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Clear filtersSemele is promised to Prince Adraste but loves Jupiter, who first courts her in disguise. Juno, jealous of Jupiter’s infidelity, impersonates Semele’s nurse and persuades her to demand that Jupiter reveal his divine form. He resists, knowing the sight will kill her, but ultimately appears in a storm of fire; Semele and Adraste die, and Jupiter restores Semele to life and raises her to heaven.
A three-act operetta centered on Sì, an actress at the Folies Bergère named for her inability to say no. Its libretto draws on La duchessa del Bal Tabarin and Majestät Mimi.
Sāvitri learns that Death has come for her husband Satyavān. Death offers her any boon except her husband’s return; she asks for a full life, then points out that such a life is impossible without Satyavān. Death relents, and Satyavān awakens.
In Tangier, Irishman Dennis O’Grady is mistaken for a French chef and faces execution if he cannot satisfy the Pasha’s taste for spicy food. Trader Marco and his sister Lola disguise the unconscious Dennis as a new harem girl while helping Fatima escape; a bottle of hot sauce saves Dennis from the Pasha’s displeasure. Later, a plot to bomb the Pasha is foiled, and the arrival of a ship carrying Tabasco sauce leads to pardons and the lovers’ reunion.
Set in Düsseldorf during the French occupation of 1813, the opera follows a local tailor who becomes a thorn in the occupiers' side.
On a snowy afternoon in the suburban home of Tracy and Laura Gates, an argument about Tracy’s drinking turns violent; Tracy dies of a heart attack, and Laura prays for him to return. A Greek chorus tells of the mariner Hypraemius’s four seasonal miracles, granted when a penitent prays for the dead at 3:59. The opera presents three miracles: a Tuscan noblewoman’s infant son returns, a Scottish farm girl gets her family’s cow back, and a German soldier’s dead brother returns. Back at the Gates’ home, Tracy revives with no memory of events, but he and Laura resume their quarrel. He suffers a second heart attack and dies permanently. A doctor treats Laura as the chorus sings that the only death in life is the death of love.
After defeating the Ottoman sultan Bajazet, Tamerlano seeks to marry Bajazet’s daughter Asteria, who loves the Greek prince Andronico. Asteria and her father resist, and she attempts to poison Tamerlano. Bajazet takes poison and dies; the events lead Tamerlano to pardon Asteria and Andronico and unite with Irene.
In Syracuse, Amenaide is secretly in love with the exiled soldier Tancredi. Her father, Argirio, arranges for her to marry Orbazzano, hoping to end a feud and strengthen the city. A letter Amenaide wrote to Tancredi is mistaken for a treasonous message to the Saracen leader Solamir, and she is imprisoned. Tancredi, still believing she betrayed him, challenges Orbazzano and wins. He later defeats the Saracens; the dying Solamir confirms Amenaide’s innocence, and the lovers reunite. In the Ferrara version, Tancredi is mortally wounded and learns the truth just before dying in Amenaide’s arms.
A French tragédie en musique in a prologue and five acts, based on Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata.
Opera by John Lunn and Steven Plaice, the third work in a Glyndebourne trilogy created to interest young people in opera.
Tannhäuser leaves Venus’s grotto after invoking Mary and returns to the Wartburg, where he reunites with Elisabeth and competes in a song contest. He reveals his time with Venus and is exiled on a pilgrimage to Rome. The Pope denies him absolution, so he returns seeking Venus. Wolfram calls out Elisabeth’s name, and her funeral procession arrives. Tannhäuser dies beside her, while returning pilgrims bear the Pope’s staff, now sprouting leaves.
Set in the early 1930s, this three-act light opera plays on contrasts between urban bohemians and rural aristocrats, artists and the hunting set.
A five-act tragédie lyrique preceded by a prologue.
In 17th-century Ukraine, Taras Bulba leaves his sons Ostap and Andriy in Kyiv for education. Andriy falls in love with Maryltsya, daughter of a Polish governor. When war breaks out, Taras takes his sons to the Cossack stronghold. During the siege of Dubno, Andriy helps Maryltsya and joins the Polish army to marry her. Taras learns of his son’s desertion and kills him; Ostap sings a lament. In the final orchestral scene, Taras and Ostap lead the Cossacks to victory and take Dubno.
