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Simonsen's Opera Company
Fanny Simonsen (née Françoise De Haes or Dehaes) (c. 1835 – 19 September 1896), also written Fannie Simonsen, was a French soprano singer who had a substantial career on the Australian stage, later a concert manager with her violinist husband Martin Simonsen (c. 1829 – 28 November 1899). Several daughters and one grand-daughter, Frances Alda, were first-rate singers. History Born Françoise De Haes or Dehaes, Fanny Simonsen was a French lyric soprano, who claimed aristocratic parentage and had studied under Manuel Garcia II. She had on occasion shared the Paris stage with Madame Carvalho, and played ''prima donna'' roles in Brussels and the great French provincial cities. She married the eminent Danish violinist Martin Simonsen, and for nine years restricted her appearances to the concert stage in Europe and California. The Simonsens arrived in Melbourne from Germany in August 1865 by the mail steamer ''Northam'' after a successful tour of China and India, and held a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frances Alda
Frances Davis Alda (31 May 1879 – 18 September 1952) was a New Zealand-born, Australian-raised operatic lyric soprano. She achieved fame during the first three decades of the 20th century due to her outstanding singing voice, fine technique and colourful personality, as well as her frequent onstage partnerships at the Metropolitan Opera, New York, with Enrico Caruso. Career Alda was born Fanny Jane Davis in Christchurch, New Zealand, on 31 May 1879 to David Davis and Leonore Simonsen.Alda amended her birth year to 1883 to make herself more appealing to operatic managers. This incorrect year is often recorded as her actual year of birth. Leonore, a promising singer from a musical family, in September 1880 divorced David and resumed her singing career. Fanny spent her early years traveling with her mother on her operatic tours. After false starts in Australasia, she took Fanny and her younger brother to San Francisco, California in 1883. Leonore Davis remarried but died of per ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Meyerbeer
Giacomo Meyerbeer (born Jakob Liebmann Beer; 5 September 1791 – 2 May 1864) was a German opera composer, "the most frequently performed opera composer during the nineteenth century, linking Mozart and Wagner". With his 1831 opera ''Robert le diable'' and its successors, he gave the genre of grand opera 'decisive character'. Meyerbeer's grand opera style was achieved by his merging of German orchestra style with Italian vocal tradition. These were employed in the context of sensational and melodramatic libretti created by Eugène Scribe and were enhanced by the up-to-date theatre technology of the Paris Opéra. They set a standard which helped to maintain Paris as the opera capital of the nineteenth century. Born to a rich Jewish family, Meyerbeer began his musical career as a pianist but soon decided to devote himself to opera, spending several years in Italy studying and composing. His 1824 opera '' Il crociato in Egitto'' was the first to bring him Europe-wide reputation, but ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Muette De Portici
''La muette de Portici'' (''The Mute Girl of Portici'', or ''The Dumb Girl of Portici''), also called ''Masaniello'' () in some versions, is an opera in five acts by Daniel Auber, with a libretto by Germain Delavigne, revised by Eugène Scribe. The work has an important place in music history as the earliest French grand opera. It is also known for its alleged role in the Belgian Revolution of 1830. Background The opera was first given at the Salle Le Peletier of the Paris Opéra on 29 February 1828. The role of Masaniello was taken by the famous tenor Adolphe Nourrit and Princess Elvire was sung by Laure Cinti-Damoreau. The dancer Lise Noblet played the mute title role, a part later taken by other dancers such as Marie Taglioni, Fanny Elssler and Pauline Leroux, also the actress Harriet Smithson (the future wife of Hector Berlioz). Alphonse was created by Alexis Dupont, who was Lise Noblet's brother-in-law. The conductor at the premiere was Henri Valentino.; ; ; . Other sou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Crown Diamonds
''Les diamants de la couronne'' (''The Crown Diamonds'') is an ''opéra comique'' by the French composer Daniel Auber, first performed by the Opéra-Comique at the second Salle Favart in Paris on 6 March 1841. The libretto (in three acts) is by Auber's regular collaborator, Eugène Scribe with the help of Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges. Performance history The opera was performed at the Opéra-Comique 379 times up to 1889, under the title ''Les diamants de la reine'', and was revived in Marseilles on 20 March 1896. Outside France it was first performed in Brussels on 25 November 1841, New Orleans on 31 March 1842, Munich on 15 July 1842 (in a German translation by V. A. Swoboda), Prague on 13 August 1842 (in German), Hamburg on 29 October 1842 (in German), Riga in 1843 (in German), Amsterdam in 1843 (in French), Berlin at the Hofoper on 11 February 1843 (in German), Copenhagen on 17 February 1843 (in a Danish translation by T. H. Reynoldson), New York City on 14 July 1843 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Daniel Auber
