This is a list of historical figures who have been characters in opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

 or operetta

Operetta

Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...

.

Historical accuracy in such works has often been subject to the imperatives of dramatic presentation. Consequently, in many cases:

• historical characters appear alongside fictional characters
• historical characters who never met, or whose lives did not even overlap, appear on stage together
• historical events depicted are transported to earlier or later times or to different places
• historical people are seen participating in entirely fictional events, or vice-versa
• the actions of historical people are attributed to other persons

For the purposes of this list, Biblical

Bible

The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

 characters are generally taken to be fictional, unless there is clear evidence of their historicity.

Operas appear in bold when the historical figure is also the title role

Title role

The title role in the performing arts is the performance part that gives the title to the piece, as in Aida, Giselle, Michael Collins or Othello. The actor, singer or dancer who performs that part is also said to have the title role....

.

A

Abdisho IV Maron

Abdisho IV Maron

Mar Abdisho IV Maron was the second Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church, from 1555 to 1570.-Life:Abdisho, whose name is spelled in many different ways meaning Servant of Jesus, was born in Gazarta on the River Tigris, son of Yohannan of the house of Mari...

, Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church

• Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Erich Pfitzner was a German composer and self-described anti-modernist. His best known work is the post-Romantic opera Palestrina, loosely based on the life of the great sixteenth-century composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina.-Biography:Pfitzner was born in Moscow, Russia, where his...
  
  : Palestrina
  Palestrina (opera)
  Palestrina is an opera by the German composer Hans Pfitzner, first performed in 1917. The composer referred to it as a Musikalische Legende , and wrote the libretto himself, based on a legend about the Renaissance musician Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, who saves the art of contrapuntal music ...
  
  (as Abdisu)

Peter Abelard

Peter Abelard

Peter Abelard was a medieval French scholastic philosopher, theologian and preeminent logician. The story of his affair with and love for Héloïse has become legendary...

, French priest, scholar, theologian

• Peter Tahourdin
  Peter Tahourdin
  Peter Richard Tahourdin was an English-born Australian composer. His compositions range from orchestral and chamber music to choral and educational music, as well as music for the opera and ballet. However, his principal contribution was in the field of electronic music.-Early life and...
  
  : Héloise and Abelard
• Charles Wilson
  Charles Wilson (composer)
  Charles Mills Wilson is a Canadian composer, choral conductor, and music educator.-Biography:Wilson began studying piano at age six with Wilfred Powell and later studied organ with Charles Peaker. He studied composition with Godfrey Ridout at the University of Toronto, earning a Bachelors of Music...
  
  : Héloise and Abelard

John Quincy Adams

John Quincy Adams

John Quincy Adams was the sixth President of the United States . He served as an American diplomat, Senator, and Congressional representative. He was a member of the Federalist, Democratic-Republican, National Republican, and later Anti-Masonic and Whig parties. Adams was the son of former...

, U.S. President

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Gabriele Adorno

Gabriele Adorno

Gabriele Adorno was the fifth Doge of Genoa. A member of the noble Adorno family, he was elected on March 14, 1363 to succeed Simone Boccanegra, who had died in office; he remained in the position until August 13, 1370, and was succeeded by Domenico di Campofregoso.Adorno is a character in...

, fifth Doge of Genoa

Doge of Genoa

The Republic of Genoa, in what is now northern Italy, was technically a communal republic in the early Middle Ages, although it was actually an oligarchy ruled by a small group of merchant families, from whom were selected the Doges of Genoa.- History :...

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Simon Boccanegra
  Simon Boccanegra
  Simon Boccanegra is an opera with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on the play Simón Bocanegra by Antonio García Gutiérrez....
  
  

Flavius Aetius

Flavius Aëtius

Flavius Aëtius , dux et patricius, was a Roman general of the closing period of the Western Roman Empire. He was an able military commander and the most influential man in the Western Roman Empire for two decades . He managed policy in regard to the attacks of barbarian peoples pressing on the Empire...

, Roman general

• Giuseppe Gazzaniga
  Giuseppe Gazzaniga
  Giuseppe Gazzaniga was a member of the Neapolitan school of opera composers. He composed fifty-one operas and is considered to be one of the last Italian opera buffa composers.-Biography:...
  
  : Ezio
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Ezio
• Gaetano Latilla
  Gaetano Latilla
  Gaetano Latilla was an Italian opera composer, the most important of the period immediately preceding Niccolò Piccinni .Latilla was born in Bari, and studied at the Loreto Conservatory in Naples...
  
  : Ezio
  Ezio (Latilla)
  Ezio is an opera eroica or "heroic" opera in 3 Acts by Gaetano Latilla. The opera uses an Italian language libretto by Pietro Metastasio. Metastasio's libretto was partly inspired by Jean Racine's play Britannicus and had earlier been set to music by George Frideric Handel in 1732...
  
  
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Attila
  Attila (opera)
  Attila is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera, based on the play Attila, König der Hunnen by Friedrich Ludwig Zacharias Werner. Initially, Verdi had enlisted Francesco Maria Piave to prepare the libretto, after Verdi's own scenario...
  
  

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim was a German magician, occult writer, theologian, astrologer, and alchemist.-Life:Agrippa was born in Cologne in 1486...

, German alchemist, writer

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : The Fiery Angel (as Agrippa of Nettesheim)

Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa

Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa

Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa was a Roman statesman and general. He was a close friend, son-in-law, lieutenant and defense minister to Octavian, the future Emperor Caesar Augustus...

, Roman statesman and general

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  

Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus

Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus (consul 32 BC)

Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus was a general and politician of ancient Rome in the 1st century BC.-Life:Ahenobarbus was captured with his father, Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, at Corfinium in 49 BC, and was present at the Battle of Pharsalus in 48 BC, but did not take any further part in the war...

, Roman consul (32 BC)

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  (as Enobarbus)

Pharaoh Akhenaten

Akhenaten

Akhenaten also spelled Echnaton,Ikhnaton,and Khuenaten;meaning "living spirit of Aten") known before the fifth year of his reign as Amenhotep IV , was a Pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt who ruled for 17 years and died perhaps in 1336 BC or 1334 BC...

 of Egypt

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Akhnaten
  Akhnaten (opera)
  Akhnaten is an opera in three acts based on the life and religious convictions of the pharaoh Akhenaten , written by the American minimalist composer Philip Glass in 1983. Akhnaten had its world premiere on March 24, 1984 at the Stuttgart State Opera, under the German title Echnaton...
  
  

3rd Duke of Alba

Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, 3rd Duke of Alba

Don Fernando Álvarez de Toledo y Pimentel, 3rd Duke of Alba was a Spanish general and governor of the Spanish Netherlands , nicknamed "the Iron Duke" in the Low Countries because of his harsh and cruel rule there and his role in the execution of his political opponents and the massacre of several...

, Governor of the Spanish Netherlands

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  , completed by Matteo Salvi
  Matteo Salvi
  Matteo Salvi was a composer of opera and classical music and a theatre director.Salvi was born in Botta di Sedrina , Italy...
  
  : Le duc d'Albe
  Le duc d'Albe
  Le duc d'Albe or Il duca d'Alba is an opera in three acts originally composed by Gaetano Donizetti in 1839 to a French language libretto by Eugène Scribe and Charles Duveyrier...
  
  
• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

Albert of Mainz

Albert of Mainz

Cardinal Albert of Hohenzollern was Elector and Archbishop of Mainz from 1514 to 1545, and Archbishop of Magdeburg from 1513 to 1545.-Biography:...

, Elector and Archbishop of Mainz

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Mathis der Maler
  Mathis der Maler (opera)
  Mathis der Maler is an opera by Paul Hindemith. The libretto is also by the composer.The opera's genesis lay in Hindemith's interest in the Protestant Reformation...
  
  (as Albrecht von Brandenburg)

Buzz Aldrin

Buzz Aldrin

Buzz Aldrin is an American mechanical engineer, retired United States Air Force pilot and astronaut who was the Lunar Module pilot on Apollo 11, the first manned lunar landing in history...

, U.S. astronaut

• Jonathan Dove
  Jonathan Dove
  Jonathan Dove is a British composer of opera, choral works, plays, films, and orchestral and chamber music. He has arranged a number of operas for English Touring Opera and the City of Birmingham Touring Opera , including in 1990 a famous 18-player two-evening adaptation of Wagner's Der Ring des...
  
  : Man on the Moon
  Man on the Moon (opera)
  Man on the Moon is a 2006 television opera in one act by Jonathan Dove with a libretto by Nicholas Wright. It relates the story of the Apollo 11 moon landing on 20 July 1969 and the subsequent problems experienced by Buzz Aldrin, the second man to walk on the moon.The opera, about 50 minutes long,...
  
  

Alexander the Great, King of Macedon

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Alessandro
  Alessandro (opera)
  Alessandro is an opera written for the Royal Academy of Music composed by George Frideric Handel in 1726. Paolo Rolli was the librettist and based the story on Ortensio Mauro's La superbia d'Alessandro...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel: Poro
  Poro (opera)
  Poro, re dell'Indie is an opera seria in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel...
  
  
• Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini was an Italian composer, best known for his operas. Pacini was born in Catania, Sicily, the son of the buffo Luigi Pacini, who was to appear in the premieres of many of Giovanni's operas...
  
  : Alessandro nelle Indie
  Alessandro nelle Indie
  Alessandro nelle Indie is an opera seria in two acts by Giovanni Pacini, with libretto by Andrea Leone Tottola, based on Alessandro nell'Indie by Pietro Metastasio...
  
  

(He appears in about 70 other operas set to the same text by Metastasio

Metastasio

Pietro Antonio Domenico Trapassi, better known by his pseudonym of Metastasio, was an Italian poet and librettist, considered the most important writer of opera seria libretti.-Early life:...

 as used by Pacini, including one by Leonardo Vinci

Leonardo Vinci

Leonardo Vinci was an Italian composer, best known for his operas.He was born at Strongoli and educated at Naples under Gaetano Greco in the Conservatorio dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo. He first became known for his opere buffe in Neapolitan dialect in 1719; he also composed many opere serie...

.)

Emperor Alexander Severus

Alexander Severus

Severus Alexander was Roman Emperor from 222 to 235. Alexander was the last emperor of the Severan dynasty. He succeeded his cousin Elagabalus upon the latter's assassination in 222, and was ultimately assassinated himself, marking the epoch event for the Crisis of the Third Century — nearly fifty...

 of Rome

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Alessandro Severo
  Alessandro Severo
  Alessandro Severo is an opera by George Frideric Handel composed in 1738. It is one of Handel's three pasticcio works, made up of the music and arias of his previous operas Giustino, Berenice and Arminio...
  
  

Tsar Alexander I of Russia

Alexander I of Russia

Alexander I of Russia , served as Emperor of Russia from 23 March 1801 to 1 December 1825 and the first Russian King of Poland from 1815 to 1825. He was also the first Russian Grand Duke of Finland and Lithuania....

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  (silent role)

Brigadier General Edward Porter Alexander

Edward Porter Alexander

Edward Porter Alexander was an engineer, an officer in the U.S. Army, a Confederate general in the American Civil War, and later a railroad executive, planter, and author....

, American military commander

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Tsarina Alexandra of Russia, consort of Tsar Nicholas II

• Deborah Drattell
  Deborah Drattell
  Deborah Drattell is an American composer. She was born in Brooklyn, New York, and started her career in music as a violinist. Her compositions have been performed by the New York Philharmonic, Orchestra of St. Luke's, the Tanglewood and Caramoor Music Festivals, and many other groups and venues...
  
  : Nicholas and Alexandra

Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich of Russia, son of Peter the Great

• Franz Lehár
  Franz Lehár
  Franz Lehár was an Austrian-Hungarian composer. He is mainly known for his operettas of which the most successful and best known is The Merry Widow .-Biography:...
  
  : Der Zarewitsch
  Der Zarewitsch
  Der Zarewitsch is an operetta in three acts by Franz Lehár. The German libretto by Heinz Reichert and Béla Jenbach is based on the play of the same name by Polish author Gabriela Zapolska. One his later operettas, Lehár composed the work as a vehicle for Richard Tauber, the acclaimed Austrian tenor...
  
  

Saint Alexius of Rome

Alexius of Rome

Saint Alexius or Alexis of Rome or Alexis von Edessa was an Eastern saint whose veneration was later transplanted to Rome, a process facilitated by the fact that, according to the earlier Syriac legend that a "Man of God" of Edessa, Mesopotamia who during the episcopate of Bishop Rabbula lived by...

• Stefano Landi
  Stefano Landi
  Stefano Landi was an Italian composer and teacher of the early Baroque Roman School. He was an influential early composer of opera, and wrote the earliest opera on a historical subject: Sant'Alessio .-Biography:Landi was born in Rome, the capital of the Papal States.In 1595 he joined the Collegio...
  
  : Sant'Alessio
  Sant'Alessio
  Sant'Alessio is an opera in three acts composed by Stefano Landi in 1631 with a libretto by Giulio Rospigliosi.Sant'Alessio was the first opera to be written on a historical subject. It describes the inner life of fifth-century Saint Alexis. The work broke new ground with a psychological...
  
   (1631; the first opera written on an historical subject)

Alfonso I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, husband of Lucrezia Borgia

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Lucrezia Borgia
  Lucrezia Borgia (opera)
  Lucrezia Borgia is a melodramma, or opera, in a prologue and two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after the play by Victor Hugo, in its turn after the legend of Lucrezia Borgia. Lucrezia Borgia was first performed on 26 December 1833 at La Scala, Milan with...
  
  

Alfonso II d'Este, Duke of Ferrara

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Torquato Tasso
  Torquato Tasso (opera)
  Torquato Tasso is a melodramma semiseria, or 'semi-serious' opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti and based on the life of the great poet Torquato Tasso. The Italian libretto was written by Jacopo Ferretti, who used a number of sources for his text, including works by Giovanni Rosini, Goethe,...
  
  

King Alfonso XI of Castile

Alfonso XI of Castile

Alfonso XI was the king of Castile, León and Galicia.He was the son of Ferdinand IV of Castile and his wife Constance of Portugal. Upon his father's death in 1312, several disputes ensued over who would hold regency, which were resolved in 1313...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : La favorite
  La favorite
  La favorite is an opera in four acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a French-language libretto by Alphonse Royer and Gustave Vaëz, based on the play Le comte de Comminges by Baculard d'Arnaud...
  
  

King Alfred the Great

Alfred the Great

Alfred the Great was King of Wessex from 871 to 899.Alfred is noted for his defence of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of southern England against the Vikings, becoming the only English monarch still to be accorded the epithet "the Great". Alfred was the first King of the West Saxons to style himself...

, legendary Anglo-Saxon king

• Thomas Arne: Alfred
• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Alfredo il grande
  Alfredo il Grande
  Alfredo il grande is a melodramma serio or serious opera in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Andrea Leone Tottola wrote the Italian libretto, which may have been derived from Johann Simon Mayr's 1818 opera of the same name...
  
  
• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Alfred
• Friedrich von Flotow
  Friedrich von Flotow
  Friedrich Adolf Ferdinand, Freiherr von Flotow was a German composer. He is chiefly remembered for his opera Martha, which was popular in the 19th century....
  
  : Alfred der Große

Dante Alighieri: see under Dante

Al-Mansur Ibn Abi Aamir

Al-Mansur Ibn Abi Aamir

Abu Aamir Muhammad Ibn Abdullah Ibn Abi Aamir, Al-Hajib Al-Mansur , better known as Almanzor, was the de facto ruler of Muslim Al-Andalus in the late 10th to early 11th centuries. His rule marked the peak of power for Moorish Iberia.-Origins:He was born Muhammad Ibn Abi Aamir, into a noble Arab...

, aka Almanzor, de facto ruler of al-Andalus

• Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...
  
  : L'esule di Granata
  L'esule di Granata
  L'esule di Granata is a melodramma in two acts by Giacomo Meyerbeer. The Italian libretto was by Felice Romani based on the rivalries between the Zegridi and the Abenceraggi factions in the last days of the kingdom of Granada...
  
  (as Almanzor)

Pedro de Alvarado

Pedro de Alvarado

Pedro de Alvarado y Contreras was a Spanish conquistador and governor of Guatemala. He participated in the conquest of Cuba, in Juan de Grijalva's exploration of the coasts of Yucatan and the Gulf of Mexico, and in the conquest of Mexico led by Hernan Cortes...

, Spanish conquistador

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : La conquista
• Roger Sessions
  Roger Sessions
  Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (opera)
  Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.-Performance history:...
  
  

Amalasuntha

Amalasuntha

Amalasuntha was a queen of the Ostrogoths from 526 to 534....

, Queen of the Ostrogoths

• André Messager
  André Messager
  André Charles Prosper Messager , was a French composer, organist, pianist, conductor and administrator. His stage compositions included ballets and 30 opéra comiques and operettas, among which Véronique, had lasting success, with Les p'tites Michu and Monsieur Beaucaire also enjoying international...
  
  : Isoline
  Isoline (opera)
  Isoline is an opera, described as a 'conte de fées' in three acts and ten tableaux, on a text by Catulle Mendès, with music by André Messager.-Background:...
  
  (as La Reine Amalasonthe)

Anacreon

Anacreon

Anacreon was a Greek lyric poet, notable for his drinking songs and hymns. Later Greeks included him in the canonical list of nine lyric poets.- Life :...

, Greek lyric poet

• Luigi Cherubini
  Luigi Cherubini
  Luigi Cherubini was an Italian composer who spent most of his working life in France. His most significant compositions are operas and sacred music. Beethoven regarded Cherubini as the greatest of his contemporaries....
  
  : Anacréon
  Anacréon (Cherubini)
  Anacréon, ou L'amour fugitif is an opera in two acts by Luigi Cherubini with a French libretto by C.R.Mendouze. It received its premiere at the Paris Opéra on 4 October 1803 but proved to be a complete failure, ending its run after only seven performances. The subject matter, a love affair of the...
  
  
• Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...
  
  : Anacréon
  Anacréon (1754)
  Anacréon is an opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau which was first performed at Fontainebleau on 23 October 1754. Its libretto is by Louis de Cahusac. It takes the form of an acte de ballet in one act. Rameau also composed another opera called Anacréon in 1757...
  
   (1754 version)
• Jean-Philippe Rameau: Anacréon
  Anacréon (1757)
  Anacréon is an opera by the French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau, first performed at the Opéra, Paris, on 31 May 1757 as part of a revised version of the opéra-ballet Les surprises de l'Amour. It takes the form of a one-act acte de ballet and has a libretto by Pierre-Joseph-Justin Bernard . Rameau...
  
   (1757 version)

Jacob Johan Anckarström

Jacob Johan Anckarström

Jacob Johan Anckarström was a Swedish military officer who was convicted and executed for regicide. He was the son of Jacob Johan Anckarström the Elder. He served as a captain in King Gustav III's regiment between 1778 and 1783...

, Swedish military officer, assassin of Gustav III

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : Gustave III
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera , is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi with text by Antonio Somma. The libretto is loosely based on an 1833 play, Gustave III, by French playwright Eugène Scribe who wrote about the historical assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden...
  
  

Tommaso Aniello: see under Masaniello

Anna of Bavaria, Holy Roman Empress, Queen of Rome and Bavaria

• Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Jakob Holzbauer was a composer of symphonies, concertos, operas, and chamber music, and a member of the Mannheim school. His aesthetic style is in line with that of the Sturm und Drang "movement" of German art and literature.Holzbauer was born in Vienna...
  
  : Günther von Schwarzburg
  Günther von Schwarzburg (opera)
  Günther von Schwarzburg is a Singspiel in three acts by Ignaz Holzbauer set to a German libretto by Anton Klein. Loosely based on events in the life of the 14th century German king, Günther von Schwarzburg, the opera premiered on 5 January 1777 at the Hoftheater in the Mannheim...
  
  

Queen Anne of Great Britain

• Friedrich von Flotow
  Friedrich von Flotow
  Friedrich Adolf Ferdinand, Freiherr von Flotow was a German composer. He is chiefly remembered for his opera Martha, which was popular in the 19th century....
  
  : Martha
  Martha (opera)
  Martha, oder Der Markt zu Richmond is a 'romantic comic' opera in four acts by Friedrich von Flotow, set to a German libretto by Friedrich Wilhelm Riese and based on a story by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges....
  
  (silent role)

Queen Anne (Boleyn)

Anne Boleyn

Anne Boleyn ;c.1501/1507 – 19 May 1536) was Queen of England from 1533 to 1536 as the second wife of Henry VIII of England and Marquess of Pembroke in her own right. Henry's marriage to Anne, and her subsequent execution, made her a key figure in the political and religious upheaval that was the...

, second consort of Henry VIII of England

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Ippolito Pindemonte's Enrico VIII ossia Anna Bolena and Alessandro Pepoli's Anna Bolena, both telling of the life of Anne Boleyn...
  
  
• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Henry VIII
  Henry VIII (opera)
  Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on El cisma en Inglaterra by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.-Composition history:...
  
  

Saint Anthony the Great

Anthony the Great

Anthony the Great or Antony the Great , , also known as Saint Anthony, Anthony the Abbot, Anthony of Egypt, Anthony of the Desert, Anthony the Anchorite, Abba Antonius , and Father of All Monks, was a Christian saint from Egypt, a prominent leader among the Desert Fathers...

• Bernice Johnson Reagon
  Bernice Johnson Reagon
  Bernice Johnson Reagon is a singer, composer, scholar, and social activist, who founded the a cappella ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock in 1973.-Early life and education:...
  
  : The Temptation of Saint Anthony
  The Temptation of Saint Anthony (opera)
  The Temptation of St. Anthony is an opera rooted in the gospel tradition based on the novel by Gustave Flaubert, directed by Robert Wilson with book, libretto and music by Bernice Johnson Reagon and costumes by Geoffrey Holder...
  
  

Susan B. Anthony

Susan B. Anthony

Susan Brownell Anthony was a prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States. She was co-founder of the first Women's Temperance Movement with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as President...

, American women’s rights activist

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Antiochus I Soter

Antiochus I Soter

Antiochus I Soter , was a king of the Hellenistic Seleucid Empire. He reigned from 281 BC - 261 BC....

, King of the Seleucid Empire

• Étienne Méhul
  Étienne Méhul
  Etienne Nicolas Méhul was a French composer, "the most important opera composer in France during the Revolution." He was also the first composer to be called a "Romantic".-Life:...
  
  : Stratonice
  Stratonice (opera)
  Stratonice is a one-act opéra comique by Étienne Méhul to a libretto by François-Benoît Hoffman, first performed at the Théâtre Favart, Paris, on 3 May 1792...
  
  
• Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...
  
  : Les fêtes de Polymnie
  Les fêtes de Polymnie
  Les fêtes de Polymnie is an opéra-ballet in three entrées and a prologue by Jean-Philippe Rameau. The work was first performed on 12 October 1745 at the Opéra, Paris, and is set to a libretto by Louis de Cahusac...
  
  

Gustaf Mauritz Armfelt

Gustaf Mauritz Armfelt

Count Gustaf Mauritz Armfelt was a Finnish and Swedish courtier and diplomat. In Finland, he is considered one of the great Finnish statesmen. Born in Tarvasjoki, Finland, he was the great grandson of Charles XII of Sweden's general, Carl Gustaf Armfeldt...

, Finnish-Swedish diplomat, possible lover of Gustav III of Sweden

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : Gustave III

Arminius

Arminius

Arminius , also known as Armin or Hermann was a chieftain of the Germanic Cherusci who defeated a Roman army in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest...

, Germanic chieftain

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Arminio
  Arminio
  Arminio is an opera composed by George Frideric Handel.- Performance History :Together with Giustino and Berenice, Arminio is one of three operas Handel wrote within a period of half a year in 1736. He began with the composition of Giustino on 14 August 1736, followed by that of Arminio on 15...
  
  

Artabanus of Persia

Artabanus of Persia

Artabanus the Hyrcanian was a Persian political figure during the Achaemenid Dynasty who was reportedly Regent of Persia for a few months ....

, political figure

• Thomas Arne: Artaxerxes
  Artaxerxes (opera)
  Artaxerxes is an opera in three acts composed by Thomas Arne set to an English adaptation of Metastasio's 1729 libretto Artaserse. The first English opera seria, Artaxerxes premiered on 2 February 1762 at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden and continued to be regularly performed until the late 1830s...
  
  

King Artaxerxes I of Persia

Artaxerxes I of Persia

Artaxerxes I was the sixth king of kings of the Achaemenid Empire from 465 BCE to 424 BCE. He was the son of Xerxes I of Persia and Amestris, daughter of Otanes.*Artaxerxes I was the sixth king of kings of the Achaemenid Empire from 465 BCE to 424 BCE. He was the son of Xerxes I of Persia and...

• Thomas Arne: Artaxerxes
  Artaxerxes (opera)
  Artaxerxes is an opera in three acts composed by Thomas Arne set to an English adaptation of Metastasio's 1729 libretto Artaserse. The first English opera seria, Artaxerxes premiered on 2 February 1762 at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden and continued to be regularly performed until the late 1830s...
  
  
• Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Maria Gasparo Sacchini was an Italian opera composer.Sacchini was born in Florence, but was raised in Naples, where he received his musical education at the San Onofrio conservatory. He wrote his first operas in Naples, thereafter moving to Venice, then London and eventually Paris, where...
  
  : Artaserse

(He appears in over 40 other operas set to the same text from Metastasio's libretto Artaserse

Artaserse

Artaserse is the name of a number of Italian operas, all based on a text by Metastasio. Artaserse is the Italian form of the name of a Persian king, Artaxerxes....

)

King Arthur

King Arthur

King Arthur is a legendary British leader of the late 5th and early 6th centuries, who, according to Medieval histories and romances, led the defence of Britain against Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and...

, legendary king of Britain

• Isaac Albéniz
  Isaac Albéniz
  Isaac Manuel Francisco Albéniz y Pascual was a Spanish Catalan pianist and composer best known for his piano works based on folk music idioms .-Life:Born in Camprodon, province of Girona, to Ángel Albéniz and his wife Dolors Pascual, Albéniz...
  
  : Merlin
  Merlin (opera)
  Merlin is the last of the operas of Isaac Albéniz. It is in three acts and the libretto was written in English by Francis Money-Coutts, 5th Baron Latymer ....
  
  
• Grażyna Bacewicz
  Grazyna Bacewicz
  Grażyna Bacewicz was a Polish composer and violinist. She is only the second Polish female composer to have achieved national and international recognition, the first being Maria Szymanowska in the early 19th century.- Life :Bacewicz was born in Łódź...
  
  : The Adventure of King Arthur
• Ernest Chausson
  Ernest Chausson
  Amédée-Ernest Chausson was a French romantic composer who died just as his career was beginning to flourish.-Life:Ernest Chausson was born in Paris into a prosperous bourgeois family...
  
  : Le roi Arthus
  Le roi Arthus
  Le roi Arthus is an opera in three acts by the French composer Ernest Chausson to his own libretto. It was composed between 1886 and 1895, but only first performed on 30 November 1903 at the Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels, after long delays...
  
  
• Henry Purcell
  Henry Purcell
  Henry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...
  
  : King Arthur
  King Arthur (opera)
  King Arthur or, The British Worthy , is a semi-opera in five acts with music by Henry Purcell and alibretto by John Dryden. It was first performed at the Queen's Theatre, Dorset Garden, London, in late May or early June 1691....
  
  
• Max Vogrich
  Max Vogrich
  Max Vogrich was an Austrian pianist and composer.Max Vogrich was born in Hermannstadt, Transylvania . A childhood prodigy, he was an acclaimed pianist at the age of 14 years. He studied at Leipzig under Carl Reinecke, Hans Richter, Moritz Hauptmann, Wenzel, and Ignaz Moscheles, completing the...
  
  : King Arthur

Chester A. Arthur

Chester A. Arthur

Chester Alan Arthur was the 21st President of the United States . Becoming President after the assassination of President James A. Garfield, Arthur struggled to overcome suspicions of his beginnings as a politician from the New York City Republican machine, succeeding at that task by embracing...

, U.S. President

• Douglas Moore: The Ballad of Baby Doe
  The Ballad of Baby Doe
  The Ballad of Baby Doe is an opera by the American composer Douglas Moore that uses an English-language libretto by John Latouche. It is Moore's most famous opera and one of the few American operas to be in the standard repertory...
  
  

Ulrica Arfvidsson

Ulrica Arfvidsson

Anna Ulrica Arfvidsson was a professional Swedish fortune-teller during the reign of Gustav III of Sweden. She was commonly known as Mamsell Arfvidsson.-Biography:...

, Swedish fortune-teller

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : Gustave III
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera , is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi with text by Antonio Somma. The libretto is loosely based on an 1833 play, Gustave III, by French playwright Eugène Scribe who wrote about the historical assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden...
  
  

Atahualpa

Atahualpa

Atahualpa, Atahuallpa, Atabalipa, or Atawallpa , was the last Sapa Inca or sovereign emperor of the Tahuantinsuyu, or the Inca Empire, prior to the Spanish conquest of Peru...

, Inca sovereign emperor

• Iain Hamilton
  Iain Hamilton (composer)
  Iain Ellis Hamilton was a Scottish composer.He was educated in London where he became an apprentice engineer, and remained in that profession for the next seven years. He undertook the study of music in his spare time...
  
  : The Royal Hunt of the Sun

Attila the Hun

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Attila
  Attila (opera)
  Attila is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera, based on the play Attila, König der Hunnen by Friedrich Ludwig Zacharias Werner. Initially, Verdi had enlisted Francesco Maria Piave to prepare the libretto, after Verdi's own scenario...
  
  

Atys

Atys son of Croesus

Atys was the son of Croesus, father of Pythius, a king of Lydia. According to book one of the Histories by Herodotus, his father had a dream, in this dream he saw his son Atys being killed by a spear. As a result Croesus, seeking to prevent or stave off the foreseen fate, had his son married...

, son of King Croesus of Lydia

• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Croesus
  Croesus (opera)
  Der hochmütige, gestürzte und wieder erhabene Croesus is a three-act opera composed by Reinhard Keiser...
  
  

Caesar Augustus

Augustus

Augustus ;23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14) is considered the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in 14 AD.The dates of his rule are contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian...

, Roman Emperor

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  (as Octavius Caesar)

Aurelian

Aurelian

Aurelian , was Roman Emperor from 270 to 275. During his reign, he defeated the Alamanni after a devastating war. He also defeated the Goths, Vandals, Juthungi, Sarmatians, and Carpi. Aurelian restored the Empire's eastern provinces after his conquest of the Palmyrene Empire in 273. The following...

, Emperor of Rome

• Gioachino Rossini: Aureliano in Palmira
  Aureliano in Palmira
  Aureliano in Palmira is an operatic dramma serio in two acts written by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto in which the librettist was credited only by the initials "G. F. R." The libretto has generally been attributed to Giuseppe Felice Romani, but sometimes to the otherwise...
  
  

Pharaoh Ay

Ay

Ay was the penultimate Pharaoh of Ancient Egypt's 18th dynasty. He held the throne of Egypt for a brief four-year period , although he was a close advisor to two and perhaps three of the pharaohs who ruled before him and was the power behind the throne during Tutankhamun's reign...

 of Egypt

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Akhnaten
  Akhnaten (opera)
  Akhnaten is an opera in three acts based on the life and religious convictions of the pharaoh Akhenaten , written by the American minimalist composer Philip Glass in 1983. Akhnaten had its world premiere on March 24, 1984 at the Stuttgart State Opera, under the German title Echnaton...
  
  

B

Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly

Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly

Prince Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly , was a Russian Field Marshal and Minister of War during Napoleon's invasion in 1812 and War of the Sixth Coalition.-Early life:...

, Russian prince and general

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Brigitte Bardot

Brigitte Bardot

Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot is a French former fashion model, actress, singer and animal rights activist. She was one of the best-known sex-symbols of the 1960s.In her early life, Bardot was an aspiring ballet dancer...

, French actress

• Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch , son of the art director Georges Wakhévitch, is an avant-garde French composer who released a series of studio albums in the 1970s and composed the music for the Salvador Dalí opera Être Dieu...
  
  : Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties
  Être Dieu
  Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties is a self-proclaimed "opera-poem" written by Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dalí, based on a libretto by Manuel Vázquez Montalbán with music by French avant-garde musician Igor Wakhévitch...
  
  (a creation of Salvador Dalí
  Salvador Dalí
  Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
  
  ; the performer plays Bardot impersonating an artichoke)

Pyotr Fyodorovich Basmanov, Russian boyar

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Dimitrij
  Dimitrij
  Dimitrij is an opera by Antonín Dvořák in 4 acts, set a libretto by Marie Červinková-Riegrová. More specifically, it belongs to the genre of Grand Opera. The work was first performed in Prague, at the Nové České Divadlo on 8 October 1882, after Dvořák began composition during May 1881...
  
  

Daisy Bates

Daisy Bates

-People:* Daisy May Bates , Australian journalist, author, amateur anthropologist and lifelong student of Indigenous Australian culture and society...

, Irish-Australian indigenous welfare worker and anthropologist

• Margaret Sutherland
  Margaret Sutherland
  Margaret Sutherland was an Australian composer, probably the best-known female composer her country has produced....
  
  : The Young Kabbarli
  The Young Kabbarli
  The Young Kabbarli is a one-act chamber opera written in 1964 by the Australian composer Margaret Sutherland; it is her only work in the operatic genre. The libretto was by Maie Casey, based on poetry by Judith Wright and Shaw Neilson....
  
  

Ottoman Sultan Bayezid I

Bayezid I

Bayezid I was the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, from 1389 to 1402. He was the son of Murad I and Valide Sultan Gülçiçek Hatun.-Biography:Bayezid was born in Edirne and spent his youth in Bursa, where he received a high-level education...

 "The Thunderbolt"

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Tamerlano
  Tamerlano
  Tamerlano is an opera in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music , with music by George Frideric Handel to an Italian text by Nicola Francesco Haym, adapted from Agostin Piovene's Tamerlano together with another libretto entitled Bajazet after Nicolas Pradon's Tamerlan, ou La Mort de...
  
  (as Bajazet)
• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Bajazet
  Bajazet (opera)
  Bajazet is an Italian opera composed by Antonio Vivaldi in 1735. Its libretto was written by Agostino Piovene. It was premiered in Verona, during the Carnival season of that year. This opera is presented in 3 acts, with a three-movement sinfonia as an introduction...
  
  

Pierre Beaumarchais

Pierre Beaumarchais

Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais was a French playwright, watchmaker, inventor, musician, diplomat, fugitive, spy, publisher, arms dealer, satirist, financier, and revolutionary ....

, French playwright

• John Corigliano
  John Corigliano
  John Corigliano is an American composer of classical music and a teacher of music. He is a distinguished professor of music at Lehman College in the City University of New York.-Biography:...
  
  : The Ghosts of Versailles
  The Ghosts of Versailles
  The Ghosts of Versailles is an opera in two acts, with music by John Corigliano to an English libretto by William M. Hoffman. The Metropolitan Opera had commissioned the work from Corigliano in 1980 in celebration of its 100th anniversary, with the premiere scheduled for 1983...
  
  

Saint Thomas Becket

Thomas Becket

Thomas Becket was Archbishop of Canterbury from 1162 until his murder in 1170. He is venerated as a saint and martyr by both the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion...

, Archbishop of Canterbury

• Ildebrando Pizzetti
  Ildebrando Pizzetti
  Ildebrando Pizzetti was an Italian composer of classical music.- Biography :Pizzetti was born in Parma in 1880. He was part of the "Generation of 1880" along with Ottorino Respighi and Gian Francesco Malipiero. They were among the first Italian composers in some time whose primary contributions...
  
  : Assassinio nella cattedrale
  Assassinio nella cattedrale
  Assassinio nella cattedrale is an opera in two acts and an intermezzo by the Italian composer Ildebrando Pizzetti. The libretto is an adaptation by the composer of an Italian translation of T.S. Eliot's play Murder in the Cathedral. The opera was first performed at La Scala, Milan on 1 March 1958...
  
  

Belisarius

Belisarius

Flavius Belisarius was a general of the Byzantine Empire. He was instrumental to Emperor Justinian's ambitious project of reconquering much of the Mediterranean territory of the former Western Roman Empire, which had been lost less than a century previously....

, Byzantine general

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Belisario
  Belisario
  Belisario is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvadore Cammarano wrote the Italian libretto after Luigi Marchionni's adaptation of Eduard von Schenk's play. The plot is loosely based on the life of the famous general Belisarius of the 6th century Byzantine Empire...
  
  

Augustin Daniel Belliard

Augustin Daniel Belliard

Augustin Daniel Belliard, comte Belliard et de l'Empire was a French general.Belliard became an officer between 1792 and 1793 under Dumouriez in Belgium...

, French general

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Belshazzar

Belshazzar

Belshazzar, or Balthazar , was a 6th century BC prince of Babylon, the son of Nabonidus and the last king of Babylon according to the Book of Daniel . Like his father, it is believed by many scholars that he was an Assyrian. In Daniel Belshazzar, or Balthazar , was a 6th century BC prince of...

, Prince of Babylon

• Gioachino Rossini: Ciro in Babilonia
  Ciro in Babilonia
  Ciro in Babilonia, ossia La caduta di Baldassare in an opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Francesco Aventi. It was first performed at the Teatro Comunale, Ferrara during Lent, 1812. The exact date of the premiere is unknown but is believed to be March 14...
  
  (as Baldassare, King of Assyria)

Olga Benário Prestes

Olga Benário Prestes

Olga Benário Prestes was a German-Brazilian communist militant.She was born in Munich as Olga Gutmann Benário, to a Jewish family. Her father, Leo Benário, was a Social-Democrat lawyer, and her mother, Eugenie , was a member of Bavarian high-society...

, German-Brazilian communist militant

• Jorge Antunes: Olga
  Olga (opera)
  Olga is an opera in three-acts and eight scenes in singspiel form composed by Jorge Antunes with a libretto by Gerson Valle. It premiered at Theatro Municipal of Sao Paulo on October 14, 2006. It is based on the life of Olga Benário Prestes....
  
  

Levin August, Count von Bennigsen

Levin August, Count von Bennigsen

Levin August Gottlieb Theophil , Count von Bennigsen was a German general in the service of the Russian Empire....

, German general

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Queen Berenice III of Egypt

Berenice III of Egypt

Berenice III , sometimes called Cleopatra Berenice, ruled as queen of Egypt from 81 to 80 BC, and possibly from 101 to 88 BC jointly with her uncle/husband Ptolemy X Alexander I....

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Berenice
  Berenice (opera)
  Berenice is an opera in three acts by George Frideric Handel to an Italian libretto, written in Italy in 1709 and originally entitled Berenice, regina d'Egitto , by Antonio Salvi....
  
  

Louis Alexandre Berthier

Louis Alexandre Berthier

Louis Alexandre Berthier, 1st Prince de Wagram, 1st Duc de Valangin, 1st Sovereign Prince de Neuchâtel , was a Marshal of France, Vice-Constable of France beginning in 1808, and Chief of Staff under Napoleon.-Early life:Alexandre was born at Versailles to Lieutenant-Colonel Jean Baptiste Berthier ,...

, Marshall of France

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Joe Biden

Joe Biden

Joseph Robinette "Joe" Biden, Jr. is the 47th and current Vice President of the United States, serving under President Barack Obama...

, Vice President of the United States

Vice President of the United States

The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...

• Curtis K. Hughes: Say It Ain't So, Joe
  Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say It Ain't So, Joe is a chamber opera in two acts by Curtis K. Hughes inspired by text drawn from the public record of the 2008 United States vice-presidential debate...
  
  

Otto von Bismarck

Otto von Bismarck

Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg , simply known as Otto von Bismarck, was a Prussian-German statesman whose actions unified Germany, made it a major player in world affairs, and created a balance of power that kept Europe at peace after 1871.As Minister President of...

, first Chancellor of Germany

• Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono was an Italian avant-garde composer of classical music and remains one of the most prominent composers of the 20th century.- Early years :Born in Venice, he was a member of a wealthy artistic family, and his grandfather was a notable painter...
  
  : Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore is an opera with music by Luigi Nono, based mainly on plays by Bertolt Brecht, but also incorporating texts of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Karl Marx, and Vladimir Lenin. Nono himself and Yury Lyubimov wrote the libretto. It premiered at the Teatro alla Scala on April...
  
  

Harman Blennerhassett

Harman Blennerhassett

Harman Blennerhassett was an Irish-American lawyer, born in Castle Conway in County Kerry, Ireland to Conway Blennerhassett and Elizabeth Lacy. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and in 1790 was called to the Irish bar...

, Irish-American lawyer

• Walter Damrosch: The Man Without a Country
  The Man Without a Country (opera)
  The Man Without a Country is an opera in 2 acts by composer Walter Damrosch. Arthur Guiterman wrote the English language libretto which was based on Edward Everett Hale's 1863 short story of the same name. The work premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City on May 12, 1937.-Roles:...
  
  

Blondel de Nesle, French troubador

• André Grétry: Richard Coeur-de-lion
  Richard Coeur-de-lion (opera)
  Richard Coeur-de-lion is an opéra comique, described as a comédie mise en musique, by the Belgian composer André Grétry. was by Michel-Jean Sedaine. The work is generally recognised as Grétry's masterpiece and one of the most important French opéras comiques...
  
  

Boabdil, last Nasrid ruler of Granada

• see Muhammad XII of Granada below

Francisco de Bobadilla

Francisco de Bobadilla

Francisco de Bobadilla was a Spanish colonial administrator. Member of the Order of Calatrava, in 1499, de Bobadilla was appointed to succeed Christopher Columbus as the second governor of the Indies, Spain's new territories in America, by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella...

, Spanish colonial administrator

• Alberto Franchetti
  Alberto Franchetti
  Alberto Franchetti was an Italian opera composer.-Biography:Alberto Franchetti was born in Turin, a Jewish nobleman of independent means. He studied first in Venice, then in Dresden under Felix Draeseke, and finally at the Munich Conservatory under Josef Rheinberger. His first major success...
  
  : Cristoforo Colombo
  Cristoforo Colombo (opera)
  Cristoforo Colombo is an opera in four acts and an epilogue by Alberto Franchetti to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica...
  
  

Giovanni Boccaccio

Giovanni Boccaccio

Giovanni Boccaccio was an Italian author and poet, a friend, student, and correspondent of Petrarch, an important Renaissance humanist and the author of a number of notable works including the Decameron, On Famous Women, and his poetry in the Italian vernacular...

, Italian writer, poet

• Franz von Suppé
  Franz von Suppé
  Franz von Suppé or Francesco Suppé Demelli was an Austrian composer of light operas who was born in what is now Croatia during the time his father was working in this outpost of the Austro-Hungarian Empire...
  
  : Boccaccio

Simone Boccanegra

Simone Boccanegra

Simone Boccanegra was the first doge of Genoa. His story was popularized by Antonio García Gutiérrez's 1843 play Simón Bocanegra and Giuseppe Verdi's 1857 opera Simon Boccanegra. Note the spellings....

, first Doge of Genoa

Doge of Genoa

The Republic of Genoa, in what is now northern Italy, was technically a communal republic in the early Middle Ages, although it was actually an oligarchy ruled by a small group of merchant families, from whom were selected the Doges of Genoa.- History :...

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Simon Boccanegra
  Simon Boccanegra
  Simon Boccanegra is an opera with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on the play Simón Bocanegra by Antonio García Gutiérrez....
  
  

George Boleyn, Viscount Rochford

George Boleyn, Viscount Rochford

George Boleyn, Viscount Rochford was an English courtier and nobleman, and the brother of queen consort Anne Boleyn...

, brother of Anne Boleyn

Anne Boleyn

Anne Boleyn ;c.1501/1507 – 19 May 1536) was Queen of England from 1533 to 1536 as the second wife of Henry VIII of England and Marquess of Pembroke in her own right. Henry's marriage to Anne, and her subsequent execution, made her a key figure in the political and religious upheaval that was the...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Ippolito Pindemonte's Enrico VIII ossia Anna Bolena and Alessandro Pepoli's Anna Bolena, both telling of the life of Anne Boleyn...
  
  (as Rochefort)

Simón Bolívar

Simón Bolívar

Simón José Antonio de la Santísima Trinidad Bolívar y Palacios Ponte y Yeiter, commonly known as Simón Bolívar was a Venezuelan military and political leader...

, South American revolutionary

• Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud was a French composer and teacher. He was a member of Les Six—also known as The Group of Six—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions are influenced by jazz and make use of polytonality...
  
  : Bolivar

Caroline Bonaparte

Caroline Bonaparte

Maria Annunziata Carolina Murat , better known as Caroline Bonaparte, was the seventh surviving child and third surviving daughter of Carlo Buonaparte and Letizia Ramolino and a younger sister of Napoleon I of France...

