Opera Books

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Book SynopsisIn Alfred Dörffel''s aria album, the classics of musical theater and other vocal works are lined up and waiting to be sung in class or on stage. Arias from the most famous operas by Mozart, Beethoven, Weber and Wagner alternate with the best solos from the sacred works by Bach, Handel and Haydn. The texts are in the original language, but some have translations into German, Italian or English.Arien-Album: Berühmte Arien für Sopran und Klavier: Aus geistlichen und weltlichen Werken von Bach bis WagnerIm Arien-Album von Alfred Dörffel reihen sich die Klassiker des Musiktheaters und anderer Vokalwerke und warten darauf, im Unterricht oder auf der Bühne gesungen zu werden. Arien aus den bekanntesten Opern von Mozart, Beethoven, Weber oder Wagner wechseln sich ab mit den besten Soli aus den geistlichen Werke von Bach, Händel und Haydn. Die Texte sind in der Originalsprache gegeben, verfügen teilweise aber über Übersetzungen ins Deutsche, Italienische oder E

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Book SynopsisThough some dismiss opera as old-fashioned, it shows no sign of disappearing from the world's stage. So why do audiences continue to flock to it? This title discovers the fanatics who haunt the legendary Colon Opera House in Buenos Aires, a key site for opera's globalization. It proposes ways of thinking about our relationship to art.Trade Review"Opera inspires passionate responses among audiences. This engaging, subtle book explains how one society shapes those passions. For Benzecry, operagoing in turn illuminates experiences of national honor, of belonging to a city, and of local loyalty to others. Wit and pleasure are not usually found in works of sociology, but they overflow these pages." (Richard Sennett, New York University)"

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Book SynopsisOffers a study of Verdi's operas in Florence in 1859, in the middle of the composer's career. This title features a systematic examination of Verdi's operas, it covered the twenty works produced between 1842 and 1857 - from Nabucco and Macbeth to Il trovatore, La traviata, and Aroldo.Trade Review"Abramo Basevi's The Operas of Giuseppe Verdi represents an extraordinary testimony to a new and important way of writing music criticism in mid-nineteenth-century Italy, and Basevi's terminology and expressions have served as the foundations for influential analytical methods. This translation is polished, elegant, and eminently accessible to a modern reader." -Francesco Izzo, University of Southampton Abramo Basevi (1818-85) was a composer, music promoter, scholar, and critic who played a major role in the cultural life of nineteenth-century Florence. He published extensively on music and philosophy and founded the periodical L'armonia, in which his study of Verdi's operas first appeared. Edward Schneider studied music at Oxford and has translated several books on music and cooking. Stefano Castelvecchi is a lecturer in music at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of St John's College, Cambridge. He is the editor of critical editions of works by Rossini and Verdi and the author of Sentimental Opera: Questions of Genre in the Age of Bourgeois Drama."

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Book SynopsisArtists today are at a crossroads. With funding for the arts and humanities endowments perpetually under attack, and school districts all over the United States scrapping their art curricula altogether, the place of the arts in our civic future is uncertain to say the least. At the same time, faced with the problems of the modern worldfrom water shortages and grave health concerns to global climate change and the now constant threat of terrorismone might question the urgency of this waning support for the arts. In the politically fraught world we live in, is the felt experience even something worth fighting for? In this soul-searching collection of vignettes, Patrick Summers gives us an adamant, impassioned affirmative. Art, he argues, nurtures freedom of thought, and is more necessary now than ever before. As artistic director of the Houston Grand Opera, Summers is well positioned to take stock of the limitations of the professional arts worlda world where the conversation revolves

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Book SynopsisDuring the middle phase of his career, Guiseppe Verdi adopted new compositional procedures to create some of his best-known works. Focusing on the operas he composed during this period, this volume explores Verdi's work from three interlinked perspectives.Table of ContentsAcknowledgments List of Abbreviations Introduction: Toward an Understanding of Verdi's Middle Period Martin Chusid 1: New Sources for Stiffelio: A Preliminary Report Philip Gossett 2: Compositional Techniques in Stiffelio: Reading the Autograph Sources Kathleen Kuzmick Hansell 3: "A Monk and At Least Some New Things": Verdi, Cammarano, and L'assedio di Firenze Carlo Matteo Mossa 4: "Insolite forme," or Basevi's Garden Path Roger Parker 5: Ottocento Opera as Cultural Drama: Generic Mixtures in Il trovatore James Hepokoski 6: "Something's Been Done to Make Room for Choruses": Choral Conception and Choral Construction in Luisa Miller Markus Engelhardt 7: A New Source for El trovador and Its Implications for the Tonal Organization of Il trovatore Martin Chusid 8: "Proud, Indomitable, Irascible": Allegories of Nation in Attila and Les Vepres siciliennes Mary Ann Smart 9: Masking Music: A Reconsideration of Light and Shade in Un ballo in maschera Elizabeth Hudson 10: "La dama velata": Act II of Un ballo in maschera Harold Powers 11: Meter, Character, and Tinta in Verdi's Operas David Rosen 12: Aspects of Tempo in Verdi's Early and Middle-Period Italian Operas Roberta Montemorra Marvin 13: The Violin Director and Verdi's Middle-Period Operas Linda B. Fairtile List of Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisDuring the middle phase of his career, Guiseppe Verdi adopted new compositional procedures to create some of his best-known works. Focusing on the operas he composed during this period, this volume explores Verdi's work from three interlinked perspectives.

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Book SynopsisProvides a look behind the scenes into the world of early 18th-century Italian opera. Based on a store of recovered documents, mainly the personal papers of Luca Casimiro degli Albizzi, this social history illustrates the complexities of staging opera in the 1720s and '30s.

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Book SynopsisExplores a variety of fields, considering questions of operatic textuality, dramaturgical practice, and performance theory. This book intends to initiate a dialogue between scholars of music, literature, and performance by addressing questions raised in each field in a manner that influences them all.Trade Review"Levin is one of the few scholars who functions effectively as both a literary critic in the university and a practical dramaturg in the opera house. His fascinating book demonstrates how critical readings of music and text can generate stagings that challenge and compel.... An indispensable guide." - Philip Gossett "Intelligent and lucidly written, Unsettling Opera opens up new and exciting vistas for thinking and writing about opera.... A book that is sure to become required reading for all those interested in the study - and performance - of opera." - German Studies Review"

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Book SynopsisThis analysis of Wagner’s vexed legacy is heightened by the author’s own experience as a dramaturg working on Wagner at the Berlin State Opera.

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Book SynopsisSet in the American West during the California Gold Rush, La fanciulla del West marked a significant departure from Giacomo Puccini's previous and best- known works. Puccini and the Girl is the first book to explore this important but often misunderstood opera that became the earliest work by a major European composer to receive an American premiere when it opened at New York's Metropolitan Opera House in 1910. Adapted from American playwright David Belasco's Broadway production, The Girl of the Golden West, Fanciulla was Puccini's most consciously modern work, and its Met debut received mixed reviews. Annie J. Randall and Rosalind Gray Davis base their account of its creation on previously unknown letters from Puccini to his main librettist, Carlo Zangarini. They mine musical materials, newspaper accounts, and rare photographs and illustrations to tell the full story of this controversial opera. Puccini and the Girl considers the production and reception of Puccini's cowboy opera in

