Abstract

The Legacy of Opera is a collection of essays that considers some of the ways in which opera's influence has informed our understanding of and approach to the musical stage. It perceives opera as part of a broader creative practice, music theatre, and interrogates the experience of contemporary audiences engaging with this practice in performance. In particular, the essays consider the effect of innovative expressive idioms, emerging performative paradigms, new technologies and contemporary ways of thinking, with approaches stemming from the multiple perspectives informed by the ideological, historical, corporeal and artistic. With contributions from international scholars in music theatre, this book's chapters explore both canonic and experimental examples of music theatre, spanning from the seventeenth century to the present day.