, Queen Consort of Naples and Sicily, sister of Napoleon

Pauline Bonaparte

Pauline Bonaparte

Pauline Bonaparte was the first sovereign Duchess of Guastalla, an imperial French Princess and the Princess consort of Sulmona and Rossano. She was the sixth child of Letizia Ramolino and Carlo Buonaparte, Corsica's representative to the court of King Louis XVI of France. Her elder brother,...

, Princess of France, sister of Napoleon

• Ivan Caryll
  Ivan Caryll
  Félix Marie Henri Tilkin , better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language...
  
  : The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic is a comic opera in three acts, set in Paris, with music by Ivan Caryll and a book and lyrics by Henry Hamilton, based on the play Madame Sans-Gêne by Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau. Additional lyrics by Adrian Ross...
  
  

Lizzie Borden, American celebrity and possible axe-murderer

• Thomas Albert
  Thomas Albert
  Thomas Albert is an American composer and educator.♥-Biography:Thomas Albert attended the public schools of Lebanon, Pennsylvania and Wilson, North Carolina. In 1970, he received the degree A.B. from Atlantic Christian College , where he studied composition with William Duckworth...
  
  : Lizbeth
• Jack Beeson
  Jack Beeson
  Jack Beeson was an American composer. He was known particularly for his operas, the best known of which are Lizzie Borden, Hello Out There! and The Sweet Bye and Bye.-Biography:...
  
  : Lizzie Borden
  Lizzie Borden (opera)
  Lizzie Borden is the best known opera by Jack Beeson. It is based on the real-life case of Lizzie Borden.It was written in 1965 and premiered on March 25, 1965 by the New York City Opera conducted by Anton Coppola. The English libretto is by Kenward Elmslie after a scenario by Richard Plant...
  
  

Jorge Luis Borges

Jorge Luis Borges

Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

, Argentinian writer

• Juan María Solare
  Juan María Solare
  Juan María Solare is an Argentine composer and pianist.-Education:Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Solare studied and received his diploma in piano , composition and conducting at the Conservatorio Nacional de Música Carlos López Buchardo...
  
  : Veinticinco de agosto, 1983
  Veinticinco de agosto, 1983
  Veinticinco de agosto, 1983 is a chamber opera by Juan María Solare, to a Spanish libretto by Javier Adúriz based on the story by Jorge Luis Borges...
  
  (2 roles, Old Borges, baritone; and Young Borges, tenor)

Saint Francis Borgia

Francis Borgia

Saint Francis Borgia, 4th duke of Gandía, 3rd Father General of the Jesuit Order, Grandee of Spain, was a Spanish Jesuit and third Superior General of the Society of Jesus. He was canonized on 20 June 1670.-Early life:He was born Francesco Borgia de Candia d'Aragon within the Duchy of Gandía,...

, Spanish Superior-General of the Jesuits

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

Lucrezia Borgia

Lucrezia Borgia

Lucrezia Borgia [luˈkrɛtsia ˈbɔrʤa] was the illegitimate daughter of Rodrigo Borgia, the powerful Renaissance Valencian who later became Pope Alexander VI, and Vannozza dei Cattanei. Her brothers included Cesare Borgia, Giovanni Borgia, and Gioffre Borgia...

, daughter of Pope Alexander VI

Pope Alexander VI

Pope Alexander VI , born Roderic Llançol i Borja was Pope from 1492 until his death on 18 August 1503. He is one of the most controversial of the Renaissance popes, and his Italianized surname—Borgia—became a byword for the debased standards of the Papacy of that era, most notoriously the Banquet...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Lucrezia Borgia
  Lucrezia Borgia (opera)
  Lucrezia Borgia is a melodramma, or opera, in a prologue and two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after the play by Victor Hugo, in its turn after the legend of Lucrezia Borgia. Lucrezia Borgia was first performed on 26 December 1833 at La Scala, Milan with...
  
  

Saint Charles Borromeo

Charles Borromeo

Charles Borromeo was the cardinal archbishop of the Catholic Archdiocese of Milan from 1564 to 1584. He was a leading figure during the Counter-Reformation and was responsible for significant reforms in the Catholic Church, including the founding of seminaries for the education of priests...

, Italian cardinal

• Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Erich Pfitzner was a German composer and self-described anti-modernist. His best known work is the post-Romantic opera Palestrina, loosely based on the life of the great sixteenth-century composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina.-Biography:Pfitzner was born in Moscow, Russia, where his...
  
  : Palestrina
  Palestrina (opera)
  Palestrina is an opera by the German composer Hans Pfitzner, first performed in 1917. The composer referred to it as a Musikalische Legende , and wrote the libretto himself, based on a legend about the Renaissance musician Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, who saves the art of contrapuntal music ...
  
  

Đurađ Branković, Serbian despot

• Ferenc Erkel: György Brankovics
  György Brankovics (opera)
  György Brankovics is an 1874 Hungarian opera by Ferenc Erkel. It is based on the life of György Brankovics.-References: The following sources were given:*Till Géza: Opera, Zeneműkiadó, Budapest, 1985, ISBN 963 330 564 0...
  
  

Prince Braslav of Pannonian Croatia

• Eugen Suchoň
  Eugen Suchon
  Eugen Suchoň was one of the greatest Slovak composers of the 20th century.-Early life:...
  
  : Svätopluk
  Svätopluk (opera)
  Svätopluk is a Slovak opera by Eugen Suchoň with the subtitle Musical drama in three acts. The libretto is by Eugen Suchoň, Ivan Stodola and Jela Krčméry-Vrteľová and is loosely based on Stodola's play Kráľ Svätopluk, which was in turn based on events in the life of King Svatopluk I. Suchoň...
  
  

Gian Francesco Brogni, Italian cardinal

• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : La Juive
  La Juive
  La Juive is a grand opera in five acts by Fromental Halévy to an original French libretto by Eugène Scribe; it was first performed at the Opéra, Paris, on February 23, 1835.-Composition history:...
  
  

John Hobhouse, 1st Baron Broughton

John Hobhouse, 1st Baron Broughton

John Cam Hobhouse, 1st Baron Broughton GCB, PC, FRS , known as Sir John Hobhouse, Bt, from 1831 to 1851, was a British politician and memoirist.-Background and education:...

, British memoirist and politician

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

John Brown, Sergeant of the Second Battalion, Boston Light Infantry Volunteer Militia

• Walter Schumann
  Walter Schumann
  Walter Schumann was an American composer for film, television, and the theater. His notable works include the score for The Night of the Hunter and the Dragnet Theme...
  
  : John Brown's Body

Antonín Brus z Mohelnice

Antonín Brus z Mohelnice

Antonín Brus was a Moravian Archbishop of Prague.- Life :He was born at Mohelnice in Moravia,After receiving his education at Prague he joined the Knights of the Cross with the Red Star, an ecclesiastical order established in Bohemia in the thirteenth century...

, Archbishop of Prague

• Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Erich Pfitzner was a German composer and self-described anti-modernist. His best known work is the post-Romantic opera Palestrina, loosely based on the life of the great sixteenth-century composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina.-Biography:Pfitzner was born in Moscow, Russia, where his...
  
  : Palestrina
  Palestrina (opera)
  Palestrina is an opera by the German composer Hans Pfitzner, first performed in 1917. The composer referred to it as a Musikalische Legende , and wrote the libretto himself, based on a legend about the Renaissance musician Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, who saves the art of contrapuntal music ...
  
  (as Anton Brus von Müglitz)

Marcus Junius Brutus the Younger, Roman politician, co-assassin of Julius Caesar

• Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Wolfgang Klebe was a German composer. He composed more than 140 works, among them 14 operas, 8 symphonies, 15 solo concerts, chamber music, piano works, and sacred music.-Biography:...
  
  : Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars, op.32, is an opera in one act by Giselher Klebe who also wrote the libretto based on the Shakespeare translation by August Wilhelm von Schlegel.It premiered on 20 September 1959 at the Stadttheater Essen...
  
  

William Jennings Bryan

William Jennings Bryan

William Jennings Bryan was an American politician in the late-19th and early-20th centuries. He was a dominant force in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, standing three times as its candidate for President of the United States...

, U.S. Secretary of State, presidential candidate

• Douglas Moore: The Ballad of Baby Doe
  The Ballad of Baby Doe
  The Ballad of Baby Doe is an opera by the American composer Douglas Moore that uses an English-language libretto by John Latouche. It is Moore's most famous opera and one of the few American operas to be in the standard repertory...
  
  

George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham

George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham

George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, 20th Baron de Ros of Helmsley, KG, PC, FRS was an English statesman and poet.- Upbringing and education :...

, English poet, statesman

• Robert Planquette
  Robert Planquette
  Jean Robert Planquette was a French composer of songs and operettas.Several of Planquette's operettas were extraordinarily successful in Britain, including Les cloches de Corneville , the length of whose initial London run broke all records for any piece of musical theatre up to that time, and Rip...
  
  : Nell Gwynne
  Nell Gwynne (operetta)
  Nell Gwynne is a three-act comic opera composed by Robert Planquette, with a libretto by H. B. Farnie. The libretto is based on the play Rochester by William Thomas Moncrieff. The piece was a rare instance of an opera by a French composer being produced first in London...
  
  

Gautama Buddha

Gautama Buddha

Siddhārtha Gautama was a spiritual teacher from the Indian subcontinent, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. In most Buddhist traditions, he is regarded as the Supreme Buddha Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit: सिद्धार्थ गौतम; Pali: Siddhattha Gotama) was a spiritual teacher from the Indian...

• Max Vogrich
  Max Vogrich
  Max Vogrich was an Austrian pianist and composer.Max Vogrich was born in Hermannstadt, Transylvania . A childhood prodigy, he was an acclaimed pianist at the age of 14 years. He studied at Leipzig under Carl Reinecke, Hans Richter, Moritz Hauptmann, Wenzel, and Ignaz Moscheles, completing the...
  
  : Buddha

Johannes Bureus

Johannes Bureus

Johannes Thomae Bureus Agrivillensis was a Swedish antiquarian, polymath and mystic. He was royal librarian, tutor, and adviser of King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden....

, Swedish scholar

• Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Olof Wilhelm Peterson-Berger was a Swedish composer and music critic...
  
  : The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets is an opera by Wilhelm Peterson-Berger, to his own Swedish libretto, composed from 1912-17...
  
  (as Johan Bure)

William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley

William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley

William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley , KG was an English statesman, the chief advisor of Queen Elizabeth I for most of her reign, twice Secretary of State and Lord High Treasurer from 1572...

, English statesman, adviser to Elizabeth I

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda is a tragic opera, , in two acts, by Gaetano Donizetti, to a libretto by Giuseppe Bardari, based on Friedrich Schiller's 1800 play Maria Stuart....
  
  (as Lord Guglielmo Cecil)

Aaron Burr

Aaron Burr

Aaron Burr, Jr. was an important political figure in the early history of the United States of America. After serving as a Continental Army officer in the Revolutionary War, Burr became a successful lawyer and politician...

, third Vice President of the United States

• Walter Damrosch: The Man Without a Country
  The Man Without a Country (opera)
  The Man Without a Country is an opera in 2 acts by composer Walter Damrosch. Arthur Guiterman wrote the English language libretto which was based on Edward Everett Hale's 1863 short story of the same name. The work premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City on May 12, 1937.-Roles:...
  
  

Anne Isabella Byron, Baroness Byron

Anne Isabella Byron, Baroness Byron

Anne Isabella Noel Byron, 11th Baroness Wentworth and Baroness Byron was the wife of the poet Lord Byron, and mother of Ada Lovelace, the patron and co-worker of mathematician Charles Babbage.-Name:Her names were unusually complex...

, wife of Lord Byron

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Lord Byron, English poet

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

C

Cacamatzin

Cacamatzin

Cacamatzin was the king of Texcoco, the second most important city of the Aztec Empire.Cacamatzin was a son of the previous king Nezahualpilli by one of his mistresses. Traditionally, the Texcocan kings were elected by the nobility from the most able of the royal family...

, Aztec king

• Roger Sessions
  Roger Sessions
  Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (opera)
  Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.-Performance history:...
  
  

Alessandro Cagliostro

Alessandro Cagliostro

Count Alessandro di Cagliostro was the alias of the occultist Giuseppe Balsamo , an Italian adventurer.-Origin:The history of Cagliostro is shrouded in rumour, propaganda and mysticism...

(Giuseppe Balsamo), Italian adventurer and imposter

• Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...
  
  : Cagliostro in Wien
  Cagliostro in Wien
  Cagliostro in Wien is an operetta in three acts by Johann Strauss II to a libretto by F. ZellF. Zell was the pen name of Camillo Walzel . and Richard Genée...
  
  
• Mikael Tariverdiev
  Mikael Tariverdiev
  Mikael Tariverdiev |Georgia]] - 24 June 1996, Sochi, Russia) was a prominent Soviet composer of Armenian descent. He headed the Composers' Guild of Soviet Cinematographers' Union from its inception.-Biography:...
  
  : Graf Cagliostro
  Graf Cagliostro
  Graf Cagliostro is a comic opera in two acts by Mikael Tariverdiev, written in 1981 to a libretto by Nikolai Kemarsky, after the tale of the same name by Alexei Nikolayevich Tolstoy....
  
  

Maria Callas

Maria Callas

Maria Callas was an American-born Greek soprano and one of the most renowned opera singers of the 20th century. She combined an impressive bel canto technique, a wide-ranging voice and great dramatic gifts...

, American-Greek opera singer

• Michael Daugherty
  Michael Daugherty
  Michael Kevin Daugherty is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. Influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and Postmodernism, Daugherty is one of the most colorful and widely performed American concert music composers of his generation...
  
  : Jackie O
  Jackie O (opera)
  Jackie O is a chamber opera in two acts composed by Michael Daugherty to a libretto by Wayne Koestenbaum. The 90 minute work, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 1995 and premiered in 1997, is inspired by American musical and popular culture of the late 1960s and episodes in the life of...
  
  

Luís de Camões

Luís de Camões

Luís Vaz de Camões is considered Portugal's and the Portuguese language's greatest poet. His mastery of verse has been compared to that of Shakespeare, Vondel, Homer, Virgil and Dante. He wrote a considerable amount of lyrical poetry and drama but is best remembered for his epic work Os Lusíadas...

, Portuguese poet

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Dom Sébastien
  Dom Sébastien
  Dom Sébastien, Roi de Portugal is a French grand opera in five acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The libretto was written by Eugène Scribe, based on Paul Foucher's play Don Sébastien de Portugal , a historic-fiction about King Sebastian of Portugal and his ill-fated 1578 expedition to Morocco...
  
  

Lorenzo Campeggio, Cardinal Protector of England

• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Henry VIII
  Henry VIII (opera)
  Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on El cisma en Inglaterra by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.-Composition history:...
  
  

Canek

Canek

Canek is the name of two different historical rulers of the Itza Maya of Petén, Guatemala. The first Canek met Hernán Cortés, who passed by the Itza capital Tayasal on his journey to Honduras in 1524...

, Aztec High Priest

• Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley was an American composer and conductor.-Life:Hadley was born into a musical family in Somerville, Massachusetts...
  
  : Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, The Daughter of Montezuma is an opera in 3 acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley to a libretto in English by author David Stevens.-Synopsis:The story takes place at the time of the conquest of the Aztecs by Cortez...
  
  

Wolfgang Capito, German religious reformer

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Mathis der Maler
  Mathis der Maler (opera)
  Mathis der Maler is an opera by Paul Hindemith. The libretto is also by the composer.The opera's genesis lay in Hindemith's interest in the Protestant Reformation...
  
  

Carlos, Prince of Asturias, son of Philip II of Spain

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Don Carlos
  Don Carlos
  Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
  
  

Julian Carlton, American murderer of Mamah Cheney

Mamah Borthwick

Martha "Mamah" Borthwick is primarily noted for her relationship with Frank Lloyd Wright, which ended when she was murdered....

, mistress of Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture...

• Daron Hagen
  Daron Hagen
  Daron Aric Hagen , is an American composer, conductor, pianist, educator, librettist, and stage director of contemporary classical music and opera.- Early life and education :...
  
  : Shining Brow
  Shining Brow
  Shining Brow is an English language opera by Daron Hagen, first performed by the Madison Opera in Madison, Wisconsin, April 21, 1993. It is based on events in the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright...
  
  

Enrico Caruso, Italian tenor

• Edwin Penhorwood
  Edwin Penhorwood
  Dr. Edwin Penhorwood is an American composer and currently assistant professor at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.-Biography:Penhorwood is a native of Toledo, Ohio, and studied music at the University of Iowa...
  
  : Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos is an opera by Indiana University Jacobs School of Music faculty member Edwin Penhorwood. Too Many Sopranos is a two-act opera in English with a pastiche of song from opera's various periods. A group of sopranos is trying to get into heaven, but there is no more room in the...
  
  (spoofed as "Enrico Carouser")

Giacomo Casanova

Giacomo Casanova

Giacomo Girolamo Casanova de Seingalt was an Italian adventurer and author from the Republic of Venice. His autobiography, Histoire de ma vie , is regarded as one of the most authentic sources of the customs and norms of European social life during the 18th century...

, Italian adventurer and libertine

• Dominick Argento
  Dominick Argento
  Dominick Argento is an American composer, best known as a leading composer of lyric opera and choral music...
  
  : Casanova's Homecoming
  Casanova's Homecoming
  Casanova's Homecoming is an opera in three acts by Dominick Argento to an English libretto by the composer, based in part on Giacomo Casanova's memoirs. It was first performed by the Minnesota Opera in Saint Paul, Minnesota in 1985....
  
  

Servilius Casca

Servilius Casca

Publius Servilius Casca Longus was one of the assassins of Gaius Julius Caesar, who was murdered on 15 March, 44 BC....

, co-assassin of Julius Caesar

Gaius Cassius Longinus

Gaius Cassius Longinus

Gaius Cassius Longinus was a Roman senator, a leading instigator of the plot to kill Julius Caesar, and the brother in-law of Marcus Junius Brutus.-Early life:...

, Roman politician, co-assassin of Julius Caesar

• Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Wolfgang Klebe was a German composer. He composed more than 140 works, among them 14 operas, 8 symphonies, 15 solo concerts, chamber music, piano works, and sacred music.-Biography:...
  
  : Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars, op.32, is an opera in one act by Giselher Klebe who also wrote the libretto based on the Shakespeare translation by August Wilhelm von Schlegel.It premiered on 20 September 1959 at the Stadttheater Essen...
  
  

Fidel Castro

Fidel Castro

Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz is a Cuban revolutionary and politician, having held the position of Prime Minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976, and then President from 1976 to 2008. He also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from the party's foundation in 1961 until 2011...

, Cuban leader

• Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono was an Italian avant-garde composer of classical music and remains one of the most prominent composers of the 20th century.- Early years :Born in Venice, he was a member of a wealthy artistic family, and his grandfather was a notable painter...
  
  : Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore is an opera with music by Luigi Nono, based mainly on plays by Bertolt Brecht, but also incorporating texts of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Karl Marx, and Vladimir Lenin. Nono himself and Yury Lyubimov wrote the libretto. It premiered at the Teatro alla Scala on April...
  
  

Inês de Castro

Inês de Castro

Inês Peres de Castro was a Galician noblewoman born of a Portuguese mother...

, lover and lawful wife of King Peter I of Portugal

• James MacMillan: Ines de Castro
• Thomas Pasatieri
  Thomas Pasatieri
  Thomas Pasatieri is an American opera composer.He began composing at age 10 and, as a teenager, studied with Nadia Boulanger...
  
  : Ines de Castro
• Giuseppe Persiani
  Giuseppe Persiani
  Giuseppe Persiani was an Italian opera composer. He wrote his first opera - one of 11 - in 1826 but, after his marriage the soprano Fanny Tacchinardi Persiani, who was to become a significant singer in her time, he devoted much of his efforts to supporting her career...
  
  : Ines de Castro
• Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli
  Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli
  Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli was an Italian composer, chiefly of opera.-Early career:Zingarelli was born in Naples, where he studied at the Santa Maria di Loreto Conservatory under Fenaroli and Speranza....
  
  : Ines de Castro

Empress Catherine I of Russia

Catherine I of Russia

Catherine I , the second wife of Peter the Great, reigned as Empress of Russia from 1725 until her death.-Life as a peasant woman:The life of Catherine I was said by Voltaire to be nearly as extraordinary as that of Peter the Great himself. There are no documents that confirm her origins. Born on...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Pietro il grande
  Pietro il grande
  Pietro il Grande zar di tutte le Russie or Il falegname di Livonia also known as Pietro, il grande, tsar delle Russie is a comic melodrama in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a libretto by Gherardo Bevilacqua-Aldobrandini.Pietro il Grande or Il falegname di Livonia was...
  
  
• André Grétry: Pierre le Grand
  Pierre le Grand
  Pierre le Grand is an opéra comique by André Grétry. The libretto, by Jean-Nicolas Bouilly, is based on the early life of the Russian tsar Peter the Great...
  
  

Empress Catherine II "The Great" of Russia

• César Cui
  César Cui
  César Antonovich Cui was a Russian of French and Lithuanian descent. His profession was as an army officer and a teacher of fortifications; his avocational life has particular significance in the history of music, in that he was a composer and music critic; in this sideline he is known as a...
  
  : The Captain's Daughter
  The Captain's Daughter (opera)
  The Captain's Daughter is an opera in four acts by César Cui, composed during 1907-1909...
  
  
• Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch , son of the art director Georges Wakhévitch, is an avant-garde French composer who released a series of studio albums in the 1970s and composed the music for the Salvador Dalí opera Être Dieu...
  
  : Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties
  Être Dieu
  Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties is a self-proclaimed "opera-poem" written by Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dalí, based on a libretto by Manuel Vázquez Montalbán with music by French avant-garde musician Igor Wakhévitch...
  
  (a creation of Salvador Dalí
  Salvador Dalí
  Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
  
  ; Catherine does a striptease with Marilyn Monroe
  Marilyn Monroe
  Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, singer, model and showgirl who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s....
  
  )

Queen Catherine (of Aragon)

Catherine of Aragon

Catherine of Aragon , also known as Katherine or Katharine, was Queen consort of England as the first wife of King Henry VIII of England and Princess of Wales as the wife to Arthur, Prince of Wales...

, first wife of Henry VIII of England

• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Henry VIII
  Henry VIII (opera)
  Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on El cisma en Inglaterra by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.-Composition history:...
  
  

Queen Catherine (Parr)

Catherine Parr

Catherine Parr ; 1512 – 5 September 1548) was Queen consort of England and Ireland and the last of the six wives of King Henry VIII of England. She married Henry VIII on 12 July 1543. She was the fourth commoner Henry had taken as his consort, and outlived him...

, sixth and last wife of Henry VIII

• Anthony Collins: Catherine Parr

Pierre Cauchon

Pierre Cauchon

Pierre Cauchon , bishop of Beauvais. A strong partisan of English interests in France during the latter years of the Hundred Years' War, his role in arranging Joan of Arc's downfall led most subsequent observers to condemn his extension of secular politics into an ecclesiastical trial...

, French bishop

• Norman Dello Joio
  Norman Dello Joio
  - Life :He was born Nicodemo DeGioio in New York City to Italian immigrants. He began his musical career as organist and choir director at the Star of the Sea Church on City Island in New York at age 14. His father was an organist, pianist, and vocal coach and coached many opera stars from the...
  
  : The Triumph of St. Joan
  The Triumph of St. Joan
  The Triumph of St. Joan was originally an opera in three acts by Norman Dello Joio to an English language libretto on the subject of the martyrdom of Joan of Arc by Dello Joio and Joseph Machilis. It was premiered at Sarah Lawrence College on May 9, 1950. Although the opera was received positively,...
  
  

Armand Augustin Louis de Caulaincourt

Armand Augustin Louis de Caulaincourt

Armand-Augustin-Louis, marquis de Caulaincourt, 1st Duc de Vicence was a French general and diplomat.-Biography:...

, French general

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  (silent role)

Guido Cavalcanti

Guido Cavalcanti

Guido Cavalcanti was a Florentine poet, as well as an intellectual influence on his best friend, Dante. His poems in their original Italian are available on Wikisource .-Historical background:...

, Florentine poet

• Ezra Pound
  Ezra Pound
  Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet and critic and a major figure in the early modernist movement in poetry...
  
   and George Antheil
  George Antheil
  George Antheil was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author and inventor. A self-described "Bad Boy of Music", his modernist compositions amazed and appalled listeners in Europe and the US during the 1920s with their cacophonous celebration of mechanical devices.Returning permanently to...
  
  : Cavalcanti

Arthur Cecil

Arthur Cecil

Arthur Cecil Blunt, better known as Arthur Cecil was an English actor, comedian, playwright and theatre manager. He is probably best remembered for playing the role of Box in the long-running production of Cox and Box, by Arthur Sullivan and F. C...

, English actor, theatre manager

• Thomas German Reed
  Thomas German Reed
  Thomas German Reed was an English composer and theatrical manager best known for creating the German Reed Entertainments, a genre of musical plays that made theatre-going respectable at a time when the stage was considered disreputable...
  
   (with W. S. Gilbert
  W. S. Gilbert
  Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...
  
  ): Our Island Home
  Our Island Home
  Our Island Home is a one-act musical entertainment with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Thomas German Reed that premiered on June 20, 1870 at the Royal Gallery of Illustration...
  
  

Benvenuto Cellini

Benvenuto Cellini

Benvenuto Cellini was an Italian goldsmith, sculptor, painter, soldier and musician, who also wrote a famous autobiography. He was one of the most important artists of Mannerism.-Youth:...

, Italian sculptor, goldsmith, artisan

• Hector Berlioz
  Hector Berlioz
  Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a...
  
  : Benvenuto Cellini
  Benvenuto Cellini (opera)
  Benvenuto Cellini is an opera in two acts with music by Hector Berlioz and libretto by Léon de Wailly and Henri Auguste Barbier. It was the first of Berlioz's operas. The story is loosely based on the memoirs of the Florentine sculptor Benvenuto Cellini. The opera is technically very challenging...
  
  
• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Ascanio
  Ascanio
  Ascanio is a grand opera in five acts and seven tableaux by composer Camille Saint-Saëns. The opera's French libretto, by Louis Gallet, is based on the 1852 play Benvenuto Cellini by French playwright Paul Meurice which was in turn based on the 1843 historical novel by Alexandre Dumas, père...
  
  

Beatrice Cenci

Beatrice Cenci

Beatrice Cenci was an Italian noblewoman. She is famous as the protagonist in a lurid murder trial in Rome....

, Italian noblewoman, protagonist of a famous murder trial

• Havergal Brian
  Havergal Brian
  Havergal Brian , was a British classical composer.Brian acquired a legendary status at the time of his rediscovery in the 1950s and 1960s for the many symphonies he had managed to write. By the end of his life he had completed 32, an unusually large number for any composer since Haydn or Mozart...
  
  : The Cenci (1951-52)
• Alberto Ginastera
  Alberto Ginastera
  Alberto Evaristo Ginastera was an Argentine composer of classical music. He is considered one of the most important Latin American classical composers.- Biography :...
  
  : Beatrix Cenci
  Beatrix Cenci
  Beatrix Cenci is an opera in two acts by Alberto Ginastera to a Spanish libretto by the composer and William Shand, based on the historical family of Beatrice Cenci, the Chroniques italiennes by Stendhal, and The Cenci by Percy Shelley. The first performance was on 10 September 1971 by the Opera...
  
  
• Berthold Goldschmidt
  Berthold Goldschmidt
  Berthold Goldschmidt was a German Jewish composer who spent most of his life in England...
  
  : Beatrice Cenci
• Alessandro Londei e Brunella Caronti: Beatrice Cenci (2006)
• James Rolfe
  James Rolfe
  James Simon Rolfe is one of Canada's leading composers of contemporary music. He studied composition with John Beckwith at the University of Toronto and Jo Kondo in Japan...
  
  : Beatrice Chancy
  Beatrice Chancy
  Beatrice Chancy is a 1999 Canadian opera. The libretto was written by George Elliott Clarke, and the music by James Rolfe.Based on Percy Bysshe Shelley's play The Cenci, which was itself based on the true story of Beatrice Cenci, the opera transplants the story from 16th century Italy to the...
  
  

Lindy Chamberlain and Michael Chamberlain

Michael Chamberlain

Michael Leigh Chamberlain is an Australian writer, retired teacher and former pastor, best known due to the 1980 disappearance of his daughter Azaria whilst camping near Uluru/Ayers Rock in the Northern Territory. When Chamberlain's then-wife Lindy was found guilty of the baby's murder in 1982, he...

, New Zealand-Australian parents, wrongly convicted of the murder of their daughter Azaria

Azaria Chamberlain disappearance

Azaria Chantel Loren Chamberlain was a nine-week-old Australian baby girl, who disappeared on the night of 17 August 1980 on a camping trip to Uluru with her family. Her body was never found. Her parents, Lindy and Michael Chamberlain, reported that she had been taken from their tent by a dingo...

• Moya Henderson
  Moya Henderson
  Moya Henderson is an Australian composer.A graduate of the University of Queensland, Henderson also studied in Germany with Karlheinz Stockhausen after which she became a lecturer at the University of Sydney...
  
  : Lindy
  Lindy (opera)
  Lindy is an opera in two acts by Australian composer Moya Henderson to an English libretto by Judith Rodriguez.It premiered on 25 October 2002 at the Sydney Opera House.-Roles:-Synopsis:The plot is based on the disappearance of Lindy...
  
  

Charlemagne

Charlemagne

Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Central Europe. During his reign, he conquered Italy and was crowned by Pope Leo III on 25 December 800...

, King of the Franks

• Franz Schubert
  Franz Schubert
  Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...
  
  : Fierrabras
  Fierrabras (opera)
  Fierrabras is a three-act opera written by the composer Franz Schubert in 1823, to a libretto by Josef Kupelwieser, the general manager of the Theater am Kärntnertor...
  
  
• Carl Maria von Weber
  Carl Maria von Weber
  Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber was a German composer, conductor, pianist, guitarist and critic, one of the first significant composers of the Romantic school....
  
  : Oberon
  Oberon (opera)
  Oberon, or The Elf King's Oath is a 3-act romantic opera in English with spoken dialogue and music by Carl Maria von Weber. The libretto by James Robinson Planche was based on a German poem, Oberon, by Christoph Martin Wieland, which itself was based on the epic romance Huon de Bordeaux, a French...
  
  

King Charles II of England

Charles II of England

Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...

• Robert Planquette
  Robert Planquette
  Jean Robert Planquette was a French composer of songs and operettas.Several of Planquette's operettas were extraordinarily successful in Britain, including Les cloches de Corneville , the length of whose initial London run broke all records for any piece of musical theatre up to that time, and Rip...
  
  : Nell Gwynne
  Nell Gwynne (operetta)
  Nell Gwynne is a three-act comic opera composed by Robert Planquette, with a libretto by H. B. Farnie. The libretto is based on the play Rochester by William Thomas Moncrieff. The piece was a rare instance of an opera by a French composer being produced first in London...
  
  

King Charles II of Spain

Charles II of Spain

Charles II was the last Habsburg King of Spain and the ruler of large parts of Italy, the Spanish territories in the Southern Low Countries, and Spain's overseas Empire, stretching from the Americas to the Spanish East Indies...

• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Don César de Bazan
  Don César de Bazan
  Don César de Bazan is an opéra comique in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Adolphe d'Ennery, Jean Henri Dumanoir and Jules Chantepie, based on the drama Ruy Blas by Victor Hugo...
  
  
• William Vincent Wallace
  William Vincent Wallace
  William Vincent Wallace was an Irish composer and musician.-Early life:Wallace was born at Colbeck Street, Waterford, Ireland. Both parents were Irish, his father, of County Mayo, was a regimental bandmaster....
  
  : Maritana
  Maritana
  Maritana is a grand opera in three acts composed by William Vincent Wallace, with a libretto by Edward Fitzball . The opera is based on the play Don César de Bazan by Adolphe d'Ennery and Philippe François Pinel Dumanoir , which was also the source material for Jules Massenet's opéra comique Don...
  
  

Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles IV , born Wenceslaus , was the second king of Bohemia from the House of Luxembourg, and the first king of Bohemia to also become Holy Roman Emperor....

• Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Jakob Holzbauer was a composer of symphonies, concertos, operas, and chamber music, and a member of the Mannheim school. His aesthetic style is in line with that of the Sturm und Drang "movement" of German art and literature.Holzbauer was born in Vienna...
  
  : Günther von Schwarzburg
  Günther von Schwarzburg (opera)
  Günther von Schwarzburg is a Singspiel in three acts by Ignaz Holzbauer set to a German libretto by Anton Klein. Loosely based on events in the life of the 14th century German king, Günther von Schwarzburg, the opera premiered on 5 January 1777 at the Hoftheater in the Mannheim...
  
  (as Karl, King of Bohemia)

Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles V was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I, of the Spanish Empire from 1516 until his voluntary retirement and abdication in favor of his younger brother Ferdinand I and his son Philip II in 1556.As...

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  
• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Ascanio
  Ascanio
  Ascanio is a grand opera in five acts and seven tableaux by composer Camille Saint-Saëns. The opera's French libretto, by Louis Gallet, is based on the 1852 play Benvenuto Cellini by French playwright Paul Meurice which was in turn based on the 1843 historical novel by Alexandre Dumas, père...
  
  
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Ernani
  Ernani
  Ernani is an operatic dramma lirico in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on the play Hernani by Victor Hugo. The first production took place at La Fenice Theatre, Venice on 9 March 1844...
  
  

King Charles VI of France

Charles VI of France

Charles VI , called the Beloved and the Mad , was the King of France from 1380 to 1422, as a member of the House of Valois. His bouts with madness, which seem to have begun in 1392, led to quarrels among the French royal family, which were exploited by the neighbouring powers of England and Burgundy...

• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : Charles VI
  Charles VI (opera)
  Charles VI is an 1843 French grand opera in five acts with music composed by Fromental Halevy and a libretto by Casimir Delavigne and his brother Germain Delavigne.-Performance history:...
  
  

King Charles VII of France

Charles VII of France

Charles VII , called the Victorious or the Well-Served , was King of France from 1422 to his death, though he was initially opposed by Henry VI of England, whose Regent, the Duke of Bedford, ruled much of France including the capital, Paris...

• César Cui
  César Cui
  César Antonovich Cui was a Russian of French and Lithuanian descent. His profession was as an army officer and a teacher of fortifications; his avocational life has particular significance in the history of music, in that he was a composer and music critic; in this sideline he is known as a...
  
  : The Saracen
  The Saracen (opera)
  The Saracen , is an opera by César Cui composed during 1896-1898. The libretto was written by Vladimir Vasilievich Stasov and the composer, based on a play by Alexandre Dumas entitled Charles VII chez ses grands vassaux...
  
  
• Norman Dello Joio
  Norman Dello Joio
  - Life :He was born Nicodemo DeGioio in New York City to Italian immigrants. He began his musical career as organist and choir director at the Star of the Sea Church on City Island in New York at age 14. His father was an organist, pianist, and vocal coach and coached many opera stars from the...
  
  : The Triumph of St. Joan
  The Triumph of St. Joan
  The Triumph of St. Joan was originally an opera in three acts by Norman Dello Joio to an English language libretto on the subject of the martyrdom of Joan of Arc by Dello Joio and Joseph Machilis. It was premiered at Sarah Lawrence College on May 9, 1950. Although the opera was received positively,...
  
  
• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : Charles VI
  Charles VI (opera)
  Charles VI is an 1843 French grand opera in five acts with music composed by Fromental Halevy and a libretto by Casimir Delavigne and his brother Germain Delavigne.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
  
  : The Maid of Orleans
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco is an operatic dramma lirico with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera....
  
  (as Carlo VII)

King Charles XI of Sweden

Charles XI of Sweden

Charles XI also Carl, was King of Sweden from 1660 until his death, in a period in Swedish history known as the Swedish empire ....

• Fredrik Pacius
  Fredrik Pacius
  Fredrik Pacius was a German composer and conductor who lived most of his life in Finland. He has been called the "Father of Finnish music"....
  
  : Kung Karls jakt
  Kung Karls jakt
  Kung Karls jakt is an opera with music by Fredrik Pacius and a libretto by Zacharias Topelius. It was the first opera to be composed in Finland. Kung Karls jakt was first performed in Helsinki on 24 March, 1852...
  
  

Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy

• Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini was an Italian composer, best known for his operas. Pacini was born in Catania, Sicily, the son of the buffo Luigi Pacini, who was to appear in the premieres of many of Giovanni's operas...
  
  : Carlo di Borgogna
  Carlo di Borgogna
  Carlo di Borgogna is an Italian opera in three parts composed by Giovanni Pacini to a libretto by Gaetano Rossi. It was first performed at the Teatro la Fenice, Venice on February 21, 1835.- Roles:- Synopsis :Part One...
  
  

Charles Martel

Charles Martel

Charles Martel , also known as Charles the Hammer, was a Frankish military and political leader, who served as Mayor of the Palace under the Merovingian kings and ruled de facto during an interregnum at the end of his life, using the title Duke and Prince of the Franks. In 739 he was offered the...

, Duke and Prince of the Franks

• Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....
  
  : Geneviève de Brabant
  Geneviève de Brabant
  Geneviève de Brabant is an opéra bouffe, or operetta, by Jacques Offenbach, first performed in Paris in 1859. The plot is based on the medieval legend of Genevieve of Brabant....
  
  

Charmian

Charmian (servant to Cleopatra)

Charmian was a trusted servant and advisor to the historical Cleopatra VII of Egypt.-Plutarch:In Plutarch's Parallel Lives biography of Mark Antony, he noted that Augustus Caesar "had a decree made, declaring war on Cleopatra, and depriving Antony of the authority which he had let a woman exercise...

, servant to Cleopatra

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  
• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Louis Payen. It was first performed in at the Opéra Monte-Carlo on February 23, 1914, nearly two years after Massenet's death....
  
  

Thomas Chatterton

Thomas Chatterton

Thomas Chatterton was an English poet and forger of pseudo-medieval poetry. He died of arsenic poisoning, either from a suicide attempt or self-medication for a venereal disease.-Childhood:...

, English poet and forger

• Ruggero Leoncavallo
  Ruggero Leoncavallo
  Ruggero Leoncavallo was an Italian opera composer. His two-act work Pagliacci remains one of the most popular works in the repertory, appearing as number 20 on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide.-Biography:...
  
  : Chatterton
  Chatterton (opera)
  Chatterton is a dramma lirico or opera in three acts by Ruggiero Leoncavallo. The libretto was written by the composer himself and is freely adapted from the life of the young English poet from Bristol, Thomas Chatterton .Considered by the romantics as the perfect archetype of the accursed poet,...
  
  
• Matthias Pintscher
  Matthias Pintscher
  Matthias Pintscher is a German composer and conductor. As a youth, he studied the violin and conducting....
  
  : Thomas Chatterton
• Gerard Victory
  Gerard Victory
  Gerard Victory was a prolific Irish composer, writing over two hundred works across many genres and styles including tonal, serial, aleatoric and electroacoustic music.-Biography:Victory was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1921...
  
  : Chatterton

Geoffrey Chaucer

Geoffrey Chaucer

Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...

, English author, poet, philosopher, courtier and diplomat

• Reginald De Koven
  Reginald de Koven
  Henry Louis Reginald De Koven was an American music critic and prolific composer, particularly of comic operas.-Biography:...
  
  : The Canterbury Pilgrims
  The Canterbury Pilgrims
  The Canterbury Pilgrims is an opera by the American composer Reginald De Koven. It premiered at the Metropolitan Opera House on March 8, 1917...
  
  

Edwin Cheney

Edwin Cheney

Edwin Henry Cheney was an electrical engineer from Oak Park, Illinois, USA. Edwin has a goofy personality... but very loving and intelligent at the same time....

, American electrical engineer

Mamah Cheney

Mamah Borthwick

Martha "Mamah" Borthwick is primarily noted for her relationship with Frank Lloyd Wright, which ended when she was murdered....

, wife of Edwin Cheney

Edwin Cheney

Edwin Henry Cheney was an electrical engineer from Oak Park, Illinois, USA. Edwin has a goofy personality... but very loving and intelligent at the same time....

, murdered mistress of Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture...

• Daron Hagen
  Daron Hagen
  Daron Aric Hagen , is an American composer, conductor, pianist, educator, librettist, and stage director of contemporary classical music and opera.- Early life and education :...
  
  : Shining Brow
  Shining Brow
  Shining Brow is an English language opera by Daron Hagen, first performed by the Madison Opera in Madison, Wisconsin, April 21, 1993. It is based on events in the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright...
  
  

André Chénier

André Chénier

André Marie Chénier was a French poet, associated with the events of the French Revolution of which he was a victim. His sensual, emotive poetry marks him as one of the precursors of the Romantic movement...

, French journalist

• Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Menotti Maria Giordano was an Italian composer, mainly of operas.He was born in Foggia in Puglia, southern Italy, and studied under Paolo Serrao at the Conservatoire of Naples...
  
  : Andrea Chénier
  Andrea Chénier
  Andrea Chénier is a verismo opera in four acts by the composer Umberto Giordano, set to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica. It is based loosely on the life of the French poet, André Chénier , who was executed during the French Revolution....
  
  

Frédéric Chopin

Frédéric Chopin

Frédéric François Chopin was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist. He is considered one of the great masters of Romantic music and has been called "the poet of the piano"....

, Polish-French composer

• Giacomo Orefice
  Giacomo Orefice
  Giacomo Orefice was an Italian composer.He was born in Vicenza. He studied under Busi and Mancinelli at the Liceo Bologna, and later became professor of composition at the Milan Conservatory...
  
  : Chopin

Chou En-lai: see under Zhou Enlai

Queen Christina of Sweden

Christina of Sweden

Christina , later adopted the name Christina Alexandra, was Queen regnant of Swedes, Goths and Vandals, Grand Princess of Finland, and Duchess of Ingria, Estonia, Livonia and Karelia, from 1633 to 1654. She was the only surviving legitimate child of King Gustav II Adolph and his wife Maria Eleonora...

• Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Olof Wilhelm Peterson-Berger was a Swedish composer and music critic...
  
  : The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets is an opera by Wilhelm Peterson-Berger, to his own Swedish libretto, composed from 1912-17...
  
  

Saint Christopher

Saint Christopher

.Saint Christopher is a saint venerated by Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians, listed as a martyr killed in the reign of the 3rd century Roman Emperor Decius or alternatively under the Roman Emperor Maximinus II Dacian...

, revered but legendary saint

• Vincent d'Indy
  Vincent d'Indy
  Vincent d'Indy was a French composer and teacher.-Life:Paul Marie Théodore Vincent d'Indy was born in Paris into an aristocratic family of royalist and Catholic persuasion. He had piano lessons from an early age from his paternal grandmother, who passed him on to Antoine François Marmontel and...
  
  : La légende de Saint-Christophe

Tillius Cimber

Tillius Cimber

Lucius Tillius Cimber was a Roman senator, one of the assassins of Julius Caesar and the one to give the signal for the attack on him.-Assassin:...

, co-assassin of Julius Caesar

• Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Wolfgang Klebe was a German composer. He composed more than 140 works, among them 14 operas, 8 symphonies, 15 solo concerts, chamber music, piano works, and sacred music.-Biography:...
  
  : Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars, op.32, is an opera in one act by Giselher Klebe who also wrote the libretto based on the Shakespeare translation by August Wilhelm von Schlegel.It premiered on 20 September 1959 at the Stadttheater Essen...
  
  (as Metellus Cimber)

Helvius Cinna

Helvius Cinna

Gaius Helvius Cinna was an influential neoteric poet of the late Roman Republic, a little older than the generation of Catullus and Calvus.His magnum opus Zmyrna established his literary fame; a mythological epic poem focused on the incestuous love of Smyrna for her father Cinyras, treated after...

, Roman poet

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Le piccole storie – ai margini delle guerre
• Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Wolfgang Klebe was a German composer. He composed more than 140 works, among them 14 operas, 8 symphonies, 15 solo concerts, chamber music, piano works, and sacred music.-Biography:...
  
  : Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars, op.32, is an opera in one act by Giselher Klebe who also wrote the libretto based on the Shakespeare translation by August Wilhelm von Schlegel.It premiered on 20 September 1959 at the Stadttheater Essen...
  
  

Lucius Cornelius Cinna

Lucius Cornelius Cinna

Lucius Cornelius Cinna was a four-time consul of the Roman Republic, serving four consecutive terms from 87 to 84 BC, and a member of the ancient Roman Cinna family of the Cornelii gens....

, Roman consul

• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Lucio Silla
  Lucio Silla
  Lucio Silla, K. 135, is an Italian opera in three acts composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto was written by Giovanni de Gamerra.It was first performed on 26 December 1772 at the Regio Ducal Teatro in Milan....
  
  

Henri Coiffier de Ruzé, Marquis of Cinq-Mars

Henri Coiffier de Ruzé, Marquis of Cinq-Mars

Henri Coiffier de Ruzé, Marquis de Cinq-Mars was a favourite of King Louis XIII of France who led the last and most nearly successful of the many conspiracies against the king's powerful first minister, the Cardinal Richelieu....