In a prologue set in 1925, Marius and Corinna are students. In a near future, Marius has become the dictator Tarquin, while Corinna is connected to a clandestine radio station. A tragedy eventually leads him back to God.
A prologue and five-act tragédie en musique.
Orgon, taken in by the hypocrite Tartuffe, plans to marry his daughter Mariane to him despite her engagement to Valère. Tartuffe attempts to seduce Orgon’s wife Elmire and tricks Orgon into giving him the family property. Elmire exposes Tartuffe, and the family stages a deception of its own: Damis, Valère, and Mariane appear in disguises to announce the King’s order for Tartuffe’s arrest. Orgon admits his mistake and reunites Mariane with Valère.
In sixteenth-century Michoacán, Princess Coyuva and Prince Ticátame seek revenge for the death of her father, but Coyuva’s Christianity leads them to Bishop Vasco de Quiroga. He seeks to improve the Purépecha community’s lives; Petámuti’s plot to kill the couple fails, and he asks for baptism as he dies.
Taverner is tried for heresy and pardoned by the Cardinal, but Death later prevails in a symbolic battle for his soul. After the Reformation, Taverner becomes an agent of royal religious policy and oversees the trial and execution of the White Abbot.
Zenobia Powell Perry’s opera is set around the real Tawawa House resort in Wilberforce, Ohio, in 1852. The site was frequented by slaveholders and their enslaved mistresses, and enslaved workers there could earn freedom and education. The house was also part of the Underground Railroad. The opera’s story concerns the lives of escaped slaves; no fuller plot is available in the reviewed text.
An opera based on a Turkish tale about a dollmaker and a love story involving a heartless character.
At a Japanese temple, monk Seikyo recalls his earlier love for Chinese princess Lan. He and Lan search for the true Book of Tea, but her brother challenges Seikyo and a struggle leaves Lan mortally wounded. Seikyo spares the Prince and renounces worldly life, returning to the ritual of empty tea.
Simon Mayr’s dramma per musica takes its subject from the Odyssey and was composed for the Venice Carnival of 1797. The cast featured castrato Girolamo Crescentini.
Intrigues and complications surround Telemachus, son of Odysseus. The libretto draws on Homer’s Odyssey and François Fénelon’s didactic novel Les Aventures de Télémaque.
Gluck’s two-act Italian dramma per musica is based on the Odyssey and uses a libretto by Marco Coltellini, adapted from Carlo Sigismondo Capece’s earlier libretto for Scarlatti’s Telemaco.
The Athenian general Temistocle lives in exile at the Persian court of Artaxerxes. He refuses to help the king conquer Athens, and Artaxerxes condemns him to death, but relents after being impressed by Temistocle’s honor. Temistocle loves Palmide, yet worries that accepting the king’s approval to marry her would make him betray his country.
A separate Porpora opera setting of the Temistocle subject, using Metastasio’s libretto rather than Apostolo Zeno’s text used for the 1718 version. The reviewed page provides no separate plot details.
In Persia, Themistocles and his son Neocles arrive incognito in Susa after exile from Athens. His daughter Aspasia, who loves the Athenian ambassador Lysimachus, has also reached the city after a shipwreck. Once their identities and circumstances are revealed, King Xerxes pardons them, unites the lovers, and makes peace with Athens.
Young Kaymakam Fikret Irmaklı arrives in Çukurova and is misled by wealthy rice growers about the harm their irrigation will cause. After learning that flooding will trap villagers in malaria, he revokes their permits and tries to stop the water, but the landowners bribe guards and obtain his transfer. The peasants accept money to leave their homes, while Memed alone refuses to yield; Irmaklı departs to continue his struggle elsewhere.
Erato and her followers summon Apollo, who arrives with the Muses. They call Terpsicore, who demonstrates dance’s power by expressing varied emotions through movement. Solo singers and chorus then praise the virtuous deeds of wise people, celebrated in the opera that follows.
