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Abdelazar
''Abdelazer; or, The Moor's Revenge'' ( or ) is a 1676 play by Aphra Behn, an adaptation of the c. 1600 tragedy ''Lust's Dominion''. It is Behn's only tragic play. Plot Abdelazer is a captive Moor living at the court of King Philip of Spain, who had killed his father some years earlier. Abdelazer seeks revenge, and becomes the lover of the Queen. Together, they poison King Phillip, and also murder the young King Ferdinand. Abdelazer and the Queen try to disinherit Prince Philip, the rightful heir. Another Moor, Osmin, warns the Prince and Cardinal Mendozo to flee. During subsequent battles, Mendozo (who is in love with the Queen) abandons Philip and is even persuaded falsely to admit to being Philip's father. Abdelazer betrays the Queen and has her murdered by one of his henchmen. He courts and tries to rape Princess Leonora (she is saved by Osmin), but rapidly falls from power. The Queen is killed, and Abdelazer is captured with Osmin's help. Mendoza repents, Philip ascends t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Purcell
Henry Purcell (, rare: September 1659 – 21 November 1695) was an English composer. Purcell's style of Baroque music was uniquely English, although it incorporated Italian and French elements. Generally considered among the greatest English opera composers, Purcell is often linked with John Dunstaple and William Byrd as England's most important early music composers. No later native-born English composer approached his fame until Edward Elgar, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Gustav Holst, William Walton and Benjamin Britten in the 20th century. Life and work Early life Purcell was born in St Ann's Lane, Old Pye Street, Westminster – the area of London later known as Devil's Acre, a notorious slum – in 1659. Henry Purcell Senior, whose older brother Thomas Purcell was a musician, was a gentleman of the Chapel Royal and sang at the coronation of King Charles II of England. Henry the elder had three sons: Edward, Henry and Daniel. Daniel Purcell, the youngest of the b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lust's Dominion
''Lust's Dominion, or The Lascivious Queen'' is an English Renaissance stage play, a tragedy written perhaps around 1600, probably by Thomas Dekker in collaboration with others and first published in 1657. The play has been categorized as a revenge tragedy, comparable to Kyd's ''The Spanish Tragedy'', Shakespeare's ''Titus Andronicus'' and ''Hamlet'', and to tragedies by Thomas Middleton (''The Revenger's Tragedy''), John Webster (''The White Devil'') and Cyril Tourneur (''The Atheist's Tragedy''). Authorship The first edition attributed the authorship of the play to Christopher Marlowe, though this attribution has been recognized as spurious by critics and scholars for nearly two centuries. (The play borrows from a pamphlet, published in 1599, about the death of King Philip II of Spain in 1598. Marlowe died in 1593.) The 1657 duodecimo edition was published by Francis Kirkman, to be sold by the bookseller Robert Pollard. Of the four surviving copies of the 1657 edition, three ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aphra Behn
Aphra Behn (; bapt. 14 December 1640 – 16 April 1689) was an English playwright, poet, prose writer and translator from the Restoration era. As one of the first English women to earn her living by her writing, she broke cultural barriers and served as a literary role model for later generations of women authors. Rising from obscurity, she came to the notice of Charles II, who employed her as a spy in Antwerp. Upon her return to London and a probable brief stay in debtors' prison, she began writing for the stage. She belonged to a coterie of poets and famous libertines such as John Wilmot, Lord Rochester. Behn wrote under the pastoral pseudonym Astrea. During the turbulent political times of the Exclusion Crisis, she wrote an epilogue and prologue that brought her into legal trouble; she thereafter devoted most of her writing to prose genres and translations. A staunch supporter of the Stuart line, she declined an invitation from Bishop Burnet to write a welcoming p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Margaret Osborne (actress)
Margaret Osborne or Osborn was an English stage actress of the seventeenth centuryLanier p.98 She was a long-standing member of the Duke's Company from 1671, acting at Lincoln's Inn Fields and the Dorset Garden Theatre. She went to Dublin to work at the Smock Alley Theatre in 1677, but returned to the Duke's Company around two years later She subsequently joined the merged United Company in 1682 and was still acting in the 1690s. Selected roles * Alexandra in ''Herod and Mariamne'' by Samuel Pordage (1671) * Cornelia in ''Charles VIII of France'' by John Crowne (1671) * Lady Turnup in ''The Morning Ramble'' by Henry Nevil Payne (1672) * Flora in ''The Fatal Jealousy'' by Henry Nevil Payne (1672) * Old Lady in ''The Duchess of Malfi'' by John Webster (1672) * Mrs Clappam in ''The Careless Lovers'' by Edward Ravenscroft (1673) * Lelia in ''The Reformation'' by Joseph Arrowsmith (1673) * Fredigond in '' Love and Revenge'' by Elkanah Settle (1674) * Elvira in ''Abdelazer'' by Aphra Beh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The First Churchills
''The First Churchills'' is a BBC serial from 1969 about the life of John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, and his wife, Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough. It stars John Neville as the duke and Susan Hampshire as the duchess, was written and produced by Donald Wilson, and was directed by David Giles. It is notable as being the first programme shown on PBS's long-running ''Masterpiece'' series in the United States. Wilson and Giles were fresh from their success in writing and directing ''The Forsyte Saga'', which also starred Susan Hampshire and Margaret Tyzack. Overview The serial presents the lives of John and Sarah Churchill from their meeting in 1673 until a time shortly after the death of Queen Anne in 1714, and illustrates, along the way, much of the context of contemporary English politics. Like many BBC serials of the era, it was made on a low budget, with sound-studio sets, and generally avoided battle and crowd scenes because they were unable to stage the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Young Person's Guide To The Orchestra
