"The history of opera has a relatively short duration within the context of the history of music in general: it appeared in 1597, when the first opera, Dafne, by Jacopo Peri, was created."
A history of the development and evolution of Opera as an art form, including significant events, influential people, and major works.
The Origins of Opera: This topic covers the early beginnings of opera in the early 17th century in Italy.
Baroque Opera: This topic deals with the opera during the Baroque period in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.
Bel Canto Opera: This topic covers the style of singing prominent in Italian opera in the 19th century.
French Opera: This topic explores the history and development of French opera, which emerged as a significant style in the 17th century.
German Opera: This topic focuses on the development of opera in German-speaking lands, including the emergence of Romantic opera in the 19th century.
Opera in the 20th Century: This topic explores the various styles and movements in opera in the 20th century, including Modernism, Neoclassicism, and Minimalism.
Opera and Politics: This topic looks at the role of opera as a tool of politics and propaganda, as well as the ways in which opera has been influenced by political and social movements.
Women in Opera: This topic explores the role of women as composers, performers, and characters in operatic history.
The Handel Legacy: This topic examines the influence of George Frideric Handel on operatic history, including his contributions to the development of Baroque opera.
Romanticism in Opera: This topic covers the emergence of Romantic opera in the 19th century, including its themes, styles, and composers.
Italian Opera in the 19th Century: This topic focuses on the evolution of the Italian opera in the 19th century and its impact on the art form.
Wagnerian Opera: This topic explores the works and influence of Richard Wagner on the development of the art form.
Popular Opera: This topic covers the emergence of popular opera in the 20th century and its impact on the genre.
Opera and Literature: This topic explores the relationship between opera and literature, with an emphasis on the adaptation of literary works to the operatic stage.
Opera Conducting: This topic explores the role of conductors in operatic performances, along with their influence on the interpretation of operatic works.
The Production of Opera: This topic covers the various elements involved in the production of operas, including set design, lighting, and costuming.
The Business of Opera: This topic explores the economic and financial aspects of opera, including the role of funding, sponsorship, and box office revenues.
Opera and Technology: This topic explores the impact of technological advances on the production and distribution of opera, such as live streaming and digital recordings.
Modern Opera: This topic examines the evolution of opera into the modern era, including its ongoing relevance in contemporary culture.
Opera and Voice: This topic covers the development of various operatic vocal styles and techniques, including the use of vibrato, belting, and falsetto.
Early opera: Refers to the first known operas, which were produced in Italy in the late 16th century. They were typically based on Greek myths or historical events.
Baroque opera: Characterized by grandiose and ornate set design, costumes, and music. Operas of this period often featured heroic themes and were performed in courtly or aristocratic settings.
Classical opera: Developed in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, classical operas feature more balanced, subtle storytelling, with music often designed to closely mirror the text.
Romantic opera: Operas of this period are characterized by grand, sweeping music and intricate, complex stories that often included supernatural or fantastical elements.
Realistic opera: Developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, realistic operas aimed to accurately depict human life and interaction, often featuring complex themes and moral ambiguity.
Expressionist opera: Developed in the early 20th century, expressionist operas sought to explore the inner world of human experience, often through disorienting visuals and abstract musical and narrative structures.
Minimalist opera: Beginning in the 1960s, minimalist operas stripped down traditional opera elements to focus on more minimalist musical and visual components, sometimes featuring only a few performers and little scenery.
Neo-romantic opera: Emerging in the late 20th century, neo-romantic operas incorporated elements of earlier opera styles while also adding contemporary musical and visual components.
Postmodern opera: Characterized by its experimental approach to narrative structure and sometimes ironic use of traditional opera conventions, postmodern opera often reflects challenging themes related to social, cultural, and political concerns.
Contemporary opera: Covers operas composed from the mid-20th century to present day, and often includes a vast range of styles and themes, from minimalist compositions that minimize narrative and rely heavily on sonic experimentation, to grander operas which follow the grandiose operatic traditions of the past.
"As a multidisciplinary genre, opera brings together music, singing, dance, theater, scenography, performance, costumes, makeup, hairdressing, and other artistic disciplines."
"Generally, the musical work contains overtures, interludes and musical accompaniments, while the sung part can be in choir or solo, duet, trio, or various combinations, in different structures such as recitative or aria."
"There are various genres, such as classical opera, chamber opera, operetta, musical, singspiel, and zarzuela."
"On the other hand, as in theater, there is dramatic opera (opera seria) and comic opera (opera buffa), as well as a hybrid between the two: the dramma giocoso."
"It is therefore a work of collective creation, which essentially starts from a librettist and a composer, and where the vocal performers have a primordial role, but where the musicians and the conductor, the dancers, the creators of the sets and costumes, and many other figures are equally essential."
"The subsequent evolution of opera has run parallel to the various musical currents that have followed one another over time: Baroque, Classicism, Romanticism, and the avant-garde of the 20th century."
"between the 17th century and the first half of the 18th it was framed by the Baroque, a period in which cultured music was reserved for the social elites, but which produced new and rich musical forms and which saw the establishment of a language of its own for opera."
"The second half of the 18th century saw the Classicism, a period of great creativity marked by the serenity and harmony of its compositions, with great figures such as Mozart and Beethoven."
"The 19th century was marked by the Romanticism, characterized by the individuality of the composer, already considered an enlightened genius, and increasingly revered, as were the greatest vocal figures of singing."
"The century saw the emergence of the musical variants of numerous nations with hardly any musical tradition until then, in what came to be called musical nationalism."
"In the 20th century opera, like the rest of music and the arts in general, entered the avant-garde, a new way of conceiving artistic creation in which new compositional methods and techniques emerged."
"During the course of history, within opera there have been differences of opinion as to which of its components was more important, the music or the text, or even whether the importance lay in the singing and virtuosity of the performers."
"From its beginnings until the consolidation of classicism, the text enjoyed greater importance, always linked to the visual spectacle, the lavish decorations, and the complex baroque scenographies."
"Mozart himself once commented: 'poetry must be the obedient servant of music'."
"Other authors, such as Richard Wagner, sought to bring together all the arts in a single creation, which he called 'total work of art' (Gesamtkunstwerk)."
"For this very reason, it has been over time a reflection of the various currents of thought, political and philosophical, religious and moral, aesthetic and cultural, peculiar to the society where the plays were produced."
"Opera was born at the end of the 16th century, as an initiative of a circle of scholars (the Florentine Camerata) who, discovering that Ancient Greek theater was sung, had the idea of setting dramatic texts to music."
"Thus, Jacopo Peri created Dafne (1597), followed by Euridice (1600), by the same author. In 1607, Claudio Monteverdi composed La favola d'Orfeo."
"Claudio Monteverdi composed La favola d'Orfeo, where he added a musical introduction that he called sinfonia, and divided the sung parts into arias, giving structure to the modern opera."