Opera
- William Alwyn - Miss Julie, opera in 2 acts, after Strindberg
- Luciano Berio – Opera (revised version, 28 May, Teatro Comunale Florence)
- Peter Maxwell Davies – The Martyrdom of St Magnus (18 June, Kirkwall, St Magnus Cathedral)
- Julian Livingston – Twist of Treason
- Thea Musgrave – Mary, Queen of Scots
- Donald Sosin – Esther
- Karlheinz Stockhausen – Atmen gibt das Leben (22 May 1977, Nice)
- Michael Tippett – The Ice Break (7 July, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden)
Read more about this topic: 1977 In Music
Famous quotes containing the word opera:
“I have witnessed, and greatly enjoyed, the first act of everything which Wagner created, but the effect on me has always been so powerful that one act was quite sufficient; whenever I have witnessed two acts I have gone away physically exhausted; and whenever I have ventured an entire opera the result has been the next thing to suicide.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“If music in general is an imitation of history, opera in particular is an imitation of human willfulness; it is rooted in the fact that we not only have feelings but insist upon having them at whatever cost to ourselves.... The quality common to all the great operatic roles, e.g., Don Giovanni, Norma, Lucia, Tristan, Isolde, Brünnhilde, is that each of them is a passionate and willful state of being. In real life they would all be bores, even Don Giovanni.”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)
“The Opera is obviously the first draft of a fine spectacle; it suggests the idea of one.”
—Jean De La Bruyère (1645–1696)