The Opera

• The Opera provides the best opportunities

for all aspects in the music of Romantic
period to be combined into a single form.

• It is a musical composition having all or most

of its text set to music with arias, recitative,
choruses, duets, trios.

• The opera is usually characterized by

elaborate costumes, scenery and
choreography

• Opera technique is called Bel Canto

which means beautiful singing.
 Overture
an instrumental composition that
serves as an introduction to an
opera

The art song is the term for a

musical composition for solo
voice and piano accompaniment,
inspired by poetry from the
Romantic period

PIANO is used as an
accompaniment for an art song.
COMPONENTS OF AN OPERA
1. Libretto - the text of an opera, it is a component of an opera
that contains the story or the plot and its text.

2. Score - the book that the composer and librettist put

together.
The score has all the musical notes, words and ideas to help
the performers to tell the story.

Often, there are operas with overtures, preludes, prologues,

several acts, finales and postludes.
COMPONENTS OF AN OPERA
3. Recitative - Declamatory singing, used in the prose
parts and dialogue of opera.

4. Aria – an air or solo singing part sung by a principal

character.
This song is what the public will remember best when
leaving the opera house.
A Capella- one or more singers performing without instrumental accompaniment.

Cantabile- In a singing style

Capo- Head, the beginning · Coda -closing section appended to a movement or song.

Dolce –done sweetly

Falsetto - a weaker and more airy voice usually in the higher pitch arranges.

Glissando - sliding quickly between 2 notes/

Passagio - parts of a singing voice where register transitions occur.

Rubato - slight speeding up or slowing down of the tempo of apieceatthe discretion of the soloist.

Tessitura - the most comfortable singing range of a singer.

Vibrato - rapidly repeated slight pitch variation during a sustained note, to give a richer & more varied sound.
Key element to mastering opera singing
techniques:
1. Opera singers traditionally use much more vibrato, a
slow, cyclic variation or wobble in pitch.
2. The main languages to focus on for opera singing are
Italian, French, and German.
3. Opera singers make use of a technique called
“resonance tuning”.
4. Opera singers should sing bel canto.
Types of voices - MALE

1 . Tenor- highest male voice .

2. Baritone- Middle male voice,

lies between Bass and Tenor
voices. It is the common male
voice.

3. Bass- lowest male voice.

Types of voices - FEMALE
1. Soprano- highest female voice.
2. Coloratura- highest soprano voice .
3. Mezzo- Soprano most common
female voice; strong middle voice, tone
is darker or deeper than the soprano.
4. Contralto- lowest female voice and
most unique among female.
OPERA COMPOSERS
OF THE
ROMANTICPERIOD
 GIUSEPPE VERDI
• His characters are ordinary people and
not those of the royal family like those
found in German operas.
• Verdi was born in Parma, Italy on
October 9, 1813. Almost all of his
works are serious love story with
unhappy ending.
• Expressive vocal melody is the soul of a
Verdi opera.
• Created “LA TRAVIATA”
 Giacomo Puccini
• Giacomo Puccini was born in a poor
family on December 22, 1858 in
Lucca, Italy.
• He studied at the Milan
Conservatory.
• He belonged to a group of composers
who stressed realism.
• Puccini‟s famous operas were: “La
Boheme”, “Tosca”, “Madame
Butterfly”, and “Turandot”.
https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=Q_hLh4qCqpg
FRANZ PETER SCHUBERT
• The proper name for Franz Schubert
songs is actually lieder, which is the
German word for songs.
• He tapped the poetry of writers like
Johann Goethe. He is considered the last
of the Classical composers and one of the
first romantic ones.
• His famous vocal music works/ Lieder
were: “Gretchen amSpinnrade”,“Erlkonig”,
“Ellens Gesang III” (“Ave Maria”) and
“Schwanenge sang” (“SwanSong)
 RICHARD WAGNER
• Wilhelm Richard Wagner was born in
Leipzig, Germany on May 22, 1813. He
attended Leipzig University.
• He was very much inspired by Ludwig
van Beethoven. Wagner introduced new
ideas in harmony and in form,
including extremes of chromaticism.
• He was a composer whose operas and
music had a revolutionary influence on
the course of Western music
GEORGES BIZET
• Georges Bizet was registered with the
legal name Alexandre-Cesar-Leopold
Bizet, but was baptized Georges Bizet
and was always known by the latter
name.
• He was born October 25, 1838 in
Paris, France. He entered the Paris
Conservatory of music at a very young
age.
• He was best remembered for his opera
Carmen (1875)
William Tell Overture

overture that depicts the story of a

Swiss patriot and revolutionary

composed by Gioachino Rossini