Daniel-François-Esprit Auber (; 29 January 178212 May 1871) was a French composer and director of the Paris Conservatoire. Born into an artistic family, Auber was at first an amateur composer before he took up writing operas professionally when the family's fortunes failed in 1820. He soon established a professional partnership with the librettist Eugène Scribe that lasted for 41 years and produced 39 operas, most of them commercial and critical successes. He is mostly associated with opéra-comique and composed 35 works in that genre. With Scribe he wrote the first French grand opera, ''La Muette de Portici'' (The Dumb Woman of Portici) in 1828, which paved the way for the large-scale works of Giacomo Meyerbeer. Auber held two important official musical posts. From 1842 to 1871 he was director of France's premier music academy, the Paris Conservatoire, which he expanded and modernised. From 1852 until the fall of the Second Empire in 1870 he was director of the imperial chap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vincenzo Bellini
Vincenzo Salvatore Carmelo Francesco Bellini (; 3 November 1801 – 23 September 1835) was a Sicilian opera composer, who was known for his long-flowing melodic lines for which he was named "the Swan of Catania". Many years later, in 1898, Giuseppe Verdi "praised the broad curves of Bellini's melody: 'there are extremely long melodies as no-one else had ever made before'." A large amount of what is known about Bellini's life and his activities comes from surviving letters—except for a short period—which were written over his lifetime to his friend Francesco Florimo, whom he had met as a fellow student in Naples and with whom he maintained a lifelong friendship. Other sources of information come from correspondence saved by other friends and business acquaintances. Bellini was the quintessential composer of the Italian '' bel canto'' era of the early 19th century, and his work has been summed up by the London critic Tim Ashley as: ... also hugely influential, as much a ... [...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] |
William Vincent Wallace
William Vincent Wallace (11 March 1812 – 12 October 1865) was an Irish composer and pianist. In his day, he was famous on three continents as a double virtuoso on violin and piano. Nowadays, he is mainly remembered as an opera composer of note, with key works such as ''Maritana'' (1845) and ''Lurline (opera), Lurline'' (1847/60), but he also wrote a large amount of piano music (including some virtuoso pieces) that was much in vogue in the 19th century. His more modest output of songs and ballads, equally wide-ranging in style and difficulty, was also popular in his day, some numbers being associated with famous singers of the time. Early life Wallace was born at Colbeck Street, Waterford, Ireland. Both of his parents were Irish; his father, Spencer Wallace of County Mayo, one of four children, who was born in Killala, County Mayo in 1789, became a regimental bandmaster with the North Mayo Militia based in Ballina, County Mayo, Ballina. William was born while the regiment wa ... [...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] |
Bell's Life In Victoria And Sporting Chronicle
''Bell's Life...'' was a group of newspapers produced in Australia in the mid-nineteenth century based upon the English publication ''Bell's Life in London''. Most publications lasted a short duration. The subtitles were usually ''sporting chronicle''. The Sydney and Melbourne papers were precursors of the ''Australasian Post''. Sydney In Sydney, New South Wales it was known as ''Bell's Life in Sydney and Sporting Reviewer'' and had a longer publication run of 1845 to 1872. Stories and articles from the Sydney paper were carried by other newspapers. Hobart In Tasmania, the subtitle was the more extensive ''sporting chronicle, agricultural gazette and country journal''. Melbourne In Melbourne, Victoria the publication was titled "Victoria", rather than the city name. Adelaide In Adelaide, South Australia, the publication lasted for less than a year. Perth The publication in Perth, Western Australia Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Wes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roberto Il Diavolo
''Robert le diable'' (''Robert the Devil'') is an opera in five acts composed by Giacomo Meyerbeer between 1827 and 1831, to a libretto written by Eugène Scribe and Germain Delavigne. ''Robert le diable'' is regarded as one of the first grand operas at the Paris Opéra. It has only a superficial connection to the medieval legend of ''Robert the Devil''. The opera was immediately successful from its first night on 21 November 1831 at the Opéra; the dramatic music, harmony and orchestration, its melodramatic plot, its star singers and its sensational stage effects compelled Frédéric Chopin, who was in the audience, to say, "If ever magnificence was seen in the theatre, I doubt that it reached the level of splendour shown in ''Robert''...It is a masterpiece...Meyerbeer has made himself immortal".Brown, ''Robert le diable'', p. 572 ''Robert'' initiated the European fame of its composer, consolidated the fame of its librettist, Scribe, and launched the reputation of the new direct ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Lorgnette
''The Lorgnette'', subtitled "Theatrical Journal and Programme" (later "A journal for Amusements"), was a weekly magazine in Melbourne, Australia, devoted to theatre, opera and the concert stage. The magazine was published Saturdays and sold for 2d (two pence) at the major entertainment venues ( Theatre Royal, Opera House, Academy of Music, Princess' Theatre, St George's Hall and Town Hall) where it had exclusive rights, and elsewhere. For much of its existence, a four-page supplement was issued with the Saturday two pence (from 1890 one penny) paper. The supplement was available ''gratis'' as a separate publication every other day of the week. This supplement was printed (and contents updated) daily, and datestamped. In order to promote forthcoming productions as well as providing up-to-date theatre news and current programmes, a great deal of its content was reprinted from one issue to the next, perhaps a unique characteristic of this magazine, while some features changed wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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