The Last Opera (EPUB) von Chandler Carter

1. The first book length study of The Rake's Progress since 1982.

2. This opera premiered in 1951 and is still a staple of opera survey courses and history textbooks today because it strikes at the heart of the cultural shift that took place between the modern and postmodern eras in its exploration of the limits of the human will. In addition to a close reading of the text this book provides critical context its creation and explores its place in the history of opera.

3. Chandler Carter is an established and respected scholar of Stravinsky who has published numerous articles on The Rake's Progress.

Acknowledgments

Part I: The Cultural Moment

Prelude

Part II: The Drama

1. A Convergence of Minds

2. A Happy Collaboration

3. Deeper Meanings

Part III: The Music

4. Stravinsky's "Special Sense"

5. Displacement, Text Setting and Stravinsky's Evolving Aesthetic

6. Stravinsky's Truths and Mozart's LiesMusic, Emotion and Theatrical Distance

7. The Structure of Scenes

8. Ruin, Disaster, ... Saving Grace

Part IV: Performance

9. Venice

10. HowThe Rakebecame a Masterpiece

Epilogue: "Good people, just a moment"

Bibliography

Index

From the fall of 1947 through the summer of 1951 composer Igor Stravinsky and poet W. H. Auden collaborated on the operaThe Rake's Progress. At the time, their self-consciously conventional work seemed to appeal only to conservative audiences. Few perceived that Stravinsky and Auden were confronting the central crisis of the Modern age, for their story of a hapless eighteenth-century Everyman dramatizes the very limits of human will, a theme Auden insists underlies all opera. InThe Last Opera, Chandler Carter weaves together three interlocking stories. The central and most detailed story explores the libretto and music ofThe Rake's Progress. The second positions the opera as a focal point in Stravinsky's artistic journey and those who helped him realize ithis librettists, Auden and Chester Kallman; his protégé Robert Craft; and his compatriot, fellow composer, and close friend Nicolas Nabokov. By exploring the ominous cultural landscape in which these fascinating individuals lived and worked, the book captures a pivotal twenty-five-year span (from approximately 1945 to 1970) during which modernists like Stravinsky and Auden confronted a tectonic disruption to their artistic worldview. Ultimately, Carter reveals how these stories fit into a larger third narrative, the 400-year history of opera. This richly and lovingly contextualized study ofThe Rake's Progress sheds new light on why, despite the hundreds of musical dramas and theater pieces that have been written since its premier in 1951, this work is still considered the "the last opera."

Chandler Carter is Professor of Music at Hofstra University.