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Lucy Escott
Lucy Escott (4 January 1829–26 November 1895) was an American soprano and actor-manager who found success in her native country but who had an even greater success in Europe and the United Kingdom. She spent eight years in Australia with the opera company of William Saurin Lyster, W. S. Lyster. Early life Lucy Escott was born as Lucy Evans Grant in Springfield, Massachusetts, Springfield, Massachusetts in 1829, the daughter of Luther Grant and his wife Lorinda ''née'' Williams. She was trained in music from an early age, and was a successful teacher of music in Springfield in her teens. On 24 March 1846, aged 17, she married the British-born musician Richard Eastcott (1817–1880), who was teaching music in Springfield. From 1834, he had studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London and claimed to have played at the coronation of Queen Victoria in 1837. He emigrated to America in 1839, where he taught piano and violin in Worcester, Massachusetts and performed in local ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Springfield, Massachusetts
Springfield is a city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States, and the seat of Hampden County. Springfield sits on the eastern bank of the Connecticut River near its confluence with three rivers: the western Westfield River, the eastern Chicopee River, and the eastern Mill River. At the 2020 census, the city's population was 155,929, making it the third-largest city in Massachusetts, the fourth-most populous city in New England after Boston, Worcester, and Providence, and the 12th-most populous in the Northeastern United States. Metropolitan Springfield, as one of two metropolitan areas in Massachusetts (the other being Greater Boston), had a population of 699,162 in 2020. Springfield was founded in 1636, the first Springfield in the New World. In the late 1700s, during the American Revolution, Springfield was designated by George Washington as the site of the Springfield Armory because of its central location. Subsequently it was the site of Shays' Rebellio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Donna Del Lago
''La donna del lago'' ( English: ''The Lady of the Lake'') is an opera composed by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Andrea Leone Tottola (whose verses are described as "limpid" by one critic) based on the French translationOsborne, Charles 1994, p. 94 of '' The Lady of the Lake'', a narrative poem written in 1810 by Sir Walter Scott, whose work continued to popularize the image of the romantic Scottish Highlands. Scott's basic story has been noted as coming from "the hint of an incident stemming from the frequent custom of James V, the King of Scotland, of walking through the kingdom in disguise". It was the first of the Italian operas to be based on Scott's romantic works,Gossett and Brauner (2001), in Holden (Ed.), p. 785 and marked the beginning of romanticism in Rossini's work. Scott was "deeply influential in the development of Italian romantic opera"Commons 2007, pp. 9 - 12 to the extent that by 1840 (barely 20 years after this opera), there were 25 Italian opera ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maurice Strakosch
Maurice Strakosch (probably 15 January 1825 – 9 October 1887) was an American musician and impresario of Czech origin. Biography Strakosch was born in Gross-Seelowitz (today Židlochovice), Moravia. He made his debut as a pianist at the age of 11 in Brno performing a piano concerto by Hummel. Because his parents weren't satisfied with his career choice, he ran away to Vienna at the age of twelve, where he studied under Simon Sechter. He also studied singing under Giuditta Pasta for some time. In 1843, he met tenor Salvatore Patti (1800–1869) at a music festival in Vicenza. Five years later, he was tour manager of Patti group in New York. These performances started his successful career as a manager in the United States and his long-standing friendship with the Patti family. In 1852, Strakosch married Patti's daughter Amalia Patti. He was also the first manager of the youngest and most successful daughter, Adelina Patti, from her debut in 1859 until her marriage in 1868. It ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
L'elisir D'amore
''L'elisir d'amore'' (''The Elixir of Love'', ) is a ' (opera buffa) in two acts by the Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto, after Eugène Scribe's libretto for Daniel Auber's ' (1831). The opera premiered on 12 May 1832 at the Teatro della Canobbiana in Milan. Background Written in haste in a six-week period, ''L'elisir d'amore'' was the most often performed opera in Italy between 1838 and 1848 and has remained continually in the international opera repertory. Today it is one of the most frequently performed of all Donizetti's operas: it appears as number 13 on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide in the five seasons between 2008 and 2013. There are a large number of recordings. It contains the popular tenor aria "Una furtiva lagrima", a ''romanza'' that has a considerable performance history in the concert hall. Donizetti insisted on a number of changes from the original Scribe libretto. The best known of these ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Macbeth
''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those who seek power. Of all the plays that Shakespeare wrote during the reign of James I, ''Macbeth'' most clearly reflects his relationship with King James, patron of Shakespeare's acting company. It was first published in the Folio of 1623, possibly from a prompt book, and is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy. A brave Scottish general named Macbeth receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will become King of Scotland. Consumed by ambition and spurred to action by his wife, Macbeth murders King Duncan and takes the Scottish throne for himself. He is then wracked with guilt and paranoia. Forced to commit more and more murders to protect himself from enmity and suspicion, he soon becomes a tyrannical ruler. The bloodbath and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James William Wallack