, French royal favourite of Louis XIII

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Cinq-Mars

Emperor Claudius

Claudius

Claudius , was Roman Emperor from 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, he was the son of Drusus and Antonia Minor. He was born at Lugdunum in Gaul and was the first Roman Emperor to be born outside Italy...

 of Rome

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Agrippina
  Agrippina (opera)
  Agrippina is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel, from a libretto by Cardinal Vincenzo Grimani. Composed for the Venice Carnevale season, the opera tells the story of Agrippina, the mother of Nero, as she plots the downfall of the Roman Emperor Claudius and the installation of...
  
  

Cleitus the Black, Macedonian soldier

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Alessandro
  Alessandro (opera)
  Alessandro is an opera written for the Royal Academy of Music composed by George Frideric Handel in 1726. Paolo Rolli was the librettist and based the story on Ortensio Mauro's La superbia d'Alessandro...
  
  , as Clito

Pope Clement VII

Pope Clement VII

Clement VII , born Giulio di Giuliano de' Medici, was a cardinal from 1513 to 1523 and was Pope from 1523 to 1534.-Early life:...

• Hector Berlioz
  Hector Berlioz
  Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a...
  
  : Benvenuto Cellini
  Benvenuto Cellini (opera)
  Benvenuto Cellini is an opera in two acts with music by Hector Berlioz and libretto by Léon de Wailly and Henri Auguste Barbier. It was the first of Berlioz's operas. The story is loosely based on the memoirs of the Florentine sculptor Benvenuto Cellini. The opera is technically very challenging...
  
  
• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

Cleopatra VII, Pharaoh of Egypt

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  
• Domenico Cimarosa
  Domenico Cimarosa
  Domenico Cimarosa was an Italian opera composer of the Neapolitan school...
  
  : La Cleopatra
  La Cleopatra
  La Cleopatra is an opera seria in two acts by composer Domenico Cimarosa with an Italian libretto by F. Moretti.-Historical background and musical analysis:...
  
  
• Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun was a German composer and tenor singer. Along with Johann Adolf Hasse, he is considered to be the most important German composer of Italian opera of his time.-Biography:...
  
  : Cesare e Cleopatra
  Cesare e Cleopatra
  Cesare e Cleopatra is a dramma per musica in three acts by composer Carl Heinrich Graun. The opera uses an Italian language libretto by Giovan Gualberto Bottarelli.-Royal Opera House premiere:...
  
  
• Louis Gruenberg
  Louis Gruenberg
  -Life and career:He was born near Brest-Litovsk , to Abe Gruenberg and Klara Kantarovitch. His family emigrated to the United States when he was a few months old. His father worked as a violinist in New York City...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
• Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley was an American composer and conductor.-Life:Hadley was born into a musical family in Somerville, Massachusetts...
  
  : Cleopatra's Night
  Cleopatra's Night
  Cleopatra's Night is a short opera in two acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley. Its libretto is by Alice Leal Pollock based on a story by French author Théophile Gautier. The opera premiered at the Metropolitan Opera on January 31, 1920...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Giulio Cesare (in Egitto)
  Giulio Cesare
  Giulio Cesare in Egitto , commonly known simply as Giulio Cesare, is an Italian opera in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel in 1724...
  
  
• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Louis Payen. It was first performed in at the Opéra Monte-Carlo on February 23, 1914, nearly two years after Massenet's death....
  
  

Henry Clifford, 10th Baron de Clifford, English military commander

• Isaac Albéniz
  Isaac Albéniz
  Isaac Manuel Francisco Albéniz y Pascual was a Spanish Catalan pianist and composer best known for his piano works based on folk music idioms .-Life:Born in Camprodon, province of Girona, to Ángel Albéniz and his wife Dolors Pascual, Albéniz...
  
  : Henry Clifford
  Henry Clifford (opera)
  Henry Clifford is a grand opera in three acts composed by Isaac Albéniz to an English libretto written by Francis Money-Coutts . It premiered at the Gran Teatro del Liceo on 8 May 1895...
  
  

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton is the 67th United States Secretary of State, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama. She was a United States Senator for New York from 2001 to 2009. As the wife of the 42nd President of the United States, Bill Clinton, she was the First Lady of the...

, U.S. First Lady, Senator, Secretary of State

• Curtis K. Hughes: Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say It Ain't So, Joe is a chamber opera in two acts by Curtis K. Hughes inspired by text drawn from the public record of the 2008 United States vice-presidential debate...
  
  

Olivier de Clisson

Olivier de Clisson

Olivier de Clisson , nicknamed "The Butcher", was a Breton soldier, the son of the Olivier de Clisson who was put to death in 1343 on the suspicion of having wished to give up Nantes to the English.- Biography :...

, Breton soldier

• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : Charles VI
  Charles VI (opera)
  Charles VI is an 1843 French grand opera in five acts with music composed by Fromental Halevy and a libretto by Casimir Delavigne and his brother Germain Delavigne.-Performance history:...
  
  

Cloelia

Cloelia

Cloelia is a semi-legendary woman from the early history of ancient Rome.As part of the peace treaty which ended the war between Rome and Clusium in 508 BC, Roman hostages were taken by Lars Porsena. One of the hostages, a young woman named Cloelia, fled the Clusian camp, leading away a group of...

, early Roman figure, possibly legendary

• Filippo Amadei, Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini was an Italian Baroque composer and cellist, one of a family of string players and composers. His father, Giovanni Maria Bononcini , was a violinist and a composer.-Biography:...
  
   and George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola is an opera in three acts about Gaius Mucius Scaevola. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, adapted from a text by Silvio Stampiglia. The music for the first act was composed by Filippo Amadei , the second act by Giovanni Battista Bononcini, and the third by...
  
  

Howell Cobb

Howell Cobb

Howell Cobb was an American political figure. A Southern Democrat, Cobb was a five-term member of the United States House of Representatives and Speaker of the House from 1849 to 1851...

, American political figure

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Walter Cocking, dean at the University of Georgia

University of Georgia

The University of Georgia is a public research university located in Athens, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1785, it is the oldest and largest of the state's institutions of higher learning and is one of multiple schools to claim the title of the oldest public university in the United States...

, the focus of the "Cocking affair

Cocking affair

The Cocking affair was an attempt in 1941 by Georgia governor Eugene Talmadge to exert direct control over the state's educational system, particularly through the firing of Professor Walter Cocking and the subsequent removal of members of the Georgia Board of Regents who disagreed with the decision...

"

• Michael Braz: A Scholar Under Siege
  A Scholar Under Siege
  A Scholar Under Siege is an opera in two acts by contemporary American composer Michael Braz. Braz also wrote the English language libretto for the opera which was composed for the centenary of Georgia Southern University...
  
  

Horatius Cocles

Horatius Cocles

Publius Horatius Cocles was an officer in the army of the ancient Roman Republic who famously defended the Pons Sublicius from the invading army of Lars Porsena, king of Clusium in the late 6th century BC, during the war between Rome and Clusium.-Background:...

, Roman military officer

• Filippo Amadei, Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini was an Italian Baroque composer and cellist, one of a family of string players and composers. His father, Giovanni Maria Bononcini , was a violinist and a composer.-Biography:...
  
   and George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola is an opera in three acts about Gaius Mucius Scaevola. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, adapted from a text by Silvio Stampiglia. The music for the first act was composed by Filippo Amadei , the second act by Giovanni Battista Bononcini, and the third by...
  
  

Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus

Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus

Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus was one of the four leaders of the revolution which overthrew the Roman monarchy, and became one of the first two consuls of Rome in 509 BC, together with Lucius Junius Brutus...

, Roman consul, husband of Lucretia

Lucretia

Lucretia is a legendary figure in the history of the Roman Republic. According to the story, told mainly by the Roman historian Livy and the Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus , her rape by the king's son and consequent suicide were the immediate cause of the revolution that overthrew the...

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : The Rape of Lucretia

Stefano Colonna

Stefano Colonna

Stefano Sciarr-illo byname of Colonna was the name of several members of the Italian family of Colonna. The most important include:*Stefano Colonna the Elder was son of Giovanni Colonna and one of the most important political figures in Rome in the first half of the 14th century. He was heir of...

(1265–1348), Roman political figure

• Richard Wagner
  Richard Wagner
  Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
  
  : Rienzi
  Rienzi
  Rienzi, der Letzte der Tribunen is an early opera by Richard Wagner in five acts, with the libretto written by the composer after Bulwer-Lytton's novel of the same name . The title is commonly shortened to Rienzi...
  
  

Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus was an explorer, colonizer, and navigator, born in the Republic of Genoa, in northwestern Italy. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to general European awareness of the American continents in the...

, Genoese explorer of the New World

• Alberto Franchetti
  Alberto Franchetti
  Alberto Franchetti was an Italian opera composer.-Biography:Alberto Franchetti was born in Turin, a Jewish nobleman of independent means. He studied first in Venice, then in Dresden under Felix Draeseke, and finally at the Munich Conservatory under Josef Rheinberger. His first major success...
  
  : Cristoforo Colombo
  Cristoforo Colombo (opera)
  Cristoforo Colombo is an opera in four acts and an epilogue by Alberto Franchetti to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica...
  
  
• Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud was a French composer and teacher. He was a member of Les Six—also known as The Group of Six—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions are influenced by jazz and make use of polytonality...
  
  : Christophe Colomb
  Christophe Colomb
  Christophe Colomb is an opera in two parts by the French composer Darius Milhaud. The libretto, by the poet Paul Claudel, is based on his own play Le livre de Christophe Colomb about the life of Christopher Columbus. The opera was first performed at the Staatsoper, Berlin on 5 May 1930 in a German...
  
  
• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : The Voyage
  The Voyage
  The Voyage is an opera in three acts by the American composer Philip Glass . The libretto was written by David Henry Hwang....
  
  

Anthony Comstock

Anthony Comstock

Anthony Comstock was a United States Postal Inspector and politician dedicated to ideas of Victorian morality.-Biography:...

, American morals campaigner

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Emperor Constantine I

Constantine I

Constantine the Great , also known as Constantine I or Saint Constantine, was Roman Emperor from 306 to 337. Well known for being the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity, Constantine and co-Emperor Licinius issued the Edict of Milan in 313, which proclaimed religious tolerance of all...

 "The Great" of Rome

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Fausta
  Fausta (opera)
  Fausta is a melodramma, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The Italian libretto was by Domenico Gilardoni, who died while writing it: the remainder was written by Donizetti. The opera debuted on 12 January 1832 at the Teatro San Carlo, Naples, and was written with prima donna Giuseppina...
  
  

Nicolaus Copernicus

Nicolaus Copernicus

Nicolaus Copernicus was a Renaissance astronomer and the first person to formulate a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology which displaced the Earth from the center of the universe....

, Polish scientist

• Claude Vivier
  Claude Vivier
  -Biography:Born to unknown parents in Montreal, Vivier was adopted at the age of three by a poor French-Canadian family. From the age of thirteen, he attended boarding schools run by the Marist Brothers, a religious order that prepared young boys for a vocation in the priesthood. At the age of...
  
  : Kopernikus

Charlotte Corday

Charlotte Corday

Marie-Anne Charlotte de Corday d'Armont , known to history as Charlotte Corday, was a figure of the French Revolution. In 1793, she was executed under the guillotine for the assassination of Jacobin leader Jean-Paul Marat, who was in part responsible, through his role as a politician and...

, French Girondin revolutionary

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Charlotte Corday

Saint Corentin of Quimper

Corentin of Quimper

Saint Corentin is a Breton saint. He is venerated as a saint and as the first bishop of Quimper. His feast day is December 12. He was a hermit at Plomodiern and regarded as one of the seven founder saints of Brittany...

, Breton patron saint of seafood

• Édouard Lalo
  Édouard Lalo
  Édouard-Victoire-Antoine Lalo was a French composer.-Biography:Lalo was born in Lille , in northernmost France. He attended that city's music conservatory in his youth. Then, beginning at age 16, Lalo studied at the Paris Conservatoire under Berlioz's old enemy François Antoine Habeneck...
  
  : Le roi d'Ys
  Le roi d'Ys
  is an opera in three acts and five tableaux by the French composer Édouard Lalo, to a libretto by Édouard Blau, based on the old Breton legend of the drowned city of Ys, which was, according to the legend, the capital of the kingdom of Cornouaille. It premiered at the Opéra Comique in Paris on 7...
  
  

Gaius Marcius Coriolanus, legendary Roman leader

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Coriolano

Catherine Cornaro

Catherine Cornaro

Nobil Donna Catherine Cornaro was Queen of Cyprus from 1474 to 1489 and declared a "Daughter of Saint Mark" in order that Venice could claim control of Cyprus after the death of her husband, James II .-Family:She was born in Venice in 1454 and was the daughter of a well-known and powerful family of...

, consort of James II of Cyprus

James II of Cyprus

James II of Cyprus or Jacques II le Bâtard de Lusignan , was the illegitimate son of John II of Cyprus and Marietta de Patras.-Archbishop of Nicosia:...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Caterina Cornaro
  Caterina Cornaro (opera)
  Caterina Cornaro ossia La Regina di Cipro is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in a prologue and two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Giacomo Sacchèro wrote the Italian libretto after Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges' libretto for Halévy's La reine de Chypre...
  
  
• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : La reine de Chypre
  La reine de Chypre
  La reine de Chypre is an 1841 grand opera composed by Fromental Halévy to a libretto by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges.-Background:...
  
  
• Franz Lachner
  Franz Lachner
  Franz Paul Lachner was a German composer and conductor.Lachner was born in Rain am Lech to a musical family . He studied music with Simon Sechter and Maximilian, the Abbé Stadler. He conducted at the Theater am Kärntnertor in Vienna. In 1834, he became Kapellmeister at Mannheim...
  
  : Caterina Cornaro

Giorgio Cornaro

Giorgio Cornaro

Nobil Huomo Giorgio Cornaro, called "Padre della Patria" , Cavaliere del Sacro Romano Impero, Patrizio Veneto, Podesta of Brescia in 1496, Procurator of San Marco....

, Italian nobleman, father of Catherine Cornaro

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Caterina Cornaro
  Caterina Cornaro (opera)
  Caterina Cornaro ossia La Regina di Cipro is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in a prologue and two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Giacomo Sacchèro wrote the Italian libretto after Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges' libretto for Halévy's La reine de Chypre...
  
  (as Andrea Cornaro)

Jeronimus Cornelisz

Jeronimus Cornelisz

Jeronimus Cornelisz was a Frisian apothecary and Dutch East India Company merchant...

, Dutch apothecary and merchant

• Richard Mills
  Richard Mills
  Richard John Mills AM, DMus BA Qld, is an Australian conductor and composer. He currently works as Artistic Director of the West Australian Opera and Artistic Consultant with Orchestra Victoria...
  
  : Batavia
  Batavia (opera)
  Batavia is an opera in three acts and a prologue by Richard Mills to a libretto by Peter Goldsworthy,commissioned by Opera Australia. The plot is based on the historical events surrounding the Dutchsailing ship Batavia....
  
  

Hernán Cortés

Hernán Cortés

Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca was a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century...

, Spanish conquistador

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : La conquista
• Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun was a German composer and tenor singer. Along with Johann Adolf Hasse, he is considered to be the most important German composer of Italian opera of his time.-Biography:...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (Graun)
  Montezuma is an opera seria in three acts by the German composer Carl Heinrich Graun. The scenario was written in French by Graun's patron, Frederick the Great, the King of Prussia, and turned into an Italian libretto by Giampetro Tagliazucchi....
  
  
• Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley was an American composer and conductor.-Life:Hadley was born into a musical family in Somerville, Massachusetts...
  
  : Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, The Daughter of Montezuma is an opera in 3 acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley to a libretto in English by author David Stevens.-Synopsis:The story takes place at the time of the conquest of the Aztecs by Cortez...
  
  
• Aniceto Ortega
  Aniceto Ortega
  Aniceto de los Dolores Luis Gonzaga Ortega del Villar was a Mexican physician, composer, and pianist. Although he had a distinguished career as a physician and surgeon, he is also remembered today for his 1871 opera Guatimotzin, one of the earliest Mexican operas to use a native...
  
  : Guatimotzin
  Guatimotzin
  Guatimotzin is an opera in one act and nine scenes composed by Aniceto Ortega del Villar to a libretto in Spanish by José Tomás de Cuéllar. It premiered on 13 September 1871 at the Gran Teatro Nacional in Mexico City. Described as an episodio musical , its plot is based on the defense of Mexico by...
  
  
• Roger Sessions
  Roger Sessions
  Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (opera)
  Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Gaspare Spontini
  Gaspare Spontini
  Gaspare Luigi Pacifico Spontini was an Italian opera composer and conductor, extremely celebrated in his time, though largely forgotten after his death.-Biography:...
  
  : Fernand Cortez
  Fernand Cortez
  Fernand Cortez, ou La conquête du Mexique is an opéra in three acts by Gaspare Spontini with a French libretto by Etienne de Jouy and Joseph-Alphonse d’Esmenard...
  
  
• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Motezuma
  Motezuma
  Motezuma is an opera in three acts by Antonio Vivaldi with an Italian libretto by Girolamo Giusti. The first performance was given in the Teatro Sant'Angelo in Venice on 14 November 1733...
  
  (as Fernando)

Thomas Cranmer

Thomas Cranmer

Thomas Cranmer was a leader of the English Reformation and Archbishop of Canterbury during the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI and, for a short time, Mary I. He helped build a favourable case for Henry's divorce from Catherine of Aragon which resulted in the separation of the English Church from...

, Archbishop of Canterbury

Archbishop of Canterbury

The Archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. In his role as head of the Anglican Communion, the archbishop leads the third largest group...

• Sir Peter Maxwell Davies
  Peter Maxwell Davies
  Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, CBE is an English composer and conductor and is currently Master of the Queen's Music.-Biography:...
  
  : Taverner
  Taverner (opera)
  Taverner is an opera with music and libretto by Peter Maxwell Davies. It is based on the life of the 16th century English composer John Taverner, but in what Davies himself acknowledged was a non-realistic treatment. The gestation for the opera dated as far back as 1956 during Davies's years in...
  
  (not identified as such)
• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Henry VIII
  Henry VIII (opera)
  Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on El cisma en Inglaterra by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.-Composition history:...
  
  

Marcus Licinius Crassus

Marcus Licinius Crassus

Marcus Licinius Crassus was a Roman general and politician who commanded the right wing of Sulla's army at the Battle of the Colline Gate, suppressed the slave revolt led by Spartacus, provided political and financial support to Julius Caesar and entered into the political alliance known as the...

, Roman general and politician

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  

Flavius Julius Crispus

Crispus

Flavius Julius Crispus , also known as Flavius Claudius Crispus and Flavius Valerius Crispus, was a Caesar of the Roman Empire. He was the first-born son of Constantine I and Minervina.-Birth:...

, Caesar of the Roman Empire

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Fausta
  Fausta (opera)
  Fausta is a melodramma, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The Italian libretto was by Domenico Gilardoni, who died while writing it: the remainder was written by Donizetti. The opera debuted on 12 January 1832 at the Teatro San Carlo, Naples, and was written with prima donna Giuseppina...
  
  

Croesus

Croesus

Croesus was the king of Lydia from 560 to 547 BC until his defeat by the Persians. The fall of Croesus made a profound impact on the Hellenes, providing a fixed point in their calendar. "By the fifth century at least," J.A.S...

, King of Lydia

• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Croesus
  Croesus (opera)
  Der hochmütige, gestürzte und wieder erhabene Croesus is a three-act opera composed by Reinhard Keiser...
  
  

Cuauhtémoc

Cuauhtémoc

Cuauhtémoc was the Aztec ruler of Tenochtitlan from 1520 to 1521...

, Aztec king

• Aniceto Ortega
  Aniceto Ortega
  Aniceto de los Dolores Luis Gonzaga Ortega del Villar was a Mexican physician, composer, and pianist. Although he had a distinguished career as a physician and surgeon, he is also remembered today for his 1871 opera Guatimotzin, one of the earliest Mexican operas to use a native...
  
  : Guatimotzin
  Guatimotzin
  Guatimotzin is an opera in one act and nine scenes composed by Aniceto Ortega del Villar to a libretto in Spanish by José Tomás de Cuéllar. It premiered on 13 September 1871 at the Gran Teatro Nacional in Mexico City. Described as an episodio musical , its plot is based on the defense of Mexico by...
  
  
• Roger Sessions
  Roger Sessions
  Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (opera)
  Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.-Performance history:...
  
  

Sir Henry Cuffe

Henry Cuffe

Sir Henry Cuffe was an English author and politician, executed during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I of England, for treason.-Family connections:...

, English politician

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  

Cyrano de Bergerac

Cyrano de Bergerac

Hercule-Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac was a French dramatist and duelist. He is now best remembered for the works of fiction which have been woven, often very loosely, around his life story, most notably the 1897 play by Edmond Rostand...

, French dramatist and duellist

• Franco Alfano
  Franco Alfano
  Franco Alfano was an Italian composer and pianist. Best known today for his opera Risurrezione and above all for having completed Puccini's opera Turandot in 1926. He had considerable success with several of his own works during his lifetime.- Biography :He was born in Posillipo, Naples...
  
  : Cyrano de Bergerac
  Cyrano de Bergerac (Alfano)
  Cyrano de Bergerac is a four-act opera with music by Franco Alfano, and libretto by Henri Caïn, based on Edmond Rostand's drama Cyrano de Bergerac. The opera received its first performance in Rome on 22 January 1936, conducted by Tullio Serafin, with Maria Caniglia and José Luccioni...
  
  
• Walter Damrosch: Cyrano
  Cyrano (Damrosch)
  Cyrano is an opera in four acts composed by Walter Damrosch to an English language libretto by William James Henderson based on Edmond Rostand's play, Cyrano de Bergerac...
  
  
• David DiChiera
  David DiChiera
  David DiChiera is an American composer and founding general director of Michigan Opera Theatre.-Career:...
  
  , orch. Mark Flint: Cyrano
  Cyrano (opera)
  Cyrano is an opera in three acts by David DiChiera to a libretto in French by Bernard Uzan, based on the play Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand. The opera premiered on 13 October 2007 at the Michigan Opera Theatre. It was then given February 8–17, 2008 at the Opera Company of Philadelphia...
  
  
• Eino Tamberg
  Eino Tamberg
  Eino Tamberg was an Estonian composer.Tamberg was born in Tallinn. He studied music composition with Eugen Kapp at the Tallinn Conservatory, graduating in 1953...
  
  : Cyrano de Bergerac

Cyrus the Great

Cyrus the Great

Cyrus II of Persia , commonly known as Cyrus the Great, also known as Cyrus the Elder, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Under his rule, the empire embraced all the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Southwest Asia and much...

, King of Persia

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Ciro
  Ciro
  ;For the Italian "comune", see Cirò, Calabria.Ciro is an opera in three acts and a prologue by the Italian composer Francesco Cavalli in collaboration with Andrea Mattioli. It was first performed at the Teatro San Giovanni e San Paolo, Venice on January 30, 1654. The libretto is by Giulio Cesare...
  
  
• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Croesus
  Croesus (opera)
  Der hochmütige, gestürzte und wieder erhabene Croesus is a three-act opera composed by Reinhard Keiser...
  
  
• Gioachino Rossini: Ciro in Babilonia
  Ciro in Babilonia
  Ciro in Babilonia, ossia La caduta di Baldassare in an opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Francesco Aventi. It was first performed at the Teatro Comunale, Ferrara during Lent, 1812. The exact date of the premiere is unknown but is believed to be March 14...
  
  

D

Salvador Dalí

Salvador Dalí

Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....

, Spanish painter

• Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch , son of the art director Georges Wakhévitch, is an avant-garde French composer who released a series of studio albums in the 1970s and composed the music for the Salvador Dalí opera Être Dieu...
  
  : Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties
  Être Dieu
  Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties is a self-proclaimed "opera-poem" written by Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dalí, based on a libretto by Manuel Vázquez Montalbán with music by French avant-garde musician Igor Wakhévitch...
  
   (Dalí's creation; his character is in turn playing God
  God
  God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
  
  )

Dante Alighieri

Dante Alighieri

Durante degli Alighieri, mononymously referred to as Dante , was an Italian poet, prose writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker. He is best known for the monumental epic poem La commedia, later named La divina commedia ...

, Italian poet

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : Marco Polo
  Marco Polo (opera)
  Marco Polo is an opera by the Chinese-born composer Tan Dun set to an English libretto by Paul Griffiths. It premiered in Munich on 7 May 1996. Described variously as an "opera within an opera" and a "fantasia on an epic journey", the multi-layered storyline is loosely based on the journey of Marco...
  
  
• Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini

Georges Danton

Georges Danton

Georges Jacques Danton was leading figure in the early stages of the French Revolution and the first President of the Committee of Public Safety. Danton's role in the onset of the Revolution has been disputed; many historians describe him as "the chief force in theoverthrow of the monarchy and the...

, French revolutionary figure

• John Eaton
  John Eaton (composer)
  John Charles Eaton is an American composer , MacArthur Fellow, is professor emeritus of composition at the University of Chicago John Charles Eaton (born 30 March 1935 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania) is an American composer (Anon. [n.d.]; Morgan 2001), MacArthur Fellow, is professor emeritus of...
  
  : Danton and Robespierre
• Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz. He also composed pieces for piano, violin and organ.-Biography:...
  
  : Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod is an opera by composer Gottfried von Einem to a libretto by Boris Blacher and Gottfried von Einem after Georg Büchner's 1835 play Danton's Death. Its first performance took place in Salzburg, August 6, 1947...
  
  

Jacques d'Arc

Jacques d'Arc

Jacques d'Arc was the father of Joan of Arc. He was a farmer in the village of Domrémy in Lorraine. He held the post of doyen, a local post that collected taxes and organized the village defense. He was born at Ceffonds. He married Isabelle de Vouthon , called Romée, in 1405...

, French farmer, father of Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc

Saint Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of Orléans" , is a national heroine of France and a Roman Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France who claimed divine guidance, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, which paved the way for the...

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco is an operatic dramma lirico with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera....
  
  (as Giacomo)

King Darius III of Persia

Darius III of Persia

Darius III , also known by his given name of Codomannus, was the last king of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia from 336 BC to 330 BC....

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Statira principessa di Persia
  Statira principessa di Persia
  Statira principessa di Persia is an opera - more specifically, a dramma per musica - in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli, set to a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello. The opera was first performed in Venice at the Teatro SS...
  
  

Sir William Davenant

William Davenant

Sir William Davenant , also spelled D'Avenant, was an English poet and playwright. Along with Thomas Killigrew, Davenant was one of the rare figures in English Renaissance theatre whose career spanned both the Caroline and Restoration eras and who was active both before and after the English Civil...

, English poet and playwright

• Gaspare Spontini
  Gaspare Spontini
  Gaspare Luigi Pacifico Spontini was an Italian opera composer and conductor, extremely celebrated in his time, though largely forgotten after his death.-Biography:...
  
  : Milton
  Milton (opera)
  Milton is an opéra comique in one act by Gaspare Spontini. The French libretto, by Victor-Joseph Étienne de Jouy and Armand-Michel Dieulafoy, is based on the life of the English poet John Milton. Milton was first performed on 27 November 1804 by the Opéra-Comique at the Salle Feydeau in Paris . It...
  
  

Louis-Nicolas Davout, Marshall of France

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Gotse Delchev

Gotse Delchev

Georgi Nikolov Delchev was an important revolutionary figure in Ottoman-ruled Macedonia and Thrace at the turn of the 20th century...

, Macedonian revolutionary figure

• Kiril Makedonski
  Kiril Makedonski
  Kiril Makedonski was a Macedonian composer. Born in Bitola, Macedonia, Makedonski studied music composition at the Zagreb Conservatory in Croatia. He is best known today for composing Goce , the first opera in the Macedonian language, which was commissioned for the inaugural performance of the...
  
  : Goce
  Goce
  Goce is an opera composed by Kiril Makedonski in tribute to Gotse Delchev. The work was commissioned to be the very first opera performed by the Macedonian National Opera Company. It premiered on May 24, 1954 and it is the first opera to be written in the Macedonian language....
  
  

Marion Delorme

Marion Delorme

Marion Delorme was a French courtesan known for her relationships with the important men of her time.- Early life, life as a courtesan, early death :...

, French courtesan

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Cinq-Mars

Camille Desmoulins

Camille Desmoulins

Lucie Simplice Camille Benoît Desmoulins was a journalist and politician who played an important role in the French Revolution. He was a childhood friend of Maximilien Robespierre and a close friend and political ally of Georges Danton, who were influential figures in the French Revolution.-Early...

, French revolutionary journalist, politician

• Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz. He also composed pieces for piano, violin and organ.-Biography:...
  
  : Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod is an opera by composer Gottfried von Einem to a libretto by Boris Blacher and Gottfried von Einem after Georg Büchner's 1835 play Danton's Death. Its first performance took place in Salzburg, August 6, 1947...
  
  

Bernal Díaz del Castillo

Bernal Díaz del Castillo

Bernal Díaz del Castillo was a conquistador, who wrote an eyewitness account of the conquest of Mexico by the Spaniards for Hernán Cortés, himself serving as a rodelero under Cortés.-Early life:...

, Spanish conquistador

• Roger Sessions
  Roger Sessions
  Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (opera)
  Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.-Performance history:...
  
  

Jimena Díaz

Jimena Díaz

Doña Ximena Díaz was the wife of El Cid from 1074 and her husband's successor as ruler of Valencia from 1099 to 1102.-References:*...

, wife of El Cid, ruler of Valencia

• Claude Debussy
  Claude Debussy
  Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
  
  : Rodrigue et Chimène
  Rodrigue et Chimène
  Rodrigue et Chimène is an unfinished opera in three acts by Claude Debussy. The French libretto, by Catulle Mendès, is based on the plays Las Mocedades del Cid by Guillén de Castro y Bellvís and Corneille's Le Cid which deal with the legend of El Cid...
  
  
• Giuseppe Farinelli
  Giuseppe Farinelli
  Giuseppe Farinelli was an Italian composer active at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century who excelled in writing opera buffas...
  
  : Il Cid della Spagna
  Il Cid della Spagna
  Il Cid della Spagna is a dramma per musica or opera in 2 acts by composer Giuseppe Farinelli. The work uses an Italian language libretto by Antonio Simeone Sografi that is based on Pierre Corneille's 1636 play Le Cid. The work premiered at La Fenice in Venice on 17 February 1802 in a double bill...
  
  (as Climene)
• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Le Cid
  Le Cid (opera)
  Le Cid is an opera in four acts and ten tableaux by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Louis Gallet, Édouard Blau and Adolphe d'Ennery. It is based on the play of the same name by Pierre Corneille....
  
   (as Chimene)

Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, "El Cid"

El Cid

Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar , known as El Cid Campeador , was a Castilian nobleman, military leader, and diplomat...

• Peter Cornelius
  Peter Cornelius
  Carl August Peter Cornelius was a German composer, writer about music, poet and translator. He was born and died in Mainz where his grave in the Hauptfriedhof survives....
  
  : Der Cid
• Claude Debussy
  Claude Debussy
  Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
  
  : Rodrigue et Chimène
  Rodrigue et Chimène
  Rodrigue et Chimène is an unfinished opera in three acts by Claude Debussy. The French libretto, by Catulle Mendès, is based on the plays Las Mocedades del Cid by Guillén de Castro y Bellvís and Corneille's Le Cid which deal with the legend of El Cid...
  
  
• Giuseppe Farinelli
  Giuseppe Farinelli
  Giuseppe Farinelli was an Italian composer active at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century who excelled in writing opera buffas...
  
  : Il Cid della Spagna
  Il Cid della Spagna
  Il Cid della Spagna is a dramma per musica or opera in 2 acts by composer Giuseppe Farinelli. The work uses an Italian language libretto by Antonio Simeone Sografi that is based on Pierre Corneille's 1636 play Le Cid. The work premiered at La Fenice in Venice on 17 February 1802 in a double bill...
  
  
• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Le Cid
  Le Cid (opera)
  Le Cid is an opera in four acts and ten tableaux by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Louis Gallet, Édouard Blau and Adolphe d'Ennery. It is based on the play of the same name by Pierre Corneille....
  
  
• Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Maria Gasparo Sacchini was an Italian opera composer.Sacchini was born in Florence, but was raised in Naples, where he received his musical education at the San Onofrio conservatory. He wrote his first operas in Naples, thereafter moving to Venice, then London and eventually Paris, where...
  
  : Il Cid

Georgi Dimitrov

Georgi Dimitrov

Georgi Dimitrov Mikhaylov , also known as Georgi Mikhaylovich Dimitrov , was a Bulgarian Communist politician...

, Bulgarian Communist leader

• Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono was an Italian avant-garde composer of classical music and remains one of the most prominent composers of the 20th century.- Early years :Born in Venice, he was a member of a wealthy artistic family, and his grandfather was a notable painter...
  
  : Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore is an opera with music by Luigi Nono, based mainly on plays by Bertolt Brecht, but also incorporating texts of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Karl Marx, and Vladimir Lenin. Nono himself and Yury Lyubimov wrote the libretto. It premiered at the Teatro alla Scala on April...
  
  

Emperor Diocletian

Diocletian

Diocletian |latinized]] upon his accession to Diocletian . c. 22 December 244  – 3 December 311), was a Roman Emperor from 284 to 305....

 of Rome

• Henry Purcell
  Henry Purcell
  Henry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...
  
  : Dioclesian
  Dioclesian
  Dioclesian is a tragicomic semi-opera in five acts by Henry Purcell to a libretto by Thomas Betterton based on the play The Prophetess, by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger, which in turn was based very loosely on the life of the Emperor Diocletian. It was premiered in late May 1690 at the...
  
  

Tsar Dmitri Ioannovich

False Dmitriy I

False Dmitriy I was the Tsar of Russia from 21 July 1605 until his death on 17 May 1606 under the name of Dimitriy Ioannovich . He is sometimes referred to under the usurped title of Dmitriy II...

of Russia, the so-called "False Dmitriy I"

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Dimitrij
  Dimitrij
  Dimitrij is an opera by Antonín Dvořák in 4 acts, set a libretto by Marie Červinková-Riegrová. More specifically, it belongs to the genre of Grand Opera. The work was first performed in Prague, at the Nové České Divadlo on 8 October 1882, after Dvořák began composition during May 1881...
  
  

Dmitry Donskoy, Prince of Moscow, Grand Prince of Vladimir

• Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
  
  : Dmitry Donskoy
  Dmitry Donskoy (opera)
  Dmitry Donskoy , also known as The Battle of Kulikovo was the first opera written by Anton Rubinstein. It was in 3 acts, with a libretto by Count Vladimir Sollogub and Vladimir Zotov, based on a drama by Dmitry Ozerov...
  
  

Dobrynya Nikitich

Dobrynya Nikitich

Dobrynya Nikitich is one of the most popular bogatyrs after Ilya Murometz from the Kievan Rus era. Many byliny center on Dobrynya completing tasks set him by the prince. Dobrynya is often portrayed as being close to the royal family, undertaking sensitive and diplomatic missions.As a courtier,...

, legendary Kievan bogatyr

• Alexander Serov
  Alexander Serov
  Alexander Nikolayevich Serov – was a Russian composer and music critic. He and his wife Valentina were the parents of painter Valentin Serov...
  
  : Rogneda
  Rogneda (opera)
  Rogneda is an opera in five acts, composed by Alexander Serov during 1863–1865. The scenario, by the composer, was based on the novel Askold's Grave by Mikhail Zagoskin and the poem Rogneda by Kondraty Ryleyev...
  
  

Publius Cornelius Dolabella

Publius Cornelius Dolabella

Publius Cornelius Dolabella was a Roman general, by far the most important of the Dolabellae. He arranged for himself to be adopted by a plebeian so that he could become a Tribune.. He married Cicero's daughter Tullia Ciceronis...

, Roman general

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  

Saint Dominic

Saint Dominic

Saint Dominic , also known as Dominic of Osma, often called Dominic de Guzmán and Domingo Félix de Guzmán was the founder of the Friars Preachers, popularly called the Dominicans or Order of Preachers , a Catholic religious order...

, Domingo de Guzman, founder of the Dominicans

• Antonio Braga
  Antonio Braga
  Antonio Braga was an Italian classical composer. Born in Naples, he wrote ballets, concerto, ouvertures, symphonies and three operas.-Ballets:*Les Abeilles a Naples *C’è un albero a New York...
  
  : San Domenico di Guzman
  San Domenico di Guzman
  San Domenico di Guzman is an opera by Antonio Braga. It was premiered in 1997 at Teatro San Carlo in Naples. It based on Domingo de Guzmán's life....
  
  

James Douglas, Lord of Douglas

James Douglas, Lord of Douglas

Sir James Douglas , , was a Scottish soldier and knight who fought in the Scottish Wars of Independence.-Early life:...

, Scots soldier, known as the "Black Douglas"

• Gioachino Rossini: Robert Bruce
  Robert Bruce (opera)
  Robert Bruce is an 1846 pastiche opera in three acts, with music by Gioachino Rossini and Louis Niedermeyer to a French-language libretto by Alphonse Royer and Gustave Vaëz, after Walter Scott's History of Scotland...
  
  (pastiche)

György Dózsa

György Dózsa

György Dózsa was a Székely Hungarian man-at-arms from Transylvania, Kingdom of Hungary who led a peasants' revolt against the kingdom's landed nobility...

, Hungarian leader of peasant revolt

• Ferenc Erkel: György Dózsa
  György Dózsa (opera)
  Dózsa György is an 1867 Hungarian opera by Ferenc Erkel. It is based on the life of György Dózsa.-References: The following sources were given:*Till Géza: Opera, Zeneműkiadó, Budapest, 1985, ISBN 963 330 564 0...
  
  

Sir Francis Drake

Francis Drake

Sir Francis Drake, Vice Admiral was an English sea captain, privateer, navigator, slaver, and politician of the Elizabethan era. Elizabeth I of England awarded Drake a knighthood in 1581. He was second-in-command of the English fleet against the Spanish Armada in 1588. He also carried out the...

, English adventurer, pirate, politician

• Matthew Locke
  Matthew Locke (composer)
  Matthew Locke was an English Baroque composer and music theorist.-Biography:As a boy, Locke was trained in the choir of Exeter Cathedral, under Edward Gibbons, the brother of Orlando Gibbons...
  
  : The History of Sir Francis Drake
  The History of Sir Francis Drake
  The History of Sir Francis Drake was a hybrid theatrical entertainment, a masque or "operatic tableau" with an English libretto written by Sir William Davenant and music by Matthew Locke. The masque was most likely first performed in 1659 and produced by Davenant...
  
  

John Dryden

John Dryden

John Dryden was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who dominated the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in literary circles as the Age of Dryden.Walter Scott called him "Glorious John." He was made Poet...

, English poet

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

King Duncan I of Scotland

Duncan I of Scotland

Donnchad mac Crínáin was king of Scotland from 1034 to 1040...

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Macbeth
  Macbeth (opera)
  Macbeth is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi, with an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave and additions by Andrea Maffei, based on Shakespeare's play of the same name...
  
  

E

Ana de Mendoza, Princess of Éboli, Spanish aristocrat

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Don Carlos
  Don Carlos
  Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
  
  

Nelson Eddy

Nelson Eddy

Nelson Ackerman Eddy was an American singer and actor who appeared in 19 musical films during the 1930s and 1940s, as well as in opera and on the concert stage, radio, television, and in nightclubs. A classically trained baritone, he is best remembered for the eight films in which he costarred...

, American tenor, actor

• Edwin Penhorwood
  Edwin Penhorwood
  Dr. Edwin Penhorwood is an American composer and currently assistant professor at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.-Biography:Penhorwood is a native of Toledo, Ohio, and studied music at the University of Iowa...
  
  : Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos is an opera by Indiana University Jacobs School of Music faculty member Edwin Penhorwood. Too Many Sopranos is a two-act opera in English with a pastiche of song from opera's various periods. A group of sopranos is trying to get into heaven, but there is no more room in the...
  
  (spoofed as "Nelson Deadly")

King Edward II of England

Edward II of England

Edward II , called Edward of Caernarfon, was King of England from 1307 until he was deposed by his wife Isabella in January 1327. He was the sixth Plantagenet king, in a line that began with the reign of Henry II...

• Gioachino Rossini: Robert Bruce
  Robert Bruce (opera)
  Robert Bruce is an 1846 pastiche opera in three acts, with music by Gioachino Rossini and Louis Niedermeyer to a French-language libretto by Alphonse Royer and Gustave Vaëz, after Walter Scott's History of Scotland...
  
  (pastiche)

King Edward III of England

Edward III of England

Edward III was King of England from 1327 until his death and is noted for his military success. Restoring royal authority after the disastrous reign of his father, Edward II, Edward III went on to transform the Kingdom of England into one of the most formidable military powers in Europe...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : L'assedio di Calais
  L'assedio di Calais
  L'assedio di Calais is a melodramma lirico, or opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvatore Cammarano wrote the Italian libretto after Luigi Marchionni's play and, secondarily, Luigi Henry's ballet , both based on Pierre Du Belloy's play Le siège de Calais...
  
  

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...

, German-American scientist

• Paul Dessau
  Paul Dessau
  Paul Dessau was a German composer and conductor.- Biography :Dessau was born in Hamburg into a musical family...
  
  : Einstein
• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Einstein on the Beach
  Einstein on the Beach
  Einstein on the Beach is an opera that premiered on July 25, 1976 at the Avignon Festival in France, scored and written by Philip Glass and designed and directed by theatrical producer Robert Wilson. It also contains writings by Christopher Knowles, Samuel M. Johnson and Lucinda Childs...
  
  

Emperor Elagabalus

Elagabalus

Elagabalus , also known as Heliogabalus, was Roman Emperor from 218 to 222. A member of the Severan Dynasty, he was Syrian on his mother's side, the son of Julia Soaemias and Sextus Varius Marcellus. Early in his youth he served as a priest of the god El-Gabal at his hometown, Emesa...

 of Rome (Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus)

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Eliogabalo
  Eliogabalo
  Eliogabalo is an opera by the Italian composer Francesco Cavalli based on the life of the Roman emperor Heliogabalus. The author of the original libretto is unknown but it was probably reworked by Aurelio Aureli...
  
  

Eleanor of Austria, Queen Consort of Portugal and France

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

Eleanor of Guzman

Eleanor of Guzman

Eleanor of Guzman or Leonor Núñez de Guzmán was a Castilian noblewoman and long-term mistress to Alfonso XI of Castile. She was the mother of King Henry II of Castile.- Life :...

, mistress of King Alfonso XI of Castile and mother of Henry II

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : La favorite
  La favorite
  La favorite is an opera in four acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a French-language libretto by Alphonse Royer and Gustave Vaëz, based on the play Le comte de Comminges by Baculard d'Arnaud...
  
   (as Leonor de Guzmán)

Elisabeth, Queen of Bohemia

• Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Jakob Holzbauer was a composer of symphonies, concertos, operas, and chamber music, and a member of the Mannheim school. His aesthetic style is in line with that of the Sturm und Drang "movement" of German art and literature.Holzbauer was born in Vienna...
  
  : Günther von Schwarzburg
  Günther von Schwarzburg (opera)
  Günther von Schwarzburg is a Singspiel in three acts by Ignaz Holzbauer set to a German libretto by Anton Klein. Loosely based on events in the life of the 14th century German king, Günther von Schwarzburg, the opera premiered on 5 January 1777 at the Hoftheater in the Mannheim...
  
  (as Asberta)

Elisabeth Farnese, Queen Consort to Philip V of Spain

• John Barnett
  John Barnett
  John Barnett was an English composer and writer on music.-Life:Barnett was the eldest son of a Prussian Jew named Bernhard Beer, who changed his surname on settling in England as a jeweller. According to some he was a cousin of the composer Giacomo Meyerbeer...
  
  : Farinelli
  Farinelli (opera)
  Farinelli is an opera in two acts, described as 'serio-comic', by John Barnett, to a libretto by his brother Charles Zachary Barnett. Produced in 1839, it is the third of the composer's large-scale operas, and was the last to reach the stage...
  
  

Elisabeth of Valois

Elisabeth of Valois

Elisabeth of Valois was the eldest daughter of Henry II of France and Catherine de' Medici.-Early life:She was born in the Château de Fontainebleau...

, daughter of Henry II of France and Catherine de' Medici, wife of Philip II of Spain

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Don Carlos
  Don Carlos
  Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
  
  

Elisiv of Kiev

Elisiv of Kiev

Elisaveta Yaroslavna of Kiev , , was a Rus' Princess of Kiev and a Norwegian queen, wife and queen consort of king Harald III of Norway.-Biography:...

• Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or...
  
  : Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy is an opera in eight scenes, comprised in three acts, by the Ukrainian composer Heorhiy Maiboroda, written in 1973 and premiered in 1975...
  