Teseo, an unknown son of King Egeo, serves Athens as a hero and loves the princess Agilea. The sorceress Medea also loves him and repeatedly uses magic to separate the couple. Egeo nearly gives Teseo a poisoned drink, but recognizes the sword left with his son in infancy and discovers his identity. Teseo and Agilea are reunited, and Minerva banishes Medea.
An opera seria by Gaspare Spontini, with a libretto by Cosimo Giotti. The cast includes Aegeus, Theseus, Asteria, and Medea; no plot description is available.
The opera depicts Nikola Tesla’s life as a series of reversals of fortune.
The two-part serenata features the sea goddess Tetide (Thetis), along with Apollo, Marte, Imeneo, Pallade, and Venere.
After Emperor Troncone’s death, Zidiana plots with governor Cino and general Sivenio to seize power, despite Teuzzone being the rightful heir. Zidiana intends to marry Teuzzone herself, while Zelinda, his fiancée, opposes the scheme.
An opera based on Joël Pommerat’s play Grâce à mes yeux, with characters including Aymar, his parents, two young women and a man with long hair.
The ascetic monk Athanaël returns to Alexandria to convert Thaïs, a courtesan and devotee of Venus, whom he remembers from his youth. His wealthy friend Nicias is Thaïs’s lover. Athanaël urges her to abandon her former life; after resisting, she agrees to join him in the desert and enter a convent. At the convent, Athanaël realizes that he has become consumed by desire for her. Learning that Thaïs is dying, he rushes to her bedside and confesses his love, while she dies believing she is entering heaven.
As Steve Jobs confronts illness, he reflects on his childhood, early experiments with Steve Wozniak, relationships with Chrisann and Laurene, and the ambition that strained those bonds. Guided in memory by his Zen mentor Kobun, he accepts his mortality in a scene that merges his wedding with a memorial; the opera closes by returning to the childhood workbench that began his story.
Belmonte arrives at Pasha Selim’s country house to rescue his betrothed Konstanze, who was captured with her maid Blonde. With his servant Pedrillo, he plans to free the women from the Pasha’s compound. Their escape is discovered, and Selim learns that Belmonte is the son of his old enemy. Selim chooses mercy and releases all four, frustrating his servant Osmin.
In this comic opera parody, the supposedly dying Figaro is taken hostage in his bed by pirate Captain Kadd. Don Giovanni, Pecadillo and their companions set out to rescue him, travel through a storm and the Pasha Shaboom’s court, and reach a tropical island. There they discover a treasure hidden in Figaro’s bed. Schlepporello breaks character and negotiates for permission to sing before the finale can conclude.
Geppetto carves Pinocchio from a log and buys him a schoolbook, but Pinocchio is distracted by the puppet theatre, the Cat and Fox, and the Field of Miracles. After repeated misadventures, the Blue Fairy cures him and he tries to be good. He is tricked into going to Funland, transformed, joins a circus, and is sold to a drum-maker. Pinocchio returns to normal, is swallowed by a large fish, and escapes with Geppetto. He works to support his father and finally receives his reward.
Three-act opera based on Thornton Wilder’s play of the same name, itself based on Euripides’ Alcestis. Roles include Alkestis, her husband Admettos, their son Epimenes, Tiresias, Herkules, and Apollo; no plot summary is supplied.
In 1939, Czech Jewish artist Joe Kavalier escapes Nazi-occupied Prague and joins his cousin Sam Clay in Brooklyn, where they create the superhero the Escapist. Joe falls in love with Rosa Saks and tries to save his sister Sarah from Europe; after the ship carrying refugee children is destroyed, he enlists and goes to war. Rosa and Sam build a life together while Joe is away, and after learning through Rosa’s letters that he has a daughter, Joe returns to reunite with them.
In 17th-century Pomerania, Mary Schweidler secretly discovers amber and uses its value to help starving villagers. Count Rudiger falls in love with her, as does the local Commandant. After Mary chooses Rudiger, the Commandant and his jealous servant Elsie accuse her of witchcraft. Mary confesses during her trial to spare her father and is condemned to burn. Rudiger escapes imprisonment and rescues her; the King pardons Mary and orders the Commandant to take her place. Elsie dies by poison, and the Commandant is banished.
