Give an example of a popular 18th century opera form?

Answer 1

Italian Opera was a popular form of opera in many European countries.

Answer 2

• Dafne (1597) by Jacopo Peri is the first acknowledged opera.
• The first famous opera was written a few years later: L'Orfeo (1607) by Claudio Monteverdi.
• Giasone (1649) by Francesco Cavalli was the most famous opera during the 17th century. It was the first to separate arias (songs with recognisable tunes) from recitatives (speech, usually dialogue, set to a minimal musical accompaniment).
• Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme (1670) is one of the best-known comedies by the greatest composer of French opera of his time, Jean-Baptiste Lully.
• Dido and Aeneas (1683) by Henry Purcell was the first opera in English.
• Médée (1693) is by Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Lully's great rival.
• The Beggar's Opera (1728), with music by Johann Christoph Pepusch and words by John Gay, is a ballad opera in English with the words set to popular tunes of the day.
• Orlando (1733) is one of the greatest operas by George Frederic Handel, the greatest composer of Italian opera of his day.
• Castor et Pollux (1737) is likewise one of the greatest operas by Jean-Philippe Rameau, the greatest composer of French opera of his day.
• Orfeo ed Euridice (1762) by Christoph Willibald Gluck is one of the best-known "reform operas", in which he tried to make opera reflect the dramatic situation more closely.
• The Marriage of Figaro (1786) is one of Mozart's greatest operas.
• Fidelio (1805) is Beethoven's only opera.
• The Barber of Seville (1816) by Rossini is one of the greatest comic operas.
• Der Freischütz (1821) by Carl Maria von Weber is one of the great Romantic operas.
• A Life for the Tsar (1836) by Mikhail Glinka is the first great Russian opera.
• Aida (1870) by Guiseppe Verdi is one of his most famous operas, set in ancient Egypt.
• Boris Godunov (1874) is Mussorgsky's great masterpiece.
• Die Fledermaus (1874) by Johann Strauss II ("The Waltz King") is one of the most popular operettas (light operas).
• Carmen (1875) is Bizet's most famous opera, and one of the most famous of all time.
• The Nibelung's Ring (1876) is a monumental cycle of four operas by Richard Wagner that sets the whole corpus of Norse mythology.
• Prince Igor (1890) is Borodin's unfinished opera, containing the excerpt known as the Polovstian Dances.
• Tosca (1900) is one of Puccini's most famous operas.
• The Merry Widow (1905) by Franz Lehar is another well-known operetta.
• Salome (1905) is Richard Strauss' most notorious opera. It caused a scandal when it was first performed.
• Wozzeck (1925) by Alban Berg is one of the best-known atonal operas.
• The Threepenny Opera (Kurt Weill) is a modern adaptation of The Beggar's Opera.
• Porgy and Bess (1935) is George Gershwin's great jazz opera.
• Peter Grimes (1945) is one of Benjamin Britten's most famous operas.
• Amahl and the Night Visitors (1951) is Carlo Menotti's famous opera written especially for television.
• Nixon in China (1987) is John Adams' minimalist opera about - well, see if you can guess.

Answer 3

Motzart did comic operas.