  

Queen Elizabeth I of England

Elizabeth I of England

Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...

• Thomas Arne: Eliza (she does not appear as a character as such, but the opera is named for her)
• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Il castello di Kenilworth
  Il castello di Kenilworth
  Il castello di Kenilworth is a melodramma serio or tragic opera in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Andrea Leone Tottola wrote the Italian libretto after Victor Hugo's play Amy Robsart and Eugene Scribe's play Leicester, in its turn after Scott's novel Kenilworth...
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti: Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda is a tragic opera, , in two acts, by Gaetano Donizetti, to a libretto by Giuseppe Bardari, based on Friedrich Schiller's 1800 play Maria Stuart....
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti: Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, by Gaetano Donizetti...
  
  
• Edward German
  Edward German
  Sir Edward German was an English musician and composer of Welsh descent, best remembered for his extensive output of incidental music for the stage and as a successor to Arthur Sullivan in the field of English comic opera.As a youth, German played the violin and led the town orchestra, also...
  
  : Merrie England
  Merrie England (opera)
  Merrie England is an English comic opera in two acts by Edward German to a libretto by Basil Hood. The patriotic story concerns love and rivalries at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, who is portrayed as jealous of the affection of Sir Walter Raleigh for Bessie Throckmorton. Its sunny depiction of...
  
  
• Gioachino Rossini: Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra
  Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra
  Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra, is a dramma per musica or opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Giovanni Schmidt, from the play The Page of Leicester by Carlo Federici...
  
  

Fanny Elssler

Fanny Elssler

Fanny Elssler - 27 November 1884), born Franziska Elßler, was an Austrian ballerina of the 'Romantic Period'.- Life :Daughter of Johann Florian Elssler, a second generation employee of Prince Esterhazy in Eisenstadt. Both Johann and his brother Josef were employed as copyists to the Prince's...

, Austrian ballerina

• Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
  
   and Jacques Ibert
  Jacques Ibert
  Jacques François Antoine Ibert was a French composer. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I.Ibert pursued a successful composing career,...
  
  : L'aiglon

Ninon de l'Enclos

Ninon de l'Enclos

Anne "Ninon" de l'Enclos also spelled Ninon de Lenclos and Ninon de Lanclos was a French author, courtesan and patron of the arts.-Early life:...

, French courtesan

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Cinq-Mars

Erasistratus

Erasistratus

Erasistratus was a Greek anatomist and royal physician under Seleucus I Nicator of Syria. Along with fellow physician Herophilus, he founded a school of anatomy in Alexandria, where they carried out anatomical research...

, Greek anatomist, physician

• Étienne Méhul
  Étienne Méhul
  Etienne Nicolas Méhul was a French composer, "the most important opera composer in France during the Revolution." He was also the first composer to be called a "Romantic".-Life:...
  
  : Stratonice
  Stratonice (opera)
  Stratonice is a one-act opéra comique by Étienne Méhul to a libretto by François-Benoît Hoffman, first performed at the Théâtre Favart, Paris, on 3 May 1792...
  
  

King Eric V of Denmark

Eric V of Denmark

Eric V "Klipping" was King of Denmark and son of Christopher I. Until 1264 he ruled under the auspices of his mother, the competent Queen Dowager Margaret Sambiria. Between 1261 and 1262, Eric was a prisoner in Holstein following a military defeat...

• Peter Arnold Heise
  Peter Arnold Heise
  Peter Heise was a Danish composer, best known for the opera Drot og Marsk ....
  
  : Drot og marsk
  Drot og Marsk
  Drot og marsk is an opera by the Danish composer Peter Heise. The libretto, by Christian Richardt, is based on Johannes Carsten Hauch's play Marsk Stig . The opera was first performed at the Royal Theatre, Copenhagen on September 25, 1878.-Roles:-Synopsis:The opera is based on the true story of...
  
  (King and Marshall)

Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex

Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex

Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, KG was an English nobleman and a favourite of Elizabeth I. Politically ambitious, and a committed general, he was placed under house arrest following a poor campaign in Ireland during the Nine Years' War in 1599...

, Elizabethan courtier and royal favourite

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, by Gaetano Donizetti...
  
  
• Edward German
  Edward German
  Sir Edward German was an English musician and composer of Welsh descent, best remembered for his extensive output of incidental music for the stage and as a successor to Arthur Sullivan in the field of English comic opera.As a youth, German played the violin and led the town orchestra, also...
  
  : Merrie England
  Merrie England (opera)
  Merrie England is an English comic opera in two acts by Edward German to a libretto by Basil Hood. The patriotic story concerns love and rivalries at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, who is portrayed as jealous of the affection of Sir Walter Raleigh for Bessie Throckmorton. Its sunny depiction of...
  
  

Frances, Countess of Essex

Frances Walsingham

Frances Walsingham, Countess of Essex and Countess of Clanricarde was an English noblewoman. The daughter of Francis Walsingham, Elizabeth I's Secretary of State, she became the wife of Sir Philip Sidney at age 14. Her second husband was Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, Queen Elizabeth's...

, English noblewoman

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  

Eufrosinia, daughter of Yaroslav Osmomysl

Yaroslav Osmomysl

Yaroslav Osmomysl was the most famous Prince of Halych from the first dynasty of its rulers, which descended from Yaroslav I's eldest son. His sobriquet, meaning "Eight-Minded" in Old East Slavic, was granted to him in recognition of his wisdom...

, Prince of Halych

Halych

Halych is a historic city on the Dniester River in western Ukraine. The town gave its name to the historic province and kingdom of Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia, of which it was the capital until the early 14th century, when the seat of the local princes was moved to Lviv...

• Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin was a Russian Romantic composer and chemist of Georgian–Russian parentage. He was a member of the group of composers called The Five , who were dedicated to producing a specifically Russian kind of art music...
  
  : Prince Igor
  Prince Igor
  Prince Igor is an opera in four acts with a prologue. It was composed by Alexander Borodin. The composer adapted the libretto from the East Slavic epic The Lay of Igor's Host, which recounts the campaign of Russian prince Igor Svyatoslavich against the invading Polovtsian tribes in 1185...
  
  (as Yaroslavna)

F

Marino Faliero

Marino Faliero

Marino Faliero was the fifty-fifth Doge of Venice, appointed on 11 September 1354. He was sometimes referred to simply as Marin Falier or Falieri.-Biography:...

, Doge of Venice

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Marino Faliero
  Marino Faliero (opera)
  Marino Faliero is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Giovanni Emanuele Bidéra wrote the Italian libretto, with revisions by Agostino Ruffini, after Casimir Delavigne's play...
  
  

Farinelli

Farinelli

Farinelli , was the stage name of Carlo Maria Broschi, celebrated Italian castrato singer of the 18th century and one of the greatest singers in the history of opera.- Early years :...

, Italian castrato singer

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : La part du diable (or Carlo Broschi)
  La part du diable
  La part du diable is an opéra comique by Daniel Auber to a libretto by Eugène Scribe, loosely based on an incident from the life of the singer Farinelli. It premiered at the Opéra-Comique on 16 January 1843...
  
  (as Carlo Broschi)
• John Barnett
  John Barnett
  John Barnett was an English composer and writer on music.-Life:Barnett was the eldest son of a Prussian Jew named Bernhard Beer, who changed his surname on settling in England as a jeweller. According to some he was a cousin of the composer Giacomo Meyerbeer...
  
  : Farinelli
  Farinelli (opera)
  Farinelli is an opera in two acts, described as 'serio-comic', by John Barnett, to a libretto by his brother Charles Zachary Barnett. Produced in 1839, it is the third of the composer's large-scale operas, and was the last to reach the stage...
  
  

Fausta Flavia Maxima

Fausta

Fausta Flavia Maxima was a Roman Empress, daughter of the Roman Emperor Maximianus. To seal the alliance between them for control of the Tetrarchy, in 307 Maximianus married her to Constantine I, who set aside his wife Minervina in her favour. Constantine and Fausta had been betrothed since...

, Empress of Rome, second wife of Constantine the Great

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Fausta
  Fausta (opera)
  Fausta is a melodramma, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The Italian libretto was by Domenico Gilardoni, who died while writing it: the remainder was written by Donizetti. The opera debuted on 12 January 1832 at the Teatro San Carlo, Naples, and was written with prima donna Giuseppina...
  
  

Charles Simon Favart

Charles Simon Favart

Charles Simon Favart was a French dramatist.Born in Paris, the son of a pastry-cook, he was educated at the college of Louis-le-Grand, and after his father's death he carried on the business for a time...

, French dramatist

• Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....
  
  : Madame Favart
  Madame Favart
  Madame Favart is an opéra comique, or operetta, in three acts by Jacques Offenbach. The French libretto was written by Alfred Duru and Henri Charles Chivot.-Performance history:...
  
  

Marie Favart

Marie Favart

Marie-Justine-Benoîte Favart was an opera singer, actress, and dancer, the wife of the dramatist, Charles Simon Favart....

, French opera singer, actress

• Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....
  
  : Madame Favart
  Madame Favart
  Madame Favart is an opéra comique, or operetta, in three acts by Jacques Offenbach. The French libretto was written by Alfred Duru and Henri Charles Chivot.-Performance history:...
  
  

Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor

Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor

Ferdinand I was Holy Roman Emperor from 1558 and king of Bohemia and Hungary from 1526 until his death. Before his accession, he ruled the Austrian hereditary lands of the Habsburgs in the name of his elder brother, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.The key events during his reign were the contest...

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

King Ferdinand I of León and Castile

• Claude Debussy
  Claude Debussy
  Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
  
  : Rodrigue et Chimène
  Rodrigue et Chimène
  Rodrigue et Chimène is an unfinished opera in three acts by Claude Debussy. The French libretto, by Catulle Mendès, is based on the plays Las Mocedades del Cid by Guillén de Castro y Bellvís and Corneille's Le Cid which deal with the legend of El Cid...
  
  
• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Le Cid
  Le Cid (opera)
  Le Cid is an opera in four acts and ten tableaux by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Louis Gallet, Édouard Blau and Adolphe d'Ennery. It is based on the play of the same name by Pierre Corneille....
  
  

Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor

Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor

Ferdinand II , a member of the House of Habsburg, was Holy Roman Emperor , King of Bohemia , and King of Hungary . His rule coincided with the Thirty Years' War.- Life :...

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt is an opera in five acts by Paul Hindemith. The German libretto was by the composer....
  
  

KIng Ferdinand II of Aragon

Ferdinand II of Aragon

Ferdinand the Catholic was King of Aragon , Sicily , Naples , Valencia, Sardinia, and Navarre, Count of Barcelona, jure uxoris King of Castile and then regent of that country also from 1508 to his death, in the name of...

(and Ferdinand V of Castile)

• Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud was a French composer and teacher. He was a member of Les Six—also known as The Group of Six—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions are influenced by jazz and make use of polytonality...
  
  : Christophe Colomb
  Christophe Colomb
  Christophe Colomb is an opera in two parts by the French composer Darius Milhaud. The libretto, by the poet Paul Claudel, is based on his own play Le livre de Christophe Colomb about the life of Christopher Columbus. The opera was first performed at the Staatsoper, Berlin on 5 May 1930 in a German...
  
  

King Ferdinand VI of Spain

Ferdinand VI of Spain

Ferdinand VI , called the Learnt, was King of Spain from 9 July 1746 until his death. He was the fourth son of the previous monarch Philip V and his first wife Maria Luisa of Savoy...

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : La part du diable (or Carlo Broschi)
  La part du diable
  La part du diable is an opéra comique by Daniel Auber to a libretto by Eugène Scribe, loosely based on an incident from the life of the singer Farinelli. It premiered at the Opéra-Comique on 16 January 1843...
  
  

Francesco Foscari

Francesco Foscari

Francesco Foscari was doge of Venice from 1423 to 1457, at the inception of the Italian Renaissance.-Biography:Foscari, of an ancient noble family, served the Republic of Venice in numerous official capacities—as ambassador, president of the Forty, member of the Council of Ten, inquisitor,...

, Doge of Venice

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : I due Foscari
  I due Foscari
  I due Foscari is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on a historical play, The Two Foscari by Lord Byron....
  
  

Joseph Fouché

Joseph Fouché

Joseph Fouché, 1st Duc d'Otrante was a French statesman and Minister of Police under Napoleon Bonaparte. In English texts his title is often translated as Duke of Otranto.-Youth:Fouché was born in Le Pellerin, a small village near Nantes...

, Duke of Otranto

• Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Menotti Maria Giordano was an Italian composer, mainly of operas.He was born in Foggia in Puglia, southern Italy, and studied under Paolo Serrao at the Conservatoire of Naples...
  
  : Madame Sans-Gêne
  Madame Sans-Gêne (opera)
  Madame Sans-Gêne is an opera in three acts by Umberto Giordano. The libretto was taken from Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau's play, adapted for the opera by Renato Simoni.-Performance history:...
  
  

Francesca da Rimini

Francesca da Rimini

Francesca da Rimini or Francesca da Polenta was the daughter of Guido da Polenta, lord of Ravenna. She was a historical contemporary of Dante Alighieri, who portrayed her as a character in the Divine Comedy.-Arranged marriage:...

, contemporary and literary subject of Dante

• Emanuele Borgatta: Francesca da Rimini
• Paolo Carlini
  Paolo Carlini
  Paolo Carlini was an Italian film actor. He appeared in 45 films between 1940 and 1979.-Selected filmography:* La Grande strada * The Mute of Portici * It Started in Naples...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Fournier-Gorre: Francesca da Rimini
• Pietro Generali
  Pietro Generali
  Pietro Generali is a former basketball player from Italy, who won the silver medal with his national team at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow.-References:...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Hermann Goetz
  Hermann Goetz
  Hermann Gustav Goetz was a German composer.After studying in Berlin, he moved to Switzerland in 1863. After ten years spent as a critic, pianist and conductor as well, he spent the last three years of his life composing...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Franco Leoni
  Franco Leoni
  Franco Leoni was an Italian opera composer. After training in Milan, he made most of his career in England, composing for Covent Garden and West End theatres. He is best known for the opera L'Oracolo, written for Covent Garden but taken up successfully by the Metropolitan Opera in New York...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Gioacchino Maglioni: Francesca da Rimini
• Luigi Mancinelli
  Luigi Mancinelli
  Luigi Mancinelli was a leading Italian orchestral conductor. He also composed music for the stage and concert hall and played the cello....
  
  : Paolo e Francesca
• Saverio Mercadante
  Saverio Mercadante
  Giuseppe Saverio Raffaele Mercadante was an Italian composer, particularly of operas. While Mercadante may not have retained the international celebrity of Gaetano Donizetti or Gioachino Rossini beyond his own lifetime, he composed as impressive a number of works as either; and his development of...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Francesco Morlacchi
  Francesco Morlacchi
  Francesco Morlacchi was an Italian composer of more than twenty operas. During the many years he spent as the royal Royal Kapellmeister in Dresden, he was instrumental in popularizing the Italian style of opera.-Biography:...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Eugene Nordal: Francesca da Rimini
• Salvatore Papparlado: Francesca da Rimini
• Gaetano Quilici: Francesca da Rimini
• Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini (as Francesca Malatesta)
• Giuseppe Staffa: Francesca da Rimini
• Feliciano Strepponi: Francesca da Rimini
• Antonio Tamburini
  Antonio Tamburini
  Antonio Tamburini was an Italian operatic baritone.Born in Faenza, then part of the Papal States, Tamburini studied the orchestral horn with his father and voice with Aldobrando Rossi, before making his debut as a singer, aged 18, in La contessa di colle erbose . He went on to become one of the...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Ambroise Thomas
  Ambroise Thomas
  Charles Louis Ambroise Thomas was a French composer, best known for his operas Mignon and Hamlet and as Director of the Conservatoire de Paris from 1871 till his death.-Biography:"There is good music, there is bad music, and then there is Ambroise Thomas."- Emmanuel Chabrier-Early life...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai was an Italian composer.-Biography:Zandonai was born in Borgo Sacco, Rovereto, then part of Austria–Hungary....
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
  Francesca da Rimini (Zandonai)
  Francesca da Rimini is an opera in four acts, composed by Riccardo Zandonai, with libretto by Tito Ricordi, , after a play by Gabriele D'Annunzio. It was premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin on February 19, 1914, and is still staged occasionally.This opera is Zandonai's best-known work...
  
  

Saint Francis of Assisi

Francis of Assisi

Saint Francis of Assisi was an Italian Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the men's Franciscan Order, the women’s Order of St. Clare, and the lay Third Order of Saint Francis. St...

, founder of the Franciscans

• Olivier Messiaen
  Olivier Messiaen
  Olivier Messiaen was a French composer, organist and ornithologist, one of the major composers of the 20th century. His music is rhythmically complex ; harmonically and melodically it is based on modes of limited transposition, which he abstracted from his early compositions and improvisations...
  
  : Saint François d'Assise

King Francis I of France

Francis I of France

Francis I was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch...

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  (as Franz I)
• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Ascanio
  Ascanio
  Ascanio is a grand opera in five acts and seven tableaux by composer Camille Saint-Saëns. The opera's French libretto, by Louis Gallet, is based on the 1852 play Benvenuto Cellini by French playwright Paul Meurice which was in turn based on the 1843 historical novel by Alexandre Dumas, père...
  
  

Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria

Franz Joseph I of Austria

Franz Joseph I or Francis Joseph I was Emperor of Austria, King of Bohemia, King of Croatia, Apostolic King of Hungary, King of Galicia and Lodomeria and Grand Duke of Cracow from 1848 until his death in 1916.In the December of 1848, Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria abdicated the throne as part of...

• Ralph Benatzky
  Ralph Benatzky
  Ralph Benatzky , Moravia, Austrian Empire – 16 October 1957), born in Moravské Budějovice as Rudolf Josef František Benatzki, was an Austrian composer of Czech origin...
  
  , Robert Stolz
  Robert Stolz
  Robert Elisabeth Stolz was an Austrian songwriter and conductor as well as a composer of operettas and film music.- Biography :...
  
   and Bruno Granichstaedten: The White Horse Inn
  The White Horse Inn
  Im weißen Rößl is an operetta or musical comedy set in the picturesque Salzkammergut region of Upper Austria. It is about the head waiter of the White Horse Inn in St. Wolfgang who is desperately in love with the owner of the inn, a resolute young woman who at first only has eyes for one of her...
  
  

Fredegund

Fredegund

Fredegund was the Queen consort of Chilperic I, the Merovingian Frankish king of Soissons.All her wealth and power came to her through her association with Chilperic...

, Merovingian Queen Consort

• César Franck
  César Franck
  César-Auguste-Jean-Guillaume-Hubert Franck was a composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher who worked in Paris during his adult life....
  
  : Ghiselle
  Ghiselle
  Ghiselle is an opera by César Franck to a Merovingian-themed French libretto by the novelist Gilbert-Augustin Thierry, son of Amédée Thierry...
  
  

Frederick I "Barbarossa"

Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor

Frederick I Barbarossa was a German Holy Roman Emperor. He was elected King of Germany at Frankfurt on 4 March 1152 and crowned in Aachen on 9 March, crowned King of Italy in Pavia in 1155, and finally crowned Roman Emperor by Pope Adrian IV, on 18 June 1155, and two years later in 1157 the term...

, Holy Roman Emperor

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : La battaglia di Legnano
  La battaglia di Legnano
  La battaglia di Legnano is an opera in four acts, with music by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian-language libretto by Salvadore Cammarano. It was based on the play La Bataille de Toulouse by Joseph Méry. The opera received its first performance on 27 January 1849, at the Teatro Argentina, Rome...
  
  

King Frederick II "The Great" of Prussia

Frederick II of Prussia

Frederick II was a King in Prussia and a King of Prussia from the Hohenzollern dynasty. In his role as a prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire, he was also Elector of Brandenburg. He was in personal union the sovereign prince of the Principality of Neuchâtel...

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down
• Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...
  
  : Ein Feldlager in Schlesien
  Ein Feldlager in Schlesien
  Ein Feldlager in Schlesien is a Singspiel in three acts by Giacomo Meyerbeer with a German-language libretto by Ludwig Rellstab after Eugène Scribe's Le champ de Silésie. It was first performed at the Hofoper, Berlin, on 7 December 1844; a version with a revised libretto by Charlotte...
  
  (he does not appear on stage, but is heard playing the flute in the background)

Frederick II, Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg

Frederick II, Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg

Frederick II of Hesse-Homburg , also known as the Prince of Homburg was Landgraf of Hesse-Homburg. He was also a successful and experienced general for the crowns of both Sweden and of Brandenburg, but is best remembered as the eponymous hero of Heinrich von Kleist's play Der Prinz von Homburg.-...

• Hans Werner Henze
  Hans Werner Henze
  Hans Werner Henze is a German composer of prodigious output best known for "his consistent cultivation of music for the theatre throughout his life"...
  
  : Der Prinz von Homburg

Frederick William I, Elector of Brandenburg

• Hans Werner Henze
  Hans Werner Henze
  Hans Werner Henze is a German composer of prodigious output best known for "his consistent cultivation of music for the theatre throughout his life"...
  
  : Der Prinz von Homburg

Jean Froissart

Jean Froissart

Jean Froissart , often referred to in English as John Froissart, was one of the most important chroniclers of medieval France. For centuries, Froissart's Chronicles have been recognized as the chief expression of the chivalric revival of the 14th century Kingdom of England and France...

, French chronicler

• Aulis Sallinen
  Aulis Sallinen
  Aulis Sallinen is a Finnish contemporary classical music composer. He writes in a modern, though tonal and not experimental music style. He studied at the Sibelius Academy, where his teachers included Joonas Kokkonen...
  
  : The King Goes Forth to France
  The King Goes Forth to France
  Kuningas lähtee Ranskaan is an opera in three acts by Aulis Sallinen, based on the novel of the same title by Paavo Haavikko, who also wrote the libretto. The English singing version is by Stephen Oliver.-Background:...
  
  

Georg von Frundsberg

Georg von Frundsberg

Georg von Frundsberg was a South German knight and Landsknecht leader in the service of the Imperial Habsburg dynasty of the Holy Roman Empire....

, South German knight

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

Tsar Fyodor II of Russia

Feodor II of Russia

Fyodor II Borisovich Godunov of Russia was a tsar of Russia during the Time of Troubles. He was born in Moscow, the son and successor to Boris Godunov...

, son of Boris Godunov

• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Boris Godunov
  Boris Godunov (opera)
  Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
  
  

G

Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei , was an Italian physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher who played a major role in the Scientific Revolution. His achievements include improvements to the telescope and consequent astronomical observations and support for Copernicanism...

, Italian scientist

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Galileo Galilei
  Galileo Galilei (opera)
  Galileo Galilei is an opera based on excerpts from the life of Galileo Galilei which premiered in 2002 at Chicago's Goodman Theatre. Music by Philip Glass, libretto by Mary Zimmerman and Arnold Weinstein. The piece is presented in one act consisting of ten scenes without break.-Production Notes:All...
  
  

Vasily Vasilyevich Galitzine, Russian statesman

• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Khovanshchina
  Khovanshchina
  Khovanshchina is an opera in five acts by Modest Mussorgsky. The work was written between 1872 and 1880 in St. Petersburg, Russia. The composer wrote the libretto based on historical sources...
  
  

Count Peter Gamba, associate of Lord Byron

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Indian freedom advocate

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Satyagraha
  Satyagraha (opera)
  Satyagraha is a 1979 opera in three acts for orchestra, chorus and soloists, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by Glass and Constance DeJong.Loosely based on the life of Mohandas K...
  
  

Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi was an Italian military and political figure. In his twenties, he joined the Carbonari Italian patriot revolutionaries, and fled Italy after a failed insurrection. Garibaldi took part in the War of the Farrapos and the Uruguayan Civil War leading the Italian Legion, and...

, Italian freedom fighter

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down

Margaret "Peggy" Garner

Margaret Garner

Margaret Garner was an enslaved African American woman in pre-Civil War America who was notorious - or celebrated - for killing her own daughter rather than allow the child to be returned to slavery. She and her family had escaped in January 1856 across the frozen Ohio River to Cincinnati, but...

, American slave who killed her own daughter rather than allow the child to be returned to slavery

• Richard Danielpour
  Richard Danielpour
  Richard Danielpour is an American composer.-Biography:Danielpour is born of Persian/Jewish descent. He studied at Oberlin College and the New England Conservatory of Music, and later at the Juilliard School of Music, where he received a DMA in composition in 1986...
  
  : Margaret Garner
  Margaret Garner (opera)
  Margaret Garner is an American opera loosely based on actual events in the life of runaway slave Margaret Garner. It was co-commissioned by the Michigan Opera Theatre, Cincinnati Opera and Opera Company of Philadelphia. The music was composed by Richard Danielpour with a libretto in English by...
  
  

Paul Gauguin

Paul Gauguin

Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin was a leading French Post-Impressionist artist. He was an important figure in the Symbolist movement as a painter, sculptor, print-maker, ceramist, and writer...

, French painter

• Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara is a Finnish composer of contemporary classical music, and is one of the most notable Finnish composers after Jean Sibelius.-Life:...
  
  : Vincent
  Vincent (opera)
  Vincent is an opera in three acts by Einojuhani Rautavaara first performed in 1990. The libretto was by the composer, and consists of scenes from the life of the artist Vincent van Gogh, told in retrospect....
  
  
• Christopher Yavelow
  Christopher Yavelow
  Christopher Yavelow , the son of a film professor and visual artist, is a composer and proponent of computer assisted composition....
  
  : The Passion of Vincent van Gogh
  The Passion of Vincent van Gogh
  The Passion of Vincent van Gogh is an opera in three acts and eighteen scenes by composer Christopher Yavelow. The opera was commissioned by the National Endowment for the Arts and composed at the Camargo Foundation in 1983 during a Camargo Fellowship in Cassis, France...
  
  

King George III of the United Kingdom

George III of the United Kingdom

George III was King of Great Britain and King of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of these two countries on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until his death...

• Peter Maxwell Davies
  Peter Maxwell Davies
  Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, CBE is an English composer and conductor and is currently Master of the Queen's Music.-Biography:...
  
  : Eight Songs for a Mad King
  Eight Songs for a Mad King
  Eight Songs for a Mad King is a monodrama by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies with a libretto by Randolph Stow, based on words of George III. The work was written for the South-African actor Roy Hart and the composer's ensemble the Pierrot Players, and premiered on 22 April 1969...
  
  

Priscilla German Reed

Priscilla Horton

Priscilla Horton, later Priscilla German Reed , was a popular English singer and actress, known for her role as Ariel in W. C. Macready's production of The Tempest in 1838 and "fairy" burlesques at Covent Garden Theatre. Later, she was known, along with her husband, Thomas German Reed, for...

, English singer and actress

Thomas German Reed

Thomas German Reed

Thomas German Reed was an English composer and theatrical manager best known for creating the German Reed Entertainments, a genre of musical plays that made theatre-going respectable at a time when the stage was considered disreputable...

, English composer and theatre manager

• Thomas German Reed
  Thomas German Reed
  Thomas German Reed was an English composer and theatrical manager best known for creating the German Reed Entertainments, a genre of musical plays that made theatre-going respectable at a time when the stage was considered disreputable...
  
   (with W. S. Gilbert
  W. S. Gilbert
  Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...
  
  ): Our Island Home
  Our Island Home
  Our Island Home is a one-act musical entertainment with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Thomas German Reed that premiered on June 20, 1870 at the Royal Gallery of Illustration...
  
  

Carlo Gesualdo

Carlo Gesualdo

Carlo Gesualdo, known as Gesualdo di Venosa or Gesualdo da Venosa , Prince of Venosa and Count of Conza, was an Italian nobleman, lutenist, composer, and murderer....

, Italian composer and murderer

• Alfred Schnittke
  Alfred Schnittke
  Alfred Schnittke ; November 24, 1934 – August 3, 1998) was a Russian and Soviet composer. Schnittke's early music shows the strong influence of Dmitri Shostakovich. He developed a polystylistic technique in works such as the epic First Symphony and First Concerto Grosso...
  
  : Gesualdo

Allen Ginsberg

Allen Ginsberg

Irwin Allen Ginsberg was an American poet and one of the leading figures of the Beat Generation in the 1950s. He vigorously opposed militarism, materialism and sexual repression...

, American poet

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Marilyn

Lisa del Giocondo

Lisa del Giocondo

Lisa del Giocondo , also known as Lisa Gherardini, Lisa di Antonio Maria Gherardini and Mona Lisa, was a member of the Gherardini family of Florence and Tuscany in Italy...

, Italian woman, subject of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa

Mona Lisa

Mona Lisa is a portrait by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. It is a painting in oil on a poplar panel, completed circa 1503–1519...

• Max von Schillings
  Max von Schillings
  Max von Schillings was a German conductor, composer and theatre director. He was chief conductor at the Berlin State Opera from 1919 to 1925....
  
  : Mona Lisa
  Mona Lisa (opera)
  Mona Lisa, Op. 31 is an opera by the German composer Max von Schillings on a libretto by Beatrice von Dovsky. It was dedicated to the Philosophy Faculty of the University of Heidelberg, where the composer was awarded the title of professor....
  
   (as Mona Fiordalisa)

Salvatore Giuliano

Salvatore Giuliano

Salvatore Giuliano was a Sicilian peasant. It has been suggested that the subjugated social status of his class led him to become a bandit and separatist. He was mythologised during his life and after his death...

, Sicilian peasant

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Salvatore Giuliano

Godfrey of Bouillon

Godfrey of Bouillon

Godfrey of Bouillon was a medieval Frankish knight who was one of the leaders of the First Crusade from 1096 until his death. He was the Lord of Bouillon, from which he took his byname, from 1076 and the Duke of Lower Lorraine from 1087...

, Frankish knight, leader of the First Crusade

First Crusade

The First Crusade was a military expedition by Western Christianity to regain the Holy Lands taken in the Muslim conquest of the Levant, ultimately resulting in the recapture of Jerusalem...

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Rinaldo
  Rinaldo (opera)
  Rinaldo is an opera by George Frideric Handel composed in 1711. It is the first Italian language opera written specifically for the London stage. The libretto was prepared by Giacomo Rossi from a scenario provided by Aaron Hill. The work was first performed at the Queen's Theatre in London's...
  
  (as Goffredo)

Boris Godunov

Boris Godunov

Boris Fyodorovich Godunov was de facto regent of Russia from c. 1585 to 1598 and then the first non-Rurikid tsar from 1598 to 1605. The end of his reign saw Russia descend into the Time of Troubles.-Early years:...

, Tsar of Russia

• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Boris Godunov
  Boris Godunov (opera)
  Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
  
  

Xenia Borisovna Godunova

Tsarevna Xenia Borisovna of Russia

Xenia Borisovna Godunova was a Russian Tsarevna, daughter of Tsar Boris Godunov, and sister of Tsar Feodor II of Russia.She was very beautiful and well educated...

, daughter of Boris Godunov

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Dimitrij
  Dimitrij
  Dimitrij is an opera by Antonín Dvořák in 4 acts, set a libretto by Marie Červinková-Riegrová. More specifically, it belongs to the genre of Grand Opera. The work was first performed in Prague, at the Nové České Divadlo on 8 October 1882, after Dvořák began composition during May 1881...
  
  
• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Boris Godunov
  Boris Godunov (opera)
  Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
  
  

Sir Eugene Goossens

Eugène Aynsley Goossens

Sir Eugene Aynsley Goossens was an English conductor and composer.-Biography:He was born in Camden Town, London, the son of the Belgian conductor and violinist Eugène Goossens and the grandson of the conductor Eugène Goossens...

, English conductor and composer

• Drew Crawford: Eugene & Roie

St Maria Goretti

Maria Goretti

Maria Goretti is an Italian virgin-martyr of the Roman Catholic Church, and is one of its youngest canonized saints. She died from multiple stab wounds inflicted by her attempted rapist after she refused him...

, 20th century Catholic martyr

• Marcel Delannoy
  Marcel Delannoy
  Marcel Delannoy was a French composer and critic. He wrote operas, ballets, orchestral works, vocal and chamber works, and film scores.-Life and career:...
  
  : Maria Goretti, radiophonic opera

Francisco Goya

Francisco Goya

Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker regarded both as the last of the Old Masters and the first of the moderns. Goya was a court painter to the Spanish Crown, and through his works was both a commentator on and chronicler of his era...

, Spanish painter

• Michael Nyman
  Michael Nyman
  Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...
  
  : Facing Goya
  Facing Goya
  Facing Goya is an opera in four acts by Michael Nyman on a libretto by Victoria Hardie. It is an expansion of their one-act opera called Vital Statistics from 1987, dealing with such subjects as physiognomy and its practitioners, and also incorporates a musical motif from Nyman's art song, "The...
  
   (he appears as a silent apparition)

Princess Grace of Monaco

Grace Kelly

Grace Patricia Kelly was an American actress who, in April 1956, married Rainier III, Prince of Monaco, to become Princess consort of Monaco, styled as Her Serene Highness The Princess of Monaco, and commonly referred to as Princess Grace.After embarking on an acting career in 1950, at the age of...

, American-born actress (as Grace Kelly)

• Michael Daugherty
  Michael Daugherty
  Michael Kevin Daugherty is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. Influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and Postmodernism, Daugherty is one of the most colorful and widely performed American concert music composers of his generation...
  
  : Jackie O
  Jackie O (opera)
  Jackie O is a chamber opera in two acts composed by Michael Daugherty to a libretto by Wayne Koestenbaum. The 90 minute work, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 1995 and premiered in 1997, is inspired by American musical and popular culture of the late 1960s and episodes in the life of...
  
  

Antonio Gramsci

Antonio Gramsci

Antonio Gramsci was an Italian writer, politician, political philosopher, and linguist. He was a founding member and onetime leader of the Communist Party of Italy and was imprisoned by Benito Mussolini's Fascist regime...

, Italian political theorist

• Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono
  Luigi Nono was an Italian avant-garde composer of classical music and remains one of the most prominent composers of the 20th century.- Early years :Born in Venice, he was a member of a wealthy artistic family, and his grandfather was a notable painter...
  
  : Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore
  Al gran sole carico d'amore is an opera with music by Luigi Nono, based mainly on plays by Bertolt Brecht, but also incorporating texts of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Karl Marx, and Vladimir Lenin. Nono himself and Yury Lyubimov wrote the libretto. It premiered at the Teatro alla Scala on April...
  
  

Urbain Grandier

Urbain Grandier

Urbain Grandier was a French Catholic priest who was burned at the stake after being convicted of witchcraft, following the events of the so-called "Loudun Possessions." The circumstances of Father Grandier's trial and execution have attracted the attention of writers Alexandre Dumas, père and...

, French priest

• Krzysztof Penderecki
  Krzysztof Penderecki
  Krzysztof Penderecki , born November 23, 1933 in Dębica) is a Polish composer and conductor. His 1960 avant-garde Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima for string orchestra brought him to international attention, and this success was followed by acclaim for his choral St. Luke Passion. Both these...
  
  : The Devils of Loudun
  The Devils of Loudun (opera)
  The Devils of Loudun is an opera in three acts written in between 1968-69 by Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki. The work was commissioned by the Hamburg State Opera, which consequently gave the premiere on June 20, 1969...
  
  

Julia Dent Grant

Julia Grant

Julia Boggs Dent-Grant , was the wife of the 18th President of the United States, Ulysses S. Grant, and was First Lady of the United States from 1869 to 1877.-Background:...

, U.S. First Lady

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States as well as military commander during the Civil War and post-war Reconstruction periods. Under Grant's command, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military and ended the Confederate States of America...

, U.S. President

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  
• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Thomas Gray

Thomas Gray

Thomas Gray was a poet, letter-writer, classical scholar and professor at Cambridge University.-Early life and education:...

, English poet

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Edvard Grieg

Edvard Grieg

Edvard Hagerup Grieg was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is best known for his Piano Concerto in A minor, for his incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt , and for his collection of piano miniatures Lyric Pieces.-Biography:Edvard Hagerup Grieg was born in...

, Norwegian composer

Nina Grieg

Nina Grieg

Nina Grieg, born Hagerup was a Danish-Norwegian lyric soprano. She was the first cousin of composer Edvard Grieg, whom she married....

, Norwegian singer, cousin and wife of Edvard Grieg

• Edvard Grieg
  Edvard Grieg
  Edvard Hagerup Grieg was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is best known for his Piano Concerto in A minor, for his incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt , and for his collection of piano miniatures Lyric Pieces.-Biography:Edvard Hagerup Grieg was born in...
  
  , arr. Robert Wright
  Robert Wright (writer)
  Robert [Craig] Wright was an American composer-lyricist for Hollywood and the musical theatre best known for the Broadway musical and musical film Kismet, for which he and his professional partner George Forrest adapted themes by Alexander Borodin and added lyrics...
  
   and George Forrest
  George Forrest (author)
  George Forrest was a writer of music and lyrics for musical theatre best known for the show Kismet, adapted from the works of Alexander Borodin.-Biography:...
  
  : Song of Norway
  Song of Norway
  Song of Norway is an operetta written in 1944 by Robert Wright and George Forrest, adapted from the music of Edvard Grieg and the book by Milton Lazarus and Homer Curran...
  
  

Gen Leslie Groves

Leslie Groves

Lieutenant General Leslie Richard Groves, Jr. was a United States Army Corps of Engineers officer who oversaw the construction of the Pentagon and directed the Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb during World War II. As the son of a United States Army chaplain, Groves lived at a...

, American military officer

• John Adams: Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic is an opera by the contemporary American composer John Adams, with libretto by Peter Sellars. It premiered at the San Francisco Opera on 1 October 2005. The work focuses on the great stress and anxiety experienced by those at Los Alamos while the test of the first atomic bomb was...
  
  

Matthias Grünewald

Matthias Grünewald

Matthias Grünewald or "Mathis" , "Gothart" or "Neithardt" , , was a German Renaissance painter of religious works, who ignored Renaissance classicism to continue the expressive and intense style of late medieval Central European art into the 16th century.Only ten paintings—several consisting...

, German renaissance painter

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Mathis der Maler
  Mathis der Maler (opera)
  Mathis der Maler is an opera by Paul Hindemith. The libretto is also by the composer.The opera's genesis lay in Hindemith's interest in the Protestant Reformation...
  
  

Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli

Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli

Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli was the mistress of Lord Byron whilst he was living in Ravenna, Italy, and writing the first five cantos of Don Juan. She wrote the biographical account Lord Byron's Life in Italy....

, Italian mistress of Lord Byron

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Guinevere

Guinevere

Guinevere was the legendary queen consort of King Arthur. In tales and folklore, she was said to have had a love affair with Arthur's chief knight Sir Lancelot...

, wife of King Arthur

King Arthur

King Arthur is a legendary British leader of the late 5th and early 6th centuries, who, according to Medieval histories and romances, led the defence of Britain against Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and...

 of Britain

• Ernest Chausson
  Ernest Chausson
  Amédée-Ernest Chausson was a French romantic composer who died just as his career was beginning to flourish.-Life:Ernest Chausson was born in Paris into a prosperous bourgeois family...
  
  : Le roi Arthus
  Le roi Arthus
  Le roi Arthus is an opera in three acts by the French composer Ernest Chausson to his own libretto. It was composed between 1886 and 1895, but only first performed on 30 November 1903 at the Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels, after long delays...
  
  (as Guenièvre)

Francis, Duke of Guise

Francis, Duke of Guise

Francis de Lorraine II, Prince of Joinville, Duke of Guise, Duke of Aumale , called Balafré , was a French soldier and politician.-Early life:...

, French nobleman

• André Messager
  André Messager
  André Charles Prosper Messager , was a French composer, organist, pianist, conductor and administrator. His stage compositions included ballets and 30 opéra comiques and operettas, among which Véronique, had lasting success, with Les p'tites Michu and Monsieur Beaucaire also enjoying international...
  
  : Le bourgeois de Calais
  Le bourgeois de Calais
  Le bourgeois de Calais is an opéra comique in three acts of 1887, with music by André Messager and a French libretto by Ernest Dubreuil, Paul Burani....
  
  

Günther von Schwarzburg

Günther von Schwarzburg

Günther XXI von Schwarzburg , German king, was a descendant of the counts of Schwarzburg and the younger son of Henry VII, count of Blankenburg....

, German king

• Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Jakob Holzbauer was a composer of symphonies, concertos, operas, and chamber music, and a member of the Mannheim school. His aesthetic style is in line with that of the Sturm und Drang "movement" of German art and literature.Holzbauer was born in Vienna...
  
  : Günther von Schwarzburg
  Günther von Schwarzburg (opera)
  Günther von Schwarzburg is a Singspiel in three acts by Ignaz Holzbauer set to a German libretto by Anton Klein. Loosely based on events in the life of the 14th century German king, Günther von Schwarzburg, the opera premiered on 5 January 1777 at the Hoftheater in the Mannheim...
  
  

Saint Guntram

Guntram

Saint Guntram was the king of Burgundy from 561 to 592. He was a son of Chlothar I and Ingunda...

, King of Burgundy

• César Franck
  César Franck
  César-Auguste-Jean-Guillaume-Hubert Franck was a composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher who worked in Paris during his adult life....
  
  : Ghiselle
  Ghiselle
  Ghiselle is an opera by César Franck to a Merovingian-themed French libretto by the novelist Gilbert-Augustin Thierry, son of Amédée Thierry...
  
  

King Gustav III of Sweden

Gustav III of Sweden

Gustav III was King of Sweden from 1771 until his death. He was the eldest son of King Adolph Frederick and Queen Louise Ulrica of Sweden, she a sister of Frederick the Great of Prussia....

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : Gustave III
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera , is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi with text by Antonio Somma. The libretto is loosely based on an 1833 play, Gustave III, by French playwright Eugène Scribe who wrote about the historical assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden...
  
  

Nell Gwyn

Nell Gwyn

Eleanor "Nell" Gwyn was a long-time mistress of King Charles II of England. Called "pretty, witty Nell" by Samuel Pepys, she has been regarded as a living embodiment of the spirit of Restoration England and has come to be considered a folk heroine, with a story echoing the rags-to-royalty tale of...

, English actress, mistress of King Charles II

• Robert Planquette
  Robert Planquette
  Jean Robert Planquette was a French composer of songs and operettas.Several of Planquette's operettas were extraordinarily successful in Britain, including Les cloches de Corneville , the length of whose initial London run broke all records for any piece of musical theatre up to that time, and Rip...
  
  : Nell Gwynne
  Nell Gwynne (operetta)
  Nell Gwynne is a three-act comic opera composed by Robert Planquette, with a libretto by H. B. Farnie. The libretto is based on the play Rochester by William Thomas Moncrieff. The piece was a rare instance of an opera by a French composer being produced first in London...
  
  

H

Emma, Lady Hamilton

Emma, Lady Hamilton

Emma, Lady Hamilton is best remembered as the mistress of Lord Nelson and as the muse of George Romney. She was born Amy Lyon in Ness near Neston, Cheshire, England, the daughter of a blacksmith, Henry Lyon, who died when she was two months old...

, English mistress of Horatio, Lord Nelson

Sir William Hamilton

William Hamilton (diplomat)

Sir William Hamilton KB, PC, FRS was a Scottish diplomat, antiquarian, archaeologist and vulcanologist. After a short period as a Member of Parliament, he served as British Ambassador to the Kingdom of Naples from 1764 to 1800...

, British diplomat, husband of Emma, Lady Hamilton

• Lennox Berkeley
  Lennox Berkeley
  Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley was an English composer.- Biography :He was born in Oxford, England, and educated at the Dragon School, Gresham's School and Merton College, Oxford...
  
  : Nelson
  Nelson (opera)
  Nelson is an opera in 3 acts by Lennox Berkeley to a libretto by Alan Pryce-Jones. The opera centres on the love affair of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson and Emma, Lady Hamilton. Completed in 1951, it was first performed in full in 1954.-Background:...
  
  

King Harald III of Norway

• Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or...
  
  : Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy is an opera in eight scenes, comprised in three acts, by the Ukrainian composer Heorhiy Maiboroda, written in 1973 and premiered in 1975...
  
  
• Judith Weir
  Judith Weir
  Judith Weir CBE, is a British composer.-Biography:Her music has been appreciated by audiences and critics alike. She trained with John Tavener while still at school and subsequently with Robin Holloway at King's College, Cambridge, graduating in 1976...
  
  : King Harald's Saga
  King Harald's Saga
  King Harald's Saga, Grand opera in three acts for unaccompanied solo soprano singing eight rôles is a monodrama by Judith Weir, commissioned by Jane Manning and premiered on May 17, 1979...
  
  

Sir Thomas Hardy, 1st Baronet, British sea captain, commander of HMS Victory at the Battle of Trafalgar

• Lennox Berkeley
  Lennox Berkeley
  Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley was an English composer.- Biography :He was born in Oxford, England, and educated at the Dragon School, Gresham's School and Merton College, Oxford...
  