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Book SynopsisTrade Review“The Comedians of the King has the potential to be recognized as a central work on eighteenth-century musical culture. Doe approaches the subject through a mingling of social and political perspectives, keying into the major questions that have arisen about the last decades of the Old Regime in France. This book offers an intriguing discussion about how we might interpret the evolution of public life by looking at it in interdisciplinary perspective.” -- William Weber, California State University, Long Beach“The richness of the book’s vision is remarkable: its elegant syntheses offer a multiple picture of a key operatic genre from its modern formation to mature survival in the age of Wagner. Musical theater studies have needed something like this for a generation now, and Doe has written a persuasive and pleasurable account of the underlying tensions between a ‘national genre’ and the ebb and flow of national politics.” -- David Charlton, Royal Holloway, University of London“Skillfully combining detailed study of a wide range of works with institutional history and royal patronage, The Comedians of the King will transform our understanding of a key chapter in the history of lyric theater. A noteworthy feature of Doe’s work is her ability to weave the political dimension of her narrative with institutional and stylistic developments in opéra comique. Meticulously researched and persuasively argued, this major study is essential reading.” -- Mark Darlow, University of Cambridge“The Comedians of the King provides a fascinating and nuanced account of the process by which the opéra comique, with its humble origins in the Parisian fairgrounds, became the cosmopolitan emblem of l’Europe française and an important vehicle for courtly propaganda. Clearly and compellingly, Doe tells the story of the opéra comique alongside the story of a queen, Marie Antoinette, whose tastes and efforts lay behind its transformation. The result is a book that amplifies our understanding of not only the genre but also the social ambivalences and contradictions it reflected on the eve of the French Revolution.” -- Georgia Cowart, Case Western Reserve University"One of the most valuable contributions of The Comedians of the King is to have integrated a deep dive into the business side of opéra-comique and the administrative machinery of culture, which made it possible for the genre to flourish, with an exploration of the artistic innovations and successes that it accomplished during the final decades of the eighteenth century. As a result of this capacious approach, Julia Doe captures in exemplary fashion the full complexity and paradoxes of the genre’s expansion in late eighteenth-century France. . . . The Comedians of the King will have a lasting impact on the study of eighteenth-century French musical culture and on scholars who, following Doe, hope to ground their work in a robust interdisciplinary methodology." * Journal of the American Musicological Society *"Groundbreaking. . . . Doe’s book presents a new historical account that explains how an originally operatic genre of secondary rank thrived and then outlived a major phase of the Bourbon monarchy. The Comedians of the King presents a freshly conceived continuity of operatic genre through major historic changes." * Music and Letters *"The overarching aim of Doe’s revised story of the opéra-comique is to offer, in her words, a framework that can better ‘match the nuance of the theatrical world it confronts.' Specifically, she hopes ‘to temper the assumed polarities of opera comique and tragédie lyrique; to deepen our understanding of these genre’s political functions; and to better capture the musical complexity, diversity, and contradictions of a society in the process of radical change.' I think the book she has created does achieve these goals, and I know my understanding of the opéra-comique, its social world and its political entanglements is much richer for it." * Eighteenth Century Music *"Doe demonstrates how librettists and composers came to test the limits of this genre by turning it into an alternative to Tragédie lyrique for the elite, while explaining how opéra-comique was exploited in the construction of the cultivated public image of the monarchy. This contribution is all the more important as it offers a nuanced picture of the aesthetic and musical evolutions of a complex genre that contributed to the construction of a genre éminemment national in the nineteenth century." -- Maxime Margollé * H-France Review *Table of ContentsEditorial Principles Introduction Institutional History Dialogue Opera and the Cosmopolitan “Revolution” The Politics of Genre 1. Opéra Comique and the Legacy of Colbert Comic Theater and the Querelle des Bouffons Theater and the NationLa Nouvelle Troupe New Rivalries 2. Character, Class, and Style in the Lyric DrameBienséance in Ancien Régime Opera Opéra Comique and the Drame Romance and Refinement Recitative for the Peuple Lyric Drame at the Opéra 3. The Musical Revolutions of Marie Antoinette The Musical Patronage of a Habsburg QueenTragédie Lyrique and Its Parodies// Italian Opera at the French Court Despotism and Privilège 4. The Decadence of the Pastoral Pastoral Living at the Petit Trianon “Private” Pastorals: The Troupe des Seigneurs Ceremonial Pastorals for Court and Capital The Pastoral as Adaptation: C. S. Favart’s Ninette à la cour 5. “Heroic” Comedy on the Eve of 1789 Opera and Revolution at the Salle Favart The Development of “Heroic” Comedy The “Heroic” Sargines Continuity and Rupture 6. Epilogue: The Foundation of a “People’s” Art Richard Coeur de Lion: The First Fifty YearsRichard Coeur de Lion: The First Hundred Years Conclusions: Richard Coeur de Lion and the Revolutionary Centennial Acknowledgments Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisFeasting and Fasting in Opera shows that the consumption of food and drink is an essential component of opera, both on and off stage. In this book, opera scholar Pierpaolo Polzonetti explores how convivial culture shaped the birth of opera and opera-going rituals until the mid-nineteenth century, when eating and drinking at the opera house were still common. Through analyses of convivial scenes in operas, the book also shows how the consumption of food and drink, and sharing or the refusal to do so, define characters' identity and relationships. Feasting and Fasting in Opera moves chronologically from around 1480 to the middle of the nineteenth century, when Wagner's operatic reforms banished refreshments during the performance and mandated a darkened auditorium and absorbed listening. The book focuses on questions of comedy, pleasure, embodiment, and indulgencelooking at fasting, poisoning, food disorders, body types, diet, and social, ethnic, and gender identitiesin both tragic aTrade Review”Polzonetti allows himself some nostalgia for the world we have lost, including the experience of eating at the opera, and speculates that operagoers of the past may have possessed ‘a better economy of attention’, which ‘did not include pretending to be engaged when they were not ‘." * Times Literary Supplement *"Feasting and Fasting in Opera is a highly singular book, which is to be expected given that gastromusicology—itself a highly singular term—is associated with one person and one person alone. Pierpaolo Polzonetti has set out to explore how convivial pleasures animated life on both sides of the boundary separating the stage from the world, a boundary that, as he demonstrates, was far more porous before Wagner tacked a 'no food or drink' sign to the door at Bayreuth and locked us all in the dark." * Journal of the American Musicological Society *"Producers of modern entertainments should find useful information about alternative uses of food and drinks, especially if they are considering re-introducing feasting into operatic performances. Thus, this book is for researchers in this field and for opera-buffs." * Pennsylvania Literary Journal *"Brilliant. . . [Polzonetti] demonstrates in delectable prose that food and drink–including how and when they are consumed, and situations in which an individual refrains from eating or refuses to dine with another—are central to a major Western cultural institution: opera." * The Arts Fuse *"The meat of the book is the role of food and drink in an opera’s narrative and music." * UC Davis College of Letters and Science *"Feasting and Fasting in Opera constitutes a novel and welcome link of musicology and food studies. . . Further, it reminds readers how gastronomic pleasures were once blended with the opera going experience, an infusion we might do well to reinstate." * Gastronomica *“Who knew that food and opera are, and have always been, intimately connected? With his humanistic learning, linguistic virtuosity, and trademark tasty wit, Polzonetti takes us from classical texts to cannibalism and on to Callas. Historical recipes are a bonus for readers interested in a more multi-modal experience of Polzonetti’s brilliant work.” -- Mary Hunter, Bowdoin College“Opera and feasting go splendidly together: we want to combine an evening at the opera with a good dinner, even if we are no longer allowed, as we once were, to take our refreshments during a performance. Even so, no one until now has explored the proximity of opera and food in such depth and with such illuminating insights as Pierpaolo Polzonetti. This is the book to turn to if you want to understand that we owe the birth of opera not only to the learned disputations in Renaissance academies, but also to the elaborate multi-media banqueting practices of the period. Polzonetti is attuned to the significance of what and how the audiences ate during performances until the practice was eliminated during the nineteenth century, victim of middle-class propriety. He is just as attuned to the significance of what and how was consumed by the protagonists of Italianate opera from Monteverdi through Mozart, to Verdi and Puccini. This book offers a feast as delicious as it is nutritious, but be forewarned: reading it will make you hungry.” -- Karol Berger, Stanford University“Polzonetti cleverly weaves together the history of opera with a beloved culture of delicious Italian food, and then some!” -- Francesca Zambello, Artistic and General Director of The Glimmerglass Festival and Artistic Director of the Washington National Opera“Food and the opera have certainly always gone together—before, during, and after the show. Today, eating at the opera is no longer considered respectful, but I wouldn’t be surprised if some of those restrictions are lifted in the near future. Theatergoers would be jealous of the spreads that are backstage in the dressing room areas, and even the little snacks that some performers hide in their costumes in case of an emergency. I just love this book. It’s making me hungry!” -- Nathan Gunn, co-director, Lyric Theatre at Illinois

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Book SynopsisDon Giovanni Captured considers the life of a single opera, engaging with the entire history of its recorded performance. Mozart's opera Don Giovanni has long inspired myths about eros and masculinity. Over time, its performance history has revealed a growing trend toward critiquean increasing effort on the part of performers and directors to highlight the violence and predatoriness of the libertine central character, alongside the suffering and resilience of his female victims. In Don Giovanni Captured, Richard Will sets out to analyze more than a century's worth ofrecorded performances of the opera, tracing the ways it has changed from one performance to another and from one generation to the next. Will consults audio recordings, starting with wax cylinders and 78s, as well as video recordings, including DVDs, films, and streaming videos. As Will argues, recordings and other media shape our experience of opera as much as live performance does. Seen as a historical record, opera recordings are also a potent reminder of the refusal of works such as Don Giovanni to sit still. By choosing a work with such a rich and complex tradition of interpretation, Will helps us see Don Giovanni as a standard-bearer for evolving ideas about desire and power, both on and off the stage.Trade Review"A fascinating new book by the musicologist Richard Will, 'Don Giovanni' Captured, reviews and analyzes the history of recordings of the opera, dating back to the age of early phonograph records at the beginning of the twentieth century. . . Don Giovanni, an opera that is almost entirely set at night, is certainly a dark comedy, if it is a comedy at all, and Will’s study of its exceptionally varied recording history suggests all the different shades of light and darkness that constitute the moral chiaroscuro of this elusive work." * New York Review of Books *“Will combines social sensitivity with a rare trove of historical perceptions that will prove rewarding to readers who have some familiarity with Mozart’s score. His analysis of the changing sound and use of recitative, like his illustration of the crucial role of conductors, is especially enriching.” * Opera News *"Musicologist Richard Will’s fascinating study, Don Giovanni Captured, examines the way Mozart and Da Ponte’s opera has been heard and seen since the birth of recorded sound... For those of us who care about opera, Don Giovanni Captured is a fascinating book." * New York Journal of Books *“Richard Will’s ‘Don Giovanni’ Captured is a welcome addition to approaches to Mozart’s masterpiece, so often marooned in constraining music-critical discourse or run aground in moral debates. Armed now with Will’s multiple accounts of audio and visual recordings, we have a richly mediated history that will disrupt how we think about operas as ‘works’ while superseding more insular and less historical analyses. ‘Don Giovanni’ Captured, by building on a lively archive of performed recordings, will greatly expand the horizons of how we teach and think about this incomparable work.” * Martha Feldman, University of Chicago *“This is a highly original book, one of the first to devote detailed and sustained attention to the history of a work’s recorded interpretation. It is quite astonishing to think that nothing of the sort has existed until now, given that we have lived with recordings for well over a century. ‘Don Giovanni’ Captured constitutes a most welcome and timely addition to the literature on Don Giovanni, Mozart’s operas, the genre of opera, and indeed the entire field of musicology.” * Emanuele Senici, University of Rome La Sapienza *"This is a fascinating and long-overdue study of Mozart's opera Don Giovanni as it has been presented in recorded form, both aurally and visually . . . Highly recommended." * Choice *"This insightful and original study illuminates fundamental trends in the performance of Mozart over the past 125 years, while also exploring the history of the recording industry as well as demonstrating the implications of performance choices for understanding the opera’s many complexities." * Early Music America *Table of ContentsNote to Readers List of Tables List of Figures Introduction Part I Clouds of Feeling: Excerpt Audio Recordings 1 Imagining Excerpts 2 Rhetorics of Seduction 3 Demons and Dandies 4 All Too Human Part II Invented Works: Complete Audio Recordings 5 The Virtual Stage 6 Cruel Laughter 7 Dancing in Time Part III Partial Visions: Video Recordings 8 Zooming In, Gazing Back 9 Trauma Retold 10 Libertines Punished Acknowledgments Notes Discography Videography Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisMessa da Requiem is the fourth work to be published in The Works of Giuseppe Verdi. Following the strict requirements of the series, this edition is based on Verdi's autograph and other authentic sources, and has been reviewed by a distinguished editorial boardPhilip Gossett (general editor), Julian Budden, Martin Chusid, Francesco Degrada, Ursula Günther, Giorgio Pestelli, and Pierluigi Petrobelli. It is available as a two-volume set: a full orchestral score and a critical commentary. The appendixes include two pieces from the compositional history of the Requiem: an early version of the Libera me, composed in 1869 as part of a collaborative work planned as a memorial to Rossini; and the Liber scriptus, which in the original score of the Manzoni memorial Requiem was composed as a fugue in G minor. The score, which has been beautifully bound and autographed, is printed on high-grade paper in an oversized format. The introduction to the score discusses the work's genesis, instrumentatio

