What is "opera"

Opera \Op"er*a\ ([o^]p"[~e]r*[.a]), n. [It., fr. opera work, composition, opposed to an improvisation, fr. L. opera pains, work, fr. opus, operis, work, labor: cf. F. op['e]ra. See Operate.]

1. A drama, either tragic or comic, of which music forms an essential part; a drama wholly or mostly sung, consisting of recitative, arias, choruses, duets, trios, etc., with orchestral accompaniment, preludes, and interludes, together with appropriate costumes, scenery, and action; a lyric drama.

2. The score of a musical drama, either written or in print; a play set to music.

3. The house where operas are exhibited.

   Op['e]ra bouffe [F. op['e]ra opera + bouffe comic, It. buffo], Opera buffa [It.], light, farcical, burlesque opera.

   Opera box, a partially inclosed portion of the auditorium of an opera house for the use of a small private party.

   Op['e]ra comique [F.], comic or humorous opera.

   Opera flannel, a light flannel, highly finished.
   --Knight.

   Opera girl or Opera girls (Bot.), an East Indian plant ( Mantisia saltatoria) of the Ginger family, sometimes seen in hothouses. It has curious flowers which have some resemblance to a ballet dancer, whence the popular name. Called also dancing girls.

   Opera glass, a short telescope with concave eye lenses of low power, usually made double, that is, with a tube and set of glasses for each eye; a lorgnette; -- so called because adapted for use at the opera, theater, etc.

   Opera hat, a gentleman's folding hat.

   Opera house, specifically, a theater devoted to the performance of operas.

   Opera seria [It.], serious or tragic opera; grand opera.

Opus \O"pus\, n.; pl. Opera. [L. See Opera.] A work; specif. (Mus.), a musical composition.

Note: Each composition, or set of pieces, as the composer may choose, is called an opus, and they are numbered in the order of their issue. (Often abbrev. to op.)

Opus incertum. [L.] (Arch.) See under Incertum.

"a drama sung" [Klein], 1640s, from Italian opera, literally "a work, labor, composition," from Latin opera "work, effort" (Latin plural regarded as feminine singular), secondary (abstract) noun from operari "to work," from opus (genitive operis) "a work" (see opus). Defined in "Elson's Music Dictionary" as, "a form of musical composition evolved shortly before 1600, by some enthusiastic Florentine amateurs who sought to bring back the Greek plays to the modern stage." No good opera plot can be sensible. ... People do not sing when they are feeling sensible. [W.H. Auden, 1961]As a branch of dramatic art, it is attested from 1759. First record of opera glass "small binoculars for use at the theater" is from 1738. Soap opera is first recorded 1939, as a disparaging reference to daytime radio dramas sponsored by soap manufacturers.

n. 1 (lb en music) A theatrical work combining drama, music, song and sometimes dance. 2 (lb en music) The score for such a work. 3 A building designed for the performance of such works; an opera house. 4 A company dedicated to performing such works. 5 (lb en by extension) Any showy, melodramatic or unrealistic production resembing an opera. 6 A collection of work (opus).

1. n. a drama set to music; consists of singing with orchestral accompaniment and an orchestral overture and interludes

2. theater where opera is performed [syn: opera house]

Opéra is a station of the Paris Métro, named after the nearby Opera Garnier, built by the architect Charles Garnier. It is located at the end of the Avenue de l'Opera, one of the accesses being opposite the Opera, and serves the district of the Boulevard Haussmann. Three Métro lines ( 3, 7 and 8) cross each other at one point, known as a "well".

The station offers a connection to the following stations:

• Auber on RER line A
• Haussmann – Saint-Lazare on RER line E
• Havre – Caumartin on lines 3 and 9
• Saint-Augustin on line 9
• Saint-Lazare on lines 3, 12, 13 and 14

The station is famous for its strong odors of sewers. When it was being built, there were concerns that one of Hector Guimard's characteristic iron metro entrances would spoil the view of the opera house, so a marble entrance was built instead.

Opera is a Western performance art which combines music and drama.

Opera may also refer to:

Opera, also known as Terror at the Opera, is a 1987 Italian giallo horror film written and directed by Dario Argento and starring Cristina Marsillach, Urbano Barberini and Ian Charleson. The film's score was composed by Brian Eno and Claudio Simonetti. The film was released in the United States under the title Terror at the Opera. The film was one of Argento's most commercially successful films, seeing 1,363,912 ticket sales in his native country of Italy. This is the second Dario Argento horror film to have THX audio certified and picture quality.

Opera is a station of the yellow M1 (Millennium Underground) line of the Budapest Metro, in front of the Hungarian State Opera House.

Opera is the third official Japanese single of South Korean boy band Super Junior, released on 9 May 2012 by Avex Trax. It was originally released in Korean as part of their fifth Korean studio album, Mr. Simple on 3 August 2011. This single set a new record as the most singles sold by a Korean artist in a week.