  : Nelson
  Nelson (opera)
  Nelson is an opera in 3 acts by Lennox Berkeley to a libretto by Alan Pryce-Jones. The opera centres on the love affair of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson and Emma, Lady Hamilton. Completed in 1951, it was first performed in full in 1954.-Background:...
  
  

Harold Godwinson

Harold Godwinson

Harold Godwinson was the last Anglo-Saxon King of England.It could be argued that Edgar the Atheling, who was proclaimed as king by the witan but never crowned, was really the last Anglo-Saxon king...

(Harold II), Anglo-Saxon King of England

• Frederic Hymen Cowen
  Frederic Hymen Cowen
  Sir Frederic Hymen Cowen , was a British pianist, conductor and composer.-Early years:Cowen was born Hymen Frederick Cohen at 90 Duke Street, Kingston, Jamaica, the fifth and last child of Frederick Augustus Cohen and Emily Cohen née Davis. His siblings were Elizabeth Rose Cohen ; actress,...
  
  : Harold or the Norman Conquest
  Harold or the Norman Conquest
  Opera in four acts with music by the British composer Frederic H. Cowen with a libretto by Edward Malet, edited by Frederic Edward Weatherly, adapted into the German by L.A. Caumont, and first performed at Covent Garden, London on 8 June 1895.-Act 1.:...
  
  
• Judith Weir
  Judith Weir
  Judith Weir CBE, is a British composer.-Biography:Her music has been appreciated by audiences and critics alike. She trained with John Tavener while still at school and subsequently with Robin Holloway at King's College, Cambridge, graduating in 1976...
  
  : King Harald's Saga
  King Harald's Saga
  King Harald's Saga, Grand opera in three acts for unaccompanied solo soprano singing eight rôles is a monodrama by Judith Weir, commissioned by Jane Manning and premiered on May 17, 1979...
  
  

Harun al-Rashid

Harun al-Rashid

Hārūn al-Rashīd was the fifth Arab Abbasid Caliph in Iraq. He was born in Rey, Iran, close to modern Tehran. His birth date remains a point of discussion, though, as various sources give the dates from 763 to 766)....

, Abbasid Caliph

• Carl Maria von Weber
  Carl Maria von Weber
  Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber was a German composer, conductor, pianist, guitarist and critic, one of the first significant composers of the Romantic school....
  
  : Oberon
  Oberon (opera)
  Oberon, or The Elf King's Oath is a 3-act romantic opera in English with spoken dialogue and music by Carl Maria von Weber. The libretto by James Robinson Planche was based on a German poem, Oberon, by Christoph Martin Wieland, which itself was based on the epic romance Huon de Bordeaux, a French...
  
  

Hasdrubal Gisco

Hasdrubal Gisco

Hasdrubal Gisco or Hasdrubal son of Gisco was a Carthaginian general who fought against Rome in Iberia and North Africa during the Second Punic War. He should not be confused with Hasdrubal Barca, the brother of Hannibal....

, Carthaginian general

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  

Wiebbe Hayes

Wiebbe Hayes

Wiebbe Hayes was a colonial soldier from Winschoten, Netherlands. Hayes became a national hero after he led a group of soldiers, sailors and other survivors of the shipwreck of the Batavia against the murderous mutineers led by Jeronimus Cornelisz at the Houtman Abrolhos Islands , off the Western...

, Dutch soldier

• Richard Mills
  Richard Mills
  Richard John Mills AM, DMus BA Qld, is an Australian conductor and composer. He currently works as Artistic Director of the West Australian Opera and Artistic Consultant with Orchestra Victoria...
  
  : Batavia
  Batavia (opera)
  Batavia is an opera in three acts and a prologue by Richard Mills to a libretto by Peter Goldsworthy,commissioned by Opera Australia. The plot is based on the historical events surrounding the Dutchsailing ship Batavia....
  
  

Heloïse, French nun associated with Peter Abelard

Peter Abelard

Peter Abelard was a medieval French scholastic philosopher, theologian and preeminent logician. The story of his affair with and love for Héloïse has become legendary...

• Peter Tahourdin
  Peter Tahourdin
  Peter Richard Tahourdin was an English-born Australian composer. His compositions range from orchestral and chamber music to choral and educational music, as well as music for the opera and ballet. However, his principal contribution was in the field of electronic music.-Early life and...
  
  : Héloise and Abelard
• Charles Wilson
  Charles Wilson (composer)
  Charles Mills Wilson is a Canadian composer, choral conductor, and music educator.-Biography:Wilson began studying piano at age six with Wilfred Powell and later studied organ with Charles Peaker. He studied composition with Godfrey Ridout at the University of Toronto, earning a Bachelors of Music...
  
  : Héloise and Abelard

Sally Hemings

Sally Hemings

Sarah "Sally" Hemings was a mixed-race slave owned by President Thomas Jefferson through inheritance from his wife. She was the half-sister of Jefferson's wife, Martha Wayles Skelton Jefferson by their father John Wayles...

, American mixed-race slave owned by Thomas Jefferson

• Damon Ferrante
  Damon Ferrante
  Damon Ferrante is an American composer whose works have been performed in concert halls and performance venues throughout North America, most notably, Carnegie Hall, Symphony Space, Guild Hall, and Theatre Project....
  
  : Jefferson & Poe: A Lyric Opera
  Jefferson & Poe: A Lyric Opera
  Jefferson & Poe is a lyric opera in two acts with music by Damon Ferrante and libretto by Daniel Mark Epstein.The opera takes place at Monticello on a March evening in the early nineteenth century and portrays two love stories: one between an elderly Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings and the other...
  
  

Henri, Prince of Condé, French noble

• Krzysztof Penderecki
  Krzysztof Penderecki
  Krzysztof Penderecki , born November 23, 1933 in Dębica) is a Polish composer and conductor. His 1960 avant-garde Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima for string orchestra brought him to international attention, and this success was followed by acclaim for his choral St. Luke Passion. Both these...
  
  : The Devils of Loudun
  The Devils of Loudun (opera)
  The Devils of Loudun is an opera in three acts written in between 1968-69 by Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki. The work was commissioned by the Hamburg State Opera, which consequently gave the premiere on June 20, 1969...
  
  

Henrietta Maria of France

Henrietta Maria of France

Henrietta Maria of France ; was the Queen consort of England, Scotland and Ireland as the wife of King Charles I...

, queen consort of Charles I of England

Charles I of England

Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...

• Vincenzo Bellini
  Vincenzo Bellini
  Vincenzo Salvatore Carmelo Francesco Bellini was an Italian opera composer. His greatest works are I Capuleti ed i Montecchi , La sonnambula , Norma , Beatrice di Tenda , and I puritani...
  
  : I puritani
  I puritani
  I puritani is an opera in three acts by Vincenzo Bellini. It was his last opera. Its libretto is by Count Carlo Pepoli, based on Têtes rondes et Cavaliers by Jacques-François Ancelot and Joseph Xavier Saintine, which is in turn based on Walter Scott's novel Old Mortality. It was first produced at...
  
  

King Henry II of England

Henry II of England

Henry II ruled as King of England , Count of Anjou, Count of Maine, Duke of Normandy, Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, Count of Nantes, Lord of Ireland and, at various times, controlled parts of Wales, Scotland and western France. Henry, the great-grandson of William the Conqueror, was the...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Rosmonda d'Inghilterra
  Rosmonda d'Inghilterra
  Rosmonda d'Inghilterra is a melodramma or opera in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The Italian libretto was written by Felice Romani originally for Coccia's Rosmunda...
  
  (as Enrico II)
• Otto Nicolai: Rosmonda d'Inghilterra (given at the first performance as Enrico II)

King Henry III of France

Henry III of France

Henry III was King of France from 1574 to 1589. As Henry of Valois, he was the first elected monarch of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth with the dual titles of King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1573 to 1575.-Childhood:Henry was born at the Royal Château de Fontainebleau,...

also as Henri de Valois, King of Poland, Grand Duke of Lithuania

• Emmanuel Chabrier
  Emmanuel Chabrier
  Emmanuel Chabrier was a French Romantic composer and pianist. Although known primarily for two of his orchestral works, España and Joyeuse marche, he left an important corpus of operas , songs, and piano music as well...
  
  : Le roi malgré lui
  Le roi malgré lui
  Le roi malgré lui is an opéra-comique in three acts by Emmanuel Chabrier with an original libretto by Emile de Najac and Paul Burani. The opera is revived occasionally, but has not found a place in the repertory, mainly because of the poor libretto...
  
  

King Henry V of England

Henry V of England

Henry V was King of England from 1413 until his death at the age of 35 in 1422. He was the second monarch belonging to the House of Lancaster....

• Gustav Holst
  Gustav Holst
  Gustav Theodore Holst was an English composer. He is most famous for his orchestral suite The Planets....
  
  : At the Boar's Head
  At the Boar's Head
  At the Boar's Head is an opera in one act by the English composer Gustav Holst, his op. 42. Holst himself described the work as "A Musical Interlude in One Act". The libretto, by the composer himself, is based on Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1 and Henry IV, Part 2.Holst devised the idea for this...
  
  (as Prince Hal)

King Henry VIII of England

Henry VIII of England

Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...

• Sir Peter Maxwell Davies
  Peter Maxwell Davies
  Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, CBE is an English composer and conductor and is currently Master of the Queen's Music.-Biography:...
  
  : Taverner
  Taverner (opera)
  Taverner is an opera with music and libretto by Peter Maxwell Davies. It is based on the life of the 16th century English composer John Taverner, but in what Davies himself acknowledged was a non-realistic treatment. The gestation for the opera dated as far back as 1956 during Davies's years in...
  
  (not identified as such)
• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Ippolito Pindemonte's Enrico VIII ossia Anna Bolena and Alessandro Pepoli's Anna Bolena, both telling of the life of Anne Boleyn...
  
  (as Enrico)
• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Henry VIII
  Henry VIII (opera)
  Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on El cisma en Inglaterra by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.-Composition history:...
  
  

Henry the Fowler, Duke of Saxony, King of the Germans

• Richard Wagner
  Richard Wagner
  Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
  
  : Lohengrin
  Lohengrin (opera)
  Lohengrin is a romantic opera in three acts composed and written by Richard Wagner, first performed in 1850. The story of the eponymous character is taken from medieval German romance, notably the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach and its sequel, Lohengrin, written by a different author, itself...
  
  

Henry the Lion

Henry the Lion

Henry the Lion was a member of the Welf dynasty and Duke of Saxony, as Henry III, from 1142, and Duke of Bavaria, as Henry XII, from 1156, which duchies he held until 1180....

, German prince (Henry III of Saxony, Henry XII of Bavaria)

• Agostino Steffani
  Agostino Steffani
  Agostino Steffani was an Italian ecclesiastic, diplomat and composer.-Biography:Steffani was born at Castelfranco Veneto. At a very early age he was admitted as a chorister at San Marco, Venice...
  
  : Enrico il Leone

Marie-Jean Hérault de Séchelles

Marie-Jean Hérault de Séchelles

Marie-Jean Hérault de Séchelles was a French judge and politician who took part in the French Revolution.-Origins and early career:...

, French revolutionary politician

• Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz. He also composed pieces for piano, violin and organ.-Biography:...
  
  : Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod is an opera by composer Gottfried von Einem to a libretto by Boris Blacher and Gottfried von Einem after Georg Büchner's 1835 play Danton's Death. Its first performance took place in Salzburg, August 6, 1947...
  
  

Fanny Holland

Fanny Holland

Fanny Holland was an English singer and comic actress primarily known as the creator of principal soprano roles in numerous German Reed Entertainments.-Life and career:...

, English singer and actress

• Thomas German Reed
  Thomas German Reed
  Thomas German Reed was an English composer and theatrical manager best known for creating the German Reed Entertainments, a genre of musical plays that made theatre-going respectable at a time when the stage was considered disreputable...
  
   (with W. S. Gilbert
  W. S. Gilbert
  Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...
  
  ): Our Island Home
  Our Island Home
  Our Island Home is a one-act musical entertainment with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Thomas German Reed that premiered on June 20, 1870 at the Royal Gallery of Illustration...
  
  

Clasina Maria "Sien" Hoornik

Sien (Van Gogh series)

Vincent van Gogh drew and painted a series of works of his mistress Sien during their time together in the Netherlands. Commonly called Sien Hoornik, Clasina Maria Hoornik lived with Vincent van Gogh during much of his time in The Hague from 1881 to 1883. Van Gogh used Sien, a pregnant prostitute,...

(1850–1904), Dutch alcoholic prostitute, sometime lover of Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent Willem van Gogh , and used Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: , with a voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of his work was produced, it is...

• Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara is a Finnish composer of contemporary classical music, and is one of the most notable Finnish composers after Jean Sibelius.-Life:...
  
  : Vincent
  Vincent (opera)
  Vincent is an opera in three acts by Einojuhani Rautavaara first performed in 1990. The libretto was by the composer, and consists of scenes from the life of the artist Vincent van Gogh, told in retrospect....
  
  

Pharaoh Horemheb

Horemheb

Horemheb was the last Pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty from either 1319 BC to late 1292 BC, or 1306 to late 1292 BC although he was not related to the preceding royal family and is believed to have been of common birth.Before he became pharaoh, Horemheb was the commander in chief...

 of Egypt

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Akhnaten
  Akhnaten (opera)
  Akhnaten is an opera in three acts based on the life and religious convictions of the pharaoh Akhenaten , written by the American minimalist composer Philip Glass in 1983. Akhnaten had its world premiere on March 24, 1984 at the Stuttgart State Opera, under the German title Echnaton...
  
  

Count Claes Fredrik Horn, co-conspirator with Anckarström in the assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : Gustave III (as Dehorn)
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera , is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi with text by Antonio Somma. The libretto is loosely based on an 1833 play, Gustave III, by French playwright Eugène Scribe who wrote about the historical assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden...
  
  

Harry Houdini

Harry Houdini

Harry Houdini was a Hungarian-born American magician and escapologist, stunt performer, actor and film producer noted for his sensational escape acts...

, Hungarian-American escapologist

• Peter Schat
  Peter Schat
  Peter Schat was a Dutch composer.Schat studied composition with Kees van Baaren at the conservatories in Utrecht and The Hague from 1952 until 1958, and then went on to study in London with Mátyás Seiber in 1959 and with Pierre Boulez in Basle in 1960–61...
  
  : Houdini

László Hunyadi

László Hunyadi

Ladislaus Hunyadi or László Hunyadi was a Hungarian statesman.Ladislaus Hunyadi was the elder of the two sons of John Hunyadi, voivode of Transylvania and later regent of the Kingdom of Hungary, and Elizabeth Szilágyi. He was the older brother of Matthias Hunyadi, who would later became the king...

, Hungarian statesman

• Ferenc Erkel: Hunyadi László
  Hunyadi László (opera)
  Hunyadi László is an opera in three acts by the Hungarian composer Ferenc Erkel. The libretto, by Béni Egressy, is based on a play by Lörinc Tóth. The opera was first performed at the Pesti Nemzeti Magyar Szinház, Budapest on 27 January 1844...
  
  

Stig Andersen Hvide

Stig Andersen Hvide

Stig Andersen Hvide was a Danish nobleman and magnate, known as the leading man among the outlaws after the murder of King Eric V of Denmark. In Danish tradition, he is known as Marsk Stig.-Biography:...

, Danish marshall, later an outlaw

• Peter Arnold Heise
  Peter Arnold Heise
  Peter Heise was a Danish composer, best known for the opera Drot og Marsk ....
  
  : Drot og marsk
  Drot og Marsk
  Drot og marsk is an opera by the Danish composer Peter Heise. The libretto, by Christian Richardt, is based on Johannes Carsten Hauch's play Marsk Stig . The opera was first performed at the Royal Theatre, Copenhagen on September 25, 1878.-Roles:-Synopsis:The opera is based on the true story of...
  
  (King and Marshall) (as Marshall Stig)

Queen Hypsicratea

Hypsicratea

Hypsicratea or Hipsicratea , was a Caucasian woman who became Queen of Pontus. She ruled a confederacy of states with King Mithridates VI of Pontus....

 of Pontus, consort of Mithradates VI

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  (as Issicratea)
• Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti was an Italian Baroque composer especially famous for his operas and chamber cantatas. He is considered the founder of the Neapolitan school of opera. He was the father of two other composers, Domenico Scarlatti and Pietro Filippo Scarlatti.-Life:Scarlatti was born in...
  
  : Mitridate Eupatore
  Mitridate Eupatore
  Il Mitridate Eupatore is an opera seria in five acts by the Italian composer Alessandro Scarlatti with a libretto by Girolamo Frigimelica Roberti. It was first performed at the Teatro San Giovanni Grisostomo, Venice on 5 January, 1707...
  
  

I

Muhammad al-Idrisi

Muhammad al-Idrisi

Abu Abd Allah Muhammad al-Idrisi al-Qurtubi al-Hasani al-Sabti or simply Al Idrisi was a Moroccan Muslim geographer, cartographer, Egyptologist and traveller who lived in Sicily, at the court of King Roger II. Muhammed al-Idrisi was born in Ceuta then belonging to the Almoravid Empire and died in...

, Andalusian cartographer, traveller

• Karol Szymanowski
  Karol Szymanowski
  Karol Maciej Szymanowski was a Polish composer and pianist.-Life:Szymanowski was born into a wealthy land-owning Polish gentry family in Tymoszówka, then in the Russian Empire, now in Cherkasy Oblast, Ukraine. He studied music privately with his father before going to Gustav Neuhaus'...
  
  : King Roger
  King Roger
  King Roger is an opera by the Polish composer Karol Szymanowski set to a libretto by Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz. It was first performed on 19 June 1926 in Warsaw, Poland...
  
  (as Edrisi)

Gwen Ifill

Gwen Ifill

Gwendolyn L. "Gwen" Ifill is an American journalist, television newscaster and author. She is the managing editor and moderator of Washington Week and a senior correspondent for the PBS NewsHour, both of which air on PBS. She is a political analyst, and moderated the 2004 and 2008 Vice...

, American television journalist

• Curtis K. Hughes: Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say It Ain't So, Joe is a chamber opera in two acts by Curtis K. Hughes inspired by text drawn from the public record of the 2008 United States vice-presidential debate...
  
  

Saint Ignatius of Loyola

Ignatius of Loyola

Ignatius of Loyola was a Spanish knight from a Basque noble family, hermit, priest since 1537, and theologian, who founded the Society of Jesus and was its first Superior General. Ignatius emerged as a religious leader during the Counter-Reformation...

, Spanish knight, founder of the Society of Jesus

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Four Saints in Three Acts
  Four Saints in Three Acts
  Four Saints in Three Acts is an opera by American composer Virgil Thomson with a libretto by Gertrude Stein. Written in 1927-8, it contains about 20 saints, and is in at least four acts...
  
  

Igor Svyatoslavich

Igor Svyatoslavich

Igor Svyatoslavich the Brave was a Rus’ prince...

, Prince of Putivl, Novgorod-Seversk and Chernigov

• Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin was a Russian Romantic composer and chemist of Georgian–Russian parentage. He was a member of the group of composers called The Five , who were dedicated to producing a specifically Russian kind of art music...
  
  : Prince Igor
  Prince Igor
  Prince Igor is an opera in four acts with a prologue. It was composed by Alexander Borodin. The composer adapted the libretto from the East Slavic epic The Lay of Igor's Host, which recounts the campaign of Russian prince Igor Svyatoslavich against the invading Polovtsian tribes in 1185...
  
  

Jaakko Ilkka

Jaakko Ilkka

Jaakko Pentinpoika Ilkka was a Finnish yeoman and trader. He is remembered for leading the Cudgel War of 1596; at its end, and the peasants' defeat on January 1–2, 1597, he escaped, but was soon recaptured and executed for his part in the fighting.Ilkka was the subject of an opera by Jorma...

, Finnish peasant leader

• Jorma Panula
  Jorma Panula
  Jorma Panula is a Finnish conductor, composer, and professor of conducting.Panula is a graduate of the Sibelius Academy, where he studied the organ, church music and conducting...
  
  : Jaakko Ilkka
  Jaakko Ilkka (opera)
  Jaakko Ilkka is an opera by Finnish composer Jorma Panula; it deals with the eponymous peasant leader of the Cudgel War of 1596, and was composed between 1977 and 1978....
  
  

Ingegerd Olofsdotter of Sweden

Ingegerd Olofsdotter of Sweden

Princess Ingegerd Olofsdotter of Sweden also known as Irene, Anna and St. Anna , was a Swedish princess and a Grand Princess of Kiev. She was the daughter of Swedish King Olof Skötkonung and Estrid of the Obotrites and the consort of Yaroslav I the Wise of Kiev.Ingegerd or St. Anna is often...

• Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or...
  
  : Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy is an opera in eight scenes, comprised in three acts, by the Ukrainian composer Heorhiy Maiboroda, written in 1973 and premiered in 1975...
  
  

John Ireland

John Ireland (Dean of Westminster)

John Ireland was an English Anglican priest, who served as Dean of Westminster from 1816 until his death. In this role, he carried the crown during the coronation services at Westminster Abbey of two monarchs...

, Dean of Westminster

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Isabeau of Bavaria

Isabeau of Bavaria

Isabeau of Bavaria was Queen consort of France as spouse of King Charles VI of France, a member of the Valois Dynasty...

, Queen Consort of Charles VI of France

• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : Charles VI
  Charles VI (opera)
  Charles VI is an 1843 French grand opera in five acts with music composed by Fromental Halevy and a libretto by Casimir Delavigne and his brother Germain Delavigne.-Performance history:...
  
  

Isabel Moctezuma (Teutile), daughter of Moctezuma II

• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Motezuma
  Motezuma
  Motezuma is an opera in three acts by Antonio Vivaldi with an Italian libretto by Girolamo Giusti. The first performance was given in the Teatro Sant'Angelo in Venice on 14 November 1733...
  
  

Queen Isabella I of Castile

Isabella I of Castile

Isabella I was Queen of Castile and León. She and her husband Ferdinand II of Aragon brought stability to both kingdoms that became the basis for the unification of Spain. Later the two laid the foundations for the political unification of Spain under their grandson, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor...

• Alberto Franchetti
  Alberto Franchetti
  Alberto Franchetti was an Italian opera composer.-Biography:Alberto Franchetti was born in Turin, a Jewish nobleman of independent means. He studied first in Venice, then in Dresden under Felix Draeseke, and finally at the Munich Conservatory under Josef Rheinberger. His first major success...
  
  : Cristoforo Colombo
  Cristoforo Colombo (opera)
  Cristoforo Colombo is an opera in four acts and an epilogue by Alberto Franchetti to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica...
  
  
• Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud
  Darius Milhaud was a French composer and teacher. He was a member of Les Six—also known as The Group of Six—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions are influenced by jazz and make use of polytonality...
  
  : Christophe Colomb
  Christophe Colomb
  Christophe Colomb is an opera in two parts by the French composer Darius Milhaud. The libretto, by the poet Paul Claudel, is based on his own play Le livre de Christophe Colomb about the life of Christopher Columbus. The opera was first performed at the Staatsoper, Berlin on 5 May 1930 in a German...
  
  
• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : The Voyage
  The Voyage
  The Voyage is an opera in three acts by the American composer Philip Glass . The libretto was written by David Henry Hwang....
  
  

Isabella of France

Isabella of France

Isabella of France , sometimes described as the She-wolf of France, was Queen consort of England as the wife of Edward II of England. She was the youngest surviving child and only surviving daughter of Philip IV of France and Joan I of Navarre...

, Queen Consort of Edward II of England and mother of Edward III

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : L'assedio di Calais
  L'assedio di Calais
  L'assedio di Calais is a melodramma lirico, or opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvatore Cammarano wrote the Italian libretto after Luigi Marchionni's play and, secondarily, Luigi Henry's ballet , both based on Pierre Du Belloy's play Le siège de Calais...
  
  (she is Edward III's wife in the opera; in real life, she was his mother)

Isabella of Portugal

Isabella of Portugal

Isabella of Portugal was a Portuguese Princess and Holy Roman Empress, Duchess of Burgundy, and a Queen Regent/Consort of Spain. She was the daughter of Manuel I of Portugal and Maria of Aragon. By her marriage to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, Isabella was also Holy Roman Empress and Queen...

, Holy Roman Empress, Queen Consort of Aragon and Castile

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

Tsar Ivan IV of Russia

Ivan IV of Russia

Ivan IV Vasilyevich , known in English as Ivan the Terrible , was Grand Prince of Moscow from 1533 until his death. His long reign saw the conquest of the Khanates of Kazan, Astrakhan, and Siberia, transforming Russia into a multiethnic and multiconfessional state spanning almost one billion acres,...

, "Ivan the Terrible"

• Georges Bizet
  Georges Bizet
  Georges Bizet formally Alexandre César Léopold Bizet, was a French composer, mainly of operas. In a career cut short by his early death, he achieved few successes before his final work, Carmen, became one of the most popular and frequently performed works in the entire opera repertory.During a...
  
  : Ivan IV
  Ivan IV (opera)
  Ivan IV is an opera in five acts by Georges Bizet, with a libretto by Francois-Hippolyte Leroy and Henri Trianon.-Composition history:A libretto on the subject of Ivan the Terrible was offered to Charles Gounod in January 1856 by the general administrator of the Paris Opera, François Louis Crosnier...
  
  
• Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five.The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie, refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César...
  
  : The Noblewoman Vera Sheloga
  The Noblewoman Vera Sheloga
  The Noblewoman Vera Sheloga is an opera in one act by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. Rimsky-Korsakov wrote the libretto, which he based on the drama by Lev Alexandrovich Mey. The opera was composed in 1898 from material omitted from Rimsky-Korsakov's first opera, The Maid of Pskov .The work was first...
  
  (unseen role; he is the father of Vera's child)
• Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov: The Maid of Pskov
  The Maid of Pskov
  The Maid of Pskov , is an opera in three acts and six scenes by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. The libretto was written by the composer, and is based on the drama of the same name by Lev Mei. The story concerns the Tsar Ivan the Terrible and his efforts to subject the cities of Pskov and Novgorod to his...
  
  

Izumi Shikibu

Izumi Shikibu

was a mid Heian period Japanese poet. She is a member of the . She was the contemporary of Murasaki Shikibu, and Akazome Emon at the court of Joto Mon'in.-Early life:...

, Japanese poetess

• Salvatore Sciarrino
  Salvatore Sciarrino
  Salvatore Sciarrino is an Italian composer of contemporary classical music.-Biography:In his youth, Sciarrino was attracted to the visual arts, but began experimenting with music when he was twelve. Though he had some lessons from Antonino Titone and Turi Belfiore, he is primarily self-taught as a...
  
  : Da gelo a gelo
  Da gelo a gelo
  Da gelo a gelo is an opera in 100 scenes by Salvatore Sciarrino. The composer's Italian libretto is based on one year and 65 poems from the journal of Izumi Shikibu encompassing her affair with Prince Atsumishi.The opera was a co-commission of the Schwetzingen Festival, the Grand Théâtre de...
  
  

J

Jack the Ripper

Jack the Ripper

"Jack the Ripper" is the best-known name given to an unidentified serial killer who was active in the largely impoverished areas in and around the Whitechapel district of London in 1888. The name originated in a letter, written by someone claiming to be the murderer, that was disseminated in the...

, unidentified murderer of English prostitutes

• Alban Berg
  Alban Berg
  Alban Maria Johannes Berg was an Austrian composer. He was a member of the Second Viennese School with Arnold Schoenberg and Anton Webern, and produced compositions that combined Mahlerian Romanticism with a personal adaptation of Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique.-Early life:Berg was born in...
  
  : Lulu
  Lulu (opera)
  Lulu is an opera by the composer Alban Berg. The libretto was adapted by Berg himself from Frank Wedekind's plays Erdgeist and Die Büchse der Pandora .-Composition history:...
  
  

King James II of Cyprus

James II of Cyprus

James II of Cyprus or Jacques II le Bâtard de Lusignan , was the illegitimate son of John II of Cyprus and Marietta de Patras.-Archbishop of Nicosia:...

"James the Bastard of Lusignan"

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Caterina Cornaro
  Caterina Cornaro (opera)
  Caterina Cornaro ossia La Regina di Cipro is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in a prologue and two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Giacomo Sacchèro wrote the Italian libretto after Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges' libretto for Halévy's La reine de Chypre...
  
  (as Lusignano)
• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : La reine de Chypre
  La reine de Chypre
  La reine de Chypre is an 1841 grand opera composed by Fromental Halévy to a libretto by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges.-Background:...
  
  (as Lusignan)

King James V of Scotland

James V of Scotland

James V was King of Scots from 9 September 1513 until his death, which followed the Scottish defeat at the Battle of Solway Moss...

• Gioachino Rossini: La donna del lago
  La donna del lago
  La donna del lago is an opera by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Andrea Leone Tottola, based on The Lady of the Lake, a poem by Sir Walter Scott.This opera was the first to be based on Scott's romantic works...
  
  (in disguise as Uberto)

Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey , also known as The Nine Days' Queen, was an English noblewoman who was de facto monarch of England from 10 July until 19 July 1553 and was subsequently executed...

, disputed Queen of England

• Henri Büsser
  Henri Büsser
  Henri Büsser was a French classical composer, organist, and conductor.- Biography :Paul-Henri Büsser was born in Toulouse, of partly Teutonic ancestry. He entered the Conservatoire in Paris in 1889; there he studied organ with César Franck and composition with Ernest Guiraud...
  
  : Jane Grey

Queen Jane (Seymour)

Jane Seymour

Jane Seymour was Queen of England as the third wife of King Henry VIII. She succeeded Anne Boleyn as queen consort following the latter's execution for trumped up charges of high treason, incest and adultery in May 1536. She died of postnatal complications less than two weeks after the birth of...

, third consort of Henry VIII of England

Henry VIII of England

Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Ippolito Pindemonte's Enrico VIII ossia Anna Bolena and Alessandro Pepoli's Anna Bolena, both telling of the life of Anne Boleyn...
  
  

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...

, U.S. President

• Damon Ferrante
  Damon Ferrante
  Damon Ferrante is an American composer whose works have been performed in concert halls and performance venues throughout North America, most notably, Carnegie Hall, Symphony Space, Guild Hall, and Theatre Project....
  
  : Jefferson & Poe: A Lyric Opera
  Jefferson & Poe: A Lyric Opera
  Jefferson & Poe is a lyric opera in two acts with music by Damon Ferrante and libretto by Daniel Mark Epstein.The opera takes place at Monticello on a March evening in the early nineteenth century and portrays two love stories: one between an elderly Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings and the other...
  
  

Jérôme Bonaparte

Jérôme Bonaparte

Jérôme-Napoléon Bonaparte, French Prince, King of Westphalia, 1st Prince of Montfort was the youngest brother of Napoleon, who made him king of Westphalia...

, King of Westphalia

• Karl Michael Ziehrer
  Karl Michael Ziehrer
  Karl Michael Ziehrer was an Austrian composer. In his lifetime, he was one of the fiercest rivals of the Strauss family; most notably Johann Strauss II and Eduard Strauss....
  
  : König Jérôme oder Immer Lustick

Jesus of Nazareth

Jesus

Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...

and his apostles

• Harrison Birtwistle
  Harrison Birtwistle
  Sir Harrison Paul Birtwistle CH is a British contemporary composer.-Life:Birtwistle was born in Accrington, a mill town in Lancashire some 20 miles north of Manchester. His interest in music was encouraged by his mother, who bought him a clarinet when he was seven, and arranged for him to have...
  
  : The Last Supper
  The Last Supper (opera)
  The Last Supper is an opera with music by Sir Harrison Birtwistle to an English and Latin libretto by Robin Blaser. Birtwistle composed the music over the period written in 1998-1999. The world premiere was given by the Berlin State Opera on 18 April 2000, with the production directed by Martin...
  
  
• Constantine Koukias
  Constantine Koukias
  Constantine Koukias is a Greek-Australian composer and flautist.He is the co-founder and Artistic Director of IHOS Music Theatre and Opera, based in Hobart, Tasmania. He is well known for his innovative work in contemporary opera and other forms...
  
  : Days and Nights with Christ
  Days and Nights with Christ
  Days and Nights with Christ is the first of five full-scale operas by the Australian composer Constantine Koukias , and was the first opera / music theatre production by IHOS Experimental Theatre Troupe . It premiered at Hobart’s Salamanca Arts Festival in 1990 and two years later was a highlight...
  
  (played by a non-singing dancer)
• Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
  
  : Christus, sacred opera

Jiang Qing

Jiang Qing

Jiang Qing was the pseudonym that was used by Chinese leader Mao Zedong's last wife and major Communist Party of China power figure. She went by the stage name Lan Ping during her acting career, and was known by various other names during her life...

Chinese figure, 4th wife of Mao Zedong

• John Adams: Nixon in China
  Nixon in China (opera)
  Nixon in China is an opera in three acts by John Adams, with a libretto by Alice Goodman. Adams' first opera, it was inspired by the 1972 visit to China by US President Richard Nixon. The work premiered at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987, in a production by Peter Sellars with...
  
  (as Chiang Ch'ing)
• Bright Sheng
  Bright Sheng
  Bright Sheng is a Chinese-American composer, conductor, and pianist. He has lived in the United States since 1982 and is on faculty at the University of Michigan. In 1999, the White House commissioned Sheng to compose a piece to honor the Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji at a state dinner hosted by...
  
  : Madame Mao

St Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc

Saint Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of Orléans" , is a national heroine of France and a Roman Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France who claimed divine guidance, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, which paved the way for the...

, French saint

• Norman Dello Joio
  Norman Dello Joio
  - Life :He was born Nicodemo DeGioio in New York City to Italian immigrants. He began his musical career as organist and choir director at the Star of the Sea Church on City Island in New York at age 14. His father was an organist, pianist, and vocal coach and coached many opera stars from the...
  
  : The Triumph of St. Joan
  The Triumph of St. Joan
  The Triumph of St. Joan was originally an opera in three acts by Norman Dello Joio to an English language libretto on the subject of the martyrdom of Joan of Arc by Dello Joio and Joseph Machilis. It was premiered at Sarah Lawrence College on May 9, 1950. Although the opera was received positively,...
  
  
• Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Wolfgang Klebe was a German composer. He composed more than 140 works, among them 14 operas, 8 symphonies, 15 solo concerts, chamber music, piano works, and sacred music.-Biography:...
  
  : Das Mädchen aus Domrémy
  Das Mädchen aus Domrémy
  Das Mädchen aus Domrémy, Op. 72, is an opera in two acts by Giselher Klebe who with his wife, Lore Klebe, also wrote the libretto based on the play Die Jungfrau von Orléans by Friedrich Schiller....
  
  
• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
  
  : The Maid of Orleans
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco is an operatic dramma lirico with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera....
  
  

Joanna of Castile

Joanna of Castile

Joanna , nicknamed Joanna the Mad , was the first queen regnant to reign over both the Crown of Castile and the Crown of Aragon , a union which evolved into modern Spain...

, Queen of Castile and Aragon

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  (as Juana)

Patriarch Job of Moscow, Russian Orthodox prelate

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Dimitrij
  Dimitrij
  Dimitrij is an opera by Antonín Dvořák in 4 acts, set a libretto by Marie Červinková-Riegrová. More specifically, it belongs to the genre of Grand Opera. The work was first performed in Prague, at the Nové České Divadlo on 8 October 1882, after Dvořák began composition during May 1881...
  
  

King John of England

John of England

John , also known as John Lackland , was King of England from 6 April 1199 until his death...

• Sir Arthur Sullivan
  Arthur Sullivan
  Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...
  
  : Ivanhoe
  Ivanhoe (opera)
  Ivanhoe is a romantic opera in three acts based on the novel by Sir Walter Scott, with music by Sir Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by Julian Sturgis. It premiered at the Royal English Opera House on 31 January 1891 for a consecutive run of 155 performances, unheard of for a grand opera...
  
  (as Prince John)

Don John of Austria, Bavarian soldier in Spanish service

• Isaac Nathan
  Isaac Nathan
  Isaac Nathan was an Anglo-Australian composer, musicologist, journalist and self-publicist, who ended an eventful career by becoming the "father of Australian music".-Early success:...
  
  : Don John of Austria
  Don John of Austria (opera)
  Don John of Austria is a ballad opera in three acts by Isaac Nathan to a librettoby . It is the first opera to be written, composed and produced in Australia.Quote from the opera's title page:-Performance history:...
  
  

John of Leiden

John of Leiden

John of Leiden , was an Anabaptist leader from the Dutch city of Leiden. He was the illegitimate son of a Dutch mayor, and a tailor's apprentice by trade.-Life:...

, Dutch Anabaptist leader

• Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...
  
  : Le prophète
  Le prophète
  Le prophète is an opera in five acts by Giacomo Meyerbeer. The French-language libretto was by Eugène Scribe.-Performance history:...
  
   (as Jean de Leyde)

Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the United States . As Vice-President of the United States in 1865, he succeeded Abraham Lincoln following the latter's assassination. Johnson then presided over the initial and contentious Reconstruction era of the United States following the American...

, U.S. President

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Ben Jonson

Ben Jonson

Benjamin Jonson was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor. A contemporary of William Shakespeare, he is best known for his satirical plays, particularly Volpone, The Alchemist, and Bartholomew Fair, which are considered his best, and his lyric poems...

, English poet

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor

Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor

Joseph II was Holy Roman Emperor from 1765 to 1790 and ruler of the Habsburg lands from 1780 to 1790. He was the eldest son of Empress Maria Theresa and her husband, Francis I...

• Georg Jarno
  Georg Jarno
  Georg Jarno was a Hungarian composer, mainly of operettas.-Biography:After he finished his studies in Budapest, he worked as Theaterkapellmeister in in Bremen, Gera, Halle, Metz, Liegnitz, Chemnitz and Magdeburg, and also as opera director in Bad Kissingen, before settling in Vienna as a freelance...
  
  : Die Försterchristl
  Die Försterchristl
  Die Försterchristl is an operetta in three acts by Georg Jarno to a libretto by Bernhard Buchbinder. It premiered on 17 December 1907 at the Theater in der Josefstadt in Vienna. Three years later, its English version had a run of 64 performances at Broadway's Herald Square Theatre in 1910/11 under...
  
  (or possibly a fictitious "Franz Joseph II of Austria")

Joséphine de Beauharnais

Joséphine de Beauharnais

Joséphine de Beauharnais was the first wife of Napoléon Bonaparte, and thus the first Empress of the French. Her first husband Alexandre de Beauharnais had been guillotined during the Reign of Terror, and she had been imprisoned in the Carmes prison until her release five days after Alexandre's...

, Consort of Napoleon I

• Emmerich Kálmán
  Emmerich Kalman
  Emmerich Kálmán was a Hungarian-born composer of operettas.- Biography :Kálmán was born Imre Koppstein in Siófok, on the southern shore of Lake Balaton, Hungary in a Jewish family.Kálmán initially intended to become a concert pianist, but because of early-onset arthritis, he focused on composition...
  
  : Kaiserin Josephine
  Kaiserin Josephine
  Kaiserin Josephine is an operetta in 8 scenes by Hungarian composer Emmerich Kalman. The German libretto was by Paul Knepler and Géza Herczeg. It premiered in Zurich, at the Stadt Theater, on 18 January 1936. - Roles :...
  
  

Julia Caesaris

Julia (daughter of Julius Caesar)

Julia Caesaris , 83 or 82 BC-54 BC, was the daughter of Gaius Julius Caesar the Roman dictator, by his first wife, Cornelia Cinna, and his only child in marriage. Julia became the fourth wife of Pompey the Great and was renowned for her beauty and virtue.-Life:Julia was born around 83 BC–82 BC...

, daughter of Julius Caesar, 4th wife of Pompey the Great

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  

Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar

Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....

, Consul and Dictator of Rome

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun was a German composer and tenor singer. Along with Johann Adolf Hasse, he is considered to be the most important German composer of Italian opera of his time.-Biography:...
  
  : Cesare e Cleopatra
  Cesare e Cleopatra
  Cesare e Cleopatra is a dramma per musica in three acts by composer Carl Heinrich Graun. The opera uses an Italian language libretto by Giovan Gualberto Bottarelli.-Royal Opera House premiere:...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Giulio Cesare (in Egitto)
  Giulio Cesare
  Giulio Cesare in Egitto , commonly known simply as Giulio Cesare, is an Italian opera in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel in 1724...
  
  
• Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Wolfgang Klebe was a German composer. He composed more than 140 works, among them 14 operas, 8 symphonies, 15 solo concerts, chamber music, piano works, and sacred music.-Biography:...
  
  : Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars, op.32, is an opera in one act by Giselher Klebe who also wrote the libretto based on the Shakespeare translation by August Wilhelm von Schlegel.It premiered on 20 September 1959 at the Stadttheater Essen...
  
  
• Antonio Sartorio
  Antonio Sartorio
  Antonio Sartorio was an Italian composer active mainly in Italy and in Hamburg, Germany. He was a leading composer of operas in his native Venice in the 1660s and 1670s and was also known for composing in other genres of vocal music...
  
  : Giulio Cesare in Egitto

K

Frida Kahlo

Frida Kahlo

Frida Kahlo de Rivera was a Mexican painter, born in Coyoacán, and perhaps best known for her self-portraits....

, Mexican painter

• Robert Xavier Rodriguez
  Robert Xavier Rodriguez
  Robert Xavier Rodríguez is an American classical composer, best known for his eight operas and his works for children.- Life and career :...
  
  : Frida
  Frida (opera)
  Frida is an opera based on the life of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo with music by Robert Xavier Rodriguez, book by Hilary Blecher, lyrics and monologues by Migdalia Cruz, conceived by Hilary Blecher....
  
  

Christoph Kaufmann (or Kauffman), associate of Jakob Lenz

• Wolfgang Rihm
  Wolfgang Rihm
  Wolfgang Rihm is a German composer.Rihm is Head of the Institute of Modern Music at the Karlsruhe Conservatory of Music and has been composer in residence at the Lucerne Festival and the Salzburg Festival...
  
  : Jakob Lenz
  Jakob Lenz (opera)
  Jakob Lenz is a one act chamber opera by Wolfgang Rihm, written 1977-78 after the novella Lenz by Georg Büchner in turn based on an incident in the life of the German poet Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz....
  
  

Grace Kelly: see Princess Grace of Monaco

John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

, U.S. President

• Michael Daugherty
  Michael Daugherty
  Michael Kevin Daugherty is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. Influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and Postmodernism, Daugherty is one of the most colorful and widely performed American concert music composers of his generation...
  
  : Jackie O
  Jackie O (opera)
  Jackie O is a chamber opera in two acts composed by Michael Daugherty to a libretto by Wayne Koestenbaum. The 90 minute work, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 1995 and premiered in 1997, is inspired by American musical and popular culture of the late 1960s and episodes in the life of...
  
  

Johannes Kepler

Johannes Kepler

Johannes Kepler was a German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer. A key figure in the 17th century scientific revolution, he is best known for his eponymous laws of planetary motion, codified by later astronomers, based on his works Astronomia nova, Harmonices Mundi, and Epitome of Copernican...

, German astronomer, mathematician

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Kepler
  Kepler (opera)
  Kepler is an opera by Philip Glass set to a libretto in German and Latin by Martina Winkel. It premiered on 20 September 2009 at the Landestheater in the Austrian city of Linz with Dennis Russell Davies conducting the Bruckner Orchestra. Its libretto is based on the life and work of Johannes...
  
  
• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt is an opera in five acts by Paul Hindemith. The German libretto was by the composer....
  
  

Ivan Andreyevich Khovansky, "Taratui" (chatter box), Russian boyar

• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Khovanshchina
  Khovanshchina
  Khovanshchina is an opera in five acts by Modest Mussorgsky. The work was written between 1872 and 1880 in St. Petersburg, Russia. The composer wrote the libretto based on historical sources...
  
  

Edgar Ray Killen

Edgar Ray Killen

Edgar Ray "Preacher" Killen is a former Ku Klux Klan organizer who conspired in the murders of three civil rights activists—James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner—in 1964....

, KKK leader, murderer

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Satyagraha
  Satyagraha (opera)
  Satyagraha is a 1979 opera in three acts for orchestra, chorus and soloists, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by Glass and Constance DeJong.Loosely based on the life of Mohandas K...
  
  

Henry Kissinger

Henry Kissinger

Heinz Alfred "Henry" Kissinger is a German-born American academic, political scientist, diplomat, and businessman. He is a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He served as National Security Advisor and later concurrently as Secretary of State in the administrations of Presidents Richard Nixon and...

, U.S. Secretary of State

• John Adams: Nixon in China
  Nixon in China (opera)
  Nixon in China is an opera in three acts by John Adams, with a libretto by Alice Goodman. Adams' first opera, it was inspired by the 1972 visit to China by US President Richard Nixon. The work premiered at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987, in a production by Peter Sellars with...
  
  

Aleksis Kivi

Aleksis Kivi

Aleksis Kivi , born Alexis Stenvall, was a Finnish author who wrote the first significant novel in the Finnish language, Seven Brothers...

