In Search of Opera.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: December 1, 2001
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 264
ISBN-13: 9780691090030
Subjects: Opera; Theory of music & musicology; Music/Songbooks; Music; Genres & Styles - Opera; Instruction & Study - Appreciation; Music / Opera; Philosophy and aesthetics
First sentence: Remember the death of Orpheus: attacked by crazy women, dismembered, he is finally decapitated, the worst indignity a singer could suffer.
Description: "In her new book, Carolyn Abbate considers the nature of operatic performance and the acoustic images of performance present in operas from Monteverdi to Ravel. Paying tribute to music's realization by musicians and singers, she argues that operatic works are indelibly bound to the contingency of live singing, playing, and staging. She seeks a middle ground between operas as abstractions and performance as the phenomenon that brings opera into being."--BOOK JACKET.