Music Browse Guides by Instrument

From classic films like Carmen Jones to contemporary works like The Diary of Sally Hemings and U-Carmen eKhayelitsa, American and South African artists and composers have used opera to reclaim black people's place in history. Naomi André draws on the experiences of performers and audiences to explore this music's resonance with today's listeners. Interacting with creators and performers, as well as with the works themselves, André reveals how black opera unearths suppressed truths. These truths provoke complex, if uncomfortable, reconsideration of racial, gender, sexual, and other oppressive ideologies. Opera, in turn, operates as a cultural and political force that employs an immense, transformative power to represent or even liberate. Viewing opera as a fertile site for critical inquiry, political activism, and social change, Black Opera lays the foundation for innovative new approaches to applied scholarship.

Why has opera transfixed and fascinated audiences for centuries? Carolyn Abbate and Roger Parker answer this question in their "effervescent, witty" (Die Welt, Germany) retelling of the history of opera, examining its development, the musical and dramatic means by which it communicates, and its role in society. Now with an expanded examination of opera as an institution in the twenty-first century, this "lucid and sweeping" (Boston Globe) narrative explores the tensions that have sustained opera over four hundred years: between words and music, character and singer, inattention and absorption. Abbate and Parker argue that, though the genre's most popular and enduring works were almost all written in a distant European past, opera continues to change the viewer-- physically, emotionally, intellectually--with its enduring power.

This guide to over 2,500 operatic characters provides both an invaluable source of reference and an absorbing and enjoyable read. Covering a wide range of works across the whole compass of opera and operetta, it contains plot synopses for over 250 operas as well as full information about eachoperatic role, including its creator and notable performers. Box features, illustrated with photographs, commissioned from well-known personalities in the world of opera, such as Janet Baker, Placido Domingo, Thomas Hampson, and Jonathan Miller, who write about their favourite opera characters.Over 2,500 characters from 280 operasArticles by well-known personalities from the world of opera about the roles they have played, directed, or enjoyed - from Janet Baker, Placido Domingo, Anne Evans, and Thomas Hampson to Jonathan Miller, Robert Tear, Theodor Uppman, and Susanna WaltonFrom Arabella to Wozzeck, entries give a description of the role, its vocal category, by whom the part was created, and notable performers and performancesDetails of who first performed a particular rolePlot synopses for over 250 operasImportant arias and ensembles mentioned, with English translations'a reference book for operaphiles who read synopses, but feel short-changed about information on the characters touched upon in such potted accounts . . . the answer to a prayer for those who attend operas without doing their homework properly . . . simply enjoy the fruits of her researches - withthe bonus of coming out considerably better informed and much the wiser.'From the Foreword by Sir George Christie, (Chairman, Glyndebourne)

Since the publication of the first edition in 1964, Phonetic Readings of Songs and Arias has served singers, teachers of singing, and students of lyric diction as a guide to the correct pronunciation of songs in foreign languages.

The repertoire files of the late Dr. Barbara Doscher, in which she noted her tips, observations on each particular piece, and notes on how to best teach it, comprise a unique trove of wisdom unmatched by any other source. Laboriously transcribed and annotated by John Nix, one of Doscher's students, the notes are presented here as a companion volume to her best-selling text, The Functional Unity of the Singing Voice. Entries are divided by broad category (art song, arias, folk songs, oratorio, musicals, etc.) and are arranged by song title. Each entry includes author, poet or librettist, key(s) available, ranges (for each key), tessitura, difficulty level, voice types, comments, a summary of the text, and notes as to genre, language, and editions available. Five comprehensive indexes facilitate searching. As a guide to selecting vocal repertoire, this book's practical and sometimes colorful comments on each song or aria will assist the vocal instructor in matching the student's ability and range to the appropriate piece. This distillation of Barbara Doscher's many years of experience in the teaching studio is a necessary addition to any vocal instructor's collection, as well as a valuable resource for the individual singer.

Identifies the location of synopses of over 11,000 titles by more than 4,000 composers. In addition to operas, operettas, and musical comedies, the supplement indexes ballets, oratories, minstrel shows, and several non-Western forms, including Kabuki, Beijing opera, and Chinese plays.

The New Pengiun Opera Guide is a fully revised and updated edition of the most comprehensive single-volume opera encyclopaedia ever published. In the course of hundreds of meticulously researched articles, it explores the complete operas of figures as diverse as Bellini and Britten, Handel and Hindemith, Massenet and Monteverdi, Rameau and Rossini, Weber and Weill; offers fresh insights into such perennial favourites as Mozart, Verdi and Wagner; and examines stage works by composers not primarily remembered for their operas - Schumann, Faure and Schoenberg among them. It also brings the reader right up to date with the latest operas by contemporary composers worldwide, including Ades, Carter, Holliger, Macmillan, Picker, Reich, Saariaho and Tan Dun. In all it discusses nearly 850 composers and looks in detail at around 2,000 works.

Designed to aid the student, librarian, teacher, or professional singer, this annotated bibliography provides access to more than 500 books, journals, and electronic resources. Included as well are chapters listing dictionaries and encyclopedias for opera and musical theater, biographical sources, guides to vocal literature and repertoire, and resources for vocal pedagogy and for the stage. Equally helpful are sources that list plots and synopses, translations, diction, travel and education. Providing ready access to a variety of topics and resources necessary for vocal study, this important reference will introduce music students to reliable, essential sources for their study, assist teachers and coaches in finding reference tools, and assist reference librarians in locating sources for patrons. The alphabetical organization within subject makes this reference easy to understand and easy to access. Three indexes allow for convenient cross-referencing.

The Chronicle of Opera celebrates four centuries of music and performance, mixing facts and anecdotes, personalities and stylistic development with hundreds of illustrations.