Staging 'Euridice'
Theatre, Sets, and Music in Late Renaissance Florence

Newly-discovered evidence underpins this comprehensive account of the creation and staging of the earliest surviving 'opera', Euridice.

Tim Carter (Author), Francesca Fantappiè (Author)

9781316515402, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 2 December 2021

280 pages
25 x 17.4 x 1.9 cm, 0.67 kg

Euridice was one of several music-theatrical works commissioned to celebrate the wedding of Maria de' Medici and King Henri IV of France in Florence in October 1600. As the first 'opera' to survive complete, it has been viewed as a landmark work, but its libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini and music by Jacopo Peri and Giulio Caccini have tended to be studied in the abstract rather than as something to be performed in a specific time and place. Staging “Euridice” explores how newly-discovered documents can be used to precisely reconstruct every aspect of its original stage and sets in the room for which it was intended in the Palazzo Pitti. By also taking into account what the singers and instrumentalists did, what the audience saw and heard, and how things changed from creation through rehearsals to performance, this book brings new aspects of Euridice to light in startling ways.

Preface
Sources, Transcriptions, and Translations
Money, Accounts, Measurements, Dates, and Time
List of Abbreviations, 1. Euridice in context
2. Staging and sets
3. Euridice in performance
4. Conclusions and consequences
Appendix I: Documents
Works cited
Index.

Subject Areas: Opera [AVGC9], Medieval & Renaissance music [c 1000 to c 1600 AVGC2], Music [AV]