera Comique. Grossmith himself had written a sketch in 1876 called Cups and Saucers that was revived as a piece to H. M. S. Pinafore in 1878, which was a satire of the blue pottery craze, a popular misconception holds that the central character of Bunthorne, a Fleshly Poet, was intended to satirise Oscar Wilde, but this identification is retrospective. Rossetti had been attacked for immorality by Robert Buchanan in an article called The Fleshly School of Poetry, published in The Contemporary Review for October 1871, nonetheless, Wildes biographer Richard Ellmann suggests that Wilde is a partial model for both Bunthorne and his rival Grosvenor. Carte, the producer of Patience, was also Wildes booking manager in 1881 as the poets popularity took off, although a satire of the aesthetic movement is dated today, fads and hero-worship are evergreen, and Gilbert’s pen was rarely sharper than when he invented Reginald Bunthorne. Gilbert originally conceived Patience as a tale of rivalry between two curates and of the ladies who attended upon them
32.
Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts
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Arthur Godfreys Talent Scouts was an American radio and television variety show which ran on CBS from 1946 until 1958. Sponsored by Lipton Tea, it starred Arthur Godfrey, who was also hosting Arthur Godfrey, the concept for the show was that Godfrey had several talent scouts who brought their discoveries onto the program to showcase their talents. The winner of each show was determined by a meter that judged the audiences applause, the radio series began July 2,1946, and was heard on CBS Tuesday evenings at 9pm. The winner on October 1,1946, was pianist José Melis, in the summer of 1947, Arthur Godfreys Talent Scouts moved to Fridays at 9,30 p. m. After August 1947 it aired on Mondays at 8,30 p. m, the radio show continued until October 1,1956. With Archie Bleyer leading the orchestra, the announcer was George Bryan. At that point, the music would segue into trombonist Lou McGarity, contestants on the show included Pat Boone, The Chordettes, The McGuire Sisters and Carmel Quinn, all of whom went on to perform on Arthur Godfrey and His Friends. Swedish singer Kjerstin Dellert won a contest in 1948 with Someone to Watch Over Me, patsy Cline first gained national attention with a winning performance of Walkin After Midnight on the January 21,1957 broadcast. Among those who auditioned but were not chosen to appear on the broadcast were Buddy Holly, The Four Freshmen, on television, Arthur Godfreys Talent Scouts premiered December 6,1948. According to the Nielsen ratings, it was the highest rated show for the 1951–1952 season. It remained a popular show through the decade. The show took a drop in ratings after orchestra bandleader Archie Bleyer left in the 1954–1955 season. However, by the fall of 1957, television began to prefer westerns and adventure shows to quiz programs. The show aired its final episode on January 1,1958, on December 24,1956, the show became the first entertainment program to be videotaped for broadcast, as the then-new technology was used for a time-delayed rebroadcast in the Pacific Time Zone. An Ampex quadruplex videotape machine recorded the live broadcast to the Eastern part of the country. Arthur Godfreys Talent Scouts aired Monday at 8, 30-9,00 PM on CBS its entire run, 1950–1951, #8 1951–1952, #1 1952–1953, #2 1953–1954, #3 1954–1955, #18 1955–1956, #16 1956–1957, #12 Dunning, John. On the Air, The Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio, new York, Oxford University Press,1998. ISBN 0-19-507678-8 Internet Archive, Arthur Godfrey Arthur Godfreys Talent Scouts at the Internet Movie Database
33.
