(Vocal/instrumental group, 1979–present) Jeremy ‘Jaz’ Coleman (vocals), Geordie Walker (guitar, synthesizers), Youth (b. Martin Glover, bass, vocals) and Paul Ferguson (drums) formed one of the most alluring post-punk bands. They are now considered forefathers of American nu-punk. Their compulsive, tribal blasts on debut Killing Joke (1980) and Revelations (1982) created a legion of rabid fans and ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1969–present) This Birmingham heavy metal outfit, led by vocalist Rob Halford, first charted with Sin After Sin in 1977. British Steel (1980) consolidated their position as one of the leading bands in the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. Their lyrics littered with Satanic imagery, the band were unsuccessfully sued in 1985 by parents of ...
(Vocal group, 1968–72) Michigan’s loud and politically resolute MC5 – Rob Tyler (vocals), Wayne Kramer (guitar), Fred ‘Sonic’ Smith (guitar), Mike Davis (bass) and Dennis Thompson (drums) – were connected with The White Panthers. Riddled with slogan-ridden social comment, rude words and raw musical attack, their three albums may be seen to have pre-empted the more dogmatic punk ...
‘The Bat’ Composed: 1874 Premiered: 1874, Vienna Libretto by Carl Haffner and Richard Genée after Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy’s Le réveillon Prologue Falke wants revenge for a practical joke when Eisenstein left him sleeping, dressed as a bat, outside the Vienna law courts. Act I Eisenstein’s wife, Rosalinde, recognizes the voice serenading her as her ...
Verdi’s last opera, Falstaff was the third taken from William Shakespeare, this time from his Merry Wives of Windsor and Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2. Verdi wrote the opera when he was 79, but it was not his only comic opera, as is often supposed. There was another, Un giorno di Regno, which ...
Rameau’s magnificent Hippolyte et Aricie is a rare example of a major composer’s first attempt at opera also being one of his greatest achievements. However, Rameau was nearly 50 years old and already a respected and experienced musician when he composed it, and had evidently been contemplating the project for several years. The impressive literary quality of Pellegrin’s libretto ...
Mozart had long admired the inspired synthesis of French and Italian opera in Gluck’s ‘reform’ works. His greatest opera seria, Idomeneo, premiered in Munich on 29 January 1781, draws much from Gluck, especially the hieratic scenes of Alceste (another opera concerned with human sacrifice). Yet its harmonic daring, orchestral richness and lyrical expansiveness are entirely Mozart’s ...
Kátya belongs to the final decade of Janáček’s work and was inspired by his muse, Kamila Stösslova. She was the magnificent obsession who received a steady stream of letters from the composer up until his death, some of them confirming that Kátya was written for her. The opera was based on Ostrovsky’s drama The Storm, which concerns a ...
‘Fidelity Rewarded’ Composed: 1780 Premiered: 1781, Eszterháza Libretto by Giambattista Lorenzi Act I Amaranta reads an inscription in the Temple of Diana describing how two lovers are to be offered to a sea monster every year until a hero sacrifices himself. Melibeo, the High Priest, chooses the victims and everyone has to be careful not to cross him. ...
‘The Force of Destiny’ La forza del destino was commissioned by the Imperial Theatre, St Petersburg where it premiered in 1862. Verdi considered the opera an ‘excellent success’ with ‘opulent’ settings and costumes, although critics thought the tragic, lugubrious love story had a depressing effect on the audience. It was first performed in New York in 1865 and ...
‘The Marriage of Figaro’ The librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte wrote that Le nozze di Figaro offered ‘a new kind of spectacle … to a public of such assured taste and refined understanding’, and it would be fair to say that after Figaro’s premiere on 1 May 1786, opera buffa was never quite the same again. There were precedents, of ...
Premiered: 1707, Venice Libretto by Girolamo Frigimelica Roberti Act I King Farnace and Stratonica, Mitridate’s mother, have usurped the Pontus throne by killing Mitridate’s father. Mitridate, the true heir, has sought refuge in Egypt; his sister, Laodice, awaits his return and dreams of avenging her father’s death. Egypt and Pontus are set to form ...
Composed: 1930–32 Premiered: 1957, Zurich Libretto by the composer Act I Moses prays in the desert. He is answered by voices from the Burning Bush telling him to become a prophet and the leader of the Israelites. He pleads that he does not have the eloquence to explain God’s will in terms they can understand, but is told that ...
Nabucco was originally named Nabucodonosor. An opera in four acts set in Jerusalem and Babylon in the sixth century bc, Nabucodonosor was first produced at La Scala, Milan on 9 March 1842 with Giuseppina Strepponi, who later became Verdi’s second wife, as Abigaille. The opera was not billed as Nabucco until 1844. It occasioned Verdi’s first serious ...
Norma, Bellini’s eighth opera and his masterpiece, followed hard on the heels of his La sonnambula when its first performance was given at La Scala less than four months later, on 26 December 1831. Once again, Giuditta Pasta created the title role, although this time she had parts of the opera transposed down to the key ...
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David Bowie
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