Opera in tre atti. Running Time: 2 hours 18 minutes. This is the first to be released in a series of Mercadante reviews that I have been working on for about six months now. The last of the pre-reform operas, this is a reworking of Die Rauber, and thus it is the same basic story […]
Opera in three acts. Running Time: 2 hours 10 minutes. With a libretto written by the mistress of the composer, this can be termed a sexy opera. The title character, a Czech warrior maiden, falls destructively in love with her victim, the male warrior Ctirad, to the point of causing the deaths of her sisters […]
Grosse Oper im drei Akten. Running Time: 2 hours 6 minutes. Jessonda was an answer to Der Freischutz, specifically because Spohr disliked the usage of spoken dialogue that plagued German opera for over a century. The scenario was actually devised by Spohr himself, although the libretto was written by a Eduard Gehe. It incorporates a thicker orchestration than […]
If Rienzi is the best opera Meyerbeer wrote, is Hansel und Gretel the best opera Wagner wrote? I recently showed Hansel and Gretel (the Met production from 1982) to my eighth grade history class and for the most part they really enjoyed it. Looking back on it, I feel that over the years I have […]
Opera Comique en trois actes. Running Time: 2 hours 29 minutes. Devoid of lower voices, this opera boasts four tenor roles with a lonely soprano and mezzo-soprano. There are thirteen musical numbers not counting the overture. The music for the soprano is exceptionally slow moving, with an air of the 18th century about it. SETTING: […]
Romantische Oper im drei Akten. Running Time: 1 hour 40 minutes. I turn 30 today! How better to celebrate than with a German opera about an Italian by a French-trained composer! Although best known for the once immensely popular Martha, in recent years this shorter work has seen a bit of a revival among the thirty operas […]
Opera in four acts and six scenes. Running Time: Variously from 1 hour 55 minutes to 2 hours and 10 minutes. And now the Opera World meets the Muslim World! I was planning on waiting until my annual birthday review to make a new release, but I finally got out of my slump and after […]
This review is dedicated to the memory of my favorite actress, two-time Academy Award winner Olivia de Havilland, who died last Saturday at the age of 104. I learned of her death listening to the overture of this opera while working on this review. Opera in tre atti. Running Time: 2 hours 8 minutes. The […]
Grand Opera en quatre actes. Running Time: 2 hours 46 minutes (ballet cut). Opera Scribe has already reviewed this opera, and this is essentially a response. The opera consists of an overture and seventeen musical numbers. The composer was the nephew of the last king of Poland and was himself at one time an operatic […]
Opera in three acts. Running Time: 3 hours 7 minutes. As with Die Königin von Saba, here Goldmark is moving a bit more towards Wagner, yet only slightly. The decade between his first and second opera led to a composition that, although borrowing from Wagner even more heavily, is still within the Meyerbeerian grand opera of the mid-19th century […]