A dramatic recital built around the reputed 1904 singing contest between James Joyce and John McCormack. Four singers move between public performance and private thought as the score and libretto develop variations on five traditional Irish ballads.
In 1498, Duchess Anne favors Fabio Fabiani, prompting the Breton nobility and French ambassador to conspire against her. Raoul, an armourer, has raised Marie, an orphan he loves. Fabio kills a man who holds documents proving Marie's noble parentage, but Raoul learns the truth. Fabio falsely accuses Raoul of murder. The Duchess discovers Fabio's crime, and Fabio is executed; Raoul and Marie reunite.
Three-scene children’s opera based on Norwegian Ash-Lad fairy tales, retold from the perspective of Pål, the Ash-Lad’s brother and a perennial loser and underdog. The entry provides no further plot details.
At Lake Como, a Lodger who studies composer Jeffrey Aspern rents rooms from former prima donna Juliana Bordereau and her niece Tina, hoping to find Aspern’s papers and a lost Medea opera score. The story shifts between 1885, as the Lodger investigates, and 1835, when the audience sees Aspern’s relationship with the younger soprano Sonia and his death. Juliana dies after the Lodger learns she has kept the papers. Tina offers him the score if he will marry her; he initially refuses, then changes his mind, but Tina says it is too late. She burns the score page by page.
A wrecked flight crew confronts whether people help one another and whether the fallen can accept their non-existence. Through investigations, a council, examination and final consent, the work questions complicity with power and violence; its original multimedia performance combined music, choral passages, clown scenes and film.
Baby Doe and Horace Tabor fall in love while Horace is married to Augusta; after he divorces Augusta, the couple marry amid social scandal. Horace’s fortunes decline as Colorado politics shift toward the gold standard, and he dies after a final visit to the opera house he built. Thirty years later, Baby Doe ends the story at the Matchless Mine.
A love story set during the Ming dynasty that celebrates the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, combining Chinese folk music with Western opera styles.
Count Almaviva, in disguise as the poor student Lindoro, falls in love with Rosina, who is confined by her guardian Bartolo. With Figaro’s help, Almaviva repeatedly disguises himself to enter Bartolo’s house and reach Rosina. After Bartolo convinces Rosina that Lindoro has betrayed her, she agrees to marry Bartolo; Almaviva reveals his identity, and the pair marry before Bartolo can stop them.
Cecil loves the Dutch soldier Franzel, but her father wants her to marry Captain Hogrestan, while Franzel’s father wants him to marry an heiress. The Baron locks Cecil in a chamber, but she escapes using the family portraits. After Cecil and Franzel marry, both fathers reject the match.
At a village fair, Mařenka and Jeník declare their love, though her parents want her to marry Vašek, the son of a wealthy landowner. The marriage broker Kecal offers Jeník money to give Mařenka up. Jeník appears to agree, but stipulates that she may marry only a son of Mícha. Meanwhile, Mařenka meets Vašek in disguise and persuades him to give up the marriage. When she learns about Jeník’s contract, she believes he has betrayed her and agrees to marry Vašek. Jeník is then revealed as Mícha’s elder son, fulfilling the contract. Mařenka understands his scheme and they marry; Vašek’s antics in a bear costume convince his parents he is not ready for marriage.
In Thebes, Pentheus tries to suppress the cult of Dionysus, whose followers embrace ecstatic revelry. A stranger—Dionysus in disguise—draws the city into the cult and entrances Pentheus, who goes to the mountain dressed as a woman. Dionysus’s spell reaches Pentheus’s mother Agave and sister Autonoë; Pentheus is torn apart, and Agave unknowingly cradles his head as the city falls.
Widow Popova insists she remains faithful to her late husband, while her servant Luka doubts her grief. When creditor Smirnov arrives to collect a debt, their quarrel escalates until they aim pistols at one another; instead, they fall in love, leaving Luka astonished.
