“The DEUS-EX-MACHINA (literally God-out-of-the-Machine) is a dramaturgical device whereby a deity descended from Olympus in very good clothes and a suitably magnificent crane (for the Greeks) or all kinds of spectacular machinery and special effects (for the 17th - 18th century Europeans) in order to solve the humanly unsolvable – at least on stage.” More
“Ever since mankind sat around a fire to tell stories – and this seems to have been one of the earliest necessities – the theme of “pacts” between humans and super-humans made its appearance. These bring nothing but trouble to the human in question, the other side ranging from unreliable to downright deceitful and ill-intentioned reminding one that, in dealings with the supernatural, ‘the house always wins’”. More
“Characterization in Idomeneo is tightly woven into the plot and its engine: the changing of the Old Order into the New and the establishment of a new civilization. It therefore does not depend on the psychological development of a personality in crisis but in the development of an idea with communal implications.” More
“The Sea has always played a great part in the representation of life in all art. From the ancient mariners’ tales of sea-monsters to Moby Dick, and The Old Man and the Sea; from old tales of shipwrecks to Prospero, Viola, Robinson Crusoe, John Mandeville’s travel tales, to Turner’s paintings – which only this year inspired composer Thea Musgrave’s splendid Turbulent Landscapes – to Debussy or the sea that harbors Wagner’s own dark Don Juan, a nasty bit of ectoplasm ‘mad, bad and dangerous to know’: The Dutchman himself.” More
“In the nineteenth century it enjoyed only the faintest of after-lives. Being by Mozart, it could not be ignored. Breitkpof and Härtel published the full score in 1868, commentators occasionally spoke well of the work, and “Placido è il mar” was a favourite with Victorian glee-clubs. But the opera was of interest much more as a pointer to the greater things to come than for itself. History was against it.” More
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