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Giovanni Apostolu
Yannis Apostolou (c.1860 – 28 August 1905) was a Greek opera singer who went on to become one of the leading tenors in Italian opera houses, performing under the name Giovanni Apostolu. His voice is preserved on some early Gramophone Company, G&T recordings made in Milan in 1902.Leotsakos, George (2001)"Apostolou, Yannis" Grove Music Online. Retrieved 14 November 2017 (subscription required for full access).Kutsch, Karl-Josef and Leo Riemens, Riemens, Leo (2004)"Apostolu, Giovanni" ''Großes Sängerlexikon'' (4th edition), Vol. 4, pp.129–130. Walter de Gruyter. Life and career Most sources list Athens as Apostolou's birthplace, although some list it as the nearby small town of Acharnes, Menidi. As a boy he sang in the Greek Royal chapel, Royal Chapel and other church choirs in Athens and later studied singing under Alexandros Katakouzenos and Napoleon Lambelet of the Athens Conservatory. He made his debut in 1888 with the newly-formed Elliniko Melodrama company (a forerunner o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Athens
Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates and is the capital of the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, with its recorded history spanning over 3,400 years and its earliest human presence beginning somewhere between the 11th and 7th millennia BC. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state. It was a centre for the arts, learning and philosophy, and the home of Plato's Academy and Aristotle's Lyceum. It is widely referred to as the cradle of Western civilization and the birthplace of democracy, largely because of its cultural and political influence on the European continent—particularly Ancient Rome. In modern times, Athens is a large cosmopolitan metropolis and central to economic, financial, industrial, maritime, political and cultural life in Gre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Favorita
''La favorite'' (''The Favourite'', sometimes referred to by its Italian title: ''La favorita'') is a grand opera in four acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a French-language libretto by Alphonse Royer and Gustave Vaëz, based on the play ''Le comte de Comminges'' by Baculard d'Arnaud with additions by Eugène Scribe based on the story of Leonora de Guzman. The opera concerns the romantic struggles of the King of Castile, Alfonso XI, and his mistress, the "favourite" Leonora, against the backdrop of the political wiles of receding Moorish Spain and the life of the Catholic Church. It premiered on 2 December 1840 at the Académie Royale de Musique (Salle Le Peletier) in Paris. Background Originally, Donizetti had been composing an opera by the name of ''Le Duc d'Albe'' as his second work for the Opéra in Paris. However, the director, Léon Pillet, objected to an opera without a prominent role for his mistress, mezzo-soprano Rosine Stoltz. Donizetti therefore abandoned ''Le Duc d' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Opéra De Monte-Carlo
The Opéra de Monte-Carlo is an opera house which is part of the Monte Carlo Casino located in the Principality of Monaco. With the lack of cultural diversions available in Monaco in the 1870s, Prince Charles III, along with the Société des bains de mer, decided to include a concert hall as part of the casino. The main public entrance to the hall was from the casino, while Charles III's private entrance was on the western side. It opened in 1879 and became known as the Salle Garnier, after the architect Charles Garnier, who designed it. During the renovation of the Salle Garnier in 2004–05, the company presented operas at the ''Salle des Princes'' in the local Grimaldi Forum, a modern conference and performance facility where Les Ballets de Monte Carlo and the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra regularly perform. Salle Garnier The architect Charles Garnier also designed the Paris opera house now known as the Palais Garnier. The Salle Garnier is much smaller, seating 524 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patrie! (opera)
''Patrie!'' is an 1886 French-language opera in five acts by Émile Paladilhe with a libretto by Victorien Sardou and Louis Gallet based on the play by Sardou about a 16th-century revolt of Flemish nobles in Brussels. The opera was Paladilhe's greatest popular success and was one of the last in the style of grand opera to premiere at the Paris Opéra. Performance history The opera was premiered on 16 December 1886 by the Opéra at the Palais Garnier in Paris. The ''mise-en-scène'' was by Pedro Gailhard, and the choreography, by Louis Merante. The opera was last performed at the Garnier on 9 August 1919, its 93rd performance.Stéphane Wolff (1962; reprint 1983). ''L'Opéra au Palais Garnier (1875–1962)''. Paris: Deposé au journal L'Entr'acte . Paris: Slatkine (1983), . . The opera has also been performed outside of France, in Prague (28 April 1887, in Czech), Ghent (25 January 1888), Antwerp (6 March 1888), Rome (23 November 1889, in Italian), Hamburg (1 January 1890, in Ger ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Regina Diaz
''Regina Diaz'' is an opera in two acts composed by Umberto Giordano to a libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci. It premiered on 5 March 1894 at the Teatro Mercadante in Naples. The libretto is based on Lockroy's and Edmond Badon's ''Un duel sous le cardinal de Richelieu'', which was also the source of Donizetti's 1843 opera ''Maria di Rohan'', although the setting for Giordano's version was moved from 17th-century Paris to 18th-century Naples. The opera was a failure at its premiere and withdrawn after the second performance. Giordano's patron and publisher, Edoardo Sonzogno, blamed the failure on the poor libretto. Giordano blamed it on Sonzogno's interference in the production. Background and performance history ''Regina Diaz'' was Giordano's second full-length opera and like its predecessor, ''Mala vita'', was commissioned by the Milanese music publisher Edoardo Sonzogno. ''Mala vita'' had had considerable success apart from its performances in Naples where t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrea Chenier
