|
Opera Factory
Opera Factory was an experimental opera ensemble founded by Australian director David Freeman. It operated in Zurich from 1976 to 1995 and in London from 1982 to 1998. In the 1980s when the company worked with the London Sinfonietta, its productions were billed as Opera Factory London Sinfonietta (OFLS). Known for its avant garde and often controversial productions, the company's 1986 '' Così fan tutte '' was described by ''The Guardian'''s music critic, Andrew Clements as one of the "ten productions that changed British opera". Opera Factory aimed to bring the techniques of Peter Brook and Jerzy Grotowski to music drama. David Freeman wrote that it would "have the luxury of being able to question many of the assumptions about opera and its role in society which a large company, because of its very size, can afford neither the time nor the money to do". He expressed a similar sentiment in a 1989 profile in ''Opera'' magazine where he criticised the approach of major opera houses, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Freiburg
Freiburg im Breisgau (; abbreviated as Freiburg i. Br. or Freiburg i. B.; Low Alemannic: ''Friburg im Brisgau''), commonly referred to as Freiburg, is an independent city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. With a population of about 230,000 (as of 31 December 2018), Freiburg is the fourth-largest city in Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim, and Karlsruhe. The population of the Freiburg metropolitan area was 656,753 in 2018. In the south-west of the country, it straddles the Dreisam river, at the foot of the Schlossberg. Historically, the city has acted as the hub of the Breisgau region on the western edge of the Black Forest in the Upper Rhine Plain. A famous old German university town, and archiepiscopal seat, Freiburg was incorporated in the early twelfth century and developed into a major commercial, intellectual, and ecclesiastical center of the upper Rhine region. The city is known for its medieval minster and Renaissance university, as well as for its high ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Lascelles, 7th Earl Of Harewood
George Henry Hubert Lascelles, 7th Earl of Harewood, (7 February 1923 – 11 July 2011), styled The Honourable George Lascelles before 1929 and Viscount Lascelles between 1929 and 1947, was a British classical music administrator and author. He served as director of the Royal Opera House (1951–53; 1969–72), chairman of the board of the English National Opera (ENO) (1986–95); managing director of the ENO (1972–85), managing director of the English National Opera North (1978–81), governor of the BBC (1985–87), and president of the British Board of Film Classification (1985–96). Harewood was the elder son of the 6th Earl of Harewood and Princess Mary, Princess Royal, the only daughter of King George V and Queen Mary. At his birth, he was 6th in the line of succession; at his death, he was 46th. Lord Harewood was the eldest grandchild of King George V and Queen Mary, nephew of both King Edward VIII and King George VI and first cousin of Queen Elizabeth II. He succe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Knot Garden
''The Knot Garden'' is the third opera by composer Michael Tippett for which he wrote the original English libretto. The work had its first performance at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, on 2 December 1970 conducted by Sir Colin Davis and produced by Sir Peter Hall. There is a recording with the original cast. Performance history The first American performance was in 1974 at Northwestern University, and the first German performance in 1987 at the Musiktheater im Revier in Gelsenkirchen. In 1984 Tippett authorised Meirion Bowen to create a reduced orchestration for a revival with the London Sinfonietta at the Wilde Theatre, conducted by Howard Williams. The reduced version has been revived six times, with productions in Britain, America, Australia, and Austria. There was a revival at the Royal Opera House in 1988, directed by Nicholas Hytner and, in 2005, Scottish Opera produced the opera for the Tippett centenary. Roles Synopsis Act 1 The psychiatrist Mangus introduces ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michael Tippett