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Book SynopsisThis critical edition presents the 1854 version as the main score, and also makes available the full score and the original 1853 settings of the revised pieces. For this text Fabrizio della Seta used the composer's autograph and many secondary sources, but also Verdi's previously unknown sketches.

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Book SynopsisProvides information on the music, libretto, and major roles of operas and music theater works by more that one hundred modern American composers, and includes selections from reviews of each work.

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Book SynopsisTraces the developments in the evolution of musical drama. This book aims to reveal the genre's beginnings in the seventeenth century and its progress. It examines the standard performance repertoire and works considered important for the genre's development. It also presents an investigation of opera from Eastern European countries and Finland.Trade ReviewWhether it be Monteverdi or Gluck or Wagner, no saner guide than Grout can be recommended The Times Literary Supplement (of earlier edition) Combines learning with a grace of expression seldom encountered in works of this kind. The subject is treated in greater detail than the word 'short'might indicate. Saturday Review (of earlier edition) A Short History of Opera is perhaps one of the best known and most widely circulated texts on the history of this art form...This is a vitally important book, and it is likely to be one of the first places students, researchers, and fans will consult. -- Tom Kaufman The Opera QuarterlyTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface to the Fourth Edition Introduction Part I. Music and Drama to the End of the Sixteenth Century 1. The Lyric Theater of the Greeks 2. Medieval Dramatic Music 3. The Immediate Forerunners of Opera Part II. The Seventeenth Century 4. The Beginnings: Opera in Florence and Mantua 5. Other Early Seventeenth-Century Italian Court Operas, Including the First Comic Operas in Florence and Rome 6. Italian Opera in the Later Seventeenth Century in Italy 7. Seventeenth-Century Italian Opera in German-Speaking Lands 8. Early German Opera 9. Opera in France from Lully to Charpentier 10. Opera in England Part III. The Eighteenth Century 11. Masters of the Early Eighteenth Century 12. Opera Seria: General Characteristics 13. Opera Seria: The Composers 14. The Operas of Gluck 15. The Comic Opera of the Eighteenth Century 16. The Operas of Mozart and His Viennese Contemporaries Part IV. The Nineteenth Century 17. The Turn of the Century 18. Grand Opera 19. Opera Comique, Operetta, and Lyric Opera 20. Italian Opera of the Primo Ottocento: Rossini, Donizetti, Verdi, and Their Contemporaries 21. The Romantic Opera in Germany 22. The Operas of Wagner 23. The Later Nineteenth Century: France, Italy, Germany, and Austria Part V. Other National Traditions of Opera from the Seventeenth to the Early Twentieth Centuries 24. National Traditions of Opera Part VI. The Twentieth Century 25. Introduction / Opera in France and Italy 26. Opera in the German-Speaking Countries 27. National Traditions in Russia and Neighboring Countries; Central and Eastern Europe; Greece and Turkey; the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland; Spain, Portugal, and Latin America 28. Opera in the British Isles; Canada; Australia and New Zealand(r)MDBRO (r)MDNMO 29. Opera in the United States Appendix: Chinese Opera List of Abbreviations Bibliography Sources and Translations of Musical Examples Index

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Book SynopsisDiving into the philosophical depths of Thomas Mann's beloved novella, as imagined in words, music, and film.Trade ReviewPhilip Kitcher's book is a profession of love: for Mann's novella, for Mahler's music, and for the commitment to ideas and reflections on life that a certain current of German culture represented in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. One senses that Kitcher has so completely immersed himself in the works of Mann, Mahler's music, their biographies, and to an extent the works by Britten and Visconti, that he speaks from within these works and lives. -- Mark M. Anderson, Columbia University Unusually rich, rewarding, and astounding in its range, Deaths in Venice asks important philosophical questions-about art's demands on its practitioners, its connections to the rest of life, and the possibility of endowing our short, evanescent lives with some lasting significance. More than reaching conclusions, these works provide beginnings: examples of new human possibilities that are not to be imitated but transcended-and that, in large part, is how the book itself proceeds. This is much more than a work on the philosophy of art: it does philosophy with art. -- Alexander Nehamas, Princeton University Deaths in Venice is a thorough discussion of the possible relation of literature, and art in general, to philosophical thinking. It is this double intensity of perspectives-a double intensity that is never sacrificed in the one or the other direction-that makes reading the book a unique experience. -- Rudiger Campe, Yale University Deaths in Venice is to the twenty-first century what Nietzsche's literary and musical criticism was to the nineteenth: a philosopher's profound, shrewd, learned, sharp-eyed, and humane interpretation of art, which is also a profound interpretation of daily life. Starting from the doomed, lonely passion of Thomas Mann's Aschenbach, Philip Kitcher explores three millennia of thinking and the hidden mysteries of the individual mind as it confronts itself, its neighbors, and the universe. -- Edward Mendelson, Columbia University [An] outstanding, intellectually agile book, which sheds so much fresh light on Mann's work and on the philosophical questions that it explores. -- Ritchie Robertson Times Literary Supplement Original and thought provoking... [Deaths in Venice] is a delight to read, and Kitcher's deep commitment to humanism and his passion for art radiate contagiously from every page. -- Iris Vidmar Philosophy and LiteratureTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface List of Abbreviations A Note on Translations 1. Discipline 2. Beauty 3. Shadows Notes Index

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Book SynopsisDiving into the philosophical depths of Thomas Mann's beloved novella, as imagined in words, music, and film.Trade ReviewPhilip Kitcher's book is a profession of love: for Mann's novella, for Mahler's music, and for the commitment to ideas and reflections on life that a certain current of German culture represented in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. One senses that Kitcher has so completely immersed himself in the works of Mann, Mahler's music, their biographies, and to an extent the works by Britten and Visconti, that he speaks from within these works and lives. -- Mark M. Anderson, Columbia University Unusually rich, rewarding, and astounding in its range, Deaths in Venice asks important philosophical questions-about art's demands on its practitioners, its connections to the rest of life, and the possibility of endowing our short, evanescent lives with some lasting significance. More than reaching conclusions, these works provide beginnings: examples of new human possibilities that are not to be imitated but transcended-and that, in large part, is how the book itself proceeds. This is much more than a work on the philosophy of art: it does philosophy with art. -- Alexander Nehamas, Princeton University Deaths in Venice is a thorough discussion of the possible relation of literature, and art in general, to philosophical thinking. It is this double intensity of perspectives-a double intensity that is never sacrificed in the one or the other direction-that makes reading the book a unique experience. -- Rudiger Campe, Yale University Deaths in Venice is to the twenty-first century what Nietzsche's literary and musical criticism was to the nineteenth: a philosopher's profound, shrewd, learned, sharp-eyed, and humane interpretation of art, which is also a profound interpretation of daily life. Starting from the doomed, lonely passion of Thomas Mann's Aschenbach, Philip Kitcher explores three millennia of thinking and the hidden mysteries of the individual mind as it confronts itself, its neighbors, and the universe. -- Edward Mendelson, Columbia University [An] outstanding, intellectually agile book, which sheds so much fresh light on Mann's work and on the philosophical questions that it explores. -- Ritchie Robertson Times Literary Supplement Original and thought provoking... [Deaths in Venice] is a delight to read, and Kitcher's deep commitment to humanism and his passion for art radiate contagiously from every page. -- Iris Vidmar Philosophy and LiteratureTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface List of Abbreviations A Note on Translations 1. Discipline 2. Beauty 3. Shadows Notes Index

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Beverly Sills came along at the perfect moment, quenching the public's thirst for a bona fide STAR. Now this book comes along at the perfect moment to quench this generation's thirst for insight into what made her shine so radiantly."--Joyce DiDonato"Guy's study goes well beyond the operatic stage or record studio to consider her subject's broad appeal and popularity."--ARSC Journal "Guy's refreshing book offers a timely contrast between the cultural backdrop of the 20th century and that of the present… This is a captivating work on Sill's unique, spellbinding artistry. Highly recommended."--Choice "An exhaustively researched, thoughtful, well-written treatment of one of the most important and beloved musicians the U.S. has ever produced."--Timothy D. Taylor, author of The Sounds of Capitalism: Advertising, Music, and the Conquest of Culture"What stays with one most about Guy's study is the passion behind it, and the way it evokes a time in which an opera could be that relevant to so many."--Opera News“Nancy Guy’s The Magic of Beverly Sills couldn’t be more timely. In an era when opera needs stars, the author has given us a fascinating, comprehensive look at the elusive magic of an artist who enchanted not only opera devotees, but the entire nation."--Renée Fleming"Frequently, biographies of opera singers are basically gushing with enthusiasm and overstated personal opinions. This book avoids those pitfalls and adds important scholarly information about how to think about an opera singer, her roles, and her fans."--Naomi André, coeditor of Blackness in Opera"Guy's elegant biography gets to the heart of Sills's magnetic stage presence and parses the performer's power to mesmerize audiences with ineffable and poignant cultural magic."--Jill Dolan, author of The Feminist Spectator in Action: Feminist Criticism for the Stage and Screen

