The Cambridge Companion To Grand Opera

Edited by David Charlton

This 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.

Bibliographic Details

29 b/w illus. 20 tables 46 music examples

Contents

• 1. Introduction David Charlton
• Part I. The Resourcing of Grand Opera: 2. The machine and the State Hervé 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 Opéra, 1828-49 Mary Ann Smart
• Part II. Revaluation and the Twenty-first Century: 8. Directing grand opera: Rienzi and Guillaume Tell at the Vienna State Opera David Pountney
• Part 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 Prophète and LAfricaine John H. Roberts
• 13. The grand operas of Fromental Halévy Diana R. Hallman
• 14. From Rossini to Verdi M. Elizabeth C. Bartlett
• 15. After 1850 at the Paris Opéra: institution and repertory Steven Huebner
• Part 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.