Opera
Monteverdi, Claudio
Monteverdi’s Il combatimento di Tancredi et Clorinda (1624) is not an opera. It has been variously called a ‘scenic madrigal’ a ‘scenic cantata’ or even a secular oratorio. What is it? Above all it is a grippingly told story...
Monteverdi’s dramatising of the brazen affair of an emperor is the first opera on a historical subject rather than a myth. It still seems scandalous in exalting vice over virtue, while having good claim to be the greatest opera before Mozart...