Classique, Opéra, Opérette, Musical

Virginia Woolf famously claimed that, around December 1910, human character changed. Aesthetic Technologies addresses how music (especially opera), the phonograph, and film served as cultural agents …

The Metropolitan has stood among the grandest of opera companies since its birth in 1883. Tracing the offstage/onstage workings of this famed New York institution, Charles Affron and Mirella Jona …

The bestselling 30-Second… series takes a revolutionary approach to learning about those subjects you feel you should really understand. Each title selects a popular topic and dissects it into the …

The name Giuseppe Verdi conjures images of Italians singing opera in the streets and bursting into song at political protests or when facing the firing squad. While many of the accompanying stories …

The first book to use subversive sexuality as a lens through which to provocatively view opera in the 21st century. Imagine Armida, Handel’s Saracen sorceress, performing her breakneck color …

“The best single volume ever written on the subject, such is its range, authority, and readability.”—Times Literary Supplement Why has opera transfixed and fascinated audiences for centuries? Carolyn …

From the fall of 1947 through the summer of 1951 composer Igor Stravinsky and poet W. H. Auden collaborated on the opera The Rake’s Progress. At the time, their self-consciously conventional work s …

In a lively exploration of Jacques Offenbach’s final masterpiece, Heather Hadlock shows how Les Contes d’Hoffmann summed up not only the composer’s career but also a century of Romantic culture. A st …

Insights into an opera stage director’s work from an internationally acclaimed director and teacher. Opera is nowadays performed worldwide. But as an art form it is little understood by performer …

The story of an Australian girl who defied convention and became the most famous singer of her era. Growing up in Melbourne, Nellie Mitchell dreamed of fame, but her devout father disapproved. …