Victor Herbert
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Victor August Herbert was an Irish-born, German-raised American composer, cellist and conductor. Although Herbert enjoyed important careers as a cello soloist and conductor and he was also prominent among the tin pan alley composers and was later a founder of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers. In the early 1880s, Herbert began a career as a cellist in Vienna, Austria, Herbert and his opera singer wife, Therese Förster, moved to the U. S. in 1886 when both were engaged by the Metropolitan Opera. In the U. S. Herbert continued his career, while also teaching at the National Conservatory of Music. His most notable compositions were his Cello Concerto No.2 in E minor, Op.30, which entered the standard repertoire. He led the Pittsburgh Symphony from 1898 to 1904 and then founded the Victor Herbert Orchestra, Herbert began to compose operettas in 1894, producing several successes, including The Serenade and The Fortune Teller. Some of the operettas that he wrote after the turn of the 20th century were more successful, Babes in Toyland. Modiste, The Red Mill, Naughty Marietta, Sweethearts and Eileen, after World War I, with the change of popular musical tastes, Herbert began to compose musicals and contributed music to other composers shows. While some of these were well-received, he never achieved the level of success that he had enjoyed with his most popular operettas. Herbert was born in Dublin, Ireland to Protestants Edward Herbert and his grandfather was the Irish novelist, playwright, poet and composer Samuel Lover. The Lovers welcomed a steady flow of musicians, writers and artists to their home, Herbert joined his mother in Stuttgart, Germany in 1867, a year after she had married a German physician, Carl Schmidt of Langenargen. In Stuttgart he received a liberal education at the Eberhard-Ludwigs-Gymnasium. Herbert initially planned to pursue a career as a medical doctor, although his stepfather was related by blood to the German royal family, his financial situation was not good by the time Herbert was a teenager. Medical education in Germany was expensive, and so Herbert focused instead on music and he initially studied the piano, flute and piccolo but ultimately settled on the cello, beginning studies on that instrument with Bernhard Cossmann from age 15 to age 18. He then attended the Stuttgart Conservatory, after studying cello, music theory and composition under Max Seifritz, Herbert graduated with a diploma in 1879. Even before studying with Cossmann, Herbert was engaged professionally as a player in concerts in Stuttgart and his first orchestra position was as a flute and piccolo player, but he soon turned solely to the cello. By the time he was 19, Herbert had received engagements as a soloist with several major German orchestras. He played in the orchestra of the wealthy Russian Baron Paul von Derwies for a few years and, Herbert joined the court orchestra in Stuttgart in 1881, where he remained for the next five years
34.
The Fortune Teller (operetta)
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The Fortune Teller is an operetta in three acts written by Victor Herbert, with a libretto by Harry B. Smith. After a brief tryout in Toronto, it premiered on Broadway on September 26,1898 at Wallacks Theatre and it was revived on November 4,1929 at Jolsons 59th Street Theatre and ran for 16 performances. Herbert wrote his sixth operetta for prima donna Alice Nielsen and her newly formed Alice Nielsen Opera Company, Nielsen having earned widespread praise in The Serenade, requested and received not one but three roles in The Fortune Teller. The story is set in Hungary and involves Irma, an heiress from Budapest, Irma is in love with a young Hussar captain but is being forced to marry the silly Count Barezowski. When a gypsy fortune teller, Musette, arrives, she is mistaken for Irma, songs include the famous Gypsy Love Song, and Romany Life. Musette, a fortune teller* - Alice Nielsen Captain Ladislas, a Hussar - Frank Rushworth Fresco, a dance master - Richard Golden Count Berezowski, a composer of no renown - Joseph W
35.