Sir Michael Kemp Tippett (2 January 1905 – 8 January 1998) was an English composer who rose to prominence during and immediately after the Second World War. In his lifetime he was sometimes ranked with his contemporary Benjamin Britten as one of the leading British composers of the 20th century. Among his best-known works are the oratorio '' A Child of Our Time'', the orchestral '' Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli'', and the opera '' The Midsummer Marriage''. Tippett's talent developed slowly. He withdrew or destroyed his earliest compositions, and was 30 before any of his works were published. Until the mid-to-late 1950s his music was broadly lyrical in character, before changing to a more astringent and experimental style. New influences, including those of jazz and blues after his first visit to America in 1965, became increasingly evident in his compositions. While Tippett's stature with the public continued to grow, not all critics approved of these chan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Beggar's Opera
''The Beggar's Opera'' is a ballad opera in three acts written in 1728 by John Gay with music arranged by Johann Christoph Pepusch. It is one of the watershed plays in Augustan drama and is the only example of the once thriving genre of satirical ballad opera to remain popular today. Ballad operas were satiric musical plays that used some of the conventions of opera, but without recitative. The lyrics of the airs in the piece are set to popular broadsheet ballads, opera arias, church hymns and folk tunes of the time. ''The Beggar's Opera'' premiered at the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre on 29 January 1728 and ran for 62 consecutive performances, the second-longest run in theatre history up to that time (after 146 performances of Robert Cambert's '' Pomone'' in Paris in 1671). The work became Gay's greatest success and has been played ever since; it has been called "the most popular play of the eighteenth century". In 1920, ''The Beggar's Opera'' began a revival run of 1,4 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Gay
John Gay (30 June 1685 – 4 December 1732) was an English poet and dramatist and member of the Scriblerus Club. He is best remembered for '' The Beggar's Opera'' (1728), a ballad opera. The characters, including Captain Macheath and Polly Peachum, became household names.. Early life Gay was born in Barnstaple, England, last of five children of William Gay (died 1695) and Katherine (died 1694), daughter of Jonathan Hanmer, "the leading Nonconformist divine of the town" as founder of the Independent Dissenting congregation in Barnstaple. The Gay family- "fairly comfortable... though far from rich"- lived in "a large house, called the Red Cross, on the corner of Joy Street". The Gay family was "of respectable antiquity" in North Devon, associated with the manor of Goldsworthy at Parkham and with the parish of Frithelstock (where the senior line remained, resident at the priory Cloister Hall with its lands, until 1823) and became "powerful and numerous" in the town, "establis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RADA Studios
RADA Studios (formerly The Drill Hall) is a theatrical venue in Chenies Street in Bloomsbury, just to the east of Tottenham Court Road in the West End of London. Owned by the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA), the building contains rehearsal rooms, meeting rooms, and the 200-seat Studio Theatre. History The building was designed by Samuel Knight as the headquarters of the St Giles's and St George's Bloomsbury Rifles and completed in 1882.Andrew Girvan"RADA Acquires Lease on the Drill Hall, Now RADA Studios" ''Whatsonstage.com'', 9 January 2012. Retrieved 2013-05-06. It has a notable artistic history: in the 1900s, Sergei Diaghilev and the Ballets Russes rehearsed there. The Bloomsbury Rifles amalgamated with the 1st Middlesex (Victoria and St George’s) Volunteer Rifle Corps and moved out to the Davies Street drill hall in 1908. In their place the 12th (County of London) Battalion, London Regiment (The Rangers) took over the Drill Hall in Chenies Street on 25 June 1908. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Punch And Judy
Punch and Judy is a traditional puppet show featuring Mr. Punch and his wife Judy. The performance consists of a sequence of short scenes, each depicting an interaction between two characters, most typically Mr. Punch and one other character who usually falls victim to Punch's slapstick. ''The Daily Telegraph'' called Punch and Judy "a staple of the British seaside scene". The various episodes of Punch comedy—often provoking shocked laughter—are dominated by the clowning of Mr. Punch. The show is performed by a single puppeteer inside the booth, known since Victorian times as a "professor" or "punchman", and assisted sometimes by a "bottler" who corrals the audience outside the booth, introduces the performance, and collects the money ("the bottle"). The bottler might also play accompanying music or sound effects on a drum or guitar, and engage in back chat with the puppets, sometimes repeating lines that may have been difficult for the audience to understand. In Victorian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harrison Birtwistle