Laine, a poor weaver’s ugly and crippled daughter, wishes to be beautiful. The Devil gives her a stone that grants beauty, and Prince Philip falls for her appearance. She renounces the stone, which passes from her father Simon to Saida; while Laine returns to her former form, Philip loses his sight in battle and recognizes her inner beauty. Saida discards the stone, and Philip chooses Laine.
Peachum and his wife discover that their daughter Polly has secretly married Macheath, the highwayman who is one of Peachum’s clients. They arrange to have Macheath captured and killed for his money. Macheath is imprisoned, escapes with Lucy Lockit’s help, and is recaptured. Four other women also claim to be his wives. He prepares to hang, but the Beggar changes the ending to satisfy the audience’s demand for a happy conclusion, and Macheath is reprieved and reunited with Polly.
Village girl Poluška, engaged to Tonek, flirts with Baron Adolf. When the gamekeeper exposes them, her parents try to arrange a match with the baron’s family, but the plan fails. Poluška returns to Tonek, while Adolf finds happiness with a countess; the characters reflect on the folly of mismatched social unions.
A chamber opera about Bannadonna, a bell-caster and architect, his daughter Una, and the workers around them. Krenek develops the mysterious events of Melville’s story into explicit dramatic action.
The unfinished opera was conceived around a team of Soviet specialists visiting America. Shostakovich wrote an overture and eight further pieces, lasting about 17 minutes.
The opening music drama of Boughton’s Arthurian cycle concerns the begetting of Arthur, with a libretto by Reginald Buckley that Boughton heavily revised.
Petra von Kant’s destructive lesbian affair is recounted in this five-act opera based on Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s screenplay. The opera first appeared in concert in Dublin before its staged London premiere.
The opera interweaves a medieval village legend with a modern story about excavations at King Casimir IV's tomb. In the legend, Christina agrees to marry a Green Man to spare villagers from an oppressive count, then breaks the bargain to marry Carl. A spider emerges from her hand and spreads plague; Christina traps it in her cousin's guitar and buries it in Casimir's tomb. In the modern story, a spider emerges when archaeologists open the tomb, and a deadly virus begins to affect them.
At a country inn, widow Mrs Waters rejects retired boatswain Harry Benn’s proposals. Benn persuades a down-on-his-luck ex-soldier to stage a burglary so he can rescue her, but Mrs Waters discovers the scheme and turns it around; the ruse ends with Benn giving himself up and Mrs Waters warming to the accomplice.
The fugitive Thaddeus joins a band of gypsies and saves the infant Arline, daughter of Count Arnheim, from a deer. Twelve years later, Arline is arrested after the Gypsy Queen frames her for theft, but Arnheim recognizes her by her scar. Thaddeus wins the Count’s blessing to marry her; the jealous Queen dies in a struggle with Devilshoof.
Chinese-American ghostwriter Ruth struggles with her elderly mother LuLing’s apparent dementia, her husband’s uncertain commitment, and her teenage stepdaughters’ behavior. Guided by a ghost of uncertain identity, Ruth travels into the past and experiences parts of LuLing’s tragic youth, gaining insight, forgiveness, and strength. The story moves between San Francisco in 1997 and China and Hong Kong around World War II.
The opera adapts Tom Wolfe’s novel and centers on ambitions and tensions among New York City’s upper classes in the 1980s. The entry does not summarize its dramatic events.
A one-act opera based on Anton Chekhov’s comic play The Bear, also known as The Boor. Its libretto uses Vladimir Ussachevsky’s English translation.
A one-act English-language opera for young people by Gian Carlo Menotti, with music and libretto by the composer.
During the Brandenburg occupation of Bohemia, Prague’s mayor Volfram suffers the plundering of the city and the detention of his daughters by the occupying troops. His daughter Ludiše rejects Jan Tausendmark, who joins the occupiers. The serf Jíra is accused of leading a revolt and condemned to death, but Junoš rescues him. Tausendmark fails to secure Ludiše, and the Brandenburgers are driven from Prague as the city is liberated.
Donald Tovey’s only opera draws on the legends of Theseus, Ariadne, and the Minotaur.