, Finnish writer

• Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara is a Finnish composer of contemporary classical music, and is one of the most notable Finnish composers after Jean Sibelius.-Life:...
  
  : Aleksis Kivi
  Aleksis Kivi (opera)
  Aleksis Kivi is an opera in two acts by Einojuhani Rautavaara, to a libretto by the composer. Composed between 1995 and 1996, it was first performed by the Savonlinna Opera Festival on July 8, 1997, with Jorma Hynninen in the title role. The opera deals with episodes in the life of Aleksis Kivi,...
  
  

Leon Klinghoffer

Leon Klinghoffer

Leon Klinghoffer was a disabled American appliance manufacturer who was murdered and thrown overboard by Palestinian terrorists in the hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro in 1985.-Hijacking and murder:...

, American ship passenger murdered by terrorists

• John Adams: The Death of Klinghoffer
  The Death of Klinghoffer
  The Death of Klinghoffer is an American opera, with music by John Adams to an English-language libretto by Alice Goodman. First produced in Brussels and New York in 1991, the opera is based on the hijacking of the passenger liner Achille Lauro by the Palestine Liberation Front in 1985, and the...
  
  

Vasily Kochubey

Vasily Kochubey

Vasily Leontiyovych Kochubey was a Ukrainian nobleman and statesman of Tatar descent. His great-grandson was the eminent imperial statesman Viktor Kochubey. The family name is also spelled Kotchoubey and Kotschoubey Between 1687 and 1704 Kochubey was a close associate of the Ukrainian hetman...

, Cossack hetman, associate of Ivan Mazepa

Ivan Mazepa

Ivan Stepanovych Mazepa , Cossack Hetman of the Hetmanate in Left-bank Ukraine, from 1687–1708. He was famous as a patron of the arts, and also played an important role in the Battle of Poltava where after learning of Peter I's intent to relieve him as acting Hetman of Ukraine and replace him...

• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
  
  : Mazeppa
  Mazeppa (opera)
  Mazeppa, properly Mazepa , is an opera in 3 acts by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The libretto was written by Victor Burenin and is based on Pushkin's poem Poltava....
  
  

Konchak, Polovtsian khan

Konchakovna, his daughter

• Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin was a Russian Romantic composer and chemist of Georgian–Russian parentage. He was a member of the group of composers called The Five , who were dedicated to producing a specifically Russian kind of art music...
  
  : Prince Igor
  Prince Igor
  Prince Igor is an opera in four acts with a prologue. It was composed by Alexander Borodin. The composer adapted the libretto from the East Slavic epic The Lay of Igor's Host, which recounts the campaign of Russian prince Igor Svyatoslavich against the invading Polovtsian tribes in 1185...
  
  

Kublai Khan

Kublai Khan

Kublai Khan , born Kublai and also known by the temple name Shizu , was the fifth Great Khan of the Mongol Empire from 1260 to 1294 and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty in China...

, Grand Khan of the Mongol Empire

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : Marco Polo
  Marco Polo (opera)
  Marco Polo is an opera by the Chinese-born composer Tan Dun set to an English libretto by Paul Griffiths. It premiered in Munich on 7 May 1996. Described variously as an "opera within an opera" and a "fantasia on an epic journey", the multi-layered storyline is loosely based on the journey of Marco...
  
  

Mikhail Kutuzov, Russian general

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

L

Ladislaus I of Poland: see Władysław I the Elbow-high

Ladislaus the Posthumous, Duke of Austria, King of Hungary and Bohemia

• Ferenc Erkel: Hunyadi László
  Hunyadi László (opera)
  Hunyadi László is an opera in three acts by the Hungarian composer Ferenc Erkel. The libretto, by Béni Egressy, is based on a play by Lörinc Tóth. The opera was first performed at the Pesti Nemzeti Magyar Szinház, Budapest on 27 January 1844...
  
  (as László V)

Lady Caroline Lamb

Lady Caroline Lamb

The Lady Caroline Lamb was a British aristocrat and novelist, best known for her affair with Lord Byron in 1812. Her husband was the 2nd Viscount Melbourne, the Prime Minister...

, lover of Lord Byron

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Anne Françoise Elisabeth Lange, French actress, known as "Mademoiselle Lange"

• Charles Lecocq: La fille de Madame Angot
  La fille de Madame Angot
  La fille de Madame Angot is an opéra comique in three acts by Charles Lecocq. The French text was by Clairville, Paul Siraudin and Victor Koning.-Performance history:...
  
  

Adrienne Lecouvreur

Adrienne Lecouvreur

Adrienne Lecouvreur was a French actress.Born in Damery, she first appeared professionally on the stage in Lille...

, French actress

• Francesco Cilea
  Francesco Cilea
  Francesco Cilea was an Italian composer. Today he is particularly known for his operas L'arlesiana and Adriana Lecouvreur.-Biography:...
  
  : Adriana Lecouvreur
  Adriana Lecouvreur
  Adriana Lecouvreur is an opera in four acts by Francesco Cilea to an Italian libretto by Arturo Colautti, based on the play by Eugène Scribe and Ernest Legouvé...
  
  

(Eleanor) Agnes Lee, daughter of Robert E. Lee

Mary Anna Custis Lee

Mary Anna Custis Lee

Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee was the wife of Confederate General Robert E. Lee.-Biography:Mary Anna Custis Lee was the only surviving child of George Washington Parke Custis, George Washington's step-grandson and adopted son and founder of Arlington House, and Mary Lee Fitzhugh Custis, daughter...

, wife of Robert E. Lee

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

General Robert E. Lee

Robert E. Lee

Robert Edward Lee was a career military officer who is best known for having commanded the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia in the American Civil War....

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down
• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

François Joseph Lefebvre

François Joseph Lefebvre

François Joseph Lefebvre, First Duc de Dantzig was a French military commander during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and one of the original eighteen Marshals of the Empire created by Napoleon....

, Marshal of France, Duke of Danzig

• Ivan Caryll
  Ivan Caryll
  Félix Marie Henri Tilkin , better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language...
  
  : The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic is a comic opera in three acts, set in Paris, with music by Ivan Caryll and a book and lyrics by Henry Hamilton, based on the play Madame Sans-Gêne by Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau. Additional lyrics by Adrian Ross...
  
  
• Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Menotti Maria Giordano was an Italian composer, mainly of operas.He was born in Foggia in Puglia, southern Italy, and studied under Paolo Serrao at the Conservatoire of Naples...
  
  : Madame Sans-Gêne
  Madame Sans-Gêne (opera)
  Madame Sans-Gêne is an opera in three acts by Umberto Giordano. The libretto was taken from Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau's play, adapted for the opera by Renato Simoni.-Performance history:...
  
  

His wife, née Cathérine Hubscher, later Duchess of Danzig

• Ivan Caryll
  Ivan Caryll
  Félix Marie Henri Tilkin , better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language...
  
  : The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic is a comic opera in three acts, set in Paris, with music by Ivan Caryll and a book and lyrics by Henry Hamilton, based on the play Madame Sans-Gêne by Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau. Additional lyrics by Adrian Ross...
  
   (as Catherine Üpscher)
• Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Menotti Maria Giordano was an Italian composer, mainly of operas.He was born in Foggia in Puglia, southern Italy, and studied under Paolo Serrao at the Conservatoire of Naples...
  
  : Madame Sans-Gêne
  Madame Sans-Gêne (opera)
  Madame Sans-Gêne is an opera in three acts by Umberto Giordano. The libretto was taken from Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau's play, adapted for the opera by Renato Simoni.-Performance history:...
  
  

Guillaume Le Gentil

Guillaume Le Gentil

Guillaume Joseph Hyacinthe Jean-Baptiste Le Gentil de la Galaisière was a French astronomer.-Biography:...

, French astronomer

• Victor Davies
  Victor Davies
  Victor Albert Davies is an award winning Canadian composer, pianist, and conductor, best known for his opera Transit of Venus.-Biography:...
  
  : Transit of Venus
  Transit of Venus (opera)
  Transit of Venus is an opera in three acts by Victor Davies. The English libretto is by Canadian playwright Maureen Hunter based on her play of the same name first produced at the Manitoba Theatre Centre in November 1992.-Roles:-Synopsis:...
  
  

Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester

Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester

Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, KG was an English nobleman and the favourite and close friend of Elizabeth I from her first year on the throne until his death...

, English courtier, favourite of Elizabeth I

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Il castello di Kenilworth
  Il castello di Kenilworth
  Il castello di Kenilworth is a melodramma serio or tragic opera in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Andrea Leone Tottola wrote the Italian libretto after Victor Hugo's play Amy Robsart and Eugene Scribe's play Leicester, in its turn after Scott's novel Kenilworth...
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti: Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda is a tragic opera, , in two acts, by Gaetano Donizetti, to a libretto by Giuseppe Bardari, based on Friedrich Schiller's 1800 play Maria Stuart....
  
  (as Roberto)
• Gioachino Rossini: Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra
  Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra
  Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra, is a dramma per musica or opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Giovanni Schmidt, from the play The Page of Leicester by Carlo Federici...
  
  

Augusta Leigh

Augusta Leigh

Augusta Maria Byron, later Augusta Maria Leigh , styled "The Honourable" from birth, was the only daughter of John "Mad Jack" Byron, the poet Lord Byron's father, by his first wife, Amelia Osborne .-Early...

, half-sister and incestuous over of Lord Byron

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz

Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz

Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz was a Baltic German writer of the Sturm und Drang movement.-Life:...

, German writer

• Wolfgang Rihm
  Wolfgang Rihm
  Wolfgang Rihm is a German composer.Rihm is Head of the Institute of Modern Music at the Karlsruhe Conservatory of Music and has been composer in residence at the Lucerne Festival and the Salzburg Festival...
  
  : Jakob Lenz
  Jakob Lenz (opera)
  Jakob Lenz is a one act chamber opera by Wolfgang Rihm, written 1977-78 after the novella Lenz by Georg Büchner in turn based on an incident in the life of the German poet Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz....
  
  

Pope St Leo I "The Great"

Pope Leo I

Pope Leo I was pope from September 29, 440 to his death.He was an Italian aristocrat, and is the first pope of the Catholic Church to have been called "the Great". He is perhaps best known for having met Attila the Hun in 452, persuading him to turn back from his invasion of Italy...

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Attila
  Attila (opera)
  Attila is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera, based on the play Attila, König der Hunnen by Friedrich Ludwig Zacharias Werner. Initially, Verdi had enlisted Francesco Maria Piave to prepare the libretto, after Verdi's own scenario...
  
  (as Leone)

Brother Leo

Brother Leo

Brother Leo was the favorite disciple, secretary and confessor of St Francis of Assisi.The dates of his birth and of his becoming a Franciscan are not known; but he was one of the small group of most trusted companions of, the saint during his last years...

, friend and confidant of Francis of Assisi

Francis of Assisi

Saint Francis of Assisi was an Italian Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the men's Franciscan Order, the women’s Order of St. Clare, and the lay Third Order of Saint Francis. St...

• Olivier Messiaen
  Olivier Messiaen
  Olivier Messiaen was a French composer, organist and ornithologist, one of the major composers of the 20th century. His music is rhythmically complex ; harmonically and melodically it is based on modes of limited transposition, which he abstracted from his early compositions and improvisations...
  
  : Saint François d'Assise

Leonidas of Epirus

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Alessandro
  Alessandro (opera)
  Alessandro is an opera written for the Royal Academy of Music composed by George Frideric Handel in 1726. Paolo Rolli was the librettist and based the story on Ortensio Mauro's La superbia d'Alessandro...
  
  

(i) Marcus Aemilius Lepidus

Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (triumvir)

Marcus Aemilius Lepidus , was a Roman patrician who rose to become a member of the Second Triumvirate and Pontifex Maximus. His father, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, had been involved in a rebellion against the Roman Republic.Lepidus was among Julius Caesar's greatest supporters...

, Roman triumvir

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  

(ii) Marcus Aemilius Lepidus

Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (executed 39)

Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, was the son of consul Lucius Aemilius Paullus. He and his sister Aemilia Lepida were both married to siblings of the Emperor Caligula...

, heir to Emperor Caligula

Caligula

Caligula , also known as Gaius, was Roman Emperor from 37 AD to 41 AD. Caligula was a member of the house of rulers conventionally known as the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Caligula's father Germanicus, the nephew and adopted son of Emperor Tiberius, was a very successful general and one of Rome's most...

 of Rome

• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Octavia
  Octavia (opera)
  The Roman Unrest, or The Noble-Minded Octavia , commonly called Octavia, is a singspiel in three acts by Reinhard Keiser to a German libretto by Barthold Feind...
  
  

Leszek I the White

Leszek I the White

Leszek I the White , also listed by some sources as Leszek II the White, was Prince of Sandomierz and High Duke of Poland from 1194 until his death, except for the short periods following when he was deposed as Polish ruler...

, High Duke of Poland 1194-1227

• Józef Elsner
  Józef Elsner
  Józef Antoni Franciszek was a composer, music teacher and music theoretician, active mainly in Warsaw...
  
  : Leszek Biały

Li Bai

Li Bai

Li Bai , also known in the West by various other transliterations, especially Li Po, was a major Chinese poet of the Tang dynasty poetry period. He has been regarded as one of the greatest poets in China's Tang period, which is often called China's "golden age" of poetry. Around a thousand existing...

or Li Po, Chinese poet

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : Marco Polo
  Marco Polo (opera)
  Marco Polo is an opera by the Chinese-born composer Tan Dun set to an English libretto by Paul Griffiths. It premiered in Munich on 7 May 1996. Described variously as an "opera within an opera" and a "fantasia on an epic journey", the multi-layered storyline is loosely based on the journey of Marco...
  
  

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

, U.S. President

Mary Todd Lincoln

Mary Todd Lincoln

Mary Ann Lincoln was the wife of the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, and was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865.-Life before the White House:...

, U.S. First Lady

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down
• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Charles Lindbergh

Charles Lindbergh

Charles Augustus Lindbergh was an American aviator, author, inventor, explorer, and social activist.Lindbergh, a 25-year-old U.S...

, American pioneer aviator

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
   and Kurt Weill
  Kurt Weill
  Kurt Julian Weill was a German-Jewish composer, active from the 1920s, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fruitful collaborations with Bertolt Brecht...
  
  : Der Lindberghflug (Lindbergh's Flight). This was later changed by removal of Hindemith's contribution, renaming it to Der Ozeanflug
  The Flight across the Ocean
  The Flight across the Ocean is a Lehrstück by the German dramatist Bertolt Brecht, inspired by We, Charles Lindbergh's 1927 account of his transatlantic flight...
  
  (The Flight across the Ocean), and removal of Lindbergh's name. The opening line was changed from “My name is Charles Lindbergh” to “My name is of no account”.

Judah Loew ben Bezalel

Judah Loew ben Bezalel

Judah Loew ben Bezalel, alt. Loewe, Löwe, or Levai, widely known to scholars of Judaism as the Maharal of Prague, or simply The MaHaRaL, the Hebrew acronym of "Moreinu ha-Rav Loew," was an important Talmudic scholar, Jewish mystic, and philosopher who served as a leading rabbi in the city of...

, Bohemian Talmudic scholar

• Nicolae Bretan
  Nicolae Bretan
  Nicolae Bretan was a Romanian opera composer, baritone, conductor and music critic.He studied in Cluj, Vienna and Budapest before becoming one of the pioneers of Romanian opera - his opera Luceafarul is cited as the first opera in Romanian...
  
  : Golem
  Golem (opera)
  Golem is a one-act opera by Nicolae Bretan to his own libretto, based on the legend of the Golem as expressed in a drama by Illés Kaczér. It was written over a brief period in 1923, and was first performed in Cluj on 23 December 1924.-Roles:-Synopsis:...
  
  (as Rabbi Lőw)

King Louis V of France

Louis V of France

Louis V , called the Indolent or the Sluggard , was the King of Western Francia from 986 until his early death...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Ugo, conte di Parigi
  Ugo, conte di Parigi
  Ugo, conte di Parigi is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Hippolyte-Louis-Florent Bis's Blanche d'Aquitaine...
  
  

King Louis VI of France

Louis VI of France

Louis VI , called the Fat , was King of France from 1108 until his death . Chronicles called him "roi de Saint-Denis".-Reign:...

• Carl Maria von Weber
  Carl Maria von Weber
  Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber was a German composer, conductor, pianist, guitarist and critic, one of the first significant composers of the Romantic school....
  
  : Euryanthe
  Euryanthe
  Euryanthe is a German "grand, heroic, romantic" opera by Carl Maria von Weber, first performed at the Theater am Kärntnertor, Vienna on 25 October 1823...
  
  

King Louis XII of France

Louis XII of France

Louis proved to be a popular king. At the end of his reign the crown deficit was no greater than it had been when he succeeded Charles VIII in 1498, despite several expensive military campaigns in Italy. His fiscal reforms of 1504 and 1508 tightened and improved procedures for the collection of taxes...

• André Messager
  André Messager
  André Charles Prosper Messager , was a French composer, organist, pianist, conductor and administrator. His stage compositions included ballets and 30 opéra comiques and operettas, among which Véronique, had lasting success, with Les p'tites Michu and Monsieur Beaucaire also enjoying international...
  
  : La Basoche
  La Basoche
  La Basoche is an opéra comique in three acts of 1890, with music by André Messager and a French libretto by Albert Carré.-History:Messager's 1889 opérette Le mari de la reine at Bouffes-Parisiens was a disappointment, and the composer and his wife were struggling to afford even basic necessities...
  
  

King Louis XIII of France

Louis XIII of France

Louis XIII was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and of Navarre from 1610 to 1643.Louis was only eight years old when he succeeded his father. His mother, Marie de Medici, acted as regent during Louis' minority...

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Cinq-Mars

King Louis XIV of France

Louis XIV of France

Louis XIV , known as Louis the Great or the Sun King , was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre. His reign, from 1643 to his death in 1715, began at the age of four and lasted seventy-two years, three months, and eighteen days...

• Léo Delibes
  Léo Delibes
  Clément Philibert Léo Delibes was a French composer of ballets, operas, and other works for the stage...
  
  : Le roi l'a dit
  Le roi l'a dit
  Le roi l'a dit is an opéra comique in three acts by Léo Delibes to a French libretto by Edmond Gondinet. It is a lively comedy, remarkably requiring 14 singers – six men and eight women...
  
   (unseen role; he is referred to by the other characters)

King Louis XV of France

Louis XV of France

Louis XV was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and of Navarre from 1 September 1715 until his death. He succeeded his great-grandfather at the age of five, his first cousin Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, served as Regent of the kingdom until Louis's majority in 1723...

• Michel Richard Delalande
  Michel Richard Delalande
  Michel Richard Delalande [de Lalande] was a French Baroque composer and organist who was in the service of King Louis XIV. He was one of the most important composers of grand motets. He also wrote orchestral suites known as "Simphonies pour les Soupers du Roy" and ballets...
  
   and André Cardinal Destouches
  André Cardinal Destouches
  André Cardinal Destouches was a French composer best known for the opéra-ballet Les élémens....
  
  : Les élémens
  Les élémens
  Les élémens , or Ballet des élémens, is an opera-ballet by the French composers André Cardinal Destouches and Michel Richard Delalande . It has a prologue and four entrées. The libretto was written by Pierre-Charles Roy.Destouches was responsible for most of the music...
  
  (represented by a chorus)
• Leo Fall
  Leo Fall
  Leo Fall was an Austrian composer of operettas.-Life:Born in Olmütz , Leo Fall was taught by his father Moritz Fall , a bandmaster and composer, who settled in Berlin. The younger Fall studied at the Vienna Conservatory before rejoining his father in Berlin...
  
  : Madame Pompadour
  Madame Pompadour (operetta)
  Madame Pompadour is an operetta in three acts, composed by Leo Fall with a libretto by Rudolf Schanzer and Ernst Friedrich Wilhelm Welisch. Conducted by the composer, It opened at the Berliner Theater in Berlin on September 9, 1922 and then at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna on March 2,...
  
  

King Louis XVI of France

Louis XVI of France

Louis XVI was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre until 1791, and then as King of the French from 1791 to 1792, before being executed in 1793....

• John Corigliano
  John Corigliano
  John Corigliano is an American composer of classical music and a teacher of music. He is a distinguished professor of music at Lehman College in the City University of New York.-Biography:...
  
  : The Ghosts of Versailles
  The Ghosts of Versailles
  The Ghosts of Versailles is an opera in two acts, with music by John Corigliano to an English libretto by William M. Hoffman. The Metropolitan Opera had commissioned the work from Corigliano in 1980 in celebration of its 100th anniversary, with the premiere scheduled for 1983...
  
  

Lucan

Lucan

Lucan is the common English name of the Roman poet Marcus Annaeus Lucanus.Lucan may also refer to:-People:*Arthur Lucan , English actor*Sir Lucan the Butler, Knight of the Round Table in Arthurian legend...

, Roman poet

• Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, and singer.Monteverdi's work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the transition from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two individual styles of composition – the...
  
  : L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...
  
  

Lucretia

Lucretia

Lucretia is a legendary figure in the history of the Roman Republic. According to the story, told mainly by the Roman historian Livy and the Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus , her rape by the king's son and consequent suicide were the immediate cause of the revolution that overthrew the...

, Roman noblewoman raped by Sextus Tarquinius

Sextus Tarquinius

Sextus Tarquinius was a Roman prince, the third and youngest son of the last king of Rome, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus . He is primarily known for his rape of Lucretia, daughter of Spurius Lucretius Tricipitinus, wife of Collatinus....

 (legendary)

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : The Rape of Lucretia
• Ottorino Respighi
  Ottorino Respighi
  Ottorino Respighi was an Italian composer, musicologist and conductor. He is best known for his orchestral "Roman trilogy": Fountains of Rome ; Pines of Rome ; and Roman Festivals...
  
  : Lucrezia

Martin Luther

Martin Luther

Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...

, initiator of the Protestant Reformation

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

M

Douglas MacArthur

Douglas MacArthur

General of the Army Douglas MacArthur was an American general and field marshal of the Philippine Army. He was a Chief of Staff of the United States Army during the 1930s and played a prominent role in the Pacific theater during World War II. He received the Medal of Honor for his service in the...

, American general

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Marilyn

Jeanette MacDonald

Jeanette MacDonald

Jeanette MacDonald was an American singer and actress best remembered for her musical films of the 1930s with Maurice Chevalier and Nelson Eddy...

, American soprano, actress

• Edwin Penhorwood
  Edwin Penhorwood
  Dr. Edwin Penhorwood is an American composer and currently assistant professor at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.-Biography:Penhorwood is a native of Toledo, Ohio, and studied music at the University of Iowa...
  
  : Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos is an opera by Indiana University Jacobs School of Music faculty member Edwin Penhorwood. Too Many Sopranos is a two-act opera in English with a pastiche of song from opera's various periods. A group of sopranos is trying to get into heaven, but there is no more room in the...
  
  (spoofed as "Just Jeannette")

Sir John A. Macdonald

John A. Macdonald

Sir John Alexander Macdonald, GCB, KCMG, PC, PC , QC was the first Prime Minister of Canada. The dominant figure of Canadian Confederation, his political career spanned almost half a century...

, first Prime Minister of Canada

William McDougall

William McDougall (politician)

Sir William McDougall PC CB was a Canadian lawyer, politician and one of the Fathers of Confederation.Born near York, Upper Canada...

, Canadian politician

• Harry Somers
  Harry Somers
  Harry Stewart Somers, CC was the foremost English-Canadian composer of his period.He was born in middle-class Toronto in 1925 but did not become interested in music until his early teenage years, when he met a doctor and his wife, both pianists, who introduced him to classical music...
  
  : Louis Riel
  Louis Riel (opera)
  Louis Riel is an opera in three acts by the Canadian composer Harry Somers.This full length opera was written for the 1967 Canadian centennial. It concerns the controversial Métis leader Louis Riel, who was executed in 1885, and is one of Somers' biggest pieces.It is arguably the most famous...
  
  

Ralph McGill

Ralph McGill

Ralph Emerson McGill , American journalist, was best known as the anti-segregationist editor and publisher of the Atlanta Constitution newspaper. He won a Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing in 1959....

, American anti-segregationist journalist

• Michael Braz: A Scholar Under Siege
  A Scholar Under Siege
  A Scholar Under Siege is an opera in two acts by contemporary American composer Michael Braz. Braz also wrote the English language libretto for the opera which was composed for the centenary of Georgia Southern University...
  
  

Wilmer McLean

Wilmer McLean

Wilmer McLean was a wholesale grocer from Virginia. It is said that the American Civil War started in his front yard and ended in his front parlor....

, U.S. Civil War figure

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Colin McPhee

Colin McPhee

Colin McPhee was a Canadian composer and musicologist. He is primarily known for being the first Western composer to make an ethnomusicological study of Bali, and for the quality of that work...

, Canadian composer and musicologist

• Evan Ziporyn
  Evan Ziporyn
  Evan Ziporyn is an American composer of post-minimalist music and music for Balinese gamelans. He plays the clarinet, bass clarinet, saxophone, and metallophone, borrowing from classical music, avant-garde, and jazz...
  
  : A House in Bali

King Macbeth of Scotland

Macbeth of Scotland

Mac Bethad mac Findlaích was King of the Scots from 1040 until his death...

• Ernest Bloch
  Ernest Bloch
  Ernest Bloch was a Swiss-born American composer.-Life:Bloch was born in Geneva and began playing the violin at age 9. He began composing soon afterwards. He studied music at the conservatory in Brussels, where his teachers included the celebrated Belgian violinist Eugène Ysaÿe...
  
  : Macbeth
  Macbeth (Bloch)
  Macbeth is an opera in three acts, with music by Ernest Bloch to a libretto by Edmond Fleg, after the eponymous play of William Shakespeare. Bloch composed the opera between 1904 and 1906, but it did not receive its first performance until November 30, 1910 by the Opéra-Comique Paris...
  
  
• Iain Hamilton
  Iain Hamilton (composer)
  Iain Ellis Hamilton was a Scottish composer.He was educated in London where he became an apprentice engineer, and remained in that profession for the next seven years. He undertook the study of music in his spare time...
  
  : The Tragedy of Macbeth
• Salvatore Sciarrino
  Salvatore Sciarrino
  Salvatore Sciarrino is an Italian composer of contemporary classical music.-Biography:In his youth, Sciarrino was attracted to the visual arts, but began experimenting with music when he was twelve. Though he had some lessons from Antonino Titone and Turi Belfiore, he is primarily self-taught as a...
  
  : Macbeth
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Macbeth
  Macbeth (opera)
  Macbeth is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi, with an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave and additions by Andrea Maffei, based on Shakespeare's play of the same name...
  
  

Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus, Roman general, natural father of Scipio Aemilianus

• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Il sogno di Scipione
  Il sogno di Scipione
  Il sogno di Scipione, K. 126, is a dramatic serenade in one act composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a libretto by Pietro Metastasio, which is based on the book Somnium Scipionis by Cicero. Mozart had originally composed the work at the age of 15 for his patron, Prince-Archbishop Sigismund von...
  
  , K. 126

Gaius Maecenas

Gaius Maecenas

Gaius Cilnius Maecenas was a confidant and political advisor to Octavian as well as an important patron for the new generation of Augustan poets...

, political adviser to Octavian (Caesar Augustus)

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  

Saint Magnus Erlendsson, Earl of Orkney

Magnus Erlendsson, Earl of Orkney

Saint Magnus, Earl Magnus Erlendsson of Orkney, sometimes known as Magnus the Martyr, was the first Earl of Orkney to bear that name, and ruled from 1108 to about 1115...

• Peter Maxwell Davies
  Peter Maxwell Davies
  Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, CBE is an English composer and conductor and is currently Master of the Queen's Music.-Biography:...
  
  : The Martyrdom of St Magnus
  The Martyrdom of St Magnus
  The Martyrdom of St Magnus is a chamber opera in one act by the British composer Peter Maxwell Davies. The libretto, by Davies himself, is based on the novel Magnus by George Mackay Brown. The opera was first performed in St...
  
  

Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt, Bohemia, in what was then Austria-Hungary, now Kaliště in the Czech Republic...

, Austrian composer

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : Marco Polo
  Marco Polo (opera)
  Marco Polo is an opera by the Chinese-born composer Tan Dun set to an English libretto by Paul Griffiths. It premiered in Munich on 7 May 1996. Described variously as an "opera within an opera" and a "fantasia on an epic journey", the multi-layered storyline is loosely based on the journey of Marco...
  
  

Marion Mahony

Marion Mahony Griffin

Marion Griffin was an American architect and artist. She was one of the first licenced female architects in the world, and is considered an original member of the Prairie School.-Biography:...

, American architect and artist, wife of Walter Burley Griffin

Walter Burley Griffin

Walter Burley Griffin was an American architect and landscape architect, who is best known for his role in designing Canberra, Australia's capital city...

• Daron Hagen
  Daron Hagen
  Daron Aric Hagen , is an American composer, conductor, pianist, educator, librettist, and stage director of contemporary classical music and opera.- Early life and education :...
  
  : Shining Brow
  Shining Brow
  Shining Brow is an English language opera by Daron Hagen, first performed by the Madison Opera in Madison, Wisconsin, April 21, 1993. It is based on events in the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright...
  
  

Giovanni Malatesta

Giovanni Malatesta

Giovanni Malatesta , known, from his lameness, as Gianciotto, or Giovanni, lo Sciancato, was the eldest son of Malatesta da Verucchio of Rimini.From 1275 onwards he played an active part in the Romagnole Wars and factions...

, husband and murderer of Francesca da Rimini

• Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini (as Lanciotto Malatesta)
• Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai was an Italian composer.-Biography:Zandonai was born in Borgo Sacco, Rovereto, then part of Austria–Hungary....
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
  Francesca da Rimini (Zandonai)
  Francesca da Rimini is an opera in four acts, composed by Riccardo Zandonai, with libretto by Tito Ricordi, , after a play by Gabriele D'Annunzio. It was premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin on February 19, 1914, and is still staged occasionally.This opera is Zandonai's best-known work...
  
  (as Giovanni lo Sciancato)

Malatestino Malatesta

Malatestino Malatesta

Malatestino Malatesta was the lord of Rimini from 1312 until his death....

, Lord of Rimini

• Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai was an Italian composer.-Biography:Zandonai was born in Borgo Sacco, Rovereto, then part of Austria–Hungary....
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
  Francesca da Rimini (Zandonai)
  Francesca da Rimini is an opera in four acts, composed by Riccardo Zandonai, with libretto by Tito Ricordi, , after a play by Gabriele D'Annunzio. It was premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin on February 19, 1914, and is still staged occasionally.This opera is Zandonai's best-known work...
  
  (as Malatestino dall'Occhio)

Paolo Malatesta

Paolo Malatesta

Paolo Malatesta was the third son of Malatesta da Verucchio, lord of Rimini. He is best known for the story of his affair with Francesca da Polenta, portrayed by Dante in a famous episode of his Inferno...

, brother-in-law and lover of Francesca da Rimini

• Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Rachmaninoff
  Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
• Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai
  Riccardo Zandonai was an Italian composer.-Biography:Zandonai was born in Borgo Sacco, Rovereto, then part of Austria–Hungary....
  
  : Francesca da Rimini
  Francesca da Rimini (Zandonai)
  Francesca da Rimini is an opera in four acts, composed by Riccardo Zandonai, with libretto by Tito Ricordi, , after a play by Gabriele D'Annunzio. It was premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin on February 19, 1914, and is still staged occasionally.This opera is Zandonai's best-known work...
  
  (as Paolo il Bello)

La Malinche

La Malinche

La Malinche , known also as Malintzin, Malinalli or Doña Marina, was a Nahua woman from the Mexican Gulf Coast, who played a role in the Spanish conquest of Mexico, acting as interpreter, advisor, lover and intermediary for Hernán Cortés...

, Aztec mistress of Hernán Cortés

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : La conquista
• Roger Sessions
  Roger Sessions
  Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (opera)
  Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.-Performance history:...
  
  

Mao Zedong

Mao Zedong

Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung , and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao , was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution...

, Chinese leader

• John Adams: Nixon in China
  Nixon in China (opera)
  Nixon in China is an opera in three acts by John Adams, with a libretto by Alice Goodman. Adams' first opera, it was inspired by the 1972 visit to China by US President Richard Nixon. The work premiered at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987, in a production by Peter Sellars with...
  
  (as Mao Tse-tung)

Madame Mao: see Jiang Qing

Jiang Qing

Jiang Qing was the pseudonym that was used by Chinese leader Mao Zedong's last wife and major Communist Party of China power figure. She went by the stage name Lan Ping during her acting career, and was known by various other names during her life...

Jean-Paul Marat

Jean-Paul Marat

Jean-Paul Marat , born in the Principality of Neuchâtel, was a physician, political theorist, and scientist best known for his career in France as a radical journalist and politician during the French Revolution...

, Jacobin leader

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Charlotte Corday

Benedetto Marcello

Benedetto Marcello

Benedetto Marcello was a Venetian composer, writer, advocate, magistrate, and teacher.-Life:...

, Italian composer

• Joachim Raff
  Joachim Raff
  Joseph Joachim Raff was a German-Swiss composer, teacher and pianist.-Biography:Raff was born in Lachen in Switzerland. His father, a teacher, had fled there from Württemberg in 1810 to escape forced recruitment into the military of that southwestern German state that had to fight for Napoleon in...
  
  : Benedetto Marcello

Alexey Maresyev, Russian fighter pilot

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : The Story of a Real Man
  The Story of a Real Man
  The Story of a Real Man is an opera in four acts by the Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev, his opus 117. It was written from 1947 to 1948, and was his last opera....
  
  

Margaret of Anjou

Margaret of Anjou

Margaret of Anjou was the wife of King Henry VI of England. As such, she was Queen consort of England from 1445 to 1461 and again from 1470 to 1471; and Queen consort of France from 1445 to 1453...

, Queen consort to Henry VI of England

Henry VI of England

Henry VI was King of England from 1422 to 1461 and again from 1470 to 1471, and disputed King of France from 1422 to 1453. Until 1437, his realm was governed by regents. Contemporaneous accounts described him as peaceful and pious, not suited for the violent dynastic civil wars, known as the Wars...

• Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...
  
  : Margherita d'Anjou
  Margherita d'Anjou
  Margherita d’Anjou is an operatic melodramma semiseria in two acts by Giacomo Meyerbeer. The Italian libretto was by Felice Romani after a text by René Charles Guilbert de Pixérécourt. It is the fourth of Meyerbeer's Italian operas and his first real success.-Performance history:Margherita d’Anjou...
  
  

Marguérite de Valois, consort of Henry IV of France/Henry III of Navarre

Henry IV of France

Henry IV , Henri-Quatre, was King of France from 1589 to 1610 and King of Navarre from 1572 to 1610. He was the first monarch of the Bourbon branch of the Capetian dynasty in France....

• Ferdinand Hérold: Le pré aux clercs
  Le Pré aux clercs
  Le pré aux clercs is an opéra comique in three acts by Ferdinand Hérold with a libretto by François-Antoine-Eugène de Planard based on Prosper Mérimée's Chronique du temps de Charles IX of 1829.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...
  
  : Les Huguenots
  Les Huguenots
  Les Huguenots is a French opera by Giacomo Meyerbeer, one of the most popular and spectacular examples of the style of grand opera. The opera is in five acts and premiered in Paris in 1836. The libretto was written by Eugène Scribe and Émile Deschamps....
  
  

Maria Carolina of Austria

Maria Carolina of Austria

Maria Carolina of Austria was Queen of Naples and Sicily as the wife of King Ferdinand IV & III. As de facto ruler of her husband's kingdoms, Maria Carolina oversaw the promulgation of many reforms, including the revocation of the ban on Freemasonry, the enlargement of the navy under her...

• Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Menotti Maria Giordano was an Italian composer, mainly of operas.He was born in Foggia in Puglia, southern Italy, and studied under Paolo Serrao at the Conservatoire of Naples...
  
  : Madame Sans-Gêne
  Madame Sans-Gêne (opera)
  Madame Sans-Gêne is an opera in three acts by Umberto Giordano. The libretto was taken from Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau's play, adapted for the opera by Renato Simoni.-Performance history:...
  
  

Sister Maria Celeste

Maria Celeste

Sister Maria Celeste , born Virginia Gamba, was the daughter of the famous Italian scientist Galileo Galilei and Marina Gamba. She was the eldest of three siblings, with a sister Livia and a brother Vincenzio...

, Italian nun, illegitimate daughter of Galileo Galilei

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Galileo Galilei
  Galileo Galilei (opera)
  Galileo Galilei is an opera based on excerpts from the life of Galileo Galilei which premiered in 2002 at Chicago's Goodman Theatre. Music by Philip Glass, libretto by Mary Zimmerman and Arnold Weinstein. The piece is presented in one act consisting of ten scenes without break.-Production Notes:All...
  
  

Maria Luisa Fernanda, Duchess of Montpensier

Infanta Luisa Fernanda, Duchess of Montpensier

Infanta María Luisa Fernanda of Spain was Infanta of Spain and Duchess of Montpensier. She was the youngest daughter of king Ferdinand VII of Spain and his fourth wife Maria Christina of the Two Sicilies, the queen-regent, who was also his niece.-Biography:-Heiress-presumptive:When her elder...

, Infanta of Spain

• Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...
  
  : Cagliostro in Wien
  Cagliostro in Wien
  Cagliostro in Wien is an operetta in three acts by Johann Strauss II to a libretto by F. ZellF. Zell was the pen name of Camillo Walzel . and Richard Genée...
  
  

Marie Antoinette

Marie Antoinette

Marie Antoinette ; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was an Archduchess of Austria and the Queen of France and of Navarre. She was the fifteenth and penultimate child of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa and Holy Roman Emperor Francis I....

, Queen Consort of Louis XVI of France

• John Corigliano
  John Corigliano
  John Corigliano is an American composer of classical music and a teacher of music. He is a distinguished professor of music at Lehman College in the City University of New York.-Biography:...
  
  : The Ghosts of Versailles
  The Ghosts of Versailles
  The Ghosts of Versailles is an opera in two acts, with music by John Corigliano to an English libretto by William M. Hoffman. The Metropolitan Opera had commissioned the work from Corigliano in 1980 in celebration of its 100th anniversary, with the premiere scheduled for 1983...
  
  

Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma

Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma

Marie Louise of Austria was the second wife of Napoleon I, Emperor of the French and later Duchess of Parma...

, wife of Napoleon I

Napoleon I

Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...

• Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
  
   and Jacques Ibert
  Jacques Ibert
  Jacques François Antoine Ibert was a French composer. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I.Ibert pursued a successful composing career,...
  
  : L'aiglon

Marie Louise Gonzaga, French Queen consort to 2 Polish kings

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Cinq-Mars

Empress Maria Theresa of Austria

Maria Theresa of Austria

Maria Theresa Walburga Amalia Christina was the only female ruler of the Habsburg dominions and the last of the House of Habsburg. She was the sovereign of Austria, Hungary, Croatia, Bohemia, Mantua, Milan, Lodomeria and Galicia, the Austrian Netherlands and Parma...

• Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...
  
  : Cagliostro in Wien
  Cagliostro in Wien
  Cagliostro in Wien is an operetta in three acts by Johann Strauss II to a libretto by F. ZellF. Zell was the pen name of Camillo Walzel . and Richard Genée...
  
  

Guadalupe Marín

Guadalupe Marín

Guadalupe Marín , born María Guadalupe Marín Preciado, was a model and novelist born in Ciudad Guzmán, Jalisco, Mexico. At eight years of age Marín moved with her family to Guadalajara. In 1922 she became the second wife of muralist Diego Rivera. Marín was the mother of Rivera's two youngest...

, Mexican model and novelist, second wife of Diego Rivera

• Robert Xavier Rodriguez
  Robert Xavier Rodriguez
  Robert Xavier Rodríguez is an American classical composer, best known for his eight operas and his works for children.- Life and career :...
  
  : Frida
  Frida (opera)
  Frida is an opera based on the life of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo with music by Robert Xavier Rodriguez, book by Hilary Blecher, lyrics and monologues by Migdalia Cruz, conceived by Hilary Blecher....
  
  (as Lupe)

Mark Antony

Mark Antony

Marcus Antonius , known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and general. As a military commander and administrator, he was an important supporter and loyal friend of his mother's cousin Julius Caesar...

, Roman politician and general

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  
• Domenico Cimarosa
  Domenico Cimarosa
  Domenico Cimarosa was an Italian opera composer of the Neapolitan school...
  
  : La Cleopatra
  La Cleopatra
  La Cleopatra is an opera seria in two acts by composer Domenico Cimarosa with an Italian libretto by F. Moretti.-Historical background and musical analysis:...
  
  
• Louis Gruenberg
  Louis Gruenberg
  -Life and career:He was born near Brest-Litovsk , to Abe Gruenberg and Klara Kantarovitch. His family emigrated to the United States when he was a few months old. His father worked as a violinist in New York City...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
• Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley was an American composer and conductor.-Life:Hadley was born into a musical family in Somerville, Massachusetts...
  
  : Cleopatra's Night
  Cleopatra's Night
  Cleopatra's Night is a short opera in two acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley. Its libretto is by Alice Leal Pollock based on a story by French author Théophile Gautier. The opera premiered at the Metropolitan Opera on January 31, 1920...
  
  
• Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Klebe
  Giselher Wolfgang Klebe was a German composer. He composed more than 140 works, among them 14 operas, 8 symphonies, 15 solo concerts, chamber music, piano works, and sacred music.-Biography:...
  
  : Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars
  Die Ermordung Cäsars, op.32, is an opera in one act by Giselher Klebe who also wrote the libretto based on the Shakespeare translation by August Wilhelm von Schlegel.It premiered on 20 September 1959 at the Stadttheater Essen...
  
  
• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Louis Payen. It was first performed in at the Opéra Monte-Carlo on February 23, 1914, nearly two years after Massenet's death....
  
  

Auguste de Marmont

• Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
  
   and Jacques Ibert
  Jacques Ibert
  Jacques François Antoine Ibert was a French composer. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I.Ibert pursued a successful composing career,...
  
  : L'aiglon

Saint Mary of Egypt

Mary of Egypt

Mary of Egypt is revered as the patron saint of penitents, most particularly in the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Eastern Catholic churches, as well as in the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches.-Life:...

, patron saint of penitents

• Ottorino Respighi
  Ottorino Respighi
  Ottorino Respighi was an Italian composer, musicologist and conductor. He is best known for his orchestral "Roman trilogy": Fountains of Rome ; Pines of Rome ; and Roman Festivals...
  
  : Maria egiziaca
  Maria egiziaca
  Maria egiziaca is an opera "in three episodes" by the Italian composer Ottorino Respighi. The libretto, by Claudio Guastallo, is based on a Medieval life of Saint Mary of Egypt by Domenico Cavalca. The work was originally intended as a concert piece although it has been fully staged in some revivals...
  
  
• John Tavener
  John Tavener
  Sir John Tavener is a British composer, best known for such religious, minimal works as "The Whale", and "Funeral Ikos"...
  
  : Mary of Egypt

Mary, Queen of Scots

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda is a tragic opera, , in two acts, by Gaetano Donizetti, to a libretto by Giuseppe Bardari, based on Friedrich Schiller's 1800 play Maria Stuart....
  
  
• Thea Musgrave
  Thea Musgrave
  Thea Musgrave CBE is a Scottish composer of opera and classical music.-Biography:Born in Barnton, Edinburgh, Thea Musgrave studied at the University of Edinburgh and in Paris as a pupil of Nadia Boulanger...
  
  : Mary, Queen of Scots
• Louis Niedermeyer
  Louis Niedermeyer
  Abraham Louis Niedermeyer was a composer chiefly of church music but also of a few operas, and a teacher who took over the Ecole Choron, duly renamed École Niedermeyer, a school for the study and practice of church music, where several eminent French musicians studied including Gabriel Fauré and...
  
  : Marie Stuart
  Marie Stuart (opera)
  Marie Stuart is a grand opera in five acts composed by Louis Niedermeyer to a libretto by Théodor Anne loosely based on events in the life of Mary, Queen of Scots...
  
  

Queen Mary I of England

Mary I of England

Mary I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from July 1553 until her death.She was the only surviving child born of the ill-fated marriage of Henry VIII and his first wife Catherine of Aragon. Her younger half-brother, Edward VI, succeeded Henry in 1547...

 "Bloody Mary"

• Antônio Carlos Gomes
  Antônio Carlos Gomes
  Antônio Carlos Gomes was the first New World composer whose work was accepted by Europe.-Life:He was born in Campinas, Brazil, son of Maestro Manuel José Gomes and Fabiana Maria Jaguari Cardoso....
  
  : Maria Tudor
• Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini was an Italian composer, best known for his operas. Pacini was born in Catania, Sicily, the son of the buffo Luigi Pacini, who was to appear in the premieres of many of Giovanni's operas...
  
