Today
In the 20th century, English opera began to assert more independence, with works of Ralph Vaughan Williams and Rutland Boughton and later Benjamin Britten, who, in a series of fine works that remain in standard repertory today, revealed an excellent flair for the dramatic and superb musicality. Other British composers writing well-received operas in the late 20th century include Richard Rodney Bennett (e.g. The Mines of Sulphur), Harrison Birtwistle (Punch and Judy), Peter Maxwell Davies (Taverner) and Oliver Knussen (Where the Wild Things Are). Today composers such as Thomas Adès continue to export English opera abroad.
Also in the 20th century, American composers like George Gershwin, Gian Carlo Menotti, and Carlisle Floyd began to contribute English-language operas infused with touches of popular musical styles. They were followed by Philip Glass, Mark Adamo, John Adams, and Jake Heggie. Moreover non-native-English speaking composers have occasionally set English libretti (e.g. Hans Werner Henze, We Come to the River).
Read more about this topic: Opera In English, 20th Century
Famous quotes containing the word today:
“Xenophobia looks like becoming the mass ideology of the 20th-century fin-de-siècle. What holds humanity together today is the denial of what the human race has in common.”
—Eric J. Hobsbawm (b. 1917)
“To the degree that respect for professors ... has risen in our society, respect for writers has fallen. Today the professorial intellect has achieved its highest public standing since the world began, while writers have come to be called men of letters, by which is meant people who are prevented by some obscure infirmity from becoming competent journalists.”
—Robert Musil (18801942)
“Working women today are trying to achieve in the work world what men have achieved all alongbut men have always had the help of a woman at home who took care of all the other details of living! Today the working woman is also that woman at home, and without support services in the workplace and a respect for the work women do within and outside the home, the attempt to do both is taking its tollon women, on men, and on our children.”
—Jeanne Elium (20th century)