John Taverner was an English composer and organist, regarded as one of the most important English composers of his era. He is best-known for Missa Gloria tibi Trinitas and The Western Wynde Mass, and Missa Corona Spinea is also often viewed as a masterwork.
In Nomine is a title given to a large number of pieces of English polyphonic, predominantly instrumental music, first composed during the 16th century.
Sir Peter Maxwell Davies was an English composer and conductor, who in 2004 was made Master of the Queen's Music.
Peter Grimes, Op. 33, is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten, with a libretto by Montagu Slater based on the section "Peter Grimes", in George Crabbe's long narrative poem The Borough. The "borough" of the opera is a fictional small town that bears some resemblance to Crabbe's – and later Britten's – home of Aldeburgh, Suffolk, on England's east coast.
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria is an opera consisting of a prologue and five acts, set by Claudio Monteverdi to a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. The opera was first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1639–1640 carnival season. The story, taken from the second half of Homer's Odyssey, tells how constancy and virtue are ultimately rewarded, treachery and deception overcome. After his long journey home from the Trojan Wars Ulisse, king of Ithaca, finally returns to his kingdom where he finds that a trio of villainous suitors are importuning his faithful queen, Penelope. With the assistance of the gods, his son Telemaco and a staunch friend Eumete, Ulisse vanquishes the suitors and recovers his kingdom.
The Fiery Angel, Op. 37, is an opera by Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev. The opera was composed between 1919 -and 1927. It was premiered posthumously in 1955 in Venice, in Italian. The work was not presented to Russian audiences until the 1990s, most notably by the Mariinsky Theatre, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Destiny is an opera in three acts by Leoš Janáček to a Czech libretto by the composer and Fedora Bartošová. Janáček began the work in 1903 and completed it in 1907. The inspiration for the opera came from a visit by Janáček in the summer of 1903, after the death of his daughter Olga, to the spa at Luhačovice. There, Janáček met Kamila Urválková, who had been the subject of an opera by Ludvík Čelanský, Kamila, where she felt that Čelanský had falsely depicted her personality. After learning that Janáček was a composer, Urválková persuaded Janáček to write another opera to counteract Čelanský's portrait of her.
Benjamin Matthew Luxon is a retired British baritone.
Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.
Resurrection is an opera by the English composer Peter Maxwell Davies. Davies conceived it in 1963 whilst at Princeton University. However, the composer did not complete the opera until over 20 years later. The work received its premiere on 18 September 1987 at the Staatstheater Darmstadt, Germany.
Daniel Crozier is an American composer and academic. He is associate professor of Theory and Composition at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.
Schneewittchen is an opera by Heinz Holliger. He wrote the libretto based on a poetic text by Robert Walser in iambic trimeter. The opera received its première on 17 October 1998 at the Zürich Opera House which had commissioned the work. The work is a psychoanalytical reworking of the fairy tale of "Snow White", analysing the complex relationships between the roles. It is not a children's opera.
The Martyrdom of St Magnus is a chamber opera in one act by the British composer Peter Maxwell Davies. The libretto, by Davies himself, is based on the novel Magnus by George Mackay Brown. The opera was first performed in St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall, Orkney on 18 June 1977.
Kommilitonen! is an opera by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies. The libretto is by David Pountney, who was also the director of the premiere performances in March 2011.
The Symphony No. 1 by Peter Maxwell Davies was composed between 1973 and 1976, and is dedicated to Sir William Glock, "as a mark of friendship and of appreciation of his work for contemporary music in his years as music controller at the B.B.C.". It was commissioned by the Philharmonia Orchestra, which gave the premiere of the symphony at the Royal Festival Hall, London, on 2 February 1978, with Simon Rattle conducting.
Tavern Scene or The Orgy is a work by William Hogarth from 1735, the third picture from the series A Rake's Progress.
Points and Dances from the Opera "Taverner" or Points and Dances from "Taverner", Op. 46, is a suite for ensemble written by British composer Peter Maxwell Davies from his own opera Taverner. Subtitled "instrumental dances and keyboard pieces from the opera for instrumental ensemble", it was finished in 1970.
Stephen Lawrence Pruslin was an American pianist and librettist who relocated to London in the 1970s to work with Peter Maxwell Davies and Harrison Birtwistle.
The Decembrists is an historical opera by Yuri Shaporin with libretto by Vsevolod Rozhdestvensky, Aleksey Tolstoy and others. It was premiered in 1953 after a long and difficult period of composition lasting some 30 years. In a style highly reminiscent of the great 19th-century Russian composers, especially Borodin, Mussorgsky and Tchaikovsky, it gives a rather fictionalized account of the 1825 Decembrist revolt of Russian army officers against the Tsarist government. Frequently performed in the Soviet Union, where it was seen as the culmination of Shaporin's career, it has never been well known in the West except through its most popular number, the Soldiers' Chorus.