Sir Harrison Birtwistle (15 July 1934 – 18 April 2022) was an English composer of contemporary classical music best known for his operas, often based on mythological subjects. Among his many compositions, his better known works include '' The Triumph of Time'' (1972) and the operas '' The Mask of Orpheus'' (1986), ''Gawain'' (1991), and '' The Minotaur'' (2008). The last of these was ranked by music critics at ''The Guardian'' in 2019 as the third-best piece of the 21st-century. Even his compositions that were not written for the stage often showed a theatrical approach. A performance of his saxophone concerto ''Panic'' during the BBC's Last Night of the Proms caused "national notoriety". He received many international awards and honorary degrees. Life and career Early life Harrison Birtwistle was born in Accrington, a mill town in Lancashire around 20 miles north of Manchester. His parents, Fred and Madge Birtwistle, ran a bakery, and his interest in music was encouraged ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dido And Aeneas
''Dido and Aeneas'' (Z. 626) is an opera in a prologue and three acts, written by the English Baroque composer Henry Purcell with a libretto by Nahum Tate. The dates of the composition and first performance of the opera are uncertain. It was composed no later than July 1688, and had been performed at Josias Priest's girls' school in London by the end of 1689.White, Bryan, 'Letter from Aleppo: dating the Chelsea School performance of Dido and Aeneas', 417 Some scholars argue for a date of composition as early as 1683.Pinnock, Andrew, 'Which Genial Day? More on the court origin of Purcell's Dido and Aeneas, with a shortlist of dates for its possible performance before King Charles II’, Early Music 43 (2015), 199–212Bruce Wood and Andrew Pinnock, Unscared by turning times'? The dating of Purcell's Dido and Aeneas," The story is based on Book IV of Virgil's ''Aeneid''. It recounts the love of Dido, Queen of Carthage, for the Trojan hero Aeneas, and her despair when he abandons ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Curlew River
''Curlew River – A Parable for Church Performance'' (Op. 71) is an English music drama, with music by Benjamin Britten to a libretto by William Plomer. The first of Britten's three 'Parables for Church Performance', the work is based on the Japanese ''noh'' play ''Sumidagawa'' (Sumida River) of Juro Motomasa] (1395–1431), which Britten saw during a visit to Japan and the Far East in early 1956. Beyond the ''noh'' source dramatic material, Britten incorporated elements of ''noh'' treatment of theatrical time into this composition. ''Curlew River'' marked a departure in style for the remainder of the composer's creative life, paving the way for such works as ''Owen Wingrave'', ''Death in Venice'' and the Third String Quartet. Plomer translated the setting of the original into a Christian parable, set in early medieval times near the fictional Curlew River, in the fenlands of East Anglia. Peter F. Alexander has investigated in detail the librettist's contribution to the work, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Habib Faye
Habib Faye (November 22, 1965 – April 25, 2018) was a bassist, keyboardist, guitar soloist, arranger, composer and Grammy-nominated producer from Senegal. He was mostly known as the musical director for Youssou N'dour's Super Étoile de Dakar. He was one of the most talented African bassists of the last quarter-century. He played the bass and produced music for Super Etoile since 1984. He was believed to have picked up the bass when he was 13, but started his musical exploration at the age of nine, thanks to his older brother, Vieux Mac Faye, who is an accomplished guitarist himself. His other brothers are musicians as well. Lamine Faye is one of Senegal's most popular and respected guitar players, and for a long time was a member of Super Diamono, before he left to form his own band, Lemzo Diamono, in 1991. Adama Faye, who died in 2005, is regarded as one of the pioneers of keyboard playing in Senegal. He was one of the founding members of Super Diamono and also played keys fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
_4029.jpg "Click for more on -> Freiburg")
