150 Years of Opera in Chicago

Robert C. Marsh

ISBN 10: 0875803539 / ISBN 13: 9780875803531

Published by Cornell University Press Jul 2006, 2006

About this Item

Neuware - Focuses on Chicago's love affair with opera. With hundred illustrations, this book offers an overview, which is supplemented with a complete list of all the professional opera performances in Chicago, from 1850 to 2005. It is suitable for people interested in music - especially opera - and the history of Chicago.

Seller Inventory # 9780875803531

Bibliographic Details

• Title: 150 Years of Opera in Chicago
• Publisher: Cornell University Press Jul 2006
• Publication Date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0875803539
• ISBN 13: 9780875803531
• Binding: Buch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 279W x 216H x 25D millimeters 279 millimeters width by 216 millimeters height by 25 millimeters depth
• Weight: 1361 grams

About this title

Synopsis

Chicago's love affair with opera began early, in 1850, when the frontier town welcomed its first traveling opera singers. A full house applauded the opening performance, but during a repeat performance the next day, the theater burned to the ground. Nonetheless, Chicago had been bitten by the opera bug, and it has never lost its enthusiasm for the art.

More than sixty years―and many visiting opera companies―would pass before the city established an opera company of its own. Robert Marsh recounts the trials and triumphs of the entrepreneurs and the colorful international artists who brought opera to Chicago and staged it in a number of different theaters. In the first half of the twentieth century, seven opera companies were started in Chicago―and failed. Finally, in 1954, three friends launched the company that became Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the city gained a company that not only thrived but earned recognition as one of the nation's great cultural institutions. This book also details the history and fortunes of the Chicago Opera Theater from its inception in 1974 to the present.

Singers, musicians, enterprising impresarios, richly decorated opera houses, and performances that held audiences spellbound all figure into Marsh's lively account of opera in Chicago. The story also provides an overview of changes in the operatic repertoire, audience development, and approaches to production as opera grew from a "stand-and-sing" event to its full flowering as enriching musical drama.

Enlivened with nearly a hundred illustrations, 150 Years of Opera in Chicago embraces its subject enthusiastically. This broad and engaging overview is supplemented with a list of professional opera performances in Chicago, from 1850 to 2005.

About the Author

Robert C. Marsh (1924–2002) served for 35 years as music critic for the Chicago Sun-Times. At home in most of the major opera houses of the world, he saw Chicago opera against the background of the international world of music. He authored a number of books and hundreds of articles related to music. Norman Pellegrini, who completed and edited this book, served for more than 40 years as program director of Chicago fine arts radio station WFMT.