Sibelius’s planned Finnish-language opera follows the wizard Väinämöinen as he tries to win the moon goddess Kuutar by creating a boat through song and magic. When his incantation lacks three words, he journeys to the underworld of Tuonela to find them. Sibelius abandoned the project before completion, later reusing some of its material in other works.
Nebuchadnezzar orders Ananias, Misael, and Asarias to worship his golden image. They refuse and are thrown into a fiery furnace. God saves them from death, and the voice of an angel joins the three Israelites in a Benedicite.
A magician entertains a caliph by conjuring a pleasure-seeking replica named Suh, who neglects his responsibilities and is eventually killed by the evil spirit Sah in serpent form. When the caliph grows angry and tries to destroy the magician’s amphora, the magician summons a storm and escapes.
The Wife of Bath loves Chaucer, who loves the Prioress. The Wife wins a bet for a brooch that carries Chaucer’s promise of marriage, but King Richard II allows her to marry again only if she chooses a miller; Chaucer and the Prioress are reconciled.
Alexander Knaifel’s three-act chamber opera adapts Oscar Wilde’s story of a ghost at Canterville.
Gordon Getty’s one-act opera adapts Oscar Wilde’s 1887 short story The Canterville Ghost.
A one-act chamber opera based on Mark Twain’s satirical short story The Legend of the Capitoline Venus.
Petr Grinev leaves home for military service and falls in love with Masha, daughter of the commandant at Belogorsky Fortress. During a snowstorm, Petr gives his coat to a guide who is later revealed to be Pugachev, leader of an uprising. When Pugachev’s forces take the fortress, he spares Petr but executes the commandant and takes his wife. Pugachev frees Masha from Shvabrin and allows the couple to leave. After Petr is arrested, Masha petitions the Empress, who pardons him and blesses their future together.
A one-act comic opera based on Nikolai Gogol’s story of the same name. Its cast includes a general, landowner Chertokutsky and his young wife, several officers, a soldier, a footman, and a groom.
The opera interweaves the story of Abraham as told in religious texts with recorded interviews of Israeli, Palestinian, and American participants reflecting on Abraham and his family. Spoken interview material is shaped into musical phrases, while images of interviewees are shown on video screens.
An eight-scene opera based on Percy Bysshe Shelley’s play The Cenci.
The opera follows five teenagers who were convicted in the Central Park jogger case, served years in prison, and were later exonerated. Its cast includes the teenagers and their parents, the actual perpetrator Matias Reyes, a prosecutor, a detective figure called the Masque, and Donald Trump, who had publicly called for the death penalty.
The Ladrones force English tourist Peter Grigg to become their chief and marry Inez, though he is already married. Later, his wife Dolly arrives, and the band helps him conceal the marriage while the missing original chief, Ferdinand, is discovered and happily resumes his position.
A family sheltering refugees during wartime is torn apart when soldiers enter their home. The mother and child flee by ship but are denied a safe landing; the island’s governor allows the child ashore, yet the child refuses to leave the mother and chooses death rather than separation. In the final, dreamlike scene, the dead children await a Messiah who proves to be an ordinary traveling salesman.
Scientist Alex Rosenthal, who fled Nazi Germany for the USSR, clones Wagner, Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, Verdi, and Mozart. After government support ends, the clones live in 1993 Moscow. Mozart falls in love with Tanya, and they marry. Kela poisons the group; Mozart survives and is left alone.
Dexter and Athena live in a ramshackle house in inner-suburban Melbourne with their disabled son Billy. Their family life is disrupted by the arrival of Phillip, Elizabeth, and Vicki, a more urbane, musical, and stylish family, bringing collateral damage in its wake.
A Chinese-language western-style opera based on the story The Orphan of Zhao.
Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven observe from heaven that classical music seems to be declining in relevance. They descend to Earth to visit Charles Rosen and interrupt a symposium on sonata form, where a doctoral student disrupts a performance of Don Giovanni with extended analysis. The composers meet anthropomorphized musical chords and eventually speak with Rosen, who tells them that relevance changes. They return to heaven, and Robert Schumann then visits Rosen.
