Portal:Opera
The Opera Portal
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work (called an opera) which combines a text (called a libretto) and a musical score. Opera is part of the Western classical music tradition. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery and costumes and sometimes includes dance. The performance is typically given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble.
Opera started in Italy at the end of the 16th century (with Jacopo Peri's lost Dafne, produced in Florence around 1597), and was championed by Claudio Monteverdi with works such as L'Orfeo. It soon spread through the rest of Europe: Schütz in Germany, Lully in France, and Purcell in England all helped to establish their national traditions in the 17th century. However, in the 18th century, Italian opera continued to dominate most of Europe, except France, attracting foreign composers such as Handel. Opera seria was the most prestigious form of Italian opera, until Gluck reacted against its artificiality with his "reform" operas in the 1760s. Today the most renowned figure of late 18th century opera is Mozart, who began with opera seria but is most famous for his Italian comic operas, especially The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte, as well as The Magic Flute, a landmark in the German tradition.
The first third of the 19th century saw the highpoint of the bel canto style, with Rossini, Donizetti and Bellini all creating works that are still performed today. It also saw the advent of Grand Opera typified by the works of Meyerbeer. The mid to late 19th century is considered by some a golden age of opera, led by Wagner in Germany and Verdi in Italy. This 'golden age' developed through the verismo era in Italy and contemporary French opera through to Puccini and Strauss in the early 20th century. During the 19th century, parallel operatic traditions emerged in Central and Eastern Europe, particularly in Russia and Bohemia. The 20th century saw many experiments with modern styles, such as atonality and serialism (Schoenberg and Berg), Neo-Classicism (Stravinsky), and Minimalism (Philip Glass and John Adams). With the rise of recording technology, singers such as Enrico Caruso became known to audiences beyond the circle of opera fans. Operas were also performed on (and written for) radio and television.
More about Opera... |
Selected article
Featured picture
In this month
- 3 May 2005 – Lorin Maazel's opera 1984 had its world premiere at London's Royal Opera House.
- 5 May 1726 – Handel's opera Alessandro premiered at the King's Theatre in London with the celebrated Italian castrato singer Senesino in the title role.
- 8 May 1895 – Henry Clifford, an opera by the Spanish composer Isaac Albéniz, premiered at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona.
- 10 May 1901 – The German tenor Max Lorenz, a famous interpreter of Wagnerian roles, was born in Düsseldorf.
- 18 May 1910 – The French opera singer and composer Pauline Viardot (pictured) died in Paris at the age of 89.
- 19 May 1894 – Verdi's last opera, Falstaff, received its first UK performance with Arturo Pessina in the title role.
- 22 May 1813 – The composer Richard Wagner was born in Leipzig. Twenty years later, he was to complete his first opera, Die Feen.
- 25 May 1869 – The Vienna State Opera House was officially inaugurated with a performance of Mozart's Don Giovanni.
Selected biography
Selected quote
Selected audio
1912 recording by Enrico Caruso and Geraldine Farrar of a scene from act 2 of Jules Massenet's Manon (1884).
Did you know?
- ...that the Théâtrophone service (1890-1932) allowed the subscribers (pictured) to listen to opera and theatre performances over the telephone lines?
- ...that the 19th century Mexican soprano Ángela Peralta once sang Donizetti's opera Maria di Rohan in a theatre improvised from a disused sand pit in La Paz, Baja California?
- ...that composer Michael Arne's obsession for alchemy and the search for the philosopher's stone led him into serious financial problems resulting in his arrest and confinement in a Dublin sponging-house?
Related portals
WikiProjects
- Parent projects
WikiProject Arts • WikiProject Music • WikiProject Theatre
- Main project
- Descendant projects
WikiProject Richard Wagner • WikiProject Gilbert and Sullivan
- Similar projects
WikiProject Classical music • WikiProject Composers
What are WikiProjects?
