Nabucco was Verdi’s first work for Olympus. After the bitter years of 1838-40, overshadowed by crises, it was Verdi’s return to the light. Verdi displayed a gigantic wealth of ideas in Nabucco, and the work became a sensational success. He later called the incipient seventeen-year creative frenzy “his galley years.”
At the height of his powers and in a two-month creative frenzy, Tchaikovsky composed his masterpiece based on a libretto by his brother Modest and a novella by Pushkin.
Tchaikovsky wrote ten operas and Eugene Onegin is his most famous and beautiful. Emotive music, dazzling orchestration and inner drama characterize this work. In addition, Tchaikovsky gives us beautiful, musical orchestral passages reminiscent of his most beautiful ballets.
Der Rosenkavalier offers the music lover two of the most sublime scenes in all of opera literature. The handing over of the silver rose and the final sestet are worthy of mention. Like Mozart, Strauss was a composer for female voices, and with this opera he created three immortal roles for sopranos: the Marschallin, Sophie […]
Richard Strauss first saw the theater piece “Salome” in 1902 in a production by Max Reinhard, and three years later created an expressionist sound world that seemed to break with everything previously known. Despite the now thirteen years that had passed since the play’s first performance, the piece, set to music as an opera, met […]
Although Rossini’s Tell is a great work, it is not often performed. The scenic complexity and casting difficulties are too great. Nevertheless, it is one of the most influential works in opera history, helping to found the modern tenor and grand opéra.
Rossini wrote a stirring opera in only 24 days. Each of the numbers in this opera is a great piece, especially the ensemble scenes are of the greatest mastery.
The fact that Da Ponte and Mozart were able to form a masterpiece out of this intricate comedy borders on a miracle. With “Le nozze di figaro” Mozart not only wrote marvelous situational comedy with stunning music, but also five immortal role portraits for the main characters.
Mozart estimated Idomeneo as his greatest work in the genre of opera. Inspired by the works of Gluck, which he had seen in his Parisian days, he wrote perhaps the best Baroque opera in history.
At the age of 27, an unknown Italian bandmaster of a village brass band achieved one of the greatest triumphs in the history of opera. With this work, Pietro Mascagni founded musical verismo and became an influence on an entire generation of composers.