  : Maria, regina d'Inghilterra
  Maria, regina d'Inghilterra
  Maria, regina d'Inghilterra is an Italian opera in three acts, composed by Giovanni Pacini from a libretto by Leopoldo Tarantini, which was based on the play Marie Tudor by Victor Hugo...
  
  

Mary Tudor, Queen of France, sister of Henry VIII, husband of Louis XII

• André Messager
  André Messager
  André Charles Prosper Messager , was a French composer, organist, pianist, conductor and administrator. His stage compositions included ballets and 30 opéra comiques and operettas, among which Véronique, had lasting success, with Les p'tites Michu and Monsieur Beaucaire also enjoying international...
  
  : La Basoche
  La Basoche
  La Basoche is an opéra comique in three acts of 1890, with music by André Messager and a French libretto by Albert Carré.-History:Messager's 1889 opérette Le mari de la reine at Bouffes-Parisiens was a disappointment, and the composer and his wife were struggling to afford even basic necessities...
  
  

Masaniello

Masaniello

Masaniello was a Neapolitan fisherman, who became leader of the revolt against Spanish Habsburg rule in Naples in 1647.-Name and place of birth:...

(Tommaso Aniello), Neapolitan fisherman, revolutionary leader

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : La muette de Portici
  La muette de Portici
  La muette de Portici originally called Masaniello, ou La muette de Portici, is an opera in five acts by Daniel Auber, with a libretto by Germain Delavigne, revised by Eugène Scribe...
  
  (aka Masaniello)
• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Masagniello
• Reinhard Keiser: Die neapolitanische Fischer-Empörung oder Masaniello furioso

Masinissa

Masinissa

Masinissa — also spelled Massinissa and Massena — was the first King of Numidia, an ancient North African nation of ancient Libyan tribes. As a successful general, Masinissa fought in the Second Punic War , first against the Romans as an ally of Carthage an later switching sides when he saw which...

, first King of Numidia

Numidia

Numidia was an ancient Berber kingdom in part of present-day Eastern Algeria and Western Tunisia in North Africa. It is known today as the Chawi-land, the land of the Chawi people , the direct descendants of the historical Numidians or the Massyles The kingdom began as a sovereign state and later...

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  

Mata Hari

Mata Hari

Mata Hari was the stage name of Margaretha Geertruida "M'greet" Zelle , a Dutch exotic dancer, courtesan, and accused spy who was executed by firing squad in France under charges of espionage for Germany during World War I.-Early life:Margaretha Geertruida Zelle was born in Leeuwarden, Friesland,...

, Dutch spy

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down

Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor

Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor

Matthias of Austria was Holy Roman Emperor from 1612, King of Hungary and Croatia from 1608 and King of Bohemia from 1611...

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : King and Charcoal Burner
  King and Charcoal Burner
  King and Charcoal Burner , Op. 14, is a three-act comic opera by the Czech composer Antonín Dvořák.The first version of the opera was written in 1871 to a libretto by Bernard J. Lobeský. That same year the composer offered the finished opera to the Czech Provisional Theatre in Prague...
  
  

King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary

Matthias Corvinus of Hungary

Matthias Corvinus , also called the Just in folk tales, was King of Hungary and Croatia from 1458, at the age of 14 until his death...

• Ferenc Erkel: Hunyadi László
  Hunyadi László (opera)
  Hunyadi László is an opera in three acts by the Hungarian composer Ferenc Erkel. The libretto, by Béni Egressy, is based on a play by Lörinc Tóth. The opera was first performed at the Pesti Nemzeti Magyar Szinház, Budapest on 27 January 1844...
  
  (as Mátyás Hunyadi)

Maurice, Elector of Saxony

Maurice, Elector of Saxony

Maurice was Duke and later Elector of Saxony. His clever manipulation of alliances and disputes gained the Albertine branch of the Wettin dynasty extensive lands and the electoral dignity....

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  

Maurice de Saxe

• Francesco Cilea
  Francesco Cilea
  Francesco Cilea was an Italian composer. Today he is particularly known for his operas L'arlesiana and Adriana Lecouvreur.-Biography:...
  
  : Adriana Lecouvreur
  Adriana Lecouvreur
  Adriana Lecouvreur is an opera in four acts by Francesco Cilea to an Italian libretto by Arturo Colautti, based on the play by Eugène Scribe and Ernest Legouvé...
  
  
• Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....
  
  : Madame Favart
  Madame Favart
  Madame Favart is an opéra comique, or operetta, in three acts by Jacques Offenbach. The French libretto was written by Alfred Duru and Henri Charles Chivot.-Performance history:...
  
  

Marcus Aurelius Valerius Maximianus Herculius

Maximian

Maximian was Roman Emperor from 286 to 305. He was Caesar from 285 to 286, then Augustus from 286 to 305. He shared the latter title with his co-emperor and superior, Diocletian, whose political brain complemented Maximian's military brawn. Maximian established his residence at Trier but spent...

, aka Maximian, Roman ruler

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Fausta
  Fausta (opera)
  Fausta is a melodramma, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The Italian libretto was by Domenico Gilardoni, who died while writing it: the remainder was written by Donizetti. The opera debuted on 12 January 1832 at the Teatro San Carlo, Naples, and was written with prima donna Giuseppina...
  
  

Maximinian, co-Emperor of Rome

• Henry Purcell
  Henry Purcell
  Henry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...
  
  : Dioclesian
  Dioclesian
  Dioclesian is a tragicomic semi-opera in five acts by Henry Purcell to a libretto by Thomas Betterton based on the play The Prophetess, by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger, which in turn was based very loosely on the life of the Emperor Diocletian. It was premiered in late May 1690 at the...
  
  

Ivan Mazepa

Ivan Mazepa

Ivan Stepanovych Mazepa , Cossack Hetman of the Hetmanate in Left-bank Ukraine, from 1687–1708. He was famous as a patron of the arts, and also played an important role in the Battle of Poltava where after learning of Peter I's intent to relieve him as acting Hetman of Ukraine and replace him...

, Cossack hetman, military leader

• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
  
  : Mazeppa
  Mazeppa (opera)
  Mazeppa, properly Mazepa , is an opera in 3 acts by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The libretto was written by Victor Burenin and is based on Pushkin's poem Poltava....
  
  

Cosimo de' Medici

Cosimo de' Medici

Còsimo di Giovanni degli Mèdici was the first of the Medici political dynasty, de facto rulers of Florence during much of the Italian Renaissance; also known as "Cosimo 'the Elder'" and "Cosimo Pater Patriae" .-Biography:Born in Florence, Cosimo inherited both his wealth and his expertise in...

, ruler of Florence

• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : Guido et Ginevra
  Guido et Ginevra
  Guido et Ginevra, ou La Peste de Florence is a grand opera in five acts by Fromental Halévy to a libretto by Eugène Scribe...
  
  

Giuliano de' Medici, son of Lorenzo the Magnificent

Lorenzo de' Medici

Lorenzo de' Medici

Lorenzo de' Medici was an Italian statesman and de facto ruler of the Florentine Republic during the Italian Renaissance. Known as Lorenzo the Magnificent by contemporary Florentines, he was a diplomat, politician and patron of scholars, artists and poets...

, "Lorenzo the Magnificent", Italian statesman

• Ruggero Leoncavallo
  Ruggero Leoncavallo
  Ruggero Leoncavallo was an Italian opera composer. His two-act work Pagliacci remains one of the most popular works in the repertory, appearing as number 20 on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide.-Biography:...
  
  : I Medici
  I Medici
  I Medici is an opera composed by Ruggero Leoncavallo, with a libretto by the composer.-Performance history:It premièred at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan on 9 November 1893. It was not successful in its day and has never become part of the standard repertoire.-Roles:-Synopsis:The opera is set in...
  
  

Lorenzino de' Medici

Lorenzino de' Medici

Lorenzino de' Medici , sometimes called Lorenzaccio de' Medici, was an Italian writer remembered primarily as the assassin of Alessandro de' Medici, duke and ruler of Florence.-Biography:...

, Italian writer and assassin

• Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini
  Giovanni Pacini was an Italian composer, best known for his operas. Pacini was born in Catania, Sicily, the son of the buffo Luigi Pacini, who was to appear in the premieres of many of Giovanni's operas...
  
  : Lorenzino de' Medici

Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II

Mehmed II

Mehmed II , was Sultan of the Ottoman Empire for a short time from 1444 to September 1446, and later from...

• Gioachino Rossini: Maometto II
  Maometto II
  Maometto II is an opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini, to an Italian libretto by Cesare della Valle, set in the 1470s during the time of the war between the Turks and Venetians. Della Valle based his libretto on his earlier play Anna Erizo...
  
  
• Gioachino Rossini: Le siège de Corinthe
  Le siège de Corinthe
  Le siège de Corinthe is an opera in three acts by Gioachino Rossini to a French libretto by Luigi Balocchi and Alexandre Soumet, based on Maometto II by Cesare della Valle...
  
  (as Mahomet II)

Aleksandr Danilovich Menshikov

Aleksandr Danilovich Menshikov

Aleksandr Danilovich Menshikov was a Russian statesman, whose official titles included Generalissimus, Prince of the Russian Empire and Duke of Izhora , Prince of the Holy Roman Empire, Duke of Cosel. A highly appreciated associate and friend of Tsar Peter the Great, he was the de facto ruler of...

, Russian statesman

• André Grétry: Pierre le Grand
  Pierre le Grand
  Pierre le Grand is an opéra comique by André Grétry. The libretto, by Jean-Nicolas Bouilly, is based on the early life of the Russian tsar Peter the Great...
  
  

Valeria Messalina, Roman Empress

• Isidore de Lara
  Isidore de Lara
  Isidore de Lara, born Isidore Cohen , was an English composer and singer. After studying in Italy and France, he returned to England where he taught for several years at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and became a well known singer and composer of art songs...
  
  : Messaline
  Messaline
  Messaline is an operatic tragédie lyrique in four acts by Isidore de Lara. The librettists were Paul Armand Silvestre and Eugène Morand.The opera premiered at the Opéra de Monte-Carlo on 21 March 1899 where it was received enthusiastically...
  
  

Caecilia Metella Dalmatica

Caecilia Metella Dalmatica

Caecilia Metella was daughter of Lucius Caecilius Metellus Dalmaticus, Pontifex Maximus in 115 BC.Dalmatica's first marriage was to Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, an aging politician at the peak of his power. The patrician Scaurus was princeps senatus and a traditional ally of her family...

, fourth wife of Lucius Cornelius Sulla

Lucius Cornelius Sulla

Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix , known commonly as Sulla, was a Roman general and statesman. He had the rare distinction of holding the office of consul twice, as well as that of dictator...

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Silla
  Silla (opera)
  Silla is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel. The Italian-language libretto was by Giacomo Rossi. The story concerns the Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla as recounted by Plutarch.The opera appears to have been a pièce d'occasion, whicht may have been performed only once...
  
  

Cornelia Metella

Cornelia Metella

Cornelia Metella was the daughter of Q. Caecilius Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica . She appears in numerous literary sources, including an official dedicatory inscription at Pergamon....

, Pompey's second wife

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Giulio Cesare (in Egitto)
  Giulio Cesare
  Giulio Cesare in Egitto , commonly known simply as Giulio Cesare, is an Italian opera in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel in 1724...
  
  (as Cornelia)

Klemens Wenzel, Prince von Metternich

• Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
  
   and Jacques Ibert
  Jacques Ibert
  Jacques François Antoine Ibert was a French composer. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I.Ibert pursued a successful composing career,...
  
  : L'aiglon

John Milton

John Milton

John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...

, English poet

• Gaspare Spontini
  Gaspare Spontini
  Gaspare Luigi Pacifico Spontini was an Italian opera composer and conductor, extremely celebrated in his time, though largely forgotten after his death.-Biography:...
  
  : Milton
  Milton (opera)
  Milton is an opéra comique in one act by Gaspare Spontini. The French libretto, by Victor-Joseph Étienne de Jouy and Armand-Michel Dieulafoy, is based on the life of the English poet John Milton. Milton was first performed on 27 November 1804 by the Opéra-Comique at the Salle Feydeau in Paris . It...
  
  
• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Gilbert Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, 1st Earl of Minto

Gilbert Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, 1st Earl of Minto

Gilbert Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, 1st Earl of Minto PC , known as Sir Gilbert Elliott between 1777 and 1797 and as The Lord Minto between 1797 and 1813, was a Scottish politician diplomat....

, Scottish diplomat, Governor-General of India

• Lennox Berkeley
  Lennox Berkeley
  Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley was an English composer.- Biography :He was born in Oxford, England, and educated at the Dragon School, Gresham's School and Merton College, Oxford...
  
  : Nelson
  Nelson (opera)
  Nelson is an opera in 3 acts by Lennox Berkeley to a libretto by Alan Pryce-Jones. The opera centres on the love affair of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson and Emma, Lady Hamilton. Completed in 1951, it was first performed in full in 1954.-Background:...
  
  

King Mithridates VI of Pontus

Mithridates VI of Pontus

Mithridates VI or Mithradates VI Mithradates , from Old Persian Mithradatha, "gift of Mithra"; 134 BC – 63 BC, also known as Mithradates the Great and Eupator Dionysius, was king of Pontus and Armenia Minor in northern Anatolia from about 120 BC to 63 BC...

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Mitridate, re di Ponto
  Mitridate, re di Ponto
  Mitridate, re di Ponto , K. 87 , is an early opera seria in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto is by Vittorio Amadeo Cigna-Santi after Giuseppe Parini's Italian translation of Jean Racine....
  
  
• Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti was an Italian Baroque composer especially famous for his operas and chamber cantatas. He is considered the founder of the Neapolitan school of opera. He was the father of two other composers, Domenico Scarlatti and Pietro Filippo Scarlatti.-Life:Scarlatti was born in...
  
  : Mitridate Eupatore
  Mitridate Eupatore
  Il Mitridate Eupatore is an opera seria in five acts by the Italian composer Alessandro Scarlatti with a libretto by Girolamo Frigimelica Roberti. It was first performed at the Teatro San Giovanni Grisostomo, Venice on 5 January, 1707...
  
  

Marina Mniszech

Marina Mniszech

Marina Mniszech Marina Mniszech Marina Mniszech (Polish: Maryna Mniszchówna or Maryna Mniszech; Russian: Марина Мнишек (Marina Mnishek); also known as "Marinka the witch" in Russian folklore; c...

, Polish noble and Russian political adventurer

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Dimitrij
  Dimitrij
  Dimitrij is an opera by Antonín Dvořák in 4 acts, set a libretto by Marie Červinková-Riegrová. More specifically, it belongs to the genre of Grand Opera. The work was first performed in Prague, at the Nové České Divadlo on 8 October 1882, after Dvořák began composition during May 1881...
  
  
• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Boris Godunov
  Boris Godunov (opera)
  Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
  
  

Moctezuma II

Moctezuma II

Moctezuma , also known by a number of variant spellings including Montezuma, Moteuczoma, Motecuhzoma and referred to in full by early Nahuatl texts as Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin, was the ninth tlatoani or ruler of Tenochtitlan, reigning from 1502 to 1520...

, Aztec ruler

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : La conquista
• Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun
  Carl Heinrich Graun was a German composer and tenor singer. Along with Johann Adolf Hasse, he is considered to be the most important German composer of Italian opera of his time.-Biography:...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (Graun)
  Montezuma is an opera seria in three acts by the German composer Carl Heinrich Graun. The scenario was written in French by Graun's patron, Frederick the Great, the King of Prussia, and turned into an Italian libretto by Giampetro Tagliazucchi....
  
  
• Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley was an American composer and conductor.-Life:Hadley was born into a musical family in Somerville, Massachusetts...
  
  : Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, The Daughter of Montezuma is an opera in 3 acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley to a libretto in English by author David Stevens.-Synopsis:The story takes place at the time of the conquest of the Aztecs by Cortez...
  
  
• Josef Mysliveček
  Josef Myslivecek
  Josef Mysliveček was a Czech composer who contributed to the formation of late eighteenth-century classicism in music...
  
  : Motezuma
• Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Maria Gasparo Sacchini was an Italian opera composer.Sacchini was born in Florence, but was raised in Naples, where he received his musical education at the San Onofrio conservatory. He wrote his first operas in Naples, thereafter moving to Venice, then London and eventually Paris, where...
  
  : Montezuma
• Roger Sessions
  Roger Sessions
  Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
  
  : Montezuma
  Montezuma (opera)
  Montezuma is an opera in three acts by the American composer Roger Sessions, with an English libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese that incorporates bits of the Aztec language, Nahuatl, as well as Spanish, Latin, and French.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Motezuma
  Motezuma
  Motezuma is an opera in three acts by Antonio Vivaldi with an Italian libretto by Girolamo Giusti. The first performance was given in the Teatro Sant'Angelo in Venice on 14 November 1733...
  
  
• Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli
  Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli
  Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli was an Italian composer, chiefly of opera.-Early career:Zingarelli was born in Naples, where he studied at the Santa Maria di Loreto Conservatory under Fenaroli and Speranza....
  
  : Montesuma

King Mojmír II

Mojmír II

Mojmir II was the last king of the Great Moravian Empire . Because of a civil war with his brother, he failed to prevent dismemberment of his Empire and probably died while fighting Magyar invaders....

of Great Moravia

• Eugen Suchoň
  Eugen Suchon
  Eugen Suchoň was one of the greatest Slovak composers of the 20th century.-Early life:...
  
  : Svätopluk
  Svätopluk (opera)
  Svätopluk is a Slovak opera by Eugen Suchoň with the subtitle Musical drama in three acts. The libretto is by Eugen Suchoň, Ivan Stodola and Jela Krčméry-Vrteľová and is loosely based on Stodola's play Kráľ Svätopluk, which was in turn based on events in the life of King Svatopluk I. Suchoň...
  
  

Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, singer, model and showgirl who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s....

, American actress

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Marilyn
• Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch
  Igor Wakhévitch , son of the art director Georges Wakhévitch, is an avant-garde French composer who released a series of studio albums in the 1970s and composed the music for the Salvador Dalí opera Être Dieu...
  
  : Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties
  Être Dieu
  Être Dieu: opéra-poème, audiovisuel et cathare en six parties is a self-proclaimed "opera-poem" written by Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dalí, based on a libretto by Manuel Vázquez Montalbán with music by French avant-garde musician Igor Wakhévitch...
  
  (a creation of Salvador Dalí
  Salvador Dalí
  Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
  
  ; Monroe is doing a striptease with Catherine the Great of Russia
  Catherine II of Russia
  Catherine II, also known as Catherine the Great , Empress of Russia, was born in Stettin, Pomerania, Prussia on as Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst-Dornburg...
  
  )

Thomas Moore

Thomas Moore

Thomas Moore was an Irish poet, singer, songwriter, and entertainer, now best remembered for the lyrics of The Minstrel Boy and The Last Rose of Summer. He was responsible, with John Murray, for burning Lord Byron's memoirs after his death...

, Irish poet, songwriter

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Mordred

Mordred

Mordred or Modred is a character in the Arthurian legend, known as a notorious traitor who fought King Arthur at the Battle of Camlann, where he was killed and Arthur fatally wounded. Tradition varies on his relationship to Arthur, but he is best known today as Arthur's illegitimate son by his...

, legendary Arthurian character

• Isaac Albéniz
  Isaac Albéniz
  Isaac Manuel Francisco Albéniz y Pascual was a Spanish Catalan pianist and composer best known for his piano works based on folk music idioms .-Life:Born in Camprodon, province of Girona, to Ángel Albéniz and his wife Dolors Pascual, Albéniz...
  
  : Merlin
  Merlin (opera)
  Merlin is the last of the operas of Isaac Albéniz. It is in three acts and the libretto was written in English by Francis Money-Coutts, 5th Baron Latymer ....
  
  
• Ernest Chausson
  Ernest Chausson
  Amédée-Ernest Chausson was a French romantic composer who died just as his career was beginning to flourish.-Life:Ernest Chausson was born in Paris into a prosperous bourgeois family...
  
  : Le roi Arthus
  Le roi Arthus
  Le roi Arthus is an opera in three acts by the French composer Ernest Chausson to his own libretto. It was composed between 1886 and 1895, but only first performed on 30 November 1903 at the Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels, after long delays...
  
  

Thomas Morton, American colonist of New England

• Howard Hanson
  Howard Hanson
  Howard Harold Hanson was an American composer, conductor, educator, music theorist, and champion of American classical music. As director for 40 years of the Eastman School of Music, he built a high-quality school and provided opportunities for commissioning and performing American music...
  
  : Merry Mount
  Merry Mount
  Merry Mount is an opera in three acts by American composer Howard Hanson; its libretto, by Richard Stokes, is loosely based on Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story "The Maypole of Merry Mount", taken from his Twice Told Tales...
  
  

Charles Blount, 8th Baron Mountjoy, Elizabethan figure

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...

, Austrian composer

• P. D. Q. Bach
  P. D. Q. Bach
  P. D. Q. Bach is a fictitious composer invented by musical satirist "Professor" Peter Schickele. In a gag that Schickele has developed over a five-decade-long career, he performs "discovered" works of this forgotten member of the Bach family...
  
   (Peter Schickele
  Peter Schickele
  Johann Peter Schickele is an American composer, musical educator, and parodist. He is best known for his comedy music albums featuring his music that he presents as music written by the fictional composer P. D. Q...
  
  ): A Little Nightmare Music
  A Little Nightmare Music
  A Little Nightmare Music is an opera in "one irrevocable act" by Peter Schickele under the pseudonym he uses for parodies and comical works P. D. Q. Bach. The title of the work refers to the English translation of Mozart's famous Eine kleine Nachtmusik...
  
  
• Reynaldo Hahn
  Reynaldo Hahn
  Reynaldo Hahn was a Venezuelan, naturalised French, composer, conductor, music critic and diarist. Best known as a composer of songs, he wrote in the French classical tradition of the mélodie....
  
  : Mozart
  Mozart (musical comedy)
  Mozart is a comédie musicale in three acts with music by Reynaldo Hahn and words by Sacha Guitry, a pastiche of the composer's early works to fit beside arias written for Yvonne Printemps...
  
   (musical comedy)
• Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five.The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie, refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César...
  
  : Mozart and Salieri
  Mozart and Salieri
  Mozart and Salieri is a one-act opera in two scenes by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, written in 1897 to a Russian libretto taken almost verbatim from Alexander Pushkin's 1830 verse drama of the same name....
  
  

Gaius Mucius Scaevola, Roman figure

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Mutio Scevola
  Mutio Scevola
  Mutio Scevola or Muzio Scevola is an opera in three acts and a prologue by the Italian composer Francesco Cavalli, with a libretto by Giovanni Faustini. It was based on the story of the Roman hero, Gaius Mucius Scaevola...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola is an opera in three acts about Gaius Mucius Scaevola. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, adapted from a text by Silvio Stampiglia. The music for the first act was composed by Filippo Amadei , the second act by Giovanni Battista Bononcini, and the third by...
  
  

Muhammad XII of Granada, aka Boabdil, last Nasrid ruler of Granada

• Moritz Moszkowski
  Moritz Moszkowski
  Moritz Moszkowski was a German Jewish composer, pianist, and teacher of Polish descent. Ignacy Paderewski said, "After Chopin, Moszkowski best understands how to write for the piano"...
  
  : Boabdil der letzte Maurenkönig

Ottoman Sultan Murad II

Murad II

Murad II Kodja was the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1421 to 1451 ....

• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Scanderbeg
  Scanderbeg (opera)
  Scanderbeg is an opera in three acts composed by Antonio Vivaldi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Salvi. It was first performed at the Teatro della Pergola in Florence on June 22, 1718 to mark the re-opening of the theatre to public performances...
  
  (as Amurat II)

John Murray II

John Murray (publisher)

John Murray is an English publisher, renowned for the authors it has published in its history, including Jane Austen, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Lord Byron, Charles Lyell, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Herman Melville, and Charles Darwin...

, British publisher

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Eadweard Muybridge

Eadweard Muybridge

Eadweard J. Muybridge was an English photographer who spent much of his life in the United States. He is known for his pioneering work on animal locomotion which used multiple cameras to capture motion, and his zoopraxiscope, a device for projecting motion pictures that pre-dated the flexible...

, English pioneer photographer

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : The Photographer
  The Photographer
  The Photographer is a chamber opera by composer Philip Glass that is based on the homicide trial of photographer Eadweard Muybridge. The opera is based on words drawn from the trial as well as Muybridge's letters to his wife...
  
  

N

Emperor Napoleon I

Napoleon I

Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...

 of France (Napoleon Bonaparte)

• Ivan Caryll
  Ivan Caryll
  Félix Marie Henri Tilkin , better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language...
  
  : The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic is a comic opera in three acts, set in Paris, with music by Ivan Caryll and a book and lyrics by Henry Hamilton, based on the play Madame Sans-Gêne by Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau. Additional lyrics by Adrian Ross...
  
  
• Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Menotti Maria Giordano was an Italian composer, mainly of operas.He was born in Foggia in Puglia, southern Italy, and studied under Paolo Serrao at the Conservatoire of Naples...
  
  : Madame Sans-Gêne
  Madame Sans-Gêne (opera)
  Madame Sans-Gêne is an opera in three acts by Umberto Giordano. The libretto was taken from Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau's play, adapted for the opera by Renato Simoni.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Emmerich Kálmán
  Emmerich Kalman
  Emmerich Kálmán was a Hungarian-born composer of operettas.- Biography :Kálmán was born Imre Koppstein in Siófok, on the southern shore of Lake Balaton, Hungary in a Jewish family.Kálmán initially intended to become a concert pianist, but because of early-onset arthritis, he focused on composition...
  
  : Kaiserin Josephine
  Kaiserin Josephine
  Kaiserin Josephine is an operetta in 8 scenes by Hungarian composer Emmerich Kalman. The German libretto was by Paul Knepler and Géza Herczeg. It premiered in Zurich, at the Stadt Theater, on 18 January 1936. - Roles :...
  
  
• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Emperor Napoleon II of France

• Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
  
   and Jacques Ibert
  Jacques Ibert
  Jacques François Antoine Ibert was a French composer. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I.Ibert pursued a successful composing career,...
  
  : L'aiglon
• Petar Stojanović
  Petar Stojanovic
  Petar Stojanović was a Serbian violinist and composer of operettas, ballets and orchestral music....
  
  : Napoleon II: Herzog von Reichstadt

Louis, comte de Narbonne-Lara

Louis, comte de Narbonne-Lara

Louis Marie Jacques Amalric, comte de Narbonne-Lara was a French nobleman, soldier and diplomat.-Birth and early life:He was born at Colorno, in the Duchy of Parma, as the son of Françoise de Châlus Louis Marie Jacques Amalric, comte de Narbonne-Lara (17, 23 or 24 August 1755 – 17 November...

• Ivan Caryll
  Ivan Caryll
  Félix Marie Henri Tilkin , better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language...
  
  : The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic
  The Duchess of Dantzic is a comic opera in three acts, set in Paris, with music by Ivan Caryll and a book and lyrics by Henry Hamilton, based on the play Madame Sans-Gêne by Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau. Additional lyrics by Adrian Ross...
  
  (as Comte de Narbonne)

Carrie Nation

Carrie Nation

Carrie Amelia Moore Nation was a member of the temperance movement, which opposed alcohol in pre-Prohibition America. She is particularly noteworthy for promoting her viewpoint through vandalism. On many occasions Nation would enter an alcohol-serving establishment and attack the bar with a hatchet...

, American temperance advocate and vandal

• Douglas Moore: Carry Nation

Nebuchadnezzar II, ruler of Babylon

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : The Burning Fiery Furnace
  The Burning Fiery Furnace
  The Burning Fiery Furnace is one of the three Parables for Church Performances composed by Benjamin Britten, dating from 1966, and is his Opus 77. The other two 'church parables' are Curlew River and The Prodigal Son . William Plomer was the librettist.The work was premiered at Orford Church,...
  
  
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Nabucco
  Nabucco
  Nabucco is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera, based on the Biblical story and the 1836 play by Auguste Anicet-Bourgeois and Francis Cornue...
  
  

Nefertiti

Nefertiti

Nefertiti was the Great Royal Wife of the Egyptian Pharaoh Akhenaten. Nefertiti and her husband were known for a religious revolution, in which they started to worship one god only...

, wife of Pharaoh Akhenaten of Egypt

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Akhnaten
  Akhnaten (opera)
  Akhnaten is an opera in three acts based on the life and religious convictions of the pharaoh Akhenaten , written by the American minimalist composer Philip Glass in 1983. Akhnaten had its world premiere on March 24, 1984 at the Stuttgart State Opera, under the German title Echnaton...
  
  

Adam Albert von Neipperg

Adam Albert von Neipperg

Adam Albert, Count von Neipperg was an Austrian general and statesman. The son of a diplomat, famous for inventing a letter-copying machine, and a French mother, he was the grandson of Wilhelm Reinhard von Neipperg....

, Austrian general

• Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Giordano
  Umberto Menotti Maria Giordano was an Italian composer, mainly of operas.He was born in Foggia in Puglia, southern Italy, and studied under Paolo Serrao at the Conservatoire of Naples...
  
  : Madame Sans-Gêne
  Madame Sans-Gêne (opera)
  Madame Sans-Gêne is an opera in three acts by Umberto Giordano. The libretto was taken from Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau's play, adapted for the opera by Renato Simoni.-Performance history:...
  
  

Frances Nelson

Frances Nelson

Frances "Fanny" Nelson, Viscountess Nelson , is best known as the wife of Horatio Nelson, the British naval officer who won several victories over the French during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars....

, Lady Nelson, wife of Lord Nelson

• Lennox Berkeley
  Lennox Berkeley
  Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley was an English composer.- Biography :He was born in Oxford, England, and educated at the Dragon School, Gresham's School and Merton College, Oxford...
  
  : Nelson
  Nelson (opera)
  Nelson is an opera in 3 acts by Lennox Berkeley to a libretto by Alan Pryce-Jones. The opera centres on the love affair of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson and Emma, Lady Hamilton. Completed in 1951, it was first performed in full in 1954.-Background:...
  
  

Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson

Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson

Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, 1st Duke of Bronté, KB was a flag officer famous for his service in the Royal Navy, particularly during the Napoleonic Wars. He was noted for his inspirational leadership and superb grasp of strategy and unconventional tactics, which resulted in a number of...

, British admiral, naval hero

• Lennox Berkeley
  Lennox Berkeley
  Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley was an English composer.- Biography :He was born in Oxford, England, and educated at the Dragon School, Gresham's School and Merton College, Oxford...
  
  : Nelson
  Nelson (opera)
  Nelson is an opera in 3 acts by Lennox Berkeley to a libretto by Alan Pryce-Jones. The opera centres on the love affair of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson and Emma, Lady Hamilton. Completed in 1951, it was first performed in full in 1954.-Background:...
  
  

Emperor Nero

Nero

Nero , was Roman Emperor from 54 to 68, and the last in the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Nero was adopted by his great-uncle Claudius to become his heir and successor, and succeeded to the throne in 54 following Claudius' death....

 of Rome

• Arrigo Boito
  Arrigo Boito
  Arrigo Boito , aka Enrico Giuseppe Giovanni Boito, pseudonym Tobia Gorrio, was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist and composer, best known today for his libretti, especially those for Giuseppe Verdi's operas Otello and Falstaff, and his own opera Mefistofele...
  
  : Nerone
  Nerone (Boito)
  Nerone is an opera in four acts composed by Arrigo Boito, to a libretto in Italian written by the composer. The work is a series of scenes from Imperial Rome at the time of Emperor Nero depicting tensions between the Imperial religion and Christianity, and ends with the Great Fire of Rome...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Agrippina
  Agrippina (opera)
  Agrippina is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel, from a libretto by Cardinal Vincenzo Grimani. Composed for the Venice Carnevale season, the opera tells the story of Agrippina, the mother of Nero, as she plots the downfall of the Roman Emperor Claudius and the installation of...
  
  
• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Octavia
  Octavia (opera)
  The Roman Unrest, or The Noble-Minded Octavia , commonly called Octavia, is a singspiel in three acts by Reinhard Keiser to a German libretto by Barthold Feind...
  
  
• Pietro Mascagni
  Pietro Mascagni
  Pietro Antonio Stefano Mascagni was an Italian composer most noted for his operas. His 1890 masterpiece Cavalleria rusticana caused one of the greatest sensations in opera history and single-handedly ushered in the Verismo movement in Italian dramatic music...
  
  : Nerone (as Claudio Cesare Nerone)
• Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, and singer.Monteverdi's work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the transition from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two individual styles of composition – the...
  
  : L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...
  
  
• Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
  
  : Néron
  Néron (opera)
  Néron , is a grand opera in four acts by Anton Rubinstein to a libretto by Jules Barbier, loosely based on the story of the Roman Emperor-Background:...
  
  

Tsar Nicholas II of Russia

Nicholas II of Russia

Nicholas II was the last Emperor of Russia, Grand Prince of Finland, and titular King of Poland. His official short title was Nicholas II, Emperor and Autocrat of All the Russias and he is known as Saint Nicholas the Passion-Bearer by the Russian Orthodox Church.Nicholas II ruled from 1894 until...

• Deborah Drattell
  Deborah Drattell
  Deborah Drattell is an American composer. She was born in Brooklyn, New York, and started her career in music as a violinist. Her compositions have been performed by the New York Philharmonic, Orchestra of St. Luke's, the Tanglewood and Caramoor Music Festivals, and many other groups and venues...
  
  : Nicholas and Alexandra

Pat Nixon

Pat Nixon

Thelma Catherine "Pat" Ryan Nixon was the wife of Richard Nixon, 37th President of the United States, and was First Lady of the United States from 1969 to 1974. She was commonly known as Patricia or Pat Nixon.Born in Nevada, Pat Ryan grew up in Los Angeles, California...

, U.S. First Lady

• John Adams: Nixon in China
  Nixon in China (opera)
  Nixon in China is an opera in three acts by John Adams, with a libretto by Alice Goodman. Adams' first opera, it was inspired by the 1972 visit to China by US President Richard Nixon. The work premiered at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987, in a production by Peter Sellars with...
  
  

Richard Nixon

Richard Nixon

Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...

, U.S. President

• John Adams: Nixon in China
  Nixon in China (opera)
  Nixon in China is an opera in three acts by John Adams, with a libretto by Alice Goodman. Adams' first opera, it was inspired by the 1972 visit to China by US President Richard Nixon. The work premiered at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987, in a production by Peter Sellars with...
  
  

Rikard Nordraak

Rikard Nordraak

Rikard Nordraak was a Norwegian composer. He is best known as the composer of the Norwegian national anthem.-Biography:...

, Norwegian composer

• Edvard Grieg
  Edvard Grieg
  Edvard Hagerup Grieg was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is best known for his Piano Concerto in A minor, for his incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt , and for his collection of piano miniatures Lyric Pieces.-Biography:Edvard Hagerup Grieg was born in...
  
  , arr. Robert Wright
  Robert Wright (writer)
  Robert [Craig] Wright was an American composer-lyricist for Hollywood and the musical theatre best known for the Broadway musical and musical film Kismet, for which he and his professional partner George Forrest adapted themes by Alexander Borodin and added lyrics...
  
   and George Forrest
  George Forrest (author)
  George Forrest was a writer of music and lyrics for musical theatre best known for the show Kismet, adapted from the works of Alexander Borodin.-Biography:...
  
  : Song of Norway
  Song of Norway
  Song of Norway is an operetta written in 1944 by Robert Wright and George Forrest, adapted from the music of Edvard Grieg and the book by Milton Lazarus and Homer Curran...
  
  

Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, KG, Earl Marshal was a prominent Tudor politician. He was uncle to Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, two of the wives of King Henry VIII, and played a major role in the machinations behind these marriages...

, English politician, uncle to two of Henry VIII’s wives

• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Henry VIII
  Henry VIII (opera)
  Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on El cisma en Inglaterra by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.-Composition history:...
  
  

Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk

Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk

Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, KG, Earl Marshal was an English nobleman.Norfolk was the son of the poet Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey. He was taught as a child by John Foxe, the Protestant martyrologist, who remained a lifelong recipient of Norfolk's patronage...

, English nobleman

• Gioachino Rossini: Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra
  Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra
  Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra, is a dramma per musica or opera in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Giovanni Schmidt, from the play The Page of Leicester by Carlo Federici...
  
  

Rosaleen Norton

Rosaleen Norton

Rosaleen "Roie" Norton , who used the craft name of Thorn, was an Australian artist and occultist, in the latter capacity adhering to a form of pantheistic Neopagan Witchcraft or Wicca which was devoted to the god Pan...

, so-called "Witch of Kings Cross", Sydney occultist

• Drew Crawford: Eugene & Roie

Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham

Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham

Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham , known as Howard of Effingham, was an English statesman and Lord High Admiral under Elizabeth I and James I...

, English admiral and statesman

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, by Gaetano Donizetti...
  
  

O

J. F. Oberlin, Alsatian pastor, philanthropist

• Wolfgang Rihm
  Wolfgang Rihm
  Wolfgang Rihm is a German composer.Rihm is Head of the Institute of Modern Music at the Karlsruhe Conservatory of Music and has been composer in residence at the Lucerne Festival and the Salzburg Festival...
  
  : Jakob Lenz
  Jakob Lenz (opera)
  Jakob Lenz is a one act chamber opera by Wolfgang Rihm, written 1977-78 after the novella Lenz by Georg Büchner in turn based on an incident in the life of the German poet Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz....
  
  

Empress Claudia Octavia

Claudia Octavia

Claudia Octavia was an Empress of Rome. She was a great-niece of the Emperor Tiberius, paternal first cousin of the Emperor Caligula, daughter of the Emperor Claudius, and stepsister and first wife of the Emperor Nero...

of Rome, consort of Nero

Nero

Nero , was Roman Emperor from 54 to 68, and the last in the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Nero was adopted by his great-uncle Claudius to become his heir and successor, and succeeded to the throne in 54 following Claudius' death....

• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Octavia
  Octavia (opera)
  The Roman Unrest, or The Noble-Minded Octavia , commonly called Octavia, is a singspiel in three acts by Reinhard Keiser to a German libretto by Barthold Feind...
  
  
• Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, and singer.Monteverdi's work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the transition from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two individual styles of composition – the...
  
  : L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...
  
  

Octavia the Younger, fourth wife of Mark Antony

• Samuel Barber
  Samuel Barber
  Samuel Osborne Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. His Adagio for Strings is his most popular composition and widely considered a masterpiece of modern classical music...
  
  : Antony and Cleopatra
  Antony and Cleopatra (opera)
  Antony and Cleopatra is an opera in three acts by American composer Samuel Barber. The libretto was prepared by Franco Zeffirelli based on the play Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare...
  
  
• Jules Massenet
  Jules Massenet
  Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer best known for his operas. His compositions were very popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and he ranks as one of the greatest melodists of his era. Soon after his death, Massenet's style went out of fashion, and many of his operas...
  
  : Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre
  Cléopâtre is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Louis Payen. It was first performed in at the Opéra Monte-Carlo on February 23, 1914, nearly two years after Massenet's death....
  
  

King Olaf I Tryggvason of Norway

Olaf I of Norway

Olaf Tryggvason was King of Norway from 995 to 1000. He was the son of Tryggvi Olafsson, king of Viken , and, according to later sagas, the great-grandson of Harald Fairhair, first King of Norway.Olaf played an important part in the often forcible, on pain of torture or death, conversion of the...

• Ragnar Søderlind
  Ragnar Søderlind
  Ragnar Søderlind is a Norwegian composer. He has written ballets and operas, and for the concert hall, programmatic works based on poems.-Biography:...
  
  : Olav Tryggvason

King Olaf II of Norway

Olaf II of Norway

Olaf II Haraldsson was King of Norway from 1015 to 1028. He was posthumously given the title Rex Perpetuus Norvegiae and canonised in Nidaros by Bishop Grimkell, one year after his death in the Battle of Stiklestad on 29 July 1030. Enshrined in Nidaros Cathedral...

 (St. Olaf)

• Judith Weir
  Judith Weir
  Judith Weir CBE, is a British composer.-Biography:Her music has been appreciated by audiences and critics alike. She trained with John Tavener while still at school and subsequently with Robin Holloway at King's College, Cambridge, graduating in 1976...
  
  : King Harald's Saga
  King Harald's Saga
  King Harald's Saga, Grand opera in three acts for unaccompanied solo soprano singing eight rôles is a monodrama by Judith Weir, commissioned by Jane Manning and premiered on May 17, 1979...
  
  

Aristotle Onassis

Aristotle Onassis

Aristotle Sokratis Onassis , commonly called Ari or Aristo Onassis, was a prominent Greek shipping magnate.- Early life :Onassis was born in Karatass, a suburb of Smyrna to Socrates and Penelope Onassis...

, Greek shipping magnate

• Michael Daugherty
  Michael Daugherty
  Michael Kevin Daugherty is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. Influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and Postmodernism, Daugherty is one of the most colorful and widely performed American concert music composers of his generation...
  
  : Jackie O
  Jackie O (opera)
  Jackie O is a chamber opera in two acts composed by Michael Daugherty to a libretto by Wayne Koestenbaum. The 90 minute work, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 1995 and premiered in 1997, is inspired by American musical and popular culture of the late 1960s and episodes in the life of...
  
  

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier "Jackie" Kennedy Onassis was the wife of the 35th President of the United States, John F. Kennedy, and served as First Lady of the United States during his presidency from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. Five years later she married Greek shipping magnate Aristotle...

, U.S. First Lady, wife of John F. Kennedy, then of Aristotle Onassis

• Michael Daugherty
  Michael Daugherty
  Michael Kevin Daugherty is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. Influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and Postmodernism, Daugherty is one of the most colorful and widely performed American concert music composers of his generation...
  
  : Jackie O
  Jackie O (opera)
  Jackie O is a chamber opera in two acts composed by Michael Daugherty to a libretto by Wayne Koestenbaum. The 90 minute work, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 1995 and premiered in 1997, is inspired by American musical and popular culture of the late 1960s and episodes in the life of...
  
  

J. Robert Oppenheimer, American physicist

• John Adams: Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic is an opera by the contemporary American composer John Adams, with libretto by Peter Sellars. It premiered at the San Francisco Opera on 1 October 2005. The work focuses on the great stress and anxiety experienced by those at Los Alamos while the test of the first atomic bomb was...
  
  

Sallustia Orbiana

Sallustia Orbiana

Seia Herennia Sallustia Barbia Orbiana Augusta , also known as Barbia Orbiana, was an Augusta of the Roman Empire and briefly the wife of Emperor Severus Alexander. She was known for her beauty, which was captured in multiple works of art...

, wife of Emperor Alexander Severus of Rome

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Alessandro Severo
  Alessandro Severo
  Alessandro Severo is an opera by George Frideric Handel composed in 1738. It is one of Handel's three pasticcio works, made up of the music and arias of his previous operas Giustino, Berenice and Arminio...
  
  

Pylyp Orlyk

Pylyp Orlyk

Pylyp Stepanovych Orlyk Pylyp Stepanovych Orlyk Pylyp Stepanovych Orlyk (born on October 11, 1672 in Kosuta, Ashmyany county, Grand Duchy of Lithuania (today in Vileyka Raion, Belarus), died on May 26, 1742 in Jassy, Principality of Moldavia (today Iaşi, Romania) was a Zaporozhian Cossack...

, associate of Ivan Mazepa

Ivan Mazepa

Ivan Stepanovych Mazepa , Cossack Hetman of the Hetmanate in Left-bank Ukraine, from 1687–1708. He was famous as a patron of the arts, and also played an important role in the Battle of Poltava where after learning of Peter I's intent to relieve him as acting Hetman of Ukraine and replace him...

• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
  
  : Mazeppa
  Mazeppa (opera)
  Mazeppa, properly Mazepa , is an opera in 3 acts by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The libretto was written by Victor Burenin and is based on Pushkin's poem Poltava....
  
  

Pier Francesco Orsini

Pier Francesco Orsini

Pier Francesco Orsini , also called Vicino Orsini, was an Italian condottiero and patron of the arts. He is famous as the commissioner of the Mannerist Park of the Monsters in Bomarzo .-Biography:...

, Italian condottiero

• Alberto Ginastera
  Alberto Ginastera
  Alberto Evaristo Ginastera was an Argentine composer of classical music. He is considered one of the most important Latin American classical composers.- Biography :...
  
  : Bomarzo

Emperor Marcus Salvius Otho

Otho

Otho , was Roman Emperor for three months, from 15 January to 16 April 69. He was the second emperor of the Year of the four emperors.- Birth and lineage :...

 of Rome

• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Ottone in villa
  Ottone in villa
  Ottone in villa is an opera in three acts by Antonio Vivaldi to an Italian libretto by Domenico Lalli . It was Vivaldi's first opera and premiered on 17 May 1713 at the Teatro delle Grazie in Vicenza...
  