A one-act Russian comic opera in 15 scenes and ten musical numbers, written for a planned visit by Catherine the Great to Tambov. It draws on Russian folk-song traditions. The entry does not explain the plot.
An English-language stage adaptation of Blaise le savetier, with new text and music by Charles Dibdin.
A traveller recounts how General K'an falsely accused the official Chao Tun, who fled with his wife and newborn son. Raised by a hermit, the son goes to the capital twenty years later to study and discovers the truth about his father's death. He deciphers a scroll revealing K'an's plot against the Emperor, warns the Emperor, and recovers his father's property.
In an unnamed European totalitarian country, political dissident John Sorel is hunted by the secret police. His wife Magda seeks a visa to flee with their child and his mother, but the consulate’s paperwork and queues delay her. The secret police question Magda, and a wealthy woman receives a visa ahead of her. Magda’s child and mother-in-law die; John is captured when he returns to the consulate. Despondent, Magda turns on the gas in her oven as the secretary tries to reach her by telephone.
A band of Spanish brigands must choose a new chief, and a law makes the first passing foreigner their leader and Inez’s husband. They force English tourist Adolphus Grigg into the role and scheme to have him killed, but he helps protect captive Rita until her fiancé Vasquez arrives; the band is pardoned and Rita is freed.
A 75-minute, seven-part opera based on Mike Corley’s experiences and theories posted on Usenet. The work portrays a paranoid mind and concerns surveillance; its vocal parts are spoken over continuous music.
Orpheus leads Eurydice out of the underworld under Hades’s condition that he not look back at her. Near the end of the corridor, he turns to make sure she is following, condemning her to return to the underworld. In a series of arias, Eurydice retreats down the corridor while Orpheus is left to return alone to the living world.
In Warsaw, the young nobleman Kazimierz loves the Countess, while Bronia, who is also in love with him, feels out of place among the Countess's salon guests. After a ball and a misunderstanding send Kazimierz away to war, the Countess recognizes his sincerity and seeks him out, but Kazimierz chooses Bronia, and they are joined at her grandfather's country manor.
An opera adaptation of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s play The Critic, using much of its second and third acts. The opera’s plot is not summarized in the entry.
In Salem during the witch trials, Abigail Williams and other girls accuse townspeople of witchcraft. Abigail’s jealousy of Elizabeth Proctor drives her accusation against Elizabeth, and John Proctor is also condemned. He chooses hanging rather than recanting his beliefs.
A forester captures a young vixen, who later escapes and lives in the forest with a fox. After a poacher kills her, the forester encounters a young frog, continuing the opera’s cycle of life and renewal.
In a village, Bětuška loves the poor Jeník, but her father Martin wants her to marry the wealthy Václav. The Prince offers Jeník a farm in exchange for an assignation with Bětuška; Veruna and the Princess foil the Prince and Jean with disguises and a trap, and the Prince grants the farm so Bětuška and Jeník can marry.
Miranda’s aunt wants her to marry her foppish cousin, Monsieur, but Miranda loves Gerard. When Miranda’s father discovers Gerard in her bedroom, Gerard pretends to be a dancing master. The aunt tests his dancing and Miranda’s maid tries to seduce Monsieur. Miranda and Gerard secretly marry, and her father approves.
Set in eighteenth-century France, the opera follows characters including Marquise de Merteuil, Vicomte de Valmont, Madame de Tourvel, Cécile de Volanges, and Chevalier de Danceny across scenes in chateaus, bedrooms, a wood, a pleasure pavilion, a convent, and Vincennes.
A Russian-language opera based on Boris Vasilyev’s novel The Dawns Here Are Quiet.
After choruses reflect on Palestinian and Jewish histories, the ship’s Captain recounts the hijacking of the Achille Lauro. Passengers and hijackers describe their experiences and motives. Leon Klinghoffer condemns the hijackers and is murdered offstage. After the hijackers surrender and the passengers disembark, the Captain tells Marilyn Klinghoffer of her husband’s death; she responds with grief and anger.