Georges Bizet
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Georges Bizet, registered at birth as Alexandre César Léopold Bizet, was a French composer of the romantic era. During a brilliant student career at the Conservatoire de Paris, Bizet won many prizes and he was recognised as an outstanding pianist, though he chose not to capitalise on this skill and rarely performed in public. Returning to Paris after almost three years in Italy, he found that the main Parisian opera theatres preferred the established classical repertoire to the works of newcomers. His keyboard and orchestral compositions were largely ignored, as a result, his career stalled. Restless for success, he began many theatrical projects during the 1860s, neither of his two operas that reached the stage in this time—Les pêcheurs de perles and La jolie fille de Perth—were immediately successful. The production of Bizets final opera, Carmen, was delayed because of fears that its themes of betrayal and murder would offend audiences. After its premiere on 3 March 1875, Bizet was convinced that the work was a failure, Bizets marriage to Geneviève Halévy was intermittently happy and produced one son. After his death, his work, apart from Carmen, was generally neglected, manuscripts were given away or lost, and published versions of his works were frequently revised and adapted by other hands. He founded no school and had no obvious disciples or successors, after years of neglect, his works began to be performed more frequently in the 20th century. Later commentators have acclaimed him as a composer of brilliance and originality whose premature death was a significant loss to French musical theatre, Georges Bizet was born in Paris on 25 October 1838. He was registered as Alexandre César Léopold, but baptised as Georges on 16 March 1840 and his father, Adolphe Bizet, had been a hairdresser and wigmaker before becoming a singing teacher despite his lack of formal training. He also composed a few works, including at least one published song, in 1837 Adolphe married Aimée Delsarte, against the wishes of her family who considered him a poor prospect, the Delsartes, though impoverished, were a cultured and highly musical family. Aimée was an accomplished pianist, while her brother François Delsarte was a singer and teacher who performed at the courts of both Louis Philippe and Napoleon III. François Delsartes wife Rosine, a prodigy, had been an assistant professor of solfège at the Conservatoire de Paris at the age of 13. Georges, a child, showed early aptitude for music and quickly picked up the basics of musical notation from his mother. This precocity convinced his ambitious parents that he was ready to begin studying at the Conservatoire even though he was only nine years old. Georges was interviewed by Joseph Meifred, the horn virtuoso who was a member of the Conservatoires Committee of Studies, Meifred was so struck by the boys demonstration of his skills that he waived the age rule and offered to take him as soon as a place became available. Bizet was admitted to the Conservatoire on 9 October 1848, two weeks before his 10th birthday and he made an early impression, within six months he had won first prize in solfège, a feat that impressed Pierre-Joseph-Guillaume Zimmermann, the Conservatoires former professor of piano
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Carmen
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Carmen is an opera in four acts by French composer Georges Bizet. The libretto was written by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on a novella of the title by Prosper Mérimée. The opera was first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875, Bizet died suddenly after the 33rd performance, unaware that the work would achieve international acclaim within the following ten years. The opera is written in the genre of opéra comique with musical numbers separated by dialogue and it is set in southern Spain and tells the story of the downfall of Don José, a naïve soldier who is seduced by the wiles of the fiery gypsy Carmen. José abandons his sweetheart and deserts from his military duties, yet loses Carmens love to the glamorous toreador Escamillo. The depictions of life, immorality, and lawlessness. After the premiere, most reviews were critical, and the French public was generally indifferent, Carmen initially gained its reputation through a series of productions outside France, and was not revived in Paris until 1883, thereafter it rapidly acquired popularity at home and abroad. Later commentators have asserted that Carmen forms the bridge between the tradition of opéra comique and the realism or verismo that characterised late 19th-century Italian opera. The opera has been recorded many times since the first acoustical recording in 1908, in the Paris of the 1860s, despite being a Prix de Rome laureate, Bizet struggled to get his stage works performed. The capitals two main state-funded opera houses—the Opéra and the Opéra-Comique—followed conservative repertoires that restricted opportunities for young native talent, Bizet was delighted with the Opéra-Comique commission, and expressed to his friend Edmund Galabert his satisfaction in the absolute certainty of having found my path. It was Bizet who first proposed an adaptation of Prosper Mérimées novella Carmen, Bizet may first have encountered the story during his Rome sojourn of 1858–60, since his journals record Mérimée as one of the writers whose works he absorbed in those years. Cast details are as provided by Mina Curtiss from the original piano, the stage