Main topics
Opera history: Origins of opera • Italian opera • Opera in German • French opera • Opera in English • Polish opera • Russian opera • Hungarian opera • Armenian opera • Opera in Latin America
Opera genres: Azione teatrale · Ballad opera · Comédie en vaudevilles · Comédie mêlée d'ariettes · Dramma giocoso · Dramma per musica · Farsa · Festa teatrale · Género chico · Grand Opera · Music Drama · Opéra-ballet · Opera buffa · Opéra bouffe · Opéra bouffon · Opéra comique · Opéra féerie · Opera semiseria · Opera seria · Operetta · Pastorale héroïque · Romantische Oper · Savoy opera · Semi-opera · Singspiel · Spieloper · Tragédie en musique · Verismo · Zarzuela · Zeitoper
Opera terms: Aria · Aria di sorbetto · Arioso · Bel canto · Breeches role · Burletta · Cabaletta · Cadenza · Cantabile · Castrato · Cavatina · Chest voice · Claque · Coloratura · Comprimario · Convenienze · Coup de glotte · Da capo aria · Diva · Entr'acte · Fach · Falsetto · Fioritura · Gesamtkunstwerk · Head voice · Intermezzo · Kammersänger · Leitmotif · Legato · Libretto · Literaturoper · Mad scene · Maestro · Melodrama · Melodramma · Monodrama · Messa di voce · Opera house · Passaggio · Portamento · Prima donna · Prompter · Recitative · Regietheater · Répétiteur · Sitzprobe · Spinto · Sprechgesang · Squillo · Stagione · Surtitles · Tessitura · Timbre · Vibrato
Opera voices: Baritenor · Baritone · Bass · Bass-baritone · Coloratura soprano · Contralto · Countertenor · Dramatic soprano · Haute-contre · Lyric soprano · Mezzo-soprano · Soprano · Soubrette · Spinto soprano · Tenor · Tenore contraltino · Tenore di grazia
Opera lists: Opera topics • List of operas by composer • Important operas • Major opera composers • Opera librettists • Opera houses • Opera companies • Opera festivals • Opera directors • Operetta composers • Orphean operas • Zarzuela composers • Opera genres • Operas set in the Crusades • The Record of Singing • Bayreuth canon
Featured content
![]() | This is a list of recognized content, updated weekly by JL-Bot (talk · contribs). There is no need to edit the list yourself. If an article is missing from the list, make sure it is tagged (e.g. {{WikiProject Opera}}) or categorized correctly. See WP:RECOG for configuration options. |
Featured articles
Agrippina (opera)
L'Ange de Nisida
L'Arianna
The Bartered Bride
Georges Bizet
Benjamin Britten
Alan Bush
Carmen
English National Opera
Falstaff (opera)
Kathleen Ferrier
Gianni Schicchi
Handel's lost Hamburg operas
Her Majesty's Theatre
L'incoronazione di Poppea
Lost operas by Claudio Monteverdi
Jules Massenet
Felix Mendelssohn
André Messager
Claudio Monteverdi
Carl Nielsen
Nixon in China
Noye's Fludde
L'Orfeo
Orpheus in the Underworld
Les pêcheurs de perles
Maurice Ravel
Rhinemaidens
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Rinaldo (opera)
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria
Gioachino Rossini
The Royal Opera
Dmitri Shostakovich
Bedřich Smetana
Charles Villiers Stanford
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Michael Tippett
Tosca
Richard Wagner
Featured lists
Good articles
Marian Anderson
W. H. Auden
Ferruccio Busoni
The Castafiore Emerald
Patrice Chéreau
Erik Chisholm
Eleonora de Cisneros
Doctor Ox's Experiment (opera)
John Thomas Douglass
Ernest II, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
The Fairy-Queen
Fatinitza
Éva Gauthier
Grant Park Music Festival
Edita Gruberová
Julius Harrison
Leoš Janáček
Giacomo Meyerbeer
Beatriz Michelena
Nabucco
Jessye Norman
Jacques Offenbach
Orfeo ed Euridice
Antonio Paoli
Parsifal
Sergei Prokofiev
Maria Radner
Robert le diable
Franz Schubert
Johann Strauss II
Twice Through the Heart
Va tacito e nascosto
Giuseppe Verdi
Wales Millennium Centre
Welsh National Opera
Portia White
Steuart Wilson
Featured pictures
Featured portals
Featured topics
Categories
Things you can do
![]() |
|
Associated Wikimedia
The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:
-
Commons
Free media repository -
Wikibooks
Free textbooks and manuals -
Wikidata
Free knowledge base -
Wikinews
Free-content news -
Wikiquote
Collection of quotations -
Wikisource
Free-content library -
Wikiversity
Free learning tools -
Wiktionary
Dictionary and thesaurus