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Book SynopsisAwards:Irving Lowens Award, Society for American Music (SAM), 2019Music in American Culture Award, American Musicological Society (AMS), 2018Trade ReviewIrving Lowens Award, Society for American Music (SAM), 2019 Music in American Culture Award, American Musicological Society (AMS), 2018 Certificate of Merit for Best Historical Research in Recorded Country, Folk, Roots, or World Music, Association for Recorded Sound Collections (ARSC), 2018 Outstanding Achievement in Humanities and Cultural Studies: Media, Visual, and Performance Studies, Association for Asian American Studies (AAAS), 2019 "Detailed, historically sound, and entertaining . . . Chinatown Opera Theater in America is an extraordinary accomplishment, and its many revelations open a world unseen for nearly a century. The glory that was is now again seen, as Chinatown Opera Theater puts the spotlight on the high achievements of the early Chinese American community that is too often portrayed otherwise in American history." --International Examiner"Chinatown Opera Theater, with its new global knowledge, provides in that sense a compelling alternative space in which to contemplate -- for opera studies and the academy of which it is a part -- the ongoing and inescapable anxieties of Western-reflexive scholarship." --Cambridge Opera Journal"Rao's detailed and engaging study reminds us of the xenophobia that continues to mark the Asian American experience. This book is implicitly an act of resistance not only against erasure, but also against racist tropes that have existed in history and reverberate into the present." --Theatre Journal"Chinatown Opera Theater in North America is a treasure trove that celebrates the transnational development of Cantonese Opera in North America in the 1920s." --Studies in Theatre and Performance"Achieves a sharpness of focus and depth of detail that takes our understanding of the history of Cantonese opera in North America to a new level . . . Chinatown Opera Theater in North America is an excellent piece of historical scholarship, and a unique and original contribution to our knowledge of Chinese performing arts in the Americas."--Ethnomusicology Forum"Rao's book not only complements Wing Chung Ng's study of the rise of Cantonese Opera and Bell Yung's analysis of its creative process, but also constitutes a significant contribution to Asian-American Studies, Chinese Studies, and American music history."--China Review International"Chinatown Theater in North America represents a significant contribution in theater scholarship. It is a book that is sure to provoke further discussion among all those who have an interest either in Chinese opera or musicology or American history or cultural studies. There is much to impress and enjoy in this interestingly illustrated book, and it is a welcome study of the subject."--Studies in Theatre and Performance"Through her in-depth archival research and adept linguistic and musicological skills, [Rao] brings to light the importance of Chinese immigrant music making. . . . A significant contribution to our understanding of the history of music making, particularly in the United States."--Theatre Survey "Rao's book is an important text that should be included in musicology or ethnomusicology courses, not only for the historical and cultural reference that it brings to bear, but also for how the genre of Cantonese opera improves our understanding of the world today." --American Music Review "An engaging manifesto. . . . This book is an invaluable source for educators, students, and general readers." --Asian Theatre Journal "The story Rao lays out in this work is rich and complex....It is therefore a story that should be of great interest to many CHINOPERL readers." --CHINOPERL "The book is abundant in content and, most of all, admirable in the sense of connectivity Rao adroitly establishes." --Journal of the American Musicological Society "Reading Nancy Yunhua Rao's Chinatown Opera Theater in North America is a great treat. . . . Rao's work makes a crucial contribution to scholarship on Chinese theatre, specifically Cantonese opera, in the diaspora, as well as to larger scholarly discussions on transationalism." --World of Music "Chinatown Opera Theater in North America does nothing less than situate Cantonese opera firmly within the warp and weft of the American musical fabric. . . . All in all, Rao's study is a wonder." --Journal of the Society for American Music "Rao's elegant writing provides insight into the mind of a scholar and researcher. The insistence on lifting 'the silence' and undoing 'invisibility' results in an influential recalibration of narratives on the history of American music." --MUSICultures "Chinatown Opera Theater, with its new global knowledge, provides in that sense a compelling alternative space in which to contemplate -- for opera studies and the academy of which it is a part -- the ongoing and inescapable anxieties of Western-reflexive scholarship." --Cambridge Opera Journal "Comprehensively conceived, exhaustively researched, and clearly written, Rao’s book is an extraordinary achievement documenting a unique musical and theatrical genre in North American history. Showing how border crossing enriches the cultural tapestry of this land, it is a must-read for those interested in American music, theater, and social history."--Bell Yung, coeditor of Music and Cultural Rights

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Book Synopsis One of the most innovative composers of his generation, Mikel Rouse is known for a trilogy of operas that includes Dennis Cleveland and a gift for superimposing pop vernaculars onto avant-garde music. This memoir channels Rouse’s high energy personality into an exuberant account of the precarity and pleasures of artistic creation. Raconteur and starving artist, witty observer and acclaimed musician, Rouse emerged from the legendary art world of 1980s New York to build a forty-year career defined by stage and musical successes, inexhaustible creativity, and a support network of famous faces, loyal allies, and high art hustlers. Rouse guides readers through a working artists’ hardscrabble life while illuminating the unromantic truth that a project’s reception may depend on a talented cast and crew but can depend on reliable air conditioning. Candid and hilarious, The World Got Away is a one-of-a-kind account of a creative life fue

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Book SynopsisAwards:Irving Lowens Award, Society for American Music (SAM), 2019Music in American Culture Award, American Musicological Society (AMS), 2018Trade ReviewIrving Lowens Award, Society for American Music (SAM), 2019 Music in American Culture Award, American Musicological Society (AMS), 2018 Certificate of Merit for Best Historical Research in Recorded Country, Folk, Roots, or World Music, Association for Recorded Sound Collections (ARSC), 2018 Outstanding Achievement in Humanities and Cultural Studies: Media, Visual, and Performance Studies, Association for Asian American Studies (AAAS), 2019 "Detailed, historically sound, and entertaining . . . Chinatown Opera Theater in America is an extraordinary accomplishment, and its many revelations open a world unseen for nearly a century. The glory that was is now again seen, as Chinatown Opera Theater puts the spotlight on the high achievements of the early Chinese American community that is too often portrayed otherwise in American history." --International Examiner"Chinatown Opera Theater, with its new global knowledge, provides in that sense a compelling alternative space in which to contemplate -- for opera studies and the academy of which it is a part -- the ongoing and inescapable anxieties of Western-reflexive scholarship." --Cambridge Opera Journal"Rao's detailed and engaging study reminds us of the xenophobia that continues to mark the Asian American experience. This book is implicitly an act of resistance not only against erasure, but also against racist tropes that have existed in history and reverberate into the present." --Theatre Journal"Chinatown Opera Theater in North America is a treasure trove that celebrates the transnational development of Cantonese Opera in North America in the 1920s." --Studies in Theatre and Performance"Achieves a sharpness of focus and depth of detail that takes our understanding of the history of Cantonese opera in North America to a new level . . . Chinatown Opera Theater in North America is an excellent piece of historical scholarship, and a unique and original contribution to our knowledge of Chinese performing arts in the Americas."--Ethnomusicology Forum"Rao's book not only complements Wing Chung Ng's study of the rise of Cantonese Opera and Bell Yung's analysis of its creative process, but also constitutes a significant contribution to Asian-American Studies, Chinese Studies, and American music history."--China Review International"Chinatown Theater in North America represents a significant contribution in theater scholarship. It is a book that is sure to provoke further discussion among all those who have an interest either in Chinese opera or musicology or American history or cultural studies. There is much to impress and enjoy in this interestingly illustrated book, and it is a welcome study of the subject."--Studies in Theatre and Performance"Through her in-depth archival research and adept linguistic and musicological skills, [Rao] brings to light the importance of Chinese immigrant music making. . . . A significant contribution to our understanding of the history of music making, particularly in the United States."--Theatre Survey "Rao's book is an important text that should be included in musicology or ethnomusicology courses, not only for the historical and cultural reference that it brings to bear, but also for how the genre of Cantonese opera improves our understanding of the world today." --American Music Review "An engaging manifesto. . . . This book is an invaluable source for educators, students, and general readers." --Asian Theatre Journal "The story Rao lays out in this work is rich and complex....It is therefore a story that should be of great interest to many CHINOPERL readers." --CHINOPERL "The book is abundant in content and, most of all, admirable in the sense of connectivity Rao adroitly establishes." --Journal of the American Musicological Society "Reading Nancy Yunhua Rao's Chinatown Opera Theater in North America is a great treat. . . . Rao's work makes a crucial contribution to scholarship on Chinese theatre, specifically Cantonese opera, in the diaspora, as well as to larger scholarly discussions on transationalism." --World of Music "Chinatown Opera Theater in North America does nothing less than situate Cantonese opera firmly within the warp and weft of the American musical fabric. . . . All in all, Rao's study is a wonder." --Journal of the Society for American Music "Rao's elegant writing provides insight into the mind of a scholar and researcher. The insistence on lifting 'the silence' and undoing 'invisibility' results in an influential recalibration of narratives on the history of American music." --MUSICultures "Chinatown Opera Theater, with its new global knowledge, provides in that sense a compelling alternative space in which to contemplate -- for opera studies and the academy of which it is a part -- the ongoing and inescapable anxieties of Western-reflexive scholarship." --Cambridge Opera Journal "Comprehensively conceived, exhaustively researched, and clearly written, Rao’s book is an extraordinary achievement documenting a unique musical and theatrical genre in North American history. Showing how border crossing enriches the cultural tapestry of this land, it is a must-read for those interested in American music, theater, and social history."--Bell Yung, coeditor of Music and Cultural Rights

