OPERA

(Ital. work.) A musical drama, in which the music forms an e ential part, and not merely an accompaniment. The whole dramatic art of the ancients po e ed much of an operatic character. The choric parts were sung; and if the dialogue was not carried on m the musical tone termed recitative in modern times, it was certainly delivered in an artificially raised and sustained key, very different from the ordinary or oratorical speech. The first operas in modem times were performed in Italy, about the end of the 1.5th century. The Orpheo of Poliziano has been cited as the first complete piece of this sort. Jean Antoine Baif introduced the opera into France, where the earliest representation of this kind is said to have taken place at the marriage of the Due de Joyeuse, in 1582. In 1707, the opera of Arsinoe, consisting of English words adapted to Italian airs, was performed at Drury Lane, and a succe ion of entertainments of this kind terminated in the Italian opera. The first attempt at a wholly English opera was made by Sir William DAvenant, in 1656. The opera is divided into seria and buffa, according to the subjects and the character of the music; and between the limits of both there is a third species, or mexxo stilo, not very accurately definable. The opera, properly speaking, admits only of singing and recitation, although, in some of the German operas, dialogue is also introduced. The romantic opera, which is considered as a German invention, is a compound between the two Italian species. Metastasio in Italy, and Goethe in Germany, have both written for the opera; but these are splendid exceptions, and the poetry has, in most instances, been held entirely subservient to the music. At the beginning of last century the opera, on its more general introduction into France and England, was attacked as an absurdity by almost all the wits and critics of the day. There were not, however, wanting defenders of this favourite child of the gay and fashionable world; and foremost among [s. 858]