Claudio Monteverdi : NPR

Jeremy Denk Maps Centuries of Music History on 'c.1300-c.2000'

Jeremy Denk's c.1300-c.2000 comes out Feb. 8 on Nonesuch. Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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First Listen

Jeremy Denk Maps Centuries of Music History on 'c.1300-c.2000'

January 31, 2019 • Hear the resourceful pianist trace 700 years of Western music, from the delicate medieval counterpoint of Guillaume de Machaut to the minimalism of Philip Glass.

The Root Of All Opera: Monteverdi's 'Orfeo'

January 8, 2010 • It's hard to say who wrote the very first opera, but there's little doubt about the first, truly great one — it's Monteverdi's 1607 masterpiece, Orfeo, and it comes to World of Opera from a truly great opera house, Milan's La Scala.

An Audio Introduction to the Opera

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Passion Vs. Propriety: Monteverdi's 'Poppea'

October 8, 2009 • Monteverdi's provocative opera, from 1643, turns the traditional morality tale on its head, with the story of two illicit lovers who prove that lofty principles are no match for pure passion.

Drottningholm Court Theatre on World of Opera -- 'The Coronation of Poppea'

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Music

Unjust Rewards: Monteverdi's 'Poppea'

December 5, 2008 • Operas, no mater how lurid or violent, generally champion lofty ideals and traditional values — but not this time. In Monteverdi's The Coronation of Poppea, the most noble and virtuous characters wind up dead or deported, while the lustful and villainous are rewarded with wealth, power and passion.

An Audio Introduction to 'The Coronation of Poppea'

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Music

Monteverdi's 'Tu se morta ...'

March 7, 2008 • Orfeo reacts to the news that his wife, Euridice, has died of a poisonous snakebite, in the aria "Tu se' morte, mia vita, ed io respiro?" — "You are dead, my life, yet I still breathe?"

Netherlands Opera on World of Opera -- 'Orfeo'

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Music

Monteverdi's 'Orfeo'

March 7, 2008 • It's hard to say who wrote the very first opera, but there's little doubt about the first, truly great one — it's Monteverdi's 1607 masterpiece, Orfeo, and it comes to World of Opera from the Netherlands Opera in Amsterdam.

Netherlands Opera on World of Opera -- 'Orfeo'

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Music

Monteverdi's 'The Return of Ul

March 23, 2007 • World of Opera presents Claudio Monteverdi's The Return of Ulysses, a brilliant musical take on Homer's "Odyssey" by history's first great opera composer, heard here from the Welsh National Opera in Cardiff with Paul Nilon in the title role.

NPR

Classics in Concert

Danielle De Niese In Concert

May 3, 2012 • Watch an intensely physical and deeply felt performance by a soprano who brings operatic elegance and rock glam to music by Handel, Dowland and Monteverdi at (Le) Poisson Rouge in New York.

Talk Like An Opera Geek: The Birth Of Opera

Orpheus makes his way through the underworld, in Jean-Pierre Ponnelle's production of one of the first operas, Monteverdi's L'Orfeo, from 1607. Deutsche Grammophon hide caption

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Deceptive Cadence

Talk Like An Opera Geek: The Birth Of Opera

February 22, 2012 • At the dawn of the 17th century, take a trip through the earliest days of a brand new art form.

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The NPR Classical 50

Monteverdi's Pioneering 'Vespers'

December 15, 2009 • Monteverdi stood on the divide between two great musical periods, the Renaissance and the Baroque. His Vespers illustrates a mastery at blending the new with the old in a way that's coherent, expressive and moving, especially in John Eliot Gardiner's atmospheric recording made in Venice.

Ted Libbey And Fred Child Recommend Monteverdi's Vespers

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Talk Like An Opera Geek: In the Basement With The Basses

Seismic singing from the bottommost voices: Know your basso buffo from your basso profondo. iStock hide caption

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Deceptive Cadence

Talk Like An Opera Geek: In the Basement With The Basses

January 18, 2012 • With opera's subterranean serenaders, it's important to know a basso buffo from a basso profondo.

Ancient Inspiration: Monteverdi's 'Return of Ulysses'

The Beaune Festival's concert version of "Ulysses" was performed at the Basilica Notre Dame in Beaune, France. Wikimedia Commons hide caption

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NPR World of Opera

Ancient Inspiration: Monteverdi's 'Return of Ulysses'

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December 17, 2010 • When it comes to opera's founding fathers, Monteverdi stood head and shoulders above all the others. Ulysses, one of his three surviving operas, comes to us from Homer's The Odyssey.

Ulysses

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