An opera by Otakar Ostrčil based on Karel Pippich’s drama about Vlasta, a leader of warriors in the Czech Maidens’ War legend. The plot is not summarized in the available record.
Against the 1825 Decembrist revolt, Prince Dimitri joins dissident officers while pursuing a love for Elena. The conspirators’ uprising in Senate Square is crushed, and Dimitri is wounded. Elena persuades Tsar Nicholas to let her accompany Dimitri into exile; other leaders face execution, and the exiles depart for Siberia singing a hymn to liberation.
In Surinam/Dutch Guiana, the local Anakawtas tribe, led by Queen Oanita and Casgan, attacks Dutch settlers defended by Captain Maurice and Major Van Pumpernickle. Oanita and Maurice fall in love, provoking Casgan. Casgan interrupts their meeting and captures Maurice, who refuses to betray his comrades. Oanita lets him escape, then faces execution by her enraged tribe. Maurice and his soldiers rescue her; Casgan is killed, and the lovers’ reunion restores peace between the settlers and the tribe.
In 15th-century London, a husband lives with a wife who has been unable to speak since birth. A surgeon gives her the ability to speak, but she becomes domineering. Exasperated, her husband calls for the Devil to take her. When the Devil arrives, he too cannot tolerate the wife, and he escapes with the husband.
New Hampshire farmer Jabez Stone sells his soul to Mr. Scratch in exchange for prosperity. When the devil comes to collect, Daniel Webster defends Stone in a trial before a jury of historical figures chosen by Scratch, and wins a not-guilty verdict.
At a village dance, Kate declares she would dance with the devil if necessary. A mysterious hunter, the devil Marbuel, dances with her and carries her to Hell. Jirka follows to rescue her and persuades Lucifer to let Kate return to Earth. Later, Jirka tells the Princess she must free the serfs or be taken to Hell. When Marbuel comes for her, Kate frightens him away. The Princess rewards Jirka and Kate, and the peasants celebrate their freedom.
The devil becomes fascinated with the young Alvare and appears in several forms, including Biondetta. As the supernatural figure grows more human, Biondetta is ultimately freed through her love for Alvare.
Jarek has sworn not to marry until his lord Vok does, while Vok has been unable to love since a past rejection. The demon Rarach exploits their hopes and the lovers’ oaths, but after Vok recognizes his former beloved’s daughter Hedvika and opens his heart to her, Rarach tries to flood the monastery by building a wall across the Vltava. Beneš breaks the demon’s power, and Vok and Hedvika as well as Jarek and Katuška can marry.
In Loudun, the prioress Jeanne’s visions and the nuns’ claims of possession are used to accuse Father Grandier of witchcraft. Grandier’s political conflict with authorities and private relationships fuel his prosecution; he is tortured and burned, and Jeanne eventually recognizes that her accusations arose from unrequited love.
Anne Frank records daily life in hiding with her family in Amsterdam from 1942 until their arrest in 1944. Through brief scenes drawn from her diary, she describes the people around her, small pleasures, her growing feelings for Peter, and the fear and loneliness of confinement.
In five continuous diary scenes set in St. Petersburg, clerk Popristchin becomes increasingly delusional: he imagines dogs are corresponding about his beloved Sophie, then believes himself to be King Ferdinand VIII of Spain, before ending in an asylum.
A group of humorists fools several dupes with a fabricated story about Blackbeard’s buried treasure. They stage a mock magical ritual and persuade the dupes to dig up a chest, which contains only bricks and stones. After Washball tries to betray the group to the king’s tax collector, the dupes confront their gullibility; Lucy and Meanwell marry, and the others resolve to reform.
The opera explores the seven virtues—prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance, faith, hope and charity—and cultural perceptions of disability.
Wealthy couple Iris and Jed are happily divorcing and host an elaborate party. Iris's sister Louise is secretly in love with Jed, while Toby is an aspiring artist hired as a waiter and Caroline, the couple's assistant, is pursued by loan sharks. By the end of the evening, the divorce has unsettled the characters' assumptions and sent them in unexpected directions.
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