designs are credited to Charles Ponchard. Place, Seville, Spain, and surrounding hills Time, Around 1820 Act 1 A square, on the right, a door to the tobacco factory. A group of soldiers relax in the square, waiting for the changing of the guard, moralès tells her that José is not yet on duty and invites her to wait with them. She declines, saying she will return later, José arrives with the new guard, which is greeted and imitated by a crowd of urchins. As the factory bell rings, the cigarette girls emerge and exchange banter with young men in the crowd, Carmen enters and sings her provocative habanera on the untameable nature of love. The men plead with her to choose a lover, and after some teasing she throws a flower to Don José, as the women go back to the factory, Micaëla returns and gives José a letter and a kiss from his mother. He reads that his mother wants him to home and marry Micaëla
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Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company
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The Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company was an American opera company located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania that was actively performing at the Academy of Music between 1950 and 1955. Fausta Cleva served as the companys first General Director and conductor, other operas presented that season were Cavalleria rusticana, Lamico Fritz, and Carmen. Cleva left the PCGOC after its first season and Giuseppe Bamboschek took over the role of General Director and conductor for the remainder of the companys history. In 1955 the PCGOC merged with their rival, the Philadelphia La Scala Opera Company, Bamboschek continued on with the PGOC as one of their primary conductors. New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Folder, Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company Frank Hamiltons Database of Opera in Philadelphia
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San Francisco Opera
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San Francisco Opera is an American opera company, based in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola, in fact, Merolas initial visits to the city were as conductor of some of these troupes—the first in 1909 with the International Opera Company of Montreal. Continued visits for the next decade convinced him that a San Francisco company was viable, while it was a popular and critical triumph, the five-day season was not a financial success. It was clear to Merola that a solid financial base was needed. Appealing to more than the elite, Merola raised 2441 contributions of $50 each from many founding members. After the opening of La bohème, the first 1923/24 season included productions of Andrea Chénier, Mefistofele, Tosca (with Giuseppe de Luca and Martinelli, during the nine years following the opening season, the San Francisco War Memorial Opera House was conceived. The building was designed by Arthur Brown, Jr. the architect who also created San Franciscos Coit Tower, the company inaugurated the new opera house with a performance of Tosca on 15 October 1932 with Claudia Muzio in the title role. However, until well after Merolas death, the main San Francisco season rarely extended beyond late October and he died while conducting an open-air concert at Stern Grove on 30 August 1953. Edwin MacArthur led the San Francisco Opera Orchestra in several 78-rpm recordings for RCA Victor in the late 1930s, some of these were later reissued by RCA on LP and CD. Short versions of all the works in the season were broadcast on about 30 California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho and British Columbia radio stations, starting about 1941. Kurt Herbert Adler came to the United States in 1938 after early experience and training in aspects of music and theatre in Austria, Germany. For five years, he worked to build the chorus of the Chicago Opera Company, Merola heard of him and, over the telephone, invited him to San Francisco opera in 1943 as chorus director. Adler was often regarded as a difficult, sometimes tyrannical person to work for, however, as Chatfield-Taylor notes, singers, conductors, directors, and designers came back season after season…. Among those who were offered new and exciting challenges were Geraint Evans, the Welsh baritone, Leontyne Price, and Luciano Pavarotti. He took on more and more details as Merolas health and energy diminished. After three months of acting as Artistic Director, and with the assistance of its president, Robert Watt Miller, Adler was confirmed as General Director, Adlers aims Adlers aims in taking over the company were several. Eventually, as seen in the 1961 SFO season, eleven operas were given five or six performances each on average while the season ran to late November. He heard Leontyne Price on the radio, and offered her a role in Dialogues of the Carmelites in 1957, thus providing her with her the first performance on a major operatic stage
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Arrigo Boito