Andrea is a given name which is common worldwide for both males and females, cognate to Andreas, Andrej and Andrew. Origin of the name The name derives from the Greek word ἀνήρ (''anēr''), genitive ἀνδρός (''andrós''), that refers to man as opposed to woman (whereas ''man'' in the sense of ''human being'' is ἄνθρωπος, ''ánthropos''). The original male Greek name, ''Andréas'', represents the hypocoristic, with endearment functions, of male Greek names composed with the ''andr-'' prefix, like Androgeos (''man of the earth''), Androcles (''man of glory''), Andronikos (''man of victory''). In the year 2006, it was the third most popular name in Italy with 3.1% of newborns. It is one of the Italian male names ending in ''a'', with others being Elia (Elias), Enea (Aeneas), Luca ( Lucas), Mattia ( Matthias), Nicola ( Nicholas), Tobia (Tobias). In recent and past times it has also been used on occasion as a female name in Italy and in Spain, where it is c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
I Medici
''I Medici'' is an opera in four acts composed by Ruggero Leoncavallo, with a libretto by the composer. Set in Renaissance Florence at the court of Lorenzo de' Medici, it was intended as the first part of a planned but unfinished trilogy called ''Crepusculum''. The opera premiered on 6 November 1893 at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan. Background and performance history ''I Medici'' was intended as the first part of a planned but unfinished trilogy called ''Crepusculum'', with the second and third operas to be called ''Savonarola'' and ''I Borgia.'' The word "crepusculum" is Latin for "twilight", signaling the influence of Richard Wagner's tetralogy ''Der Ring des Nibelungen'' (whose fourth installment is called "Twilight of the Gods" (''Götterdämmerung'')). The remaining two operas were never completed. Leoncavallo sought to create an "epic poem" for the stage. However, one contemporary review of the premiere stated: In ''I Medici'' we have a historical opera like those that h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Bohème
''La bohème'' (; ) is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions ''quadri'', ''tableaux'' or "images", rather than ''atti'' (acts). composed by Giacomo Puccini between 1893 and 1895 to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on ''Scènes de la vie de bohème'' (1851) by Henri Murger. The story is set in Paris around 1830 and shows the Bohemian lifestyle (known in French as "") of a poor seamstress and her artist friends. The world premiere of ''La bohème'' was in Turin on 1 February 1896 at the Teatro Regio, conducted by the 28-year-old Arturo Toscanini. Since then, ''La bohème'' has become part of the standard Italian opera repertory and is one of the most frequently performed operas worldwide. In 1946, fifty years after the opera's premiere, Toscanini conducted a commemorative performance of it on radio with the NBC Symphony Orchestra. A recording of the performance was later released by RCA Victor on vinyl record, tape and compact disc. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spinto
Spinto (from Italian, "pushed") is a vocal term used to characterize a soprano or tenor voice of a weight between lyric and dramatic that is capable of handling large musical climaxes in opera at moderate intervals. (Sometimes the terms ' or ' are used to denote this category of voice.) The spinto voice type is recognisable by its tonal "slice" or ''squillo''. This enables the singer to cut through the wall of sound produced by a full Romantic orchestra in a wide variety of roles, excluding only the most taxing ones written by the likes of Richard Wagner (such as ''Brünhilde'', ''Isolde'', ''Tristan'' and ''Siegfried''), Giacomo Meyerbeer (''John of Leyden''), Verdi (''Otello''), Puccini (''Turandot'', ''Calaf'') and Richard Strauss (''Elektra''). * : a fundamentally lyric soprano with a fair amount of extra "pulp" in her tone and a distinct thrust in her vocal attack. As they possess both a lyric and a dramatic quality, spinto sopranos are suitable for a broad spectrum of rol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lyric Tenor
A tenor is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. The tenor's vocal range extends up to C5. The low extreme for tenors is widely defined to be B2, though some roles include an A2 (two As below middle C). At the highest extreme, some tenors can sing up to the second F above middle C (F5). The tenor voice type is generally divided into the ''leggero'' tenor, lyric tenor, spinto tenor, dramatic tenor, heldentenor, and tenor buffo or . History The name "tenor" derives from the Latin word '' tenere'', which means "to hold". As Fallows, Jander, Forbes, Steane, Harris and Waldman note in the "Tenor" article at ''Grove Music Online'': In polyphony between about 1250 and 1500, the enor was thestructurally fundamental (or 'holding') voice, vocal or instrumental; by the 15th century it came to signify the male voice that sang such parts. All other voices were normally ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Teatro San Carlo
The Real Teatro di San Carlo ("Royal Theatre of Saint Charles"), as originally named by the Bourbon monarchy but today known simply as the Teatro (di) San Carlo, is an opera house in Naples, Italy, connected to the Royal Palace and adjacent to the Piazza del Plebiscito. It is the oldest continuously active venue for opera in the world, having opened in 1737, decades before either Milan's La Scala or Venice's La Fenice."The Theatre and its history" on the Teatro di San Carlo's official website. (In English). Retrieved 23 December 2013 The opera season runs from late November to July, with the ballet season taking place from December to early June. The house once had a seating capacity of 3,285, but has now been reduced to 1,386 seats. Given its size, structure and antiquity, it was the model for theatres that were ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Fenice
Teatro La Fenice (, "The Phoenix") is an opera house in Venice, Italy. It is one of "the most famous and renowned landmarks in the history of Italian theatre" and in the history of opera as a whole. Especially in the 19th century, La Fenice became the site of many famous operatic premieres at which the works of several of the four major bel canto era composers – Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi – were performed. Its name reflects its role in permitting an opera company to "rise from the ashes" despite losing the use of three theatres to fire, the first in 1774 after the city's leading house was destroyed and rebuilt but not opened until 1792; the second fire came in 1836, but rebuilding was completed within a year. However, the third fire was the result of arson. It destroyed the house in 1996 leaving only the exterior walls, but it was rebuilt and re-opened in November 2004. In order to celebrate this event the tradition of the Venice New Year's Concert started. Hist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
_-_Facade.jpg "Click for more on -> La Fenice")