Mozart's earliest complete opera: Phoebus, but not feeble, one might say.
143. Apollo et Hyacinthus (Mozart)
Category: The Classics
141. Alceste (Gluck)
Gluck's reform opera: boring or beautiful?
33. Orfeo ed Euridice / Orphée et Eurydice (Gluck)
In which Gluck reforms opera with a prehistoric sun-myth.
136. Naïs (Rameau)
The plot is negligible; characterization and action almost nil; and the arias nondescript. This, surprisingly, doesn’t matter.
135. Croesus (Keiser)
DER HOCHMÜTIGE, GESTÜRZTE UND WIEDER ERHABENE CROESUS Composer: Reinhard KeiserLibretto: Lukas von Bostel, after Nicolò Minato’s 1678 operaFirst performed: Theater am Gänsemarkt, Hamburg, 1711.Revised: Theater am Gänsemarkt, Hamburg, 6 December 1730 Reinhard Keiser was once hailed as “the greatest opera composer in the world” (Johann Mattheson, writing his obituary in 1740). Thirty years later, one … Continue reading 135. Croesus (Keiser)
134. Dardanus (Rameau)
Tragédie lyrique in 5 actsComposer: Jean-Philippe RameauLibretto: Charles Antoine Le Clerc de la BruèreFirst performed : Académie royale de musique, Paris, 19 November 1739 (revised 23 April 1744) The tragédie lyrique, with its emphasis on text and ballet, bewildered foreigners: Burney considered the form “displeasing to all ears but those of France, which had been nursed … Continue reading 134. Dardanus (Rameau)
133. Serse (Handel)
The appeal of Handel's comic masterpiece is plane for all to see.
