The Cambridge companion to Grand Opera

Description

This 2003 Companion is a fascinating and accessible exploration of the world of grand opera. Through this volume a team of scholars and writers on opera examine those important Romantic operas which embraced the Shakespearean sweep of tragedy, history, love in time of conflict, and the struggle for national self-determination. Rival nations, rival religions and violent resolutions are common elements, with various social or political groups represented in the form of operatic choruses. The book traces the origins and development of a style created during an increasingly technical age, which exploited the world-renowned skills of Parisian stage-designers, artists, and dancers as well as singers. It analyses in detail the grand operas by Rossini, Auber, Meyerbeer and Halévy, discusses grand opera in Russia and Germany, and also in the Czech lands, Italy, Britain and the Americas. The volume also includes an essay by the renowned opera director David Pountney. 1. Introduction / David Charlton -- Pt. I. The Resourcing of Grand Opera -- 2. The 'machine' and the State / Herve Lacombe -- 3. Fictions and librettos / Nicholas White -- 4. The spectacle of the past in grand opera / Simon Williams -- 5. The chorus / James Parakilas -- 6. Dance and dancers / Marian Smith -- 7. Roles, reputations, shadows: singers at the Opera, 1828-49 / Mary Ann Smart -- Pt. II. Revaluation and the Twenty-first Century -- 8. Directing grand opera: Rienzi and Guillaume Tell at the Vienna State Opera / David Pountney -- Pt. III. Grand Operas for Paris -- 9. La Muette and her context / Sarah Hibberd -- 10. Scribe and Auber: constructing grand opera / Herbert Schneider -- 11. Meyerbeer: Robert le Diable and Les Huguenots / Matthias Brzoska -- 12. Meyerbeer: Le Prophete and L'Africaine / John H. Roberts -- 13. The grand operas of Fromental Halevy / Diana R. Hallman -- 14. From Rossini to Verdi / M. Elizabeth C. Bartlett -- 15. After 1850 at the Paris Opera: institution and repertory / Steven Huebner -- Pt. IV. Transformations of Grand Opera -- 16. Richard Wagner and the legacy of French grand opera / Thomas Grey -- 17. Grand opera in Russia: fragments / Marina Frolova-Walker -- 18. Grand opera among the Czechs / Jan Smaczny -- 19. Italian opera / Fiamma Nicolodi -- 20. Grand opera in Britain and the Americas / Sarah Hibberd.