Mar 29, 2024  
Catalogue 2020-2021 
    
Catalogue 2020-2021 [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

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MUSI 283 - Opera as a Whole

Semester Offered: Spring
0.5 unit(s)
Why did Richard Wagner call opera the “complete work of art” (Gesamtkunstwerk)?  In this 6-week intensive course, we will learn about opera from a detailed examination of six masterpieces of the genre, Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea, Handel’s Giulio Cesare, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Verdi’s Rigoletto, Wagner’s Das Rheingold and Puccini’s La Boheme.  Is opera a musical form?  A theatrical one?  A literary one?  Opera began in the 16th century as an exploration by a group of elite Italian poets of ancient Greek drama, but in the four centuries since then it has incorporated and explored the limits of the voice, dance, and applied arts within the form, and become more and more a response to the politics and society in which it was created.  Through the lens of some of the greatest works in the repertoire, and the outputs of their composers, students consider why and how opera has moved from an elite literary form to a public art form. Drew Minter.

Prerequisite(s): One course in music (applied lessons, intensive, or classroom).

First six-week course.

Two 75-minute periods.

Course Format: CLS



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