James William Wallack (c. 1794–1864), commonly referred to as J. W. Wallack, was an Anglo-American actor and manager, born in London, and brother of Henry John Wallack. Life Wallack's father was named William Wallack and his sister was named Elizabeth. His parents were comedians, who performed at the London minor playhouses and in the British provinces. His first appearance on the stage was as a child at the Surrey Theatre in London. Soon afterward he performed in juvenile characters at Drury Lane, and at the age of eighteen entered on a permanent career at the same house as Laertes in ''Hamlet''. He also acted in the British provinces and in Ireland, gradually winning his way to popularity as a useful representative of drama and comedy. In 1823 he played Victor Frankenstein in ''Presumption; or, the Fate of Frankenstein'' at the English Opera House. In 1824, Wallack became stage manager at Drury Lane, and rose to the performance of secondary roles in tragedy. Later he pla ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Sonnambula
''La sonnambula'' (''The Sleepwalker'') is an opera semiseria in two acts, with music in the '' bel canto'' tradition by Vincenzo Bellini set to an Italian libretto by Felice Romani, based on a scenario for a ''ballet-pantomime'' written by Eugène Scribe and choreographed by Jean-Pierre Aumer called ''La somnambule, ou L'arrivée d'un nouveau seigneur''. The ballet had premiered in Paris in September 1827 at the height of a fashion for stage works incorporating somnambulism. The role of Amina was originally written for the soprano sfogato Giuditta Pasta and the tenor Giovanni Battista Rubini, but during Bellini's lifetime another soprano sfogato, Maria Malibran, was a notable exponent of the role. The first performance took place at the Teatro Carcano in Milan on 6 March 1831. The majority of twentieth-century recordings have been made with a soprano cast as Amina, usually with added top-notes and other changes according to tradition, although it was released in soprano sfogat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Mountain Sylph
''The Mountain Sylph'' is an opera in two acts by John Barnett to a libretto by Thomas James Thackeray, after '' Trilby, ou le lutin d'Argail'' by Charles Nodier. It was first produced in London at the Lyceum Theatre in 1834 with great success. Often (mistakenly) cited as the first through-composed English opera of the 19th century, it was Barnett's only great success on the stage out of some 30 operas and operettas, and was perhaps the most effective work by an English composer in the style of Carl Maria von Weber. Rarely (if ever) performed in the last century, its plot was parodied by W. S. Gilbert in his libretto for the Savoy Opera '' Iolanthe'' (1882). Background The story-line of ''The Mountain Sylph'', based on Nodier's tale, had already been adapted in 1832 by the singer Adolphe Nourrit as the basis of the ballet ''La Sylphide'', and it was probably the success of the ballet in Paris, where the cast included the famous ballerina, Marie Taglioni, which brought the subject ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maritana
''Maritana'' is a three-act opera including both spoken dialogue and some recitatives, composed by William Vincent Wallace, with a libretto by Edward Fitzball (1792–1873). The opera is based on the 1844 French play ''Don César de Bazan'' by Adolphe d'Ennery and Philippe François Pinel (Dumanoir), which was also the source material for Jules Massenet's opéra comique ''Don César de Bazan'' (the character of Don César de Bazan first appeared in Victor Hugo's ''Ruy Blas''). The opera premiered at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on 15 November 1845. The first of six operas by Wallace, the work is often cited as an inspiration for a plot device in Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera ''The Yeomen of the Guard'' in which a man weds a woman while awaiting execution in prison, escapes and, while he is disguised, the couple fall in love. Performance history ''Maritana'' was first produced at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane under Alfred Bunn's management on 15 November 1845, conducted fi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Esmeralda (Battista)
''Esmeralda'' is an 1856 grand opera in four acts with a score by the Italian composer Vincenzo Battista. With a libretto in English by Charles Jefferys,F. Boase. ''Modern English Biography'', 6 vols. (1892–1921) it was based on Battista's Italian version ''Ermelinda'' (1851), which in turn was based on Victor Hugo, Hugo's 1831 novel ''The Hunchback of Notre-Dame''. In 1851 in Naples in Italy Battista was at the height of his fame and powers. He had already staged a number of operas at the prestigious Teatro di San Carlo including ''Margherita d'Aragona'' (1844) Opening Night! - Stanford University Libraries with the soprano Fanny Goldberg, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vincenzo Battista
Vincenzo Maria Battista (5 October 1823–14 November 1873) was an Italian composer and conductor.Battista, Vincenzo, '' Enciclopedia universal ilustrada europeo-americana'', vol. 7: B - Bell. Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1975, p.1189. ISBN 84-239-4507-3 At first his operas were received with enthusiasm by his compatriots. Today none of his works are in the repertoire of any opera companies, despite the fact that in his lifetime they were performed in the most important theatres in Italy.Ambiveri, Corrado. Operisti minori dell'Ottocento italiano (en italià). Roma: Gremese Editore, 1998, p. 17 (Piccola biblioteca delle arti). ISBN 88-7742-263-7 Life Vincenzo (he preferred Vincenzio) Battista was born in Naples in Italy in 1823 - although it may actually have been 1818. He studied at the Conservatorio di Musica San Pietro a Majella in Naples. His first work to be performed was the tragic opera ''Anna la Prie'' at the Teatro Nuovo in Naples in February 1843. This was an instant s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
