If you’ve never listened to opera before and come straight to a concert hall without being prepared, then you’ll probably have problems understanding what is happening on stage. And this will happen not because you are not smart enough, but because you need to have a certain basic level of knowledge to understand this form of art. However, you can easily learn it by yourself, you don’t have to study music to figure it out.

We can explain why you need to master the basics of opera in advance with a simple example. Imagine that you’re watching the latest part of Avengers, Star Wars, or Harry Potter. You know nothing about the characters, events, and story on screen. And because of that you anticipate that you won’t be able to enjoy the film. The same thing applies to opera: you need to be prepared to understand it.

First, you need to learn the periods of opera development, as well as find out the names of people who are considered iconic figures in this form of art.

Opera began in the 16th century with the work Dafne by Jacopo Peri which, unfortunately, was lost. A bit later, during the transition from the late Renaissance to the early Baroque, one of the most popular composers was Claudio Monteverdi. And although it wasn’t Monteverdi who wrote the first opera, he is thought to be the “father” of this art. His work usually includes small orchestras. However, the same can be said about Monteverdi’s contemporaries. Other composers who wrote operas during the Baroque period were George Frideric Handel and Antonio Vivaldi.
The Baroque period was transitioned into the classical period. Composers like Antonio Salieri and of course Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart were some of the most important figures of this period. Classical music is usually very formal. It strictly follows rules and structure, yet these things don’t take away from its beauty.
After the classical era, a rather significant period in the history of opera began with composers like Giuseppe Verdi, Gaetano Donizetti, Richard Wagner, and countless others. During this period, large orchestras began to be widely used. Modern opera composers from the middle of the 20th century onward have almost exclusively followed this example.

💡 The 4 greatest figures in the history of opera are believed to be Mozart (The Marriage of Figaro), Wagner (Tristan and Isolde), Verdi (Il Trovatore) and Giacomo Puccini (Madama Butterfly).

Below we will consider 2 ways of learning opera basics.

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