''The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra'', Op. 34, is a 1945 musical composition by Benjamin Britten with a subtitle ''Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Purcell''. It was based on the second movement, "Rondeau", of the ''Abdelazer'' suite. It was originally commissioned for the British educational documentary film called ''Instruments of the Orchestra'' released on 29 November 1946, directed by Muir Mathieson and featuring the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Malcolm Sargent; Sargent also conducted the concert première on 15 October 1946 with the Liverpool Philharmonic in the Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool, England. The work is one of the best-known pieces by the composer, and is often associated with two other works in music history: Saint-Saëns' ''The Carnival of the Animals'' and Prokofiev's ''Peter and the Wolf''. This piece is also commonly played as the intro for british band Yes' live tours, starting in the 2000s. Instrumentation ''The Young Person's Guide ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other vocal music, orchestral and chamber pieces. His best-known works include the opera '' Peter Grimes'' (1945), the '' War Requiem'' (1962) and the orchestral showpiece ''The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra'' (1945). Born in Lowestoft, Suffolk, the son of a dentist, Britten showed talent from an early age. He studied at the Royal College of Music in London and privately with the composer Frank Bridge. Britten first came to public attention with the '' a cappella'' choral work '' A Boy was Born'' in 1934. With the premiere of ''Peter Grimes'' in 1945, he leapt to international fame. Over the next 28 years, he wrote 14 more operas, establishing himself as one of the leading 20th-century composers in the genre. In addition to large-sca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hornpipe
The hornpipe is any of several dance forms played and danced in Britain and Ireland and elsewhere from the 16th century until the present day. The earliest references to hornpipes are from England with Hugh Aston's Hornepype of 1522 and others referring to Lancashire hornpipes in 1609 and 1613. It is suggested that the hornpipe as a dance began around the 16th century on English sailing vessels. However, the dance does not seem to have become associated with sailors until after 1740 when the dancer Yates performed 'a hornpipe in the character of a Jack Tar' at Drury Lane Theatre, after which, in 1741 at Covent Garden we hear of "a hornpipe by a gentleman in the character of a sailor". Movements were those familiar to sailors of that time: "looking out to sea" with the right hand to the forehead, then the left, lurching as in heavy weather, and giving the occasional rhythmic tug to their breeches both fore and aft. Folk hornpipes The hornpipe is an Irish, Scottish and English d ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Minuet
A minuet (; also spelled menuet) is a social dance of French origin for two people, usually in time. The English word was adapted from the Italian ''minuetto'' and the French ''menuet''. The term also describes the musical form that accompanies the dance, which subsequently developed more fully, often with a longer musical form called the minuet and trio, and was much used as a movement in the early classical symphony. Dance The name may refer to the short steps, ''pas menus'', taken in the dance, or else be derived from the ''branle à mener'' or ''amener'', popular group dances in early 17th-century France. The minuet was traditionally said to have descended from the ''bransle de Poitou'', though there is no evidence making a clear connection between these two dances. The earliest treatise to mention the possible connection of the name to the expression ''pas menus'' is Gottfried Taubert's ''Rechtschaffener Tantzmeister'', published in Leipzig in 1717, but this source ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Air (music)
An air ( it, aria; also ''ayr'', ''ayre'' in French) is a song-like vocal or instrumental composition. The term can also be applied to the interchangeable melodies of folk songs and ballads. It is a variant of the musical song form often referred to (in opera, cantata and oratorio) as aria. English lute ayres Lute airs were first produced in the royal court of England toward the end of the 16th century and enjoyed considerable popularity until the 1620s. Probably based on Italian monody and French ''air de cour'', they were solo songs, occasionally with more (usually three) parts, accompanied on a lute.G. J. Buelow, ''History of Baroque Music: Music in the 17th and First Half of the 18th Centuries'', Indiana University Press, 2004 (p. 306). Their popularity began with the publication of John Dowland's (1563–1626) ''First Booke of Songs or Ayres'' (1597). His most famous airs include " Come again", "Flow, my tears", " I saw my Lady weepe", and " In darkness let me dwell". The gen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rondo
The rondo is an instrumental musical form introduced in the Classical period. Etymology The English word ''rondo'' comes from the Italian form of the French ''rondeau'', which means "a little round". Despite the common etymological root, rondo and rondeau as musical forms are essentially different. Rondeau is a ''vocal'' musical form that was originally developed as monophonic music (in the 13th century) and then as polyphonic music (in the 14th century). Notably, both vocal forms of rondeau nearly disappeared from the repertoire by the beginning of the 16th century. In French, ''rondeau'' is used for both forms, while in English ''rondeau'' is generally used for the ''vocal'' musical form, while ''rondo'' is used for the ''instrumental'' musical form.Don Neville, "Rondò", ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'', 4 vols., edited by Stanley Sadie Stanley John Sadie (; 30 October 1930 – 21 March 2005) was an influential and prolific British musicologist, music critic, and edit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ouverture
Overture (from French ''ouverture'', "opening") in music was originally the instrumental introduction to a ballet, opera, or oratorio in the 17th century. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn composed overtures which were independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that foreshadowed genres such as the symphonic poem. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". History 17th century The idea of an instrumental opening to opera existed during the 17th century. Peri's '' Euridice'' opens with a brief instrumental ritornello, and Monteverdi's ''L'Orfeo'' (1607) opens with a toccata, in this case a fanfare for muted trumpets. More important, however, was the prologue, which comprised sung dialogue between allegorical characters which introduced the overarching themes of the stories depicted. French overture As a musical form, however, the French overture first appears in the court ballet a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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