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewIn the last 20 years, scholarly research on opera has encompassed cultural, media, gender, psychoanalytic, and literary theories. With this book, Everett makes an important, impressive contribution to that scholarship. . . . Highly recommended. * Choice *[O]ne of the most satisfying aspects of Reconfiguring Myth is Everett's sensitive attention to the way different productions articulate an opera as historical drama, allegory, and myth; such case studies set a new standard in our understanding of contemporary opera as not only a multi-dimensional, but also a constantly changing theatrical experience. * Music and Letters *Table of ContentsPrefaceAcknowledgmentsList of Abbreviations1. Toward a Multimodal Discourse on Opera2. Osvaldo Golijov's Ainadamar: A Myth of "Wounded" Freedom3. Kaija Saariaho's Adriana Mater: A Narrative of Trauma and Ambivalence4. John Adams' Doctor Atomic: A Faustian Parable for the Modern Age?5. The Anti-hero in Tan Dun's The First EmperorEpilogue: Opera as Myth in the Global AgeGlossaryNotesBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisPerforming in a country rife with racism and segregation, the tenor Roland Hayes was the first African American man to reach international fame as a concert performer and one of the few artists who could sell out Town Hall, Carnegie Hall, Symphony Hall, and Covent Garden. His trailblazing career carved the way for a host of African American artists, including Marian Anderson and Paul Robeson. Performing the African American spirituals he was raised on, Hayes's voice was marked with a unique sonority which easily navigated French, German, and Italian art songs. A multiculturalist both on and off the stage, he counted among his friends George Washington Carver, Eleanor Roosevelt, Ezra Pound, Pearl Buck, Dwight Eisenhower, and Langston Hughes. This engaging biography spans the history of Hayes's life and career and the legacy he left behind as a musician and a champion of African American rights. It is an authentic, panoramic portrait of a man who was as complex as the music he performed.Trade ReviewLargely forgotten today outside specialist circles, the African-American tenor Roland Hayes (1887–1976) was a much admired and internationally celebrated artist during his lifetime. As the authors of this substantial and well-documented new biography suggest, a reluctance to broadcast and a relatively limited recording career have prevented wider circulation of his fame in our own day. . . The authors detail his long career meticulously, as well as his complicated private life. * BBC Music Magazine *Well researched, with several primary sources and newspapers cited, the volume includes 48 illustrations of Hayes and other musicians. . . . Highly recommended. * Choice *An impressive work of scholarship, shedding light on a significant figure in American music and the time in which he lived. * Epoch Times *What we have here is a thorough and well-documented account of the life of a most interesting artist, one who was both a racial pioneer and a fine interpreter of both European art music and African-American spirituals. * ARSC Journal *With moving contributions from tenor George Shirley and bass Simon Estes, this text captures the essence of [Hayes's] career thoughtfully compiled with the accuracy of historian Christopher Brooks and the music depth of baritone Robert Sims. This book is a wonderful journey through Hayes' performances, racial plight and acceptance. * Examiner.com *Offers a gripping, sensitive, and balanced story of this historical icon and musician. * The Atlanta Voice *Table of ContentsForewordIntroduction: "I'll Make Me a Man"Prologue1. A New Jerusalem (1887-1911)2. Roland's World in Boston (1911-1920)3. Roland Rules Britannia (1920-1921)4. "Le Rage de Paris" (1921-1922)5. You're Tired, Chile (1923)6. The Hayes Conquest (1923-1924)7. Roland and the Countess (1924-1926)8. The Conquest Slows (1926-1930)9. Hard Trials, Great Tribulations (1930-1935)10. Return to Europe (1936-1942)11. Rome, Georgia—194212. "You can tell the World about This!" (1942-1950)13. Struggles in Remaining Relevant (1950-1959)14. I Wanna Go Home (1960-1977)Epilogue: The Hayes Legacy (1977- )AfterwordRoland Hayes: RepertoireBibliographyNotesIndex

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Book SynopsisIn this comprehensive study of Olivier Messiaen's magnum opus, Saint François d'Assise, Vincent Perez Benitez examines the opera from both theological and musical-analytical perspectives to ask how Messiaen expresses his Catholic theology through his work.Trade ReviewThis well-researched book is wonderfully written with great clarity and organization, and provides a remarkable and original perspective on the work of the great French composer. -- Christopher E. Mehrens * Music Reference Services Quarterly *This volume fulfills Benitez's 'hope that it will serve as an intellectual springboard into the mind of one of the most creative musicians of the twentieth century and Messiaen's self-described 'synthesis of all that he had done up to that point in his career as a composer', the opera Saint François d'Assise." -- Melissa Cummins - Sam Houston State University * MLA NOTES *Table of ContentsPrefaceAcknowledgmentsNotes on the TextIntroduction: Setting the Stage for Messiaen's Compositional Summa1. Theology as Light in Saint François d'Assise2. A Theological Opera and Its Musical Themes3. Form as an Expression of the Beyond4. Chords and Colors: The Harmonic Vocabulary of Saint François d'Assise5. Analyzing the Musical Language of Saint François d'Assise6. Light, Freedom, and the Beauty of Creation: Birdsong in Saint François d'Assise7. Tonal-Dramatic Associations in Saint Francis's Spiritual Journey8. Saint Francis's Path toward the Numinous: A Tonal-Color NarrativeEpilogue: Saint François d'Assise as Religious Drama in a Contemporary WorldAppendix 1 GlossaryAppendix 2 Dramatic SynopsisNotesBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewUniquely, this volume gives us innovative translations, detailed comparisons and interdisciplinary analyses of all three texts detailing the journey from Carl Gozzi's fiaba, through Meyerhold/Soloviev/Vogak's Divertissement, to Prokofiev's opera. Previous literature mapped some of the changes, but none offered the comprehensive analyses we find in this book. . . . The tripartite structure of the book is the most logical in terms of the material and, together with the cited paired chapters, as well as reading chapters as stand-alone texts, allow a multi-focus use both for the specialist and the general reader. The editors are to be congratulated for their overall innovative approach and for making the work of many Italian and Russian scholars available in English. -- F Jane Schopf * Stanislavski Studies *Table of ContentsEditorial NotesList of Definitions and AbbreviationsList of IllustrationsList of Musical ExamplesPreface: How Not to Die Laughing in a Lethal Time, by Caryl EmersonAcknowledgmentsIntroduction, by Dassia N. Posner, Kevin Bartig, and Maria De SimonePart I: The Fiaba1. Reflective Analysis of the Fairy Tale The Love of Three Oranges, by Carlo Gozzi , by Maria De Simone2. The Love of Three Oranges, Venice 1761: A Theatrical Provocation, by Alberto Beniscelli3. A Short Note on the First Sacchi Company , by Giulietta Bazoli4. Gozzi's The Love of Three Oranges: A New Horizon of Expectations, by Domenico Pietropaolo5. Carlo Gozzi's Reactionary Imagination, by Ted Emery6. A Cultural Pastiche of Fantasy, Satire, and Citrus: Gozzi's The Love of Three Oranges in its German Afterlife, by Natalya BaldygaPart II: The Divertissement7. Love for Three Oranges. A Divertissement in Twelve Scenes, a Prologue, an Epilogue, and Three Interludes, by Konstantin Vogak, Vsevolod Meyerhold, and Vladimir Soloviev, by Dassia N. Posner8. Carlo Gozzi in The Journal of Doctor Dapertutto , by Raissa Raskina9. Meyerhold and the Russian Commedia dell'Arte Myth , by Vadim Shcherbakov10. The Miklashevsky Connection, by Laurence Senelick11. From Divertissement to Opera: Two Russian Oranges, by Julia GalaninaPart III: The Opera12. Love for Three Oranges, by Sergei Prokofiev , by Kevin Bartig13. Tsardom and Buttocks: From Empress Anna to Prokofiev's Fata Morgana, by Inna Naroditskaya14. Notes on the Musical Parody in Prokofiev's Three Oranges , by Natalia Savkina15. Notes on the Notes , by Simon A. Morrison16. Boris Anisfeld, an Alchemist of Color , by John E. Bowlt17. Oranges in Leningrad , by Kevin BartigList of ContributorsIndex