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Along with Emilio Praga, and his own brother Camillo Boito he is regarded as one of the prominent representatives of the Scapigliatura artistic movement. His older brother, Camillo Boito, was an Italian architect and engineer, in 1866 he fought under Giuseppe Garibaldi in the Seven Weeks War in which the Kingdom of Italy and Prussia fought against Austria, after which Venice was ceded to Italy. Between 1887 and 1894, he had an affair with celebrated actress Eleonora Duse and their relationship was carried out in a highly clandestine manner, presumably because of Boitos many aristocratic friends and acquaintances. The two remained on good terms until his death, towards the end of his musical career, Boito succeeded Giovanni Bottesini as director of the Parma Conservatory after the latters death in 1889 and held the post until 1897. He received the degree of doctor of music from the University of Cambridge in 1893, and when he died in Milan. A memorial concert was given in his honor at La Scala in 1948, the orchestra was conducted by Arturo Toscanini. Recorded in very primitive sound, the concert has been issued on CD. Boito wrote very little music, but completed the opera, Ero e Leandro, and left incomplete a further opera, Nerone, which he had been working at, on and off, between 1877 and 1915. Excluding its last act, for which Boito left only a few sketches, Nerone was finished after his death by Arturo Toscanini and Vincenzo Tommasini and he also left a Symphony in A minor in manuscript. Mefistofele His only finished opera, Mefistofele, based on Goethes Faust, was given its first performance on 5 March 1868, at La Scala, Milan. The premiere, which he conducted himself, was received, provoking riots and duels over its supposed Wagnerism. Boitos revised and drastically cut version also changed Faust from a baritone to a tenor, Mefistofele is the only work of his performed with any regularity today, and Enrico Caruso included its two tenor arias in his first recording session. The Prologue to the opera, set in Heaven, is a favorite concert excerpt, librettos Boitos literary powers never dried up. As well as writing the libretti for his own operas, he wrote them for other composers, as Tobia Gorrio he provided the libretto for Amilcare Ponchiellis La Gioconda. The revised Boccanegra premiered to acclaim in 1881. With that, their friendship and respect blossomed. After their years of association, when Verdi died in 1901. The years given are those of the premieres, Boito also provided the text to Verdis cantata Inno delle Nazioni which was first given on 24 May 1862 at Her Majestys Theatre, London
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Mefistofele
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Mefistofele is an opera in a prologue, four acts and an epilogue, the only completed opera with music by the Italian composer-librettist Arrigo Boito. The opera was given its premiere on 5 March 1868 at La Scala, Milan under the baton of the composer, despite his lack of experience, however, it was not a success and was immediately withdrawn after only two performances. Revisions in 1875 resulted in success in Bologna and, with adjustments in 1876 for Venice. Boito began consideration of an opera on the Faustian theme after completing his studies at the Milan Conservatory in 1861, Mefistofele is one of many pieces of classical music based on the Faust legend and, like many other composers, Boito used Goethes version as his starting point. He was an admirer of Richard Wagner and, like him, chose to write his own libretto, much of the text is actually a literal translation from Goethes German to Boitos Italian. The most popular earlier work based on the legend was Charles Gounods opera Faust and he hoped that it would be a wake-up call and an inspiration to other young Italian composers. The piano-vocal score was completed in 1867 while Boito was visiting relatives in Poland, furthermore, the work was far too long and the cast inadequate for the complexities of the music. When the curtain came down well after midnight, it was clear that the premiere had been a failure. After just two performances, with the one being divided into two sections and presented on successive evenings, the opera was withdrawn. Boito immediately set to work revising his opera, greatly reduced its length by about one-third by making many scenes smaller in scale, Faust was changed from a baritone to a tenor. The revised version was premiered in Bologna on 4 October 1875, this time sung by what is regarded to be a very fine cast. Boito made further minor revisions during 1876, and this version was first performed in Venice on 13 May 1876, the first British performance took place at Her Majestys Theatre, London on 6 July 1880 and the American premiere was on 16 November 1880 in Boston. Thereafter, Boito continued to make small changes until the definitive production in Milan on 25 May 1881. Chaliapin made his first appearance at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden on 25 May 1926, parts of a subsequent performance on 31 May were recorded by His Masters Voice. In 1969, the New York City Opera presented a new production by Tito Capobianco, the Metropolitan Opera has given the work a total of 67 times since it first appeared there on 5 December 1883, most recently in February 2000. The Royal Opera in London has only one performance of the opera. As Mefistofele, Ramey made the role a signature one, appearing in productions in the 1980s and early 1990s. The opera was performed as part of the 2013/14 season at the Croatian National Theatre, directed by Michał Znaniecki, in 2014 the opera was performed in Kraków as a co-production with Trondheim Symphony Orchestra, the premiere in Trondheim, Norway took place in June 2015
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Don Giovanni
