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OPERA America’s 2007-2008 Season of Online Learning
OPERA America is pleased to announce its second season of online learning. From September 2007 to May 2008, four new courses will be available.
Designed as a service for opera lovers and those who wish to learn more about the art form, our courses provide an in-depth understanding of masterpieces of opera literature using the unique capacity and convenience of the Internet.
About the Season of Online Learning
Each online course features content that focuses on the historical background, musical style, literary source, and the dramatic structure of an opera. Course lectures are e-mailed to participants once each week for four weeks, allowing you to review the course material at your own pace. Audio clips and production photos are also provided, aiding in the study of musical style and analysis. Online bulletin boards are used to connect course participants to the instructor and each other.
To Register:
 Registration is currently available for all courses! To register, click here. The course registration fee is $10.00 per course for the general public. OPERA America members, and patrons of partner opera companies listed with each course can register free of charge. For member registration, please email education@operaamerica.org. For patron registration, please contact your opera company.
Course Schedule
La bohème: August 28- September 18, 2007
This story of a close-knit group of young artists has long occupied a place on opera's "top 10" list of most frequently performed operas. This course will examine the literary roots of this beguiling story and consider the musical and dramatic elements that ensured Puccini's score a permanent place in the opera repertoire.
About Your Instructor
Detroit native John Glover is a freelance writer and composer working in Los Angeles. He has received numerous awards and grants for his work including a fellowship for masters studies in composition at the USC Thornton School of Music. Recent commissions from organizations such as Baltimore Opera, Glimmerglass Opera, People’s Light and Theater Company, and the American Conservatory Theater have distinguished John as an emerging voice in contemporary music. He served as Dramaturg Assistant at Glimmerglass Opera for two seasons and currently works in the Publications Department for the Los Angeles Philharmonic.
Hansel and Gretel: October 22- November 12, 2007
The protagonists may be children, but this opera is not kid stuff. While the melodies are appropriately folk-like, the orchestral colors and textures are brilliantly complex, and no less than Richard Strauss called the work a masterpiece. This course will consider the place of fairy tales in culture in the 19th and 20th centuries and discuss Humperdinck's musical influences.
About Your Instructor
Larry Bomback is Lecturer of Music at Hunter College. His research focuses on nineteenth-century opera and American musical theater. His work has been published in The Musical Times, Musicological Explorations, and The Harmonizer, and he has presented papers and lectures in the United States, Canada, and Great Britain. He is currently the Operations Manager of the award-winning New York Youth Symphony.
La Cenerentola: February 13- March 5, 2008
A retelling of the story of Cinderella, this opera has it all: an underdog, a love story, and two delicious villainesses. Rossini, the comic genius responsible for The Barber of Seville, wrote this opera in a little over three weeks; this course will take four weeks to consider the work's story, music, performance traditions, and productions over the years.
About Your Instructor
Denise Gallo is a specialist in nineteenth-century Italian opera. Formerly an Assistant Professor and Co-Director of the Music History Division at The Catholic University of America, she holds a doctorate in Historical Musicology. Active in arts education, she is a frequent lecturer for Washington Opera, the Baltimore Opera Company, Washington Concert Opera, the Smithsonian Associates, and Summer Opera Theatre Company. In 2006, she was a featured lecturer for the Metropolitan Opera Education Series.
An active scholar, she presents her research at national and international musicological conferences. Her book, Opera: The Basics, was published in 2006 by Routledge. Other publications include a book on Rossini and a chapter on the libretto of Verdi’s Falstaff for The Verdi Sourcebook (Toccata Press). She is also preparing the volume of banda music for the Critical Edition of the Works of Gioachino Rossini, to be published by Bärenreiter Press in 2008 and is at work on a book entitled Walt Whitman and Music: “I and my recitatives.”
Dr. Gallo is one of the senior music specialists at the Library of Congress
Nixon in China: May 15- June 5, 2008
Richard Nixon's visit to China in 1972 was a groundbreaking event, as was the appearance — 15 years later — of an opera that took recent political events as its subject. John Adams' eclectic, minimalist score is influenced by American popular music, as well as master opera composers of the past. One of the most critically acclaimed American works of recent decades, Nixon in China continues to hold a place in opera houses around the world.
Meet Your Instructor
Thomas May is the author of the guide to Wagner and his works, Decoding Wagner, An Invitation to His World of Music Drama (2004), and The John Adams Reader: Essential Writings on an American Composer (2006), both published by Amadeus Press. He is a former Fulbright scholar and contributes to programs for leading opera companies and symphonies around the country. May also lectures and contributes to Opera Now, crosscut.com, and many other arts publications. Before settling in Seattle, May was a freelance critic for The Washington Post.
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