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"It is often authoritative and comprehensive; it is especially well informed on the origins of the libretto, Maeterlinck's philosophical and literary influences, and the collaborative processes between the playwright, the composer Paul Dukas, and the singer Georgette Leblanc. The tables of recordings, performances, and so on render this book an invaluable tool for researchers."—Laura Watson, author of Paul Dukas: Composer and Critic"This is as thorough an examination of Ariane et Barbe-bleue, in all its aspects, as one is likely to see. Generous appendixes with illustrations and historical documents round out the picture. An intriguing addition to the literature on music."—B. J. Murray, Miami UniversityTable of ContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. Ariane et Barbe-bleue: A Dramatic and Musical Overview, by Matthew Gordon Brown and Thomas Emil Homerin2. The Genesis of Ariane et Barbe-Bleue, by Matthew Gordon Brown3. Performing Ariane et Barbe-Bleue: From Premier to Orchestral Suite, by Matthew Gordon Brown4. A Feminist Opera? Women's Rights and Women's Wrongs in Maurice Maeterlinck's and Paul Dukas' Ariane and Bluebeard, by Jean Elisabeth Pedersen5. Maurice Maeterlinck and the Mystical Ariane, by Thomas Emil Homerin6. Maeterlinck and Plato's Cave, by Nicholas Gresens7. Ariane et Barbe-Bleue and the Legacy of Richard Wagner, by Matthew Gordon Brown8. Singing Ariane: An Interview with Katherine Ciesinski, by Katherine Ciesinski and Matthew Gordon Brown9. Bluebeard, or Female Curiosity? Not the Same Old Story, by Andrea G. Reithmayr10. Reflections on Comic Book Opera: P. Craig Russell's Ariane and Bluebeard, by Thomas Emil Homerin11. An Adaptation of an Adaptation: TableTopOpera's Live Production of Ariane and Bluebeard, by Matthew Gordon BrownAppendicesAlbert Flament, "'Ariane' dans les ruines de St-Wandrille," Femina 163 (1 November, 1907), 484–85. English translation by Sébastien Cornut.Henri Duvernois, "Les femmes de Barbe-Bleue," Femina 153 (1 June, 1907), 246–249. English translation by Sébastien Cornut.Lucien Fugère, "La vie du théâtre," Musica 55 (April 1907), 53–55. English translation by Sébastien Cornut.Paul Dukas, "Ariane et Barbe-Bleue," La Revue Musicale (numéro spécial) (May-June, 1936), 4–7. English translation by Timothy Scheie.Montrose J. Moses, "The Wife of Maurice Maeterlinck," Metropolitan Magazine 34 (March, 1912), 38–52.Georgette Leblanc-Maeterlinck, "The Later Heroines of Maurice Maeterlinck," Fortnightly Review 93 (January 1910), 48–56. English translation by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos.BibliographyContributorsIndex

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"It is often authoritative and comprehensive; it is especially well informed on the origins of the libretto, Maeterlinck's philosophical and literary influences, and the collaborative processes between the playwright, the composer Paul Dukas, and the singer Georgette Leblanc. The tables of recordings, performances, and so on render this book an invaluable tool for researchers."—Laura Watson, author of Paul Dukas: Composer and Critic"This is as thorough an examination of Ariane et Barbe-bleue, in all its aspects, as one is likely to see. Generous appendixes with illustrations and historical documents round out the picture. An intriguing addition to the literature on music."—B. J. Murray, Miami UniversityTable of ContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. Ariane et Barbe-bleue: A Dramatic and Musical Overview, by Matthew Gordon Brown and Thomas Emil Homerin2. The Genesis of Ariane et Barbe-Bleue, by Matthew Gordon Brown3. Performing Ariane et Barbe-Bleue: From Premier to Orchestral Suite, by Matthew Gordon Brown4. A Feminist Opera? Women's Rights and Women's Wrongs in Maurice Maeterlinck's and Paul Dukas' Ariane and Bluebeard, by Jean Elisabeth Pedersen5. Maurice Maeterlinck and the Mystical Ariane, by Thomas Emil Homerin6. Maeterlinck and Plato's Cave, by Nicholas Gresens7. Ariane et Barbe-Bleue and the Legacy of Richard Wagner, by Matthew Gordon Brown8. Singing Ariane: An Interview with Katherine Ciesinski, by Katherine Ciesinski and Matthew Gordon Brown9. Bluebeard, or Female Curiosity? Not the Same Old Story, by Andrea G. Reithmayr10. Reflections on Comic Book Opera: P. Craig Russell's Ariane and Bluebeard, by Thomas Emil Homerin11. An Adaptation of an Adaptation: TableTopOpera's Live Production of Ariane and Bluebeard, by Matthew Gordon BrownAppendicesAlbert Flament, "'Ariane' dans les ruines de St-Wandrille," Femina 163 (1 November, 1907), 484–85. English translation by Sébastien Cornut.Henri Duvernois, "Les femmes de Barbe-Bleue," Femina 153 (1 June, 1907), 246–249. English translation by Sébastien Cornut.Lucien Fugère, "La vie du théâtre," Musica 55 (April 1907), 53–55. English translation by Sébastien Cornut.Paul Dukas, "Ariane et Barbe-Bleue," La Revue Musicale (numéro spécial) (May-June, 1936), 4–7. English translation by Timothy Scheie.Montrose J. Moses, "The Wife of Maurice Maeterlinck," Metropolitan Magazine 34 (March, 1912), 38–52.Georgette Leblanc-Maeterlinck, "The Later Heroines of Maurice Maeterlinck," Fortnightly Review 93 (January 1910), 48–56. English translation by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos.BibliographyContributorsIndex

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Book SynopsisDiscusses Wagner's legacy in sound and on screenTrade Review[D]emands and deserves a commitment of time and space from a wide range of readers as they experience its transitions . . . and powerful enlightening moments. Vol. 64 2 Summer 2011 * Jrnl American Musicological Soc JAMS *[Wagner and Cinema] looks at the plethora of senses in which Wagner's music and different kinds of Wagnerian reception histories have informed cinematic production throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. ...Wagner and Cinema is a text that will no doubt be consulted for many years henceforward.Issue 24, 2012 -- Nathan Waddell * Scope *[T]he book . . . present[s] the reader with a strong and very varied attempt to discuss the relation between Wagner, opera and cinema and includes a vast array of densely detailed information covering large historical periods in many of its well-written essays.Issue 29 * Screening the Past *A useful resource for serious students of film, theater, and/or music, the book includes numerous photos, and helpful music notation enhances the text. . . . Recommended. * Choice *Wagner & Cinema provides a comprehensive discussion of its subject . . . [I]t offers an excellent introduction for scholars interested in Wagner's influence on film and offers a starting point for future studies. 34/2 (2011) * German Studies Review *The essays in this collection engage in a critical dialogue with existing studies—extending and renovating current theories related to the topic—and propose unexplored topics and new methodological perspectives.March 01, 2010 * Camero-Stylo *Table of ContentsForeword by Tony PalmerIntroduction: Why Wagner and Cinema? Tolkien Was Wrong \ Jeongwon JoePart 1. Wagner and the Silent Film 1. Wagnerian Motives: Narrative Integration and the Development of Silent Film Accompaniment, 1908–1913 \ James Buhler 2. Underscoring Drama—Picturing Music \ Peter Franklin 3. The Life and Works of Richard Wagner (1913): Becce, Froelich, and Messter \ Paul Fryer 4. Listening for Wagner in Fritz Lang's Die Nibelungen \ Adeline MuellerPart 2. Wagnerian Resonance in Film Scoring 5. The Resonances of Wagnerian Opera and Nineteenth-Century Melodrama in the Film Scores of Max Steiner \ David Neumeyer 6. Wagner's Influence on Gender Roles in Early Hollywood Film \ Eva Rieger 7. The Penumbra of Wagner's Ombra in Two Science Fiction Films from 1951: The Thing from Another World and The Day the Earth Stood Still \ William H. RosarPart 3. Wagner in Hollywood 8. "Soll ich lauschen?": Love-Death in Humoresque \ Marcia J. Citron 9. Hollywood's German Fantasy: Ridley Scott's Gladiator \ Marc A. Weiner 10. Reading Wagner in Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips (1944) \ Neil Lerner 11. Piercing Wagner: The Ring in Golden Earrings \ Scott D. PaulinPart 4. Wagner in German Cinema 12. Wagner as Leitmotif: The New German Cinema and Beyond \ Roger Hillman 13. The Power of Emotion: Wagner and Film \ Jeremy Tambling 14. Wagner in East Germany: Joachim Herz's Der fliegende Holländer (1964) \ Joy H. CalicoPart 5. Wagner beyond the Soundtrack 15. Nocturnal Wagner: The Cultural Survival of Tristan und Isolde in Hollywood \ Elisabeth Bronfen 16. Ludwig's Wagner and Visconti's Ludwig \ Giorgio Biancorosso 17. The Tristan Project: Time in Wagner and Viola \ Jeongwon Joe 18. "The Threshold of the Visible World": Wagner, Bill Viola, and Tristan \ Lawrence KramerPostlude: Looking for Richard: An Archival Search for Wagner \ Warren M. SherkEpilogue: Some Thoughts about Wagner and Cinema; Opera and Politics; Style and Reception \ Sander L. GilmanInterview with Bill Viola \ Jeongwon JoeFilmography \ Jeongwon Joe, Warren M. Sherk, and Scott D. PaulinList of ContributorsIndex