Opera (; English plural: operas; Italian plural: opere ) is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text ( libretto) and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. In traditional opera, singers do two types of singing: recitative, a speech-inflected style and arias, a more melodic style. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance. The performance is typically given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble, which since the early 19th century has been led by a conductor.

Opera is part of the Western classical music tradition. It started in Italy at the end of the 16th century (with Jacopo Peri's lost Dafne, produced in Florence in 1598) and soon spread through the rest of Europe: Schütz in Germany, Lully in France, and Purcell in England all helped to establish their national traditions in the 17th century. In the 18th century, Italian opera continued to dominate most of Europe (except France), attracting foreign composers such as Handel. Opera seria was the most prestigious form of Italian opera, until Gluck reacted against its artificiality with his "reform" operas in the 1760s. In the 2000s, the most renowned figure of late 18th-century opera is Mozart, who began with opera seria but is most famous for his Italian comic operas, especially The Marriage of Figaro (Le Nozze Di Figaro), Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte, as well as The Magic Flute (Die Zauberflöte), a landmark in the German tradition.

The first third of the 19th century saw the high point of the bel canto style, with Rossini, Donizetti and Bellini all creating works that are still performed in the 2000s It also saw the advent of Grand Opera typified by the works of Auber and Meyerbeer. The mid-to-late 19th century was a "golden age" of opera, led and dominated by Wagner in Germany and Verdi in Italy. The popularity of opera continued through the verismo era in Italy and contemporary French opera through to Puccini and Strauss in the early 20th century. During the 19th century, parallel operatic traditions emerged in central and eastern Europe, particularly in Russia and Bohemia. The 20th century saw many experiments with modern styles, such as atonality and serialism ( Schoenberg and Berg), Neoclassicism ( Stravinsky), and Minimalism ( Philip Glass and John Adams). With the rise of recording technology, singers such as Enrico Caruso and Maria Callas became known to much wider audiences that went beyond the circle of opera fans. Since the invention of radio and television, operas were also performed on (and written for) these mediums. Beginning in 2006, a number of major opera houses began to present live high-definition video transmissions of their performances in cinemas all over the world. In 2009, an opera company offered an online download of a complete performance.

"Opera", written by Buğra Uğur and Aysel Gürel, was the song performed by Çetin Alp & The Short Waves that represented Turkey at the Eurovision Song Contest 1983.

The song was performed 6th on the night, following Italy's Riccardo Fogli with " Per Lucia" and preceding Spain's Remedios Amaya with " Quién maneja mi barca". The song received no points from the 19 other countries taking part, placing joint last of 20 together with Spain who also failed to score.

The song was succeeded as Turkish representative at the 1984 contest by Beş Yıl Önce, On Yıl Sonra with " Halay".

Opera is the first Classical compilation album of opera arias by Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli. The album was only released in the United Kingdom and charted in the album charts of both the UK and Ireland.

Opera is the debut studio album of Richard Dorfmeister and Rupert Huber's electronic music project Tosca. It combines new material and previously released singles, including "Chocolate Elvis". "Irresistibly funky" (BBC), "the blues, and the thick sultry bass, makes it as sexy and melancholy as cigarette smoke after a one-night stand in a strange city" (Mixmag). It is "one of the few sure things in a modest genre" (Sasha Frere-Jones, LA Weekly).

Ópera is a station on Line 2, Line 5 and Ramal of the Madrid Metro. It is located in fare Zone A, in the Plaza de Isabel II, in the central district of Madrid. The station provides access to an area with tourist landmarks such as Teatro Real, Plaza de Oriente and the Royal Palace. Its name comes from nearby Madrid opera house, the Teatro Real.

Opera is a station in the Antwerp premetro network, lying under the Leien near the Teniersplaats in the city centre. The station was opened on March 25, 1975, at the initial opening of the Antwerp premetro network. The station lies in the immediate proximity of the Antwerp opera building and is a part of the central east-west premetro axis.

Opera is a web browser developed by Opera Software. The latest version is available for Microsoft Windows, , and Linux operating systems, and uses the Blink layout engine. An earlier version using the Presto layout engine is still available, and additionally runs on FreeBSD systems.

Opera siblings – Opera Mobile, Opera Mini and Opera Coast – work on devices running Android, iOS, Windows Phone, Symbian, Maemo, Bada, BlackBerry and Windows Mobile operating systems, while Opera Mini runs on Java ME-capable devices.

According to Opera Software, the browser had more than 350 million users worldwide in the 4th quarter 2014. Total Opera mobile users reached 291 million in June 2015. Opera has been noted for originating many features later adopted by other web browsers. Prominent examples are Speed Dial, Pop-up Blocking, Browser Sessions, Private Browsing and, among major browsers, Tabbed Browsing.