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Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It is based on the legends of Don Juan, a fictional libertine and it was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the National Theater, now called the Estates Theatre, on 29 October 1787. Da Pontes libretto was billed as a dramma giocoso, a designation of its time that denotes a mixing of serious. Mozart entered the work into his catalogue as an opera buffa, although sometimes classified as comic, it blends comedy, melodrama and supernatural elements. A staple of the operatic repertoire, Don Giovanni for the five seasons 2011/12 through 2015/16 was ninth on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide. It has also proved a fruitful subject for writers and philosophers, the opera was commissioned as a result of the overwhelming success of Mozarts trip to Prague in January and February 1787. The subject matter may have chosen in consideration of the long history of Don Juan operas in Prague. For Bertati, the setting was Villena, Spain, whereas Da Pontes libretto only specifies a city in Spain, the score was completed on 28 or 29 October 1787 after Da Ponte was recalled to Vienna to work on another opera. Reports about the completion of the overture conflict, some say it was completed the day before the premiere. More likely it was completed the day before, in light of the fact that Mozart recorded the completion of the opera on 28 October. The score calls for double woodwinds, two horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani, basso continuo for the recitatives, and the string section. The composer also specified occasional special musical effects, in act 2, Giovanni is seen to play the mandolin, accompanied by pizzicato strings. In the same act, two of the Commendatores interventions are accompanied by a chorale of oboes, clarinets, bassoons. The instrumentation and vocal writing are very reminiscent of Mozarts treatment of the voice of Neptune in Idomeneo, the opera was first performed on 29 October 1787 in Prague under its full title of Il Dissoluto Punito ossia il Don Giovanni – Dramma giocoso in due atti. The work was received, as was often true of Mozarts work in Prague. The Prager Oberpostamtzeitung reported, Connoisseurs and musicians say that Prague has never heard the like, the Provincialnachrichten of Vienna reported, Herr Mozart conducted in person and was welcomed joyously and jubilantly by the numerous gathering. Mozart also supervised the Vienna premiere of the work, which place on 7 May 1788. These cuts are very seldom performed in theatres or recordings, the operas final ensemble was generally omitted until the early 20th century, a tradition that apparently began very early on
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Aida
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Aida is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni. Set in Egypt, it was commissioned by and first performed at Cairos Khedivial Opera House on 24 December 1871, ghislanzonis scheme follows a scenario often attributed to the French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, but Verdi biographer Mary Jane Phillips-Matz argues that the source is actually Temistocle Solera. Aida eventually premiered in Cairo in late 1871, contrary to popular belief, the opera was not written to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, for which Verdi had been invited to write an inaugural hymn, but had declined. The plot bears striking, though similarities to Metastasios libretto La Nitteti. Verdi originally chose to write an orchestral prelude instead of a full overture for the opera. He then composed an overture of the variety to replace the original prelude. However, in the end he decided not to have the overture performed because of its—his own words—pretentious insipidity and this overture, never used today, was given a rare broadcast performance by Arturo Toscanini and the NBC Symphony Orchestra on 30 March 1940, but was never commercially issued. Aida met with acclaim when it finally opened in Cairo on 24 December 1871. He therefore considered the Italian premiere, held at La Scala, Milan on 8 February 1872, Verdi had also written the role of Aida for the voice of Teresa Stolz, who sang it for the first time at the Milan premiere. Verdi had asked her fiancé, Angelo Mariani, to conduct the Cairo premiere, the Milan Amneris, Maria Waldmann, was his favourite in the role and she repeated it a number of times at his request. Aida was received with enthusiasm at its Milan premiere. With Polish translation Aida was performed for the first time 9 June 1877, france,22 April 1876, Théâtre-Lyrique Italien, Salle Ventadour, Paris, with almost the same cast as the Milan premiere, but with Édouard de Reszke making his debut as the King. Rio de Janeiro,30 June 1886, Theatro Lyrico Fluminense, Arturo Toscanini, at the time a 19-year-old cellist who was assistant chorus master, was persuaded to take up the baton for the performance. Toscanini conducted the opera from memory, with great success. This would be the start of a promising career, laibach, Austrian Empire,1 October 1898, conducted by Hilarion Benišek A complete concert version of the opera was given in New York City in 1949. Conducted by Toscanini with Herva Nelli as Aida and Richard Tucker as Radamès, due to the length of the opera, it was divided into two telecasts, preserved on kinescopes, and later released on video by RCA and Testament. The audio portion of the broadcast, including some remakes in June 1954, was released on LP, La Scala mounted a lavish new production of Aida designed by Franco Zeffirelli for the opening night of its 2006/2007 season. The production starred Violeta Urmana in the role and Roberto Alagna as Radamès