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Book SynopsisOne man's impact on the performing arts in RussiaTrade ReviewThis is a valuable and long overdue work that enriches an ignored but greatly influential artistic enterprise drawn from the era's greatest artistic figures, and sponsored and set together in dynamic collaborations by the ingenuity and tastes of Savva Mamontov. * Sineris *Haldey has performed a crucial service to scholarship and to everyone interested in this fascinating period.V.70.3 July 2011 * The Russian Review *Haldey, a musicologist at the University of Maryland, provides a close-up of what, remarkably, [Mamontov] accomplished and how and why. . . . [S]he manages to evoke successfully a larger than life man and his era. August 22, 2010 * The Reporter-Times *With extensive notes and 40 halftone photographs, this is an important work for Russian and turn-of-the-century cultural studies. Highly recommended.March 2011 * Choice *This fine, rigorously researched book should please anyone interested in the development of the arts in Russia. Opera NewsMarch 1, 2011 * Opera News *Haldey gives an evocative and detailed portrait of the era, drawing on letters, memoirs, contemporary criticism and reviews, and synthesizing important secondary literature in a variety of related fields . . . [This] should be required reading for all historians of Russian theatre. * Slavonic and East European Review *Hadley's research provides an effective reclaiming of the important . . . role played by Savva Mamontov and the MPO in the history of modernist theater in Russia. It should attract the interest of musicologists, visual art and theater historians, as well as social and cultural historians interested in the development of artistic modernism in late imperial Russia. * H-Russia *Haldey's fresh account of Mamontov's vital role in the creation of the modern Russian theater is striking for its originality, the depth of its research and analysis, and the detail it provides. * Slavic and East European Journal *Haldey deserves great credit for re-creating this lost world of art for its own sake and restoring it to its proper place in the pages of Russian history. * Revolutionary Russia *[Haldey's] book will change our understanding of Russian opera in the 'Silver Age.' It is the necessary—and overdue—complement to Braun's 1999 study, whose focus is on the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg. . . .67.4 June 2011 * Notes *Mamontov's Private Opera is a fascinating and detailed presentation—using existing primary source materials—of the power and influence that one man had on both Russian music history and international music history at the turn of the twentieth century. * Music Reference Services Quarterly *This is a bracing account of a time when faith in dramatic art was contagious—and worked wonders. * Slavic Review *Table of ContentsContentsAcknowledgmentsNote on Transliteration and TranslationAbbreviationsIntroduction1. The Silver Age and the Legacy of the 1860s2. Serving the Beautiful3. Echoes of Abramtsevo4. Visual Impressions5. Opera as Drama6. From Meiningen to Meyerhold7. Politics, Repertory, and the Market8. Faces of the EnterpriseAppendix A. Brief Chronology of Savva Mamontov's Life and CareerAppendix B. Selected Premieres and Revivals at the Moscow Private OperaNotesWorks CitedIndex

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Book SynopsisDocuments women's influence on popular culture in twentieth-century China by examining Yue opera. This title documents and analyzes the origins and development of the genre and its unique role in modern Chinese culture. It looks at Chinese women's struggle to control their lives, careers, and public images.Trade Review"Jin Jiang's groundbreaking book is by far the best study of women's Yue opera as a social and cultural history in any language. . . . fascinating and surprisingly accessible. . ." -- Liang Luo * China Review International *"This clearly written text will be useful to those interested in Chinese theatre, women and performance, and the history of modern China. . . . This book, rich in social and theatre history, puts this understudied genre center stage." -- Kathy Foley * Theatre History Studies *"A major contribution to Chinese theater, performance studies, and modern history. . . . It breaks new ground in existing scholarship on traditional Chinese opera . . . [and] draws needed attention to the intriguing question of women's culture and gender identity in cosmopolitan Shanghai during the Republican period." -- Xiaomei Chen * The Opera Quarterly *"Scholars and teachers who work in the fields of China's gender, cultural, and urban histories will commend its publication." -- Yuen Ting Lee * Canadian Journal of History, vol. XLVI *"The stories, people, plays, and films that are the legacy of Yue opera and which Jin Jiang so lovingly preserves in her book are a vital reminder of how deeply engrained our needs are for entertainment focusing on that universal theme: love." -- Andrew Field * American Historical Review *"Jin Jiang's study on the history of Yue opera is as thoughtful in its elucidation of social and political contexts as it is sympathetic in its intimate portraits of its protagonists, the actresses who created Yue opera…. the work provides an important addition to our understanding of the transformations of gender ideology and gendered praxis and performance in twentieth-century China. What is more, her history fully bridges-indeed, incorporates—the challenge that 1949 typically represents for historians of modern Chinese culture." * The Journal of Asian Studies *"The transformation of a rural, male dramatic form into an urban, female phenomenon lies at the heart of this stimulating study of 20th-century Shanghai culture. . . . Recommended." * Choice *"…women of Yue opera expressed modern urban feminine aspirations through the aesthetics and narratives of Yue opera. Such expressions represented the rise of feminine power in Shanghai and in Chinese society in general. This book should be welcomed by scholars in Chinese gender studies." * China Qaurterly *"This well-researched study examines a form of dialect opera that burst onto the scene in Shanghai in the 1920s, transformed itself under the aegis of its female stars in the 1930s and 1940s, eclipsed Bejing opera in the 1940s and maintained its predominance well into the 1980s. . . . This excellent study will be of interest to scholars and students of Chinese drama, urban popular culture, women's history, and gender studies. * Pacific Affairs *"Drawing on a wealth of written and oral sources the author effectively engages the subject from a cultural studies/feminist theory perspective to provide an outstanding example of how social and cultural dynamics can be examined through the lens of a performance tradition." * The Chinese Historical Review *Table of ContentsPreface Introduction | Opera, Gender, and the City 1. The Origins of Yue Opera 2. The Rise of Feminine Opera 3. Patrons and Patronage 4. Staging in the Public Arena 5. The Opera as History 6. A Feminine Aesthetics Conclusion Appendix | Interviews and Informants Notes Chinese Character Glossary References Index

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Book SynopsisThe story of how a trinity of California-based creatives pushed the boundaries to re-imagine a radical Tristan und Isolde opera for our times, resulting in a sensational major body of artwork by visionary American artist Bill Viola

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Book SynopsisThe Birth of an Opera offers illuminating insight into how operas are written and the personalities, incidents, and musical circumstances that have shaped their composition.Trade Review"Here are chapters of delight, elegantly and evocatively written by Rose, conjuring up the process of creation so as to make one eagerly turn or return to the music—and do so with heightened admiration and enjoyment." -- John Warrack, University of Oxford"In the world of opera the voices of librettists and composers, critics and witnesses, have never been so vividly or so ably assembled as in Michael Rose’s The Birth of an Opera, which takes the reader into the heart of the process by which great operas are made. These essays bring the composers’ partners, friends, enemies, and deepest thoughts to life. It is hard to imagine opera goers who would not be absorbed by the origins and background of their favorite operas, faithfully and lovingly set out as they are here." -- Hugh Macdonald, professor emeritus of music, Washington University in St. Louis"This is a delightful book! Michael Rose writes with grace and charm, his prose light as a feather and entirely accessible to someone approaching this art form for the first time. And yet what passion, what thought and experience lie behind his words, his astonishing quotations, and the subtle but always loyal judgments he delivers. Each of his fifteen chapters reads like a short story, sometimes funny, sometimes filled with twists and turns. But the cumulative effect is to place composers where they should be—at the very centre. For Rose, the musician is the dramatist." -- Gerard McBurney, creative director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's "Beyond the Score" series"Rose's entertaining book reveals new aspects of favorite operas for opera buffs and provides a nice introduction to opera for new listeners." -- Publisher's Weekly"Rather than retreading familiar ground with historical analysis and musical commentary, Rose produces an engaging script in which the individuals most closely concerned with each opera are seen to comment, debate and compromise. In this way Rose offers his readers a direct link to events that are otherwise beyond their reach, and he captures the often bizarre interactions of chance, genius, practical necessity and dogged determination that heralded the creation of opera’s most enduring and compelling masterpieces." -- Alexa B. Antopol - Opera America"An appealing invitation to lovers of opera to discover—or learn anew—how 15 imperishable works of genius came into being." -- John Check - The Wall Street Journal

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Book SynopsisFour centuries of opera through the stories they tell.Table of ContentsPart I: Experiencing Opera Chapter 1: Going to the Opera House Chapter 2: The Orchestra Plays Chapter 3: The Cast Appears Chapter 4: The Story Unfolds Part II: Opera of the 17th Century Chapter 5: Opera in Princely Courts: Florence and Mantua Monteverdi: Orfeo Chapter 6: Opera in Commercial Opera Houses: Venice Cavalli: Giasone Monteverdi: L'incoronazione di Poppea Chapter 7: National Opera: Paris and London Lully: Alceste, Atys, Armide Purcell: Dido and Aeneas Part III: Opera of the 18th Century Chapter 8: Opera on Classical Subjects Handel: Giulio Cesare in Egitto Rameau: Dardamus, Hippolyte et Aricie Gluck: Orfeo et Euridice, Alceste, the Iphigenia operas Chapter 9: Opera on Comic Subjects The Beggar's Opera Pergolesi: La serva padrona Mozart: The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte Part IV: Opera of the 19th Century Chapter 10: Opera on Themes of Political Conflict Grétry: Richard Coeur-de-Lion Beethoven: Fidelio Meyerbeer: Les Huguenots Bellini: Norma Verdi: Aida Musorgsky: Boris Godunov Chapter 11: Opera on Themes of Domestic Conflict Bizet: Carmen Rossini: The Barber of Seville Donizetti: Lucia di Lammermoor Verdi: La Traviata, Otello Puccini: La bohème Chapter 12: Opera on Legendary Themes Gounod: Faust Wagner: The Flying Dutchman, Lohengrin, Die Walküre Glinka: Ruslan and Lyudmila Rimsky-Korsakov: The Legend of Kitezh Dvorák: Rusalka Part V: Opera of the 20th Century and Beyond Chapter 13: Human-Interest Opera Janácek: Jenufa Berg: Wozzeck Gershwin: Porgy and Bess Britten: Peter Grimes Operas of Floyd and Heggie Shostakovich: The Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District Poulenc: Dialogues of the Carmelites Adams: The Death of Klinghoffer Chapter 14: Operas of Dreaming Saariaho: L'Amour de loin Debussy: Pelléas et Mélisande Strauss: Die Frau ohne Schatten Stravinsky: The Rake's Progress Messiaen: Saint Francis of Assisi Schoenberg: Moses and Aaron Operas of Thomson, Glass, and Davis Ligeti: Le Grand Macabre Ravel: L'Enfant et les Sortilèges Glossary Notes Works Cited Credits Index

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Book SynopsisAn original concept: in one volume, a study-size score of a major musical work, and a comprehensive body of tools for the study of that work.

