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Hardcover, 312pp
1e druk, 1972
ISBN: 0297995082

Humanity has always raised its voice when happy and cried when miserable; that, basically, is the essence of opera. Yet strangely enough it is a comparatively new art form. It grew out of a conviction, popular in Italy during the Renaissance, that music could revitalize Greek drama, then held in high esteem. Poetry had been the form through which man could express his feelings, and until the sixteenth century music was written mainly for religious purposes. At a time when the rigid, traditional modes of composition were being questioned, musicians and writers began to feel the need for another language in which to express the passions of the heart: they found it in the marriage of music and poetry. Dafne, generally agreed to be the first opera, was performed during the 1590s.

Since then it is estimated that some 42,000 operas have been written (Donizetti alone wrote over 70) though only a few hundred survive. Joseph Wechsberg, musician and life-long opera-addict, claqueur, listener and critic, takes the reader through the history, evolution and performance of these operas, providing vivid descriptions of those who created, and still re-create them. He reminds us that a single performance is the result of the synchronized efforts of some 400 people: librettist, composer, singers, conductors, producer, orchestra, chorus, critics, stage-hands and extras - all of whose talents and livelihood depend on this exacting art.