‘The Birth of an Opera’, by Michael Rose – review

When, more than half a century ago, I was a student, deriving much of my education from the Third Programme, I was given, between 1955 and 1971, a crash course on opera by Hans Hammelmann and Michael Rose. The two of them were major opera historians and both were natural broadcasters, able to pass their enthusiasm on to the public; and more or less immediately I became a devoted operaphile. But, as the radio programmes grew fainter in the memory and one’s tastes were moulded by countless actual performances, so one craved the book of the series.Now at last Michael Rose (Hammelmann is dead) has written that book, and it is not only as scholarly, authoritative and entertaining as the broadcasts; it has also benefited by another 50 years of Rose’s study and mastery of the subject.

He has chosen a mere 15 operas for his own delectation and for the education and entertainment of the opera audience. He starts with Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione de Poppea and ends with Berg’s Wozzeck.In his elegant preface he admits to leaving out Janácek, Britten, Shostakovich and Prokofiev, but defends himself on linguistic and copyright grounds. One can only hope that he will produce a second volume with a solid 20th-century slant.

Each of the 15 works analysed has its own chapter, and the operas range from old warhorses like Carmen to relatively rarely performed and difficult pieces such as Pelléas et Mélissande and Ariadne auf Naxos. It is a bold critic who represents Richard Strauss with Ariadne rather than Salome, Electra or Rosenkavalier, but Rose is manifestly bold, girded by great erudition and a captivating style.

At the beginning he writes: ‘In 1637, at the Teatro san Cassiano in Venice, the first opera house in the world opened its doors to the public.’