Opera is a monthly British magazine devoted to covering all things related to opera. It contains reviews and articles about current opera productions internationally, as well as articles on opera recordings, opera singers, opera companies, opera directors, and opera books. The magazine also contains major features and analysis on individual operas and people associated with opera.

The magazine employs a network of international correspondents around the world who write for the magazine. Contributors to the magazine, past and present, include William Ashbrook, Martin Bernheimer, Julian Budden, Rodolfo Celletti, Alan Blyth, Elizabeth Forbes, and J.B. Steane among many others.

Opera is printed in A5 size, with colour photos, and consists of around 130 pages. Page numbering is consecutive for a complete year (e.g. September 2009 goes from p1033-1168). All issues since August 2006 are available online to current subscribers (through Exact Editions).

Based in London, the magazine was founded in 1950 by George Lascelles, 7th Earl of Harewood. It was launched at the house of Richard Buckle, under the imprint 'Ballet Publications Ltd'.

After Lascelles, Harold Rosenthal served as editor from 1953–1986, Rodney Milnes from 1986 and John Allison has held that position since 2000, with Milnes as chair of the Editorial Board.

In 1965 Victor Gollancz Limited published a wide-ranging collection of articles which had appeared in the magazine during the first 15 years, with alongside those by regular Opera contributors, articles by Benjamin Britten, Sylvia Fisher, Magda Olivero, Helga Pilarczyk, Dennis Arundell, Osbert Lancaster, Joan Cross, Gottfried Schmiedel and Erwin Stein.

An occasional series of supplements have been published: Thirty all-time great recordings (August 2002), Great Opera Houses of the World (July 2003), In character: Great singers in great roles 1 (August 2004) and 2 (September 2006), Great First Nights (September 2005), Opera stage on screen (September 2007); along with four volumes of reprints of profiles of singers (grouped by voice type, 2002–2004) and directors (January 2006 and January 2007).

A separate annual 'Festivals' issue was published until 2012, with listings of opera or operetta festivals (or music festivals including operas) in the UK and all around the world for the coming season, preceded by longer articles on particular festival projects or personalities. From 2013, the separate issue was dropped in favour of a festivals focus in the April edition, due to the ready availability of listings on-line.

In recent years, the last page has been a lighter feature, such as 'I can't live without... golf' by Barbara Bonney (August 1999), ‘My First Opera – Don Giovanni’ by Osmo Vänskä (February 2004), and Roger Parker on why he would like to come back as Pasha Selim (December 2007).

Opera, also spelled as Gli Opera, was an Italian pop-rock band, active between 1975 and 1985.

Opera is a term commonly used in Tuscany ( Italy)) to describe the Fabrica ecclesiae foundations. The general term in use in Italy is Fabbriceria, but local entities use Opera, instead, or Fabbrica or Cappella or Maramma, depending on the Region.

Operas are a confessional foundation, led by a laical deputation elected in part from the bishop and in part from Ministry of the Interior. This is and old heritage of the highly diversified nature of Fabrica ecclesiae foundation all over Italy. Originally they were designated by bishops who wanted to separate their spiritual affairs from pecuniary ones but, in the centuries, people from the local administrations entered the deputations. In the past was very important to have control of a fabrica, because they managed the commerce of cereals and had possession of several palaces, it was like being a second Lord of the city. Nowadays fabricas are only intended to keep their buildings with restoration works, maintenance, sourveillance and letting conduct daily religious services without interfering. Most of fabricas are under Associazione Fabbricerie Italiane a national association founded in 2007. The following fabricas are part of the Associazione Fabbricerie Italiane:

• Opera Laicale della Cattedrale di Chiusi ( Cathedral of Chiusi)
• Opera di Santa Croce di Firenze ( Church of Santa Croce of Florence))
• Opera Santa Maria del Fiore di Firenze ( Cathedral of Florence)
• Veneranda Fabbrica del Duomo di Milano ( Cathedral of Milan)
• Opera del Duomo di Orvieto ( Cathedral of Orvieto)
• Fabbriceria della Basilica Cattedrale di Parma ( Cathedral of Parma)
• Fabbriceria della Chiesa Cattedrale Monumentale di S. Stefano Martire in Pavia ( Cathedral of Pavia)
• Fabbriceria della Chiesa Cattedrale di Pienza ( Cathedral of Pienza)
• Opera della Primaziale Pisana ( Cathedral of Pisa)
• Opera del Duomo di Prato della Chiesa Cattedrale Monumentale di S. Stefano ( Cathedral of Prato)
• Opera della Metropolitana di Siena ( Cathedral of Siena)
• Fabbriceria della Sagrestia della Cattedrale di Todi ( Cathedral of Todi)
• Procuratoria di San Marco di Venezia ( Cathedral of Venice)
• Opere Ecclesiastiche Riunite di Montepulciano ( Cathedral of Montepulciano)
• Fabbriceria del Duomo di Monreale ( Cathedral of Monreale)

Category:Roman Catholic Church organizations