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Book SynopsisHighlights the dynamism of twenty-first-century opera performance practice with regard to sexual violence, establishes methods to evaluate representations of sexual violence on the opera stage, and reframes the primary responsibility of opera critics and creators as being not to opera composers and librettists but to the public.Trade ReviewRape at the Opera: Staging Sexual Violence makes a substantial contribution to the body of updated, ethical criticism about opera narratives and productions. Given the intensified conversations around sexual violence in contemporary culture in general, Cormier’s critical assessment is a timely call for reflection on the responsibilities of staging opera today." - Kristi Brown-Montesano, Herb Albert School of Music, UCLA"Rape at the Opera is a compelling piece of scholarship with clear and engaging writing. Cormier's ethics of care—when it comes to staging—extends to an ethics of care for her reader as well. She presents nuanced analyses of the risks and benefits to staging sexual violence, providing a thoroughly interdisciplinary approach to opera." - Monica Hershberger, SUNY GenescoTable of Contents List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Staging Rape Myths in Don Giovanni 2. Salomeas Victim 3. Die EntfÜhrung aus dem Serail and the Limits of Critique 4: Rape in/as Warfare: The Perils of Allegory Conclusion Appendix: Don Giovanni Productions

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Book SynopsisDrawing upon a complex web of early modern sources and ancient texts, this study is a treatment of women, gender and sexuality in 17th-century opera. It explores the operatic manifestations of female chastity, power, transvestism, androgyny and desire.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations List of Tables Preface and Acknowledgments List of Abbreviations Editorial Principles Introduction 1. The Emblematic Woman 2. Bizzarrie Femminile: Opera and the Accademia degli Incogniti 3. Didone and the Voice of Chastity 4. "Disprezzata regina": Woman and Empire 5. The Nymph Calisto and the Myth of Female Pleasure 6. Semiramide and Musical Transvestism 7. Messalina la Meretrice: Envoicing the Courtesan Conclusions Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisIlluminates the diverse elements that constitute opera by focusing the investigation around three main categories: composition and production; words, music, and drama; and the interaction of society, genre, and aesthetics.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface to the English Edition Introduction Part 1 Genesis, Performance, and Reception 1 The Genesis of an Opera 2 Performance 3 Reception Part 2 Drama, Poetry, and Music 4 The Construction of a Drama 5 Space and Time 6 Poetic Expression and Musical Expression Part 3 French Opera: Society, Genre, and Aesthetics 7 The Parisian Operatic World 8 Genre 9 The Aesthetic Foundations of Nineteenth-Century French Opera Conclusion Appendix 1 The Sources of Bizet’s Les Pêcheurs de perles Appendix 2 The Versions of Les Pêcheurs de perles Appendix 3 Several States of the Beginning of the Act 2 Finale Appendix 4 Passages Cut in the Course of Performance Appendix 5 Performances and Daily Box-Office Receipts of the Théâtre-Lyrique,September 27–November 28, 1863 Appendix 6 The Staging of Les Pêcheurs de perles Appendix 7 Symmetrical Versification and Reformulation of the Text Biographical Notes on Composers Notes Index

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Book SynopsisExplores the female roles in Mozart's four most frequently performed operas, Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte, and Die Zauberflote. Each chapter looks at the music, libretto text, literary sources, and historical factors that give shape to a character, re-evaluating common assumptions and proposing fresh interpretations.Trade Review“An interesting, unique, well-written study.” * CHOICE *“Brown-Montesano has set out to write something that will be of value to directors and singers in search of a character and general opera lovers who simply want to understand more about Mozart. This lively, perceptive study succeeds brilliantly on all counts.” * Classical Music Magazine *Table of ContentsContents Acknowledgments Overture Act One: (Anti-)Heroines and Women on the Edge 1. Feminine Vengeance I: The Assailed/Assailant Donna Anna 2. Sisterhood and Seduction I: Abandonment and Rescue Donna Elvira 3. Class Survival Zerlina 4. Feminine Vengeance II: (Over)Powered Politics The Queen of the Night 5. Good Daughter, Good Wife Pamina 6. Woman's Identity I: Sacred and Profane The Three Ladies and Papagena Act Two: Sisterly Alliances and Sisters Subverted 7. Sisterhood and Seduction II: Friendship and Class Countess Almaviva and Susanna 8. Woman's Identity II: Loss and Legitimacy Marcellina and Barbarina 9. Sisterhood and Seduction III: Intimacy and Influence Fiordiligi and Dorabella 10. Survival Class Despina Notes Works Cited Index

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Book SynopsisThe Metropolitan has stood among the grandest of opera companies since its birth in 1883. Tracing the offstage/onstage workings of this famed New York institution, this title tells how the Met became and remains a powerful actor on the global cultural scene.Trade Review"A welcome addition to the annals of opera history. Opera fans will feast on the facts and famous figures that fill these pages." Library Journal "A valuable and readable history of the Met." -- Joseph Horowitz Wall Street Journal "An entertaining and serious contextualization of the state of the Metropolitan Opera today, as well as an emotionally and intellectually satisfying read." -- Weston Williams Christian Science Monitor "This volume tells of a grand operatic melodrama, though played out as often by general managers and unions as by prima donnas." BEST BOOKS OF 2014 -- Richard Fairman Financial Times "Passionate opera fans Charles and Mirella Affron have created a comprehensive, decade-by-decade history of the Metropolitan Opera House and its changing repertoire, from the inaugural 1883 Faust to Marian Anderson's Civil Rights era debut to the age of 'Live in HD"'simulcast. If the Phoenicia Festival of the Voice whetted your operatic appetite, here is a splendid multicourse meal." -- Nina Shengold Chronogram "This new history is an epic treat for the Metophile ... an exhaustively researched, updated, thoughtful Met Opera history. The successive directors' flaws and achievements are described with equanimity. It compellingly conveys the problems and the progress, the failures and the glories of the Metropolitan Opera." -- Carol L. Anderson Wagner Notes "The Affrons have filled a void with 'Grand Opera: The Story of the Met.' ... They have written a conscientious, readable history of this world-renowned opera company. Their writing style is elegant, fitting for the elegant Met." -- Bill Schwab The Missourian "Richly detailed ... For better or worse, where the Met goes, other companies follow; and as the Affrons' gracefully written and finely researched history so often reminds us, the history of the Met is frequently the history of opera itself." -- Ditlev Rindom Cambridge Humanities ReviewTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface Acknowledgments 1 * A Matter of Boxes, 1883--1884: Bel Canto 2 * Cultural Capital, 1884--1903: The German Seasons and French Opera 3 * Opera Wars, 1903--1908: Parsifal, Salome, and the Manhattan Opera Company 4 * Modernity, 1908--1929: Puccini 5 * Hard Times, 1929--1940: Wagner 6 * Strains of War, 1940--1950: The Conductor's Opera 7 * Stage Business, 1950--1966: Verdi 8 * In Transit, 1966--1975: American Opera 9 * Maestro Assoluto, 1975--1990: Twentieth-Century European Opera and the Baroque 10 * Patronage and Perestroika, 1990--2006: American Opera (Redux) and Slavic Opera 11 * In the Age of New Media, 2006--2013 Notes Index

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Book SynopsisPresents a different view of Richard Wagner based on research that does not shy away from some truths about this controversial composer. This book tells what Wagner did, said, and wrote. It suggests that an estimation of Wagner does not lie in an all too easy condemnation of his many provocative actions and ideas.Trade Review"Essential reading for all who take an intelligent, informed interest in Wagner." Wagner Journal "Engaging." Australian Book Rev "A solid and stimulating read." -- George Hall Opera "Wide-ranging and eclectic, this volume presents the latest Wagner scholarship and criticism." -- S. Edwards Choice "An engaging portrait" Music Educators JournalTable of ContentsPreface part i. a few beginnings 1. Wagner Lives Issues in Autobiography 2. "Pale" Senta Female Sacrifice and the Desire for Heimat 3. Wagner the Progressive Another Look at Lohengrin part ii. der ring des nibelungen 4. Fairy Tale, Revolution, Prophecy Preliminary Evening: Das Rheingold 5. Symphonic Mastery or Moral Anarchy? First Day: Die Walkure 6. Siegfried Hero Second Day: Siegfried 7. Finishing the End Third Day: Gotterdammerung part iii. the elusiveness of tragedy 8. Don Carlos and Gotterdammerung Two Operatic Endings and Walter Benjamin's Trauerspiel 9. Wagner's Greeks, and Wieland's Too Contents part iv. tristan und isolde 10. Dangerous Fascinations 11. Public and Private Life Reflections on the Genesis of Tristan and Isolde and the Wesendonck Lieder 12. Postmortem on Isolde part v. mature polemics 13. Strange Love, Or, How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Parsifal 14. Mendelssohn and the Strange Case of the (Lost) Symphony in C 15. Unfinished Symphonies part vi. Operatic Futures 16. Configurations of the New 17. Wagner and Beyond List of Abbreviations Notes Acknowledgments Index

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Book SynopsisArgues that Brecht's simultaneous work on opera and Lehrstuck in the 1920s generated the concept of audience experience that would come to define epic theater, and that his revisions to the theory of Gestus in the mid-1930s are reminiscent of nineteenth-century opera performance practices of mimesis.Trade Review"A noteworthy, compelling, and occasionally provocative addition to the vast body of literature about Brecht that even literary scholars would not want to miss perusing." -- Eve M. Duffy H-German "An impressive book: impeccably researched, with two essential and pioneering chapters and three more which have much of interest to offer." -- Michael Ewans Comparative Drama "Excellent... Recommended." -- John Harrison, University of Northern Colorado Opera JournalTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Lehrstuck, Opera, and the New Audience Contract of the Epic Theater 2. The Operatic Roots of Gestus in The Mother and Round Heads and Pointed Heads 3. Fragments of Opera in American Exile 4. Lucullus: Opera and National Identity 5. Brecht's Legacy for Opera: Estrangement and the Canon Notes Bibliography Index

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