  

P

María de Padilla

María de Padilla

María Díaz de Padilla was the mistress of King Peter of Castile whom he married in secret in 1353.She was a Castilian noblewoman...

, mistress and secret wife of Peter of Castile

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Maria Padilla
  Maria Padilla
  Maria Padilla is a melodramma, or opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Gaetano Rossi and the composer wrote the Italian libretto after François Ancelot's play. It premiered on December 26, 1841 at La Scala, Milan...
  
  

Niccolò Paganini

Niccolò Paganini

Niccolò Paganini was an Italian violinist, violist, guitarist, and composer. He was one of the most celebrated violin virtuosi of his time, and left his mark as one of the pillars of modern violin technique...

, Italian violinist and composer

• Sir Harrison Birtwistle
  Harrison Birtwistle
  Sir Harrison Paul Birtwistle CH is a British contemporary composer.-Life:Birtwistle was born in Accrington, a mill town in Lancashire some 20 miles north of Manchester. His interest in music was encouraged by his mother, who bought him a clarinet when he was seven, and arranged for him to have...
  
  : The Second Mrs Kong
  The Second Mrs Kong
  The Second Mrs Kong is an opera in two acts, with music by Sir Harrison Birtwistle to a libretto by Russell Hoban. Glyndebourne Touring Opera first staged the opera on 24 October 1994. The cast included Philip Langridge, Helen Field and Michael Chance. Tom Cairns designed and directed the...
  
  

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina was an Italian Renaissance composer of sacred music and the best-known 16th-century representative of the Roman School of musical composition...

, Italian composer

• Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Erich Pfitzner was a German composer and self-described anti-modernist. His best known work is the post-Romantic opera Palestrina, loosely based on the life of the great sixteenth-century composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina.-Biography:Pfitzner was born in Moscow, Russia, where his...
  
  : Palestrina
  Palestrina (opera)
  Palestrina is an opera by the German composer Hans Pfitzner, first performed in 1917. The composer referred to it as a Musikalische Legende , and wrote the libretto himself, based on a legend about the Renaissance musician Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, who saves the art of contrapuntal music ...
  
  
• Johann Sachs
  Johann Sachs
  Johann Melchior Ernst Sachs was a German romantic composer, who also held teaching and performing posts.He studied first at Altdorf Seminary; taught in elementary schools from 1861 to 1863, then entered the Munich College of Music and remained there from 1863 to 1865, before becoming a pupil there...
  
  : Palestrina

Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin

Sarah Louise Palin is an American politician, commentator and author. As the Republican Party nominee for Vice President in the 2008 presidential election, she was the first Alaskan on the national ticket of a major party and first Republican woman nominated for the vice-presidency.She was...

, American politician, Governor of Alaska, vice-presidential candidate

• Curtis K. Hughes: Say It Ain't So, Joe
  Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say It Ain't So, Joe is a chamber opera in two acts by Curtis K. Hughes inspired by text drawn from the public record of the 2008 United States vice-presidential debate...
  
  

Papantzin

Papantzin

Papantzin was a Texcocoan princess, the grand-daughter of Nezahualpulli, and the sister-in-law of Moctezuma II, whose policy was to marry his brothers and male relatives to the daughters of rival kings, and thus secure his realm. In 1509, Papantzin fell seriously ill and became comatose...

, Aztec princess, sister of Moctezuma II

• Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley
  Henry Kimball Hadley was an American composer and conductor.-Life:Hadley was born into a musical family in Somerville, Massachusetts...
  
  : Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, The Daughter of Montezuma is an opera in 3 acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley to a libretto in English by author David Stevens.-Synopsis:The story takes place at the time of the conquest of the Aztecs by Cortez...
  
  

Johan Papegoja

Johan Papegoja

Johan Papegoja was the fifth governor of the Swedish Colony of New Sweden.Johan Papegoja had been one of the early Swedish settlers on the Delaware. Papegoja is the Swedish word for parrot. He served as a Lieutenant at New Sweden under governor Johan Björnsson Printz...

, Governor of New Sweden

New Sweden

New Sweden was a Swedish colony along the Delaware River on the Mid-Atlantic coast of North America from 1638 to 1655. Fort Christina, now in Wilmington, Delaware, was the first settlement. New Sweden included parts of the present-day American states of Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania....

• Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Olof Wilhelm Peterson-Berger was a Swedish composer and music critic...
  
  : The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets is an opera by Wilhelm Peterson-Berger, to his own Swedish libretto, composed from 1912-17...
  
  

Ely S. Parker

Ely S. Parker

Ely Samuel Parker , was a Seneca attorney, engineer, and tribal diplomat. He was commissioned a lieutenant colonel during the American Civil War, when he served as adjutant to General Ulysses S. Grant. He wrote the final draft of the Confederate surrender terms at Appomattox...

, American Seneca native, Commissioner of Indian Affairs

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Boris Pasternak

Boris Pasternak

Boris Leonidovich Pasternak was a Russian language poet, novelist, and literary translator. In his native Russia, Pasternak's anthology My Sister Life, is one of the most influential collections ever published in the Russian language...

, Russian novelist

• Nigel Osborne
  Nigel Osborne
  Nigel Osborne MBE, FRCM is a British composer.He serves as Reid Professor of music at the University of Edinburgh and has been teaching at the Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover.He studied composition with Kenneth Leighton ,...
  
  : The Electrification of the Soviet Union
  The Electrification of the Soviet Union
  The Electrification of the Soviet Union is an opera in two acts by Nigel Osborne. The libretto was written by Craig Raine and based on The Last Summer and Spectorsky, two semi-autobiographical works by Boris Pasternak who appears as a narrator in the opera...
  
  (narrator)

Francisco Pelsaert

Francisco Pelsaert

Francisco Pelsaert was a Dutch merchant who worked for the Dutch East India Company, who became most famous as the commander of the ship Batavia, which ran aground in the Houtman Abrolhos off the coast of Western Australia in June...

, Dutch merchant, naval commander

• Richard Mills
  Richard Mills
  Richard John Mills AM, DMus BA Qld, is an Australian conductor and composer. He currently works as Artistic Director of the West Australian Opera and Artistic Consultant with Orchestra Victoria...
  
  : Batavia
  Batavia (opera)
  Batavia is an opera in three acts and a prologue by Richard Mills to a libretto by Peter Goldsworthy,commissioned by Opera Australia. The plot is based on the historical events surrounding the Dutchsailing ship Batavia....
  
  

Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys FRS, MP, JP, was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament who is now most famous for the diary he kept for a decade while still a relatively young man...

, English diarist

• Albert Coates
  Albert Coates (musician)
  Albert Coates was an English conductor and composer. Born in Saint Petersburg where his English father was a successful businessman, he studied in Russia, England and Germany, before beginning his career as a conductor in a series of German opera houses...
  
  : Samuel Pepys

Henry Percy, 6th Earl of Northumberland

Henry Percy, 6th Earl of Northumberland

Henry Percy, 6th Earl of Northumberland, KG was an English nobleman, active as a military officer in the north. He is now primarily remembered as the betrothed of Anne Boleyn, whom he was forced to give up before she became involved with King Henry VIII.-Early life:He was eldest son of Henry...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Ippolito Pindemonte's Enrico VIII ossia Anna Bolena and Alessandro Pepoli's Anna Bolena, both telling of the life of Anne Boleyn...
  
  

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi was an Italian composer, violinist and organist.-Biography:Born at Iesi, Pergolesi studied music there under a local musician, Francesco Santini, before going to Naples in 1725, where he studied under Gaetano Greco and Francesco Feo among others...

, Italian composer

• Paolo Serrao
  Paolo Serrao
  Paolo Serrao was a distinguished and influential Italian teacher of musical theory and composition at Naples....
  
  : Pergolesi

Pericles

Pericles

Pericles was a prominent and influential statesman, orator, and general of Athens during the city's Golden Age—specifically, the time between the Persian and Peloponnesian wars...

, Athenian statesman

• Henri Christiné
  Henri Christiné
  Henri Marius Christiné was a French composer of Swiss birth.The son of a French Savoyard watchmaker, Christiné was born in Geneva, Switzerland. He began by teaching at the lycée in Geneva, while pursuing his interest in music and playing organ in a local church...
  
  : Phi-Phi
  Phi-Phi
  Phi-Phi is an opérette légère in three acts with music by Henri Christiné and a French libretto by Albert Willemetz and Fabien Solar. The piece was one which founded the new style of French comédie musicale, the first to really use the latest rhythms of jazz along with a plot which emphasised...
  
  

Saint Peter

Saint Peter

Saint Peter or Simon Peter was an early Christian leader, who is featured prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. The son of John or of Jonah and from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee, his brother Andrew was also an apostle...

, Christian apostle

• Harrison Birtwistle
  Harrison Birtwistle
  Sir Harrison Paul Birtwistle CH is a British contemporary composer.-Life:Birtwistle was born in Accrington, a mill town in Lancashire some 20 miles north of Manchester. His interest in music was encouraged by his mother, who bought him a clarinet when he was seven, and arranged for him to have...
  
  : The Last Supper
  The Last Supper (opera)
  The Last Supper is an opera with music by Sir Harrison Birtwistle to an English and Latin libretto by Robin Blaser. Birtwistle composed the music over the period written in 1998-1999. The world premiere was given by the Berlin State Opera on 18 April 2000, with the production directed by Martin...
  
  
• Edwin Penhorwood
  Edwin Penhorwood
  Dr. Edwin Penhorwood is an American composer and currently assistant professor at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.-Biography:Penhorwood is a native of Toledo, Ohio, and studied music at the University of Iowa...
  
  : Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos is an opera by Indiana University Jacobs School of Music faculty member Edwin Penhorwood. Too Many Sopranos is a two-act opera in English with a pastiche of song from opera's various periods. A group of sopranos is trying to get into heaven, but there is no more room in the...
  
  

King Peter of Castile, "Peter the Cruel"

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Maria Padilla
  Maria Padilla
  Maria Padilla is a melodramma, or opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Gaetano Rossi and the composer wrote the Italian libretto after François Ancelot's play. It premiered on December 26, 1841 at La Scala, Milan...
  
  (as Don Pedro, Prince of Castile)

Tsar Peter I "The Great" of Russia

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Pietro il grande
  Pietro il grande
  Pietro il Grande zar di tutte le Russie or Il falegname di Livonia also known as Pietro, il grande, tsar delle Russie is a comic melodrama in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a libretto by Gherardo Bevilacqua-Aldobrandini.Pietro il Grande or Il falegname di Livonia was...
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti: Il borgomastro di Saardam
  Il borgomastro di Saardam
  Il borgomastro di Saardam is an opera buffa in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. It premiered at the Teatro del Fondo in Naples on 19 August 1827. The Neapolitans loved it, for Donizetti was very popular in that city, but when it was staged at the Teatro La Scala in Milan, it completely failed...
  
  
• André Grétry: Pierre le Grand
  Pierre le Grand
  Pierre le Grand is an opéra comique by André Grétry. The libretto, by Jean-Nicolas Bouilly, is based on the early life of the Russian tsar Peter the Great...
  
  
• Albert Lortzing
  Albert Lortzing
  Gustav Albert Lortzing was a German composer, actor and singer. He is considered to be the main representative of the German Spieloper, a form similar to the French opéra comique, which grew out of the Singspiel.-Biography:Lortzing was born in Berlin to Johann Gottlieb Lortzing and Charlotte Sophie...
  
  : Zar und Zimmermann
  Zar und Zimmermann
  Zar und Zimmermann is an opera in three acts, music by Albert Lortzing, libretto by the composer after Georg Christian Römer's Der Bürgermeister on Saarlem, oder Die zwei Peter, itself based on a French work entitled Le Bourgesmestre de Sardam, ou Les deux Pierres by Anne-Honoré-Joseph Duveyrier...
  
  
• Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...
  
  : L'étoile du nord
  L'étoile du nord
  L'étoile du nord is an opéra comique in three acts by Giacomo Meyerbeer. The French-language libretto was by Eugène Scribe....
  
  

Peter the Hermit

Peter the Hermit

Peter the Hermit was a priest of Amiens and a key figure during the First Crusade.-Before 1096:According to Anna Comnena, he had attempted to go on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem before 1096, but was prevented by the Seljuk Turks from reaching his goal and was tortured.Sources differ as to whether he...

, priest and leader of the First Crusade

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : La nonne sanglante
  La nonne sanglante
  La nonne sanglante , is a five-act opera by Charles Gounod to a libretto by Eugène Scribe and Germain Delavigne. Written between 1852 and 1854, it was first produced on 18 October 1854 at the Salle Le Peletier by the Paris Opéra. It received 11 performances between October and November 1854...
  
  

Gaius Petronius Arbiter

Petronius

Gaius Petronius Arbiter was a Roman courtier during the reign of Nero. He is generally believed to be the author of the Satyricon, a satirical novel believed to have been written during the Neronian age.-Life:...

, Roman courtier, writer

• Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, and singer.Monteverdi's work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the transition from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two individual styles of composition – the...
  
  : L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...
  
  

Michele Pezza

Fra Diavolo

Fra Diavolo , is the popular name given to Michele Pezza, a famous Neapolitan guerrilla leader who resisted the French occupation of Naples, proving an “inspirational practicioner of popular insurrection”. Pezza figures prominently in folk lore and fiction...

, Neapolitan guerilla leader, known as "Fra Diavolo"

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : Fra Diavolo
  Fra Diavolo (opera)
  Fra Diavolo, ou L'hôtellerie de Terracine is an opéra comique in three acts by the French composer Daniel Auber, from a libretto by Auber's regular collaborator Eugène Scribe...
  
  

King Pharnaces II of Pontus

Pharnaces II of Pontus

Pharnaces II of Pontus, also known as Pharnaces II was a prince, then King of Pontus and the Bosporan until his death. He was a monarch of Persian and Greek Macedonian ancestry. Pharnaces II was the youngest son and child born to King Mithridates VI of Pontus from his first wife, his sister Queen...

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  (as Farnace)
• Francesco Corselli: Farnace
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Mitridate, re di Ponto
  Mitridate, re di Ponto
  Mitridate, re di Ponto , K. 87 , is an early opera seria in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto is by Vittorio Amadeo Cigna-Santi after Giuseppe Parini's Italian translation of Jean Racine....
  
  
• Josef Mysliveček
  Josef Myslivecek
  Josef Mysliveček was a Czech composer who contributed to the formation of late eighteenth-century classicism in music...
  
  : Farnace
• Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti was an Italian Baroque composer especially famous for his operas and chamber cantatas. He is considered the founder of the Neapolitan school of opera. He was the father of two other composers, Domenico Scarlatti and Pietro Filippo Scarlatti.-Life:Scarlatti was born in...
  
  : Mitridate Eupatore
  Mitridate Eupatore
  Il Mitridate Eupatore is an opera seria in five acts by the Italian composer Alessandro Scarlatti with a libretto by Girolamo Frigimelica Roberti. It was first performed at the Teatro San Giovanni Grisostomo, Venice on 5 January, 1707...
  
  
• Leonardo Vinci
  Leonardo Vinci
  Leonardo Vinci was an Italian composer, best known for his operas.He was born at Strongoli and educated at Naples under Gaetano Greco in the Conservatorio dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo. He first became known for his opere buffe in Neapolitan dialect in 1719; he also composed many opere serie...
  
  : Farnace
• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Farnace
  Farnace
  Farnace , is the title of several 18th-century operas set to various librettos. The earliest version was written by Lorenzo Morari with music by Antonio Caldara, first performed at the Teatro Sant'Angelo in Venice in 1703...
  
  

Phidias

Phidias

Phidias or the great Pheidias , was a Greek sculptor, painter and architect, who lived in the 5th century BC, and is commonly regarded as one of the greatest of all sculptors of Classical Greece: Phidias' Statue of Zeus at Olympia was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World...

, Greek sculptor

• Henri Christiné
  Henri Christiné
  Henri Marius Christiné was a French composer of Swiss birth.The son of a French Savoyard watchmaker, Christiné was born in Geneva, Switzerland. He began by teaching at the lycée in Geneva, while pursuing his interest in music and playing organ in a local church...
  
  : Phi-Phi
  Phi-Phi
  Phi-Phi is an opérette légère in three acts with music by Henri Christiné and a French libretto by Albert Willemetz and Fabien Solar. The piece was one which founded the new style of French comédie musicale, the first to really use the latest rhythms of jazz along with a plot which emphasised...
  
  

King Philip II of Spain

Philip II of Spain

Philip II was King of Spain, Portugal, Naples, Sicily, and, while married to Mary I, King of England and Ireland. He was lord of the Seventeen Provinces from 1556 until 1581, holding various titles for the individual territories such as duke or count....

• Isaac Nathan
  Isaac Nathan
  Isaac Nathan was an Anglo-Australian composer, musicologist, journalist and self-publicist, who ended an eventful career by becoming the "father of Australian music".-Early success:...
  
  : Don John of Austria
  Don John of Austria (opera)
  Don John of Austria is a ballad opera in three acts by Isaac Nathan to a librettoby . It is the first opera to be written, composed and produced in Australia.Quote from the opera's title page:-Performance history:...
  
  (disguised as Count de Santa Fiore)
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Don Carlos
  Don Carlos
  Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
  
  

King Philip V of Spain

Philip V of Spain

Philip V was King of Spain from 15 November 1700 to 15 January 1724, when he abdicated in favor of his son Louis, and from 6 September 1724, when he assumed the throne again upon his son's death, to his death.Before his reign, Philip occupied an exalted place in the royal family of France as a...

• John Barnett
  John Barnett
  John Barnett was an English composer and writer on music.-Life:Barnett was the eldest son of a Prussian Jew named Bernhard Beer, who changed his surname on settling in England as a jeweller. According to some he was a cousin of the composer Giacomo Meyerbeer...
  
  : Farinelli
  Farinelli (opera)
  Farinelli is an opera in two acts, described as 'serio-comic', by John Barnett, to a libretto by his brother Charles Zachary Barnett. Produced in 1839, it is the third of the composer's large-scale operas, and was the last to reach the stage...
  
  

Gaspare Pisciotta

Gaspare Pisciotta

Gaspare Pisciotta was a companion and close friend of the Sicilian bandit Salvatore Giuliano, and considered to be the co-leader of his outlaw band.- Origins :...

, Sicilian peasant

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Salvatore Giuliano

Gaius Calpurnius Piso

Gaius Calpurnius Piso

Gnaeus Calpurnius Piso was a Roman senator in the 1st century. He was the focal figure in the Pisonian Conspiracy of 65 AD, the most famous and wide-ranging plot against the throne of Emperor Nero.-Character and early life:...

, Roman senator

• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Octavia
  Octavia (opera)
  The Roman Unrest, or The Noble-Minded Octavia , commonly called Octavia, is a singspiel in three acts by Reinhard Keiser to a German libretto by Barthold Feind...
  
  

Pope Pius IV

Pope Pius IV

Pope Pius IV , born Giovanni Angelo Medici, was Pope from 1559 to 1565. He is notable for presiding over the culmination of the Council of Trent.-Biography:...

• Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Pfitzner
  Hans Erich Pfitzner was a German composer and self-described anti-modernist. His best known work is the post-Romantic opera Palestrina, loosely based on the life of the great sixteenth-century composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina.-Biography:Pfitzner was born in Moscow, Russia, where his...
  
  : Palestrina
  Palestrina (opera)
  Palestrina is an opera by the German composer Hans Pfitzner, first performed in 1917. The composer referred to it as a Musikalische Legende , and wrote the libretto himself, based on a legend about the Renaissance musician Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, who saves the art of contrapuntal music ...
  
  

Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...

, American writer

• Damon Ferrante
  Damon Ferrante
  Damon Ferrante is an American composer whose works have been performed in concert halls and performance venues throughout North America, most notably, Carnegie Hall, Symphony Space, Guild Hall, and Theatre Project....
  
  : Jefferson & Poe: A Lyric Opera
  Jefferson & Poe: A Lyric Opera
  Jefferson & Poe is a lyric opera in two acts with music by Damon Ferrante and libretto by Daniel Mark Epstein.The opera takes place at Monticello on a March evening in the early nineteenth century and portrays two love stories: one between an elderly Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings and the other...
  
  

Poliziano

Poliziano

Angelo Ambrogini, commonly known by his nickname, anglicized as Politian, Italian Poliziano, Latin Politianus was an Italian Renaissance classical scholar and poet, one of the revivers of Humanist Latin...

(Angelo Ambrogini), Italian renaissance poet, scholar

• Ruggero Leoncavallo
  Ruggero Leoncavallo
  Ruggero Leoncavallo was an Italian opera composer. His two-act work Pagliacci remains one of the most popular works in the repertory, appearing as number 20 on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide.-Biography:...
  
  : I Medici
  I Medici
  I Medici is an opera composed by Ruggero Leoncavallo, with a libretto by the composer.-Performance history:It premièred at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan on 9 November 1893. It was not successful in its day and has never become part of the standard repertoire.-Roles:-Synopsis:The opera is set in...
  
  

Marco Polo

Marco Polo

Marco Polo was a Venetian merchant traveler from the Venetian Republic whose travels are recorded in Il Milione, a book which did much to introduce Europeans to Central Asia and China. He learned about trading whilst his father and uncle, Niccolò and Maffeo, travelled through Asia and apparently...

, Italian adventurer

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : Marco Polo
  Marco Polo (opera)
  Marco Polo is an opera by the Chinese-born composer Tan Dun set to an English libretto by Paul Griffiths. It premiered in Munich on 7 May 1996. Described variously as an "opera within an opera" and a "fantasia on an epic journey", the multi-layered storyline is loosely based on the journey of Marco...
  
  

Saint Polyeuctus

Polyeuctus

Saint Polyeuctus of Melitene is an ancient Roman saint. Christian tradition states that he was a wealthy Roman army officer who was martyred at Melitene, Armenia, under Valerian....

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Poliuto
  Poliuto
  Poliuto is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvadore Cammarano wrote the Italian libretto after Pierre Corneille's play Polyeucte . It was composed in 1838 and first performed on 30 November 1848 at the Teatro San Carlo, Naples...
  
  
• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Polyeucte
  Polyeucte (opera)
  Polyeucte is an opéra by Charles Gounod based on the play about Saint Polyeuctus by Pierre Corneille. The libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré is more faithful to its source than Les martyrs, Scribe's adaptation for Donizetti, and Gounod hoped to express "the unknown and irresistable...
  
  

Lorenz Truchsess von Pommersfelden

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Mathis der Maler
  Mathis der Maler (opera)
  Mathis der Maler is an opera by Paul Hindemith. The libretto is also by the composer.The opera's genesis lay in Hindemith's interest in the Protestant Reformation...
  
  

Madame de Pompadour

Madame de Pompadour

Jeanne Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour, also known as Madame de Pompadour was a member of the French court, and was the official chief mistress of Louis XV from 1745 to her death.-Biography:...

, French courtier, mistress of Louis XV

Louis XV of France

Louis XV was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and of Navarre from 1 September 1715 until his death. He succeeded his great-grandfather at the age of five, his first cousin Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, served as Regent of the kingdom until Louis's majority in 1723...

• Leo Fall
  Leo Fall
  Leo Fall was an Austrian composer of operettas.-Life:Born in Olmütz , Leo Fall was taught by his father Moritz Fall , a bandmaster and composer, who settled in Berlin. The younger Fall studied at the Vienna Conservatory before rejoining his father in Berlin...
  
  : Madame Pompadour
  Madame Pompadour (operetta)
  Madame Pompadour is an operetta in three acts, composed by Leo Fall with a libretto by Rudolf Schanzer and Ernst Friedrich Wilhelm Welisch. Conducted by the composer, It opened at the Berliner Theater in Berlin on September 9, 1922 and then at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna on March 2,...
  
  
• Edwin Penhorwood
  Edwin Penhorwood
  Dr. Edwin Penhorwood is an American composer and currently assistant professor at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.-Biography:Penhorwood is a native of Toledo, Ohio, and studied music at the University of Iowa...
  
  : Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos
  Too Many Sopranos is an opera by Indiana University Jacobs School of Music faculty member Edwin Penhorwood. Too Many Sopranos is a two-act opera in English with a pastiche of song from opera's various periods. A group of sopranos is trying to get into heaven, but there is no more room in the...
  
  (spoofed as "Madame Popmpous")

Pompey the Great

Pompey

Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, also known as Pompey or Pompey the Great , was a military and political leader of the late Roman Republic...

, Roman military and political leader

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  

Empress Poppaea Augusta Sabina

Poppaea Sabina

Poppaea Sabina and sometimes referred to as Poppaea Sabina the Younger to differentiate her from her mother of the same name, was a Roman Empress as the second wife of the Emperor Nero. Prior to this she was the wife of the future Emperor Otho...

, consort of Roman Emperors Nero and Otho

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Agrippina
  Agrippina (opera)
  Agrippina is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel, from a libretto by Cardinal Vincenzo Grimani. Composed for the Venice Carnevale season, the opera tells the story of Agrippina, the mother of Nero, as she plots the downfall of the Roman Emperor Claudius and the installation of...
  
  
• Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, and singer.Monteverdi's work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the transition from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two individual styles of composition – the...
  
  : L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...
  
  

Lars Porsena

Lars Porsena

Lars Porsena, in Etruscan Pursenas, was an Etruscan king known for his war against the city of Rome. He ruled over the city of Clusium...

, King of Etruria

• Filippo Amadei, Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini was an Italian Baroque composer and cellist, one of a family of string players and composers. His father, Giovanni Maria Bononcini , was a violinist and a composer.-Biography:...
  
   and George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola is an opera in three acts about Gaius Mucius Scaevola. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, adapted from a text by Silvio Stampiglia. The music for the first act was composed by Filippo Amadei , the second act by Giovanni Battista Bononcini, and the third by...
  
  

Porus, King of Paurava

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Poro
  Poro (opera)
  Poro, re dell'Indie is an opera seria in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel...
  
  

Sister Helen Prejean

Helen Prejean

Sister Helen Prejean, C.S.J., is a Roman Catholic religious sister, a member of the Congregation of St. Joseph, who has become a leading American advocate for the abolition of the death penalty.-Death row ministry:...

, American nun, death penalty abolitionist

• Jake Heggie
  Jake Heggie
  Jake Heggie is an American composer and pianist.Jake Heggie is the composer of the operas Dead Man Walking , The End of the Affair , At The Statue of Venus , To Hell and Back , and Moby-Dick , as well as the stage work For a Look or a Touch...
  
  : Dead Man Walking
  Dead Man Walking (opera)
  Dead Man Walking is the first opera by Jake Heggie, with a libretto by Terrence McNally; it premiered on October 7, 2000 at the War Memorial Opera House, San Francisco Opera.-Roles:...
  
  

John Proctor

John Proctor

John Proctor was a farmer in 17th century Massachusetts. He married three women in his life, and divorced the first two. The last one he married was Elizabeth Proctor, who gave birth to two children, William and Sarah...

, a tavern keeper in 17th century Massachusetts who was hanged for witchcraft during the Salem witch trials

• Robert Ward: The Crucible
  The Crucible (opera)
  The Crucible is an English language opera written by Robert Ward based on the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller. It won both the 1962 Pulitzer Prize for Music and the New York Music Critics Circle Citation. The libretto was lightly adapted from Miller's text by Bernard Stambler.Ward received a...
  
  

Chevalier de Prokesch-Osten

• Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger
  Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
  
   and Jacques Ibert
  Jacques Ibert
  Jacques François Antoine Ibert was a French composer. Having studied music from an early age, he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won its top prize, the Prix de Rome at his first attempt, despite studies interrupted by his service in World War I.Ibert pursued a successful composing career,...
  
  : L'aiglon

Marcel Proust

Marcel Proust

Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...

, French novelist

• Alfred Schnittke
  Alfred Schnittke
  Alfred Schnittke ; November 24, 1934 – August 3, 1998) was a Russian and Soviet composer. Schnittke's early music shows the strong influence of Dmitri Shostakovich. He developed a polystylistic technique in works such as the epic First Symphony and First Concerto Grosso...
  
  : Life with an Idiot
  Life with an Idiot
  Life with an Idiot is an opera by the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke. The libretto is by Viktor Erofeyev. It was first performed at Het Muziektheater, Amsterdam on 13 April 1992. The opera is an allegory of Soviet oppression.-Roles:-Act One:...
  
  

Pharaoh Ptolemy IX Lathyros

Ptolemy IX Lathyros

Ptolemy IX Soter II or Lathyros was king of Egypt three times, from 116 BC to 110 BC, 109 BC to 107 BC and 88 BC to 81 BC, with intervening periods ruled by his brother, Ptolemy X Alexander....

 of Egypt

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Tolomeo
  Tolomeo
  Tolomeo, re d'Egitto is an opera in three acts by George Frideric Handel to an Italian text by Nicola Francesco Haym, adapted from Carlo Sigismondo Capece's Tolomeo et Alessandro.-Performance history:...
  
  

Pharaoh Ptolemy XI Alexander II

Ptolemy XI Alexander II

Ptolemy XI Alexander II was a member of the Ptolemaic dynasty who ruled Egypt for a few days in 80 BC.Ptolemy XI was born to Ptolemy X Alexander I and either Cleopatra Selene or Berenice III. His uncle Ptolemy IX Lathryos died in 81 BC or 80 BC, leaving no...

 of Egypt

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Tolomeo
  Tolomeo
  Tolomeo, re d'Egitto is an opera in three acts by George Frideric Handel to an Italian text by Nicola Francesco Haym, adapted from Carlo Sigismondo Capece's Tolomeo et Alessandro.-Performance history:...
  
  

Publius Valerius Publicola

Publius Valerius Publicola

Publius Valerius Publicola was one of four Roman aristocrats who led the overthrow of the monarchy, and became a Roman consul, the colleague of Lucius Junius Brutus in 509 BC, traditionally considered the first year of the Roman Republic...

, Roman consul

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola is an opera in three acts about Gaius Mucius Scaevola. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, adapted from a text by Silvio Stampiglia. The music for the first act was composed by Filippo Amadei , the second act by Giovanni Battista Bononcini, and the third by...
  
  

Yemelyan Pugachev

Yemelyan Pugachev

Yemelyan Ivanovich Pugachov , was a pretender to the Russian throne who led a great Cossack insurrection during the reign of Catherine II...

, Russian pretender to the throne

• César Cui
  César Cui
  César Antonovich Cui was a Russian of French and Lithuanian descent. His profession was as an army officer and a teacher of fortifications; his avocational life has particular significance in the history of music, in that he was a composer and music critic; in this sideline he is known as a...
  
  : The Captain's Daughter
  The Captain's Daughter (opera)
  The Captain's Daughter is an opera in four acts by César Cui, composed during 1907-1909...
  
  

Q

Qin Shi Huang

Qin Shi Huang

Qin Shi Huang , personal name Ying Zheng , was king of the Chinese State of Qin from 246 BC to 221 BC during the Warring States Period. He became the first emperor of a unified China in 221 BC...

, first Emperor of unified China

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : The First Emperor
  The First Emperor
  The First Emperor is an opera in two acts with a libretto written in English by Tan Dun and Ha Jin, and music by Tan Dun. The opera received its premiere at the Metropolitan Opera at the Lincoln Center in New York City on 21 December 2006, conducted by the composer and with Plácido Domingo in the...
  
  

Vasco de Quiroga

Vasco de Quiroga

Vasco de Quiroga was the first bishop of Michoacán, Mexico and one of the judges in the second Audiencia that governed New Spain from January 10, 1531 to April 16, 1535....

, member of the second Audiencia in Mexico and first bishop of Michoacán

Michoacán

Michoacán officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Michoacán de Ocampo is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 113 municipalities and its capital city is Morelia...

• Miguel Bernal Jiménez
  Miguel Bernal Jiménez
  Miguel Bernal Jiménez was a Mexican composer, organist, pedagogist and musicologist.He is widely regarded as the best representative of 20th century Mexican religious music, in addition to his important contributions to the Mexican nationalist music movement...
  
  : Tata Vasco
  Tata Vasco (opera)
  Tata Vasco is an opera in five scenes composed by Miguel Bernal Jiménez to a Spanish libretto with nationalistic and devoutly Roman Catholic themes by the Mexican priest and poet, Manuel Muñoz. It premiered in Pátzcuaro, Mexico on 15 February 1941. The opera is based on the life of Vasco de...
  
  

R

Nikolay Raevsky

Nikolay Raevsky

Nikolay Nikolayevich Raevsky was a Russian general and statesman who achieved fame for his feats of arms during the Napoleonic wars. His family left a lasting legacy in Russian society and culture.-Early life:Nikolay Raevsky was born in Saint Petersburg...

, Russian general

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Elizabeth Raleigh

Elizabeth Raleigh

Elizabeth, Lady Raleigh , née Throckmorton, was Sir Walter Raleigh's wife, and a Lady of the Privy Chamber to Queen Elizabeth I of England. Their secret marriage precipitated a long period of royal disfavour for Raleigh....

, wife of Sir Walter Raleigh

• Edward German
  Edward German
  Sir Edward German was an English musician and composer of Welsh descent, best remembered for his extensive output of incidental music for the stage and as a successor to Arthur Sullivan in the field of English comic opera.As a youth, German played the violin and led the town orchestra, also...
  
  : Merrie England
  Merrie England (opera)
  Merrie England is an English comic opera in two acts by Edward German to a libretto by Basil Hood. The patriotic story concerns love and rivalries at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, who is portrayed as jealous of the affection of Sir Walter Raleigh for Bessie Throckmorton. Its sunny depiction of...
  
  (as Bessie Throckmorton)

Sir Walter Raleigh

Walter Raleigh

Sir Walter Raleigh was an English aristocrat, writer, poet, soldier, courtier, spy, and explorer. He is also well known for popularising tobacco in England....

, English explorer and courtier

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, by Gaetano Donizetti...
  
  
• Edward German
  Edward German
  Sir Edward German was an English musician and composer of Welsh descent, best remembered for his extensive output of incidental music for the stage and as a successor to Arthur Sullivan in the field of English comic opera.As a youth, German played the violin and led the town orchestra, also...
  
  : Merrie England
  Merrie England (opera)
  Merrie England is an English comic opera in two acts by Edward German to a libretto by Basil Hood. The patriotic story concerns love and rivalries at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, who is portrayed as jealous of the affection of Sir Walter Raleigh for Bessie Throckmorton. Its sunny depiction of...
  
  

Grigori Rasputin

Grigori Rasputin

Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin was a Russian Orthodox Christian and mystic who is perceived as having influenced the latter days of the Russian Emperor Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra, and their only son Alexei...

, Russian mystic, confidant of Tsarina Alexandra

• Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara is a Finnish composer of contemporary classical music, and is one of the most notable Finnish composers after Jean Sibelius.-Life:...
  
  : Rasputin

King Rastislav

Rastislav

Rastislav or Rostislav was the second known ruler of Moravia . Although he started his reign as vassal to Louis the German, king of East Francia, he consolidated his rule to the extent that after 855 he was able to repel a series of Frankish attacks...

of Great Moravia

• Eugen Suchoň
  Eugen Suchon
  Eugen Suchoň was one of the greatest Slovak composers of the 20th century.-Early life:...
  
  : Svätopluk
  Svätopluk (opera)
  Svätopluk is a Slovak opera by Eugen Suchoň with the subtitle Musical drama in three acts. The libretto is by Eugen Suchoň, Ivan Stodola and Jela Krčméry-Vrteľová and is loosely based on Stodola's play Kráľ Svätopluk, which was in turn based on events in the life of King Svatopluk I. Suchoň...
  
  

John Aaron Rawlins

John Aaron Rawlins

John Aaron Rawlins was an United States Army general during the American Civil War, a confidant of Ulysses S. Grant, and later U.S. Secretary of War.-Biography:...

, U.S. general, Secretary of War

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Appomattox
  Appomattox (opera)
  Appomattox is an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton. The work had its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera on October 5, 2007, with a cast that included Dwayne Croft as Robert E. Lee, Andrew Shore as...
  
  

Wilhelm Reich

Wilhelm Reich

Wilhelm Reich was an Austrian-American psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, known as one of the most radical figures in the history of psychiatry...

, Austrian-American psychiatrist and psychoanalyst

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Marilyn

Count Adolf Ludvig Ribbing, co-conspirator with Anckarström in the assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden

• Daniel Auber
  Daniel Auber
  Daniel François Esprit Auber was a French composer.-Biography:The son of a Paris print-seller, Auber was born in Caen in Normandy. Though his father expected him to continue in the print-selling business, he also allowed his son to learn how to play several musical instruments...
  
  : Gustave III
• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera
  Un ballo in maschera , is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi with text by Antonio Somma. The libretto is loosely based on an 1833 play, Gustave III, by French playwright Eugène Scribe who wrote about the historical assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden...
  
  

Penelope Rich, Lady Rich, English noblewoman

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  

King Richard I "Coeur de Lion" of England

Richard I of England

Richard I was King of England from 6 July 1189 until his death. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, Lord of Cyprus, Count of Anjou, Count of Maine, Count of Nantes, and Overlord of Brittany at various times during the same period...

• André Grétry: Richard Coeur-de-lion
  Richard Coeur-de-lion (opera)
  Richard Coeur-de-lion is an opéra comique, described as a comédie mise en musique, by the Belgian composer André Grétry. was by Michel-Jean Sedaine. The work is generally recognised as Grétry's masterpiece and one of the most important French opéras comiques...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Riccardo Primo
  Riccardo Primo
  Riccardo primo, re d’Inghilterra is an opera in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, after Francesco Briani's Isacio tiranno, set by Antonio Lotti in 1710...
  
  
• Heinrich Marschner
  Heinrich Marschner
  Heinrich August Marschner , was the most important composer of German Romantic opera between Carl Maria von Weber and Richard Wagner, and is remembered principally for his operas Hans Heiling , Der Vampyr , and Der Templer und die Jüdin...
  
  : Der Templer und die Jüdin
  Der Templer und die Jüdin
  Der Templer und die Jüdin is an opera in three acts by Heinrich Marschner...
  
  (as the Black Knight)
• Sir Arthur Sullivan
  Arthur Sullivan
  Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...
  
  : Ivanhoe
  Ivanhoe (opera)
  Ivanhoe is a romantic opera in three acts based on the novel by Sir Walter Scott, with music by Sir Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by Julian Sturgis. It premiered at the Royal English Opera House on 31 January 1891 for a consecutive run of 155 performances, unheard of for a grand opera...
  
  

King Richard II of England

Richard II of England

Richard II was King of England, a member of the House of Plantagenet and the last of its main-line kings. He ruled from 1377 until he was deposed in 1399. Richard was a son of Edward, the Black Prince, and was born during the reign of his grandfather, Edward III...

• Reginald De Koven
  Reginald de Koven
  Henry Louis Reginald De Koven was an American music critic and prolific composer, particularly of comic operas.-Biography:...
  
  : The Canterbury Pilgrims
  The Canterbury Pilgrims
  The Canterbury Pilgrims is an opera by the American composer Reginald De Koven. It premiered at the Metropolitan Opera House on March 8, 1917...
  
  

King Richard III of England

Richard III of England

Richard III was King of England for two years, from 1483 until his death in 1485 during the Battle of Bosworth Field. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty...

• Flavio Testi
  Flavio Testi
  Flavio Testi is an Italian composer of contemporary classical music and musicologist. He studied with Gedda and Peracchio at the Turin Conservatory, and took an arts degree at Milan University . He then worked for Suvini Zerboni and Ricordi while also composing, pursuing his interest in music...
  
  : Riccardo III

Louis Riel

Louis Riel

Louis David Riel was a Canadian politician, a founder of the province of Manitoba, and a political and spiritual leader of the Métis people of the Canadian prairies. He led two resistance movements against the Canadian government and its first post-Confederation Prime Minister, Sir John A....

, executed Canadian folk hero

• Harry Somers
  Harry Somers
  Harry Stewart Somers, CC was the foremost English-Canadian composer of his period.He was born in middle-class Toronto in 1925 but did not become interested in music until his early teenage years, when he met a doctor and his wife, both pianists, who introduced him to classical music...
  
  : Louis Riel
  Louis Riel (opera)
  Louis Riel is an opera in three acts by the Canadian composer Harry Somers.This full length opera was written for the 1967 Canadian centennial. It concerns the controversial Métis leader Louis Riel, who was executed in 1885, and is one of Somers' biggest pieces.It is arguably the most famous...
  
  

Cola di Rienzo

Cola di Rienzo

Cola di Rienzo was an Italian medieval politician and popular leader, tribune of the Roman people in the mid-14th century.-Early career:Cola was born in Rome of humble origins...

, Roman tribune

• Richard Wagner
  Richard Wagner
  Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
  
  : Rienzi
  Rienzi
  Rienzi, der Letzte der Tribunen is an early opera by Richard Wagner in five acts, with the libretto written by the composer after Bulwer-Lytton's novel of the same name . The title is commonly shortened to Rienzi...
  
  

Rainer Maria Rilke

Rainer Maria Rilke

René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke , better known as Rainer Maria Rilke, was a Bohemian–Austrian poet. He is considered one of the most significant poets in the German language...

, Austrian poet

• Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Sergeevich Korndorf was a Russian and Canadian composer and conductor. He was prolific both in Moscow, Russia and in Vancouver, Canada.-Biography:...
  
  : MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR is a chamber opera in one act by the Russian composer Nikolai Korndorf . The libretto by Yuri Lourié is in Russian, German, Ancient Greek and Japanese)...
  
  

Arthur Rimbaud

Arthur Rimbaud

Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud was a French poet. Born in Charleville, Ardennes, he produced his best known works while still in his late teens—Victor Hugo described him at the time as "an infant Shakespeare"—and he gave up creative writing altogether before the age of 21. As part of the decadent...

, French poet

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Rimbaud, ou le fils du soleil

Diego Rivera

Diego Rivera

Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez was a prominent Mexican painter born in Guanajuato, Guanajuato, an active communist, and husband of Frida Kahlo . His large wall works in fresco helped establish the Mexican Mural Movement in...

, Mexican painter

• Robert Xavier Rodriguez
  Robert Xavier Rodriguez
  Robert Xavier Rodríguez is an American classical composer, best known for his eight operas and his works for children.- Life and career :...
  
  : Frida
  Frida (opera)
  Frida is an opera based on the life of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo with music by Robert Xavier Rodriguez, book by Hilary Blecher, lyrics and monologues by Migdalia Cruz, conceived by Hilary Blecher....
  
  

King Robert I of Scotland

Robert I of Scotland

Robert I , popularly known as Robert the Bruce , was King of Scots from March 25, 1306, until his death in 1329.His paternal ancestors were of Scoto-Norman heritage , and...

, "Robert the Bruce"

• Gioachino Rossini: Robert Bruce
  Robert Bruce (opera)
  Robert Bruce is an 1846 pastiche opera in three acts, with music by Gioachino Rossini and Louis Niedermeyer to a French-language libretto by Alphonse Royer and Gustave Vaëz, after Walter Scott's History of Scotland...
  
   (pastiche)

Robert I, Duke of Normandy

• Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer
  Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...
  
  : Robert le diable
  Robert le diable (opera)
  Robert le diable is an opera by Giacomo Meyerbeer, often regarded as the first grand opera. The libretto was written by Eugène Scribe and Casimir Delavigne and has little connection to the medieval legend of Robert the Devil. Originally planned as a three-act opéra comique, "Meyerbeer persuaded...
  
  

Maximilien Robespierre

Maximilien Robespierre

Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre is one of the best-known and most influential figures of the French Revolution. He largely dominated the Committee of Public Safety and was instrumental in the period of the Revolution commonly known as the Reign of Terror, which ended with his...

, French revolutionary figure

• John Eaton
  John Eaton (composer)
  John Charles Eaton is an American composer , MacArthur Fellow, is professor emeritus of composition at the University of Chicago John Charles Eaton (born 30 March 1935 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania) is an American composer (Anon. [n.d.]; Morgan 2001), MacArthur Fellow, is professor emeritus of...
  
  : Danton and Robespierre
• Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz. He also composed pieces for piano, violin and organ.-Biography:...
  
  : Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod is an opera by composer Gottfried von Einem to a libretto by Boris Blacher and Gottfried von Einem after Georg Büchner's 1835 play Danton's Death. Its first performance took place in Salzburg, August 6, 1947...
  
  
• Henry Charles Litolff
  Henry Charles Litolff
  Henry Charles Litolff was a piano virtuoso, composer of Romantic music and music publisher.Litolff was born in London, the son of a Scottish mother and an Alsatian father...
  
  : Robespierre

Robin Hood

Robin Hood

Robin Hood was a heroic outlaw in English folklore. A highly skilled archer and swordsman, he is known for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor", assisted by a group of fellow outlaws known as his "Merry Men". Traditionally, Robin Hood and his men are depicted wearing Lincoln green clothes....

(legendary)

• W. H. Birch: The Merrie Men of Sherwood Forest
  The Merrie Men of Sherwood Forest
  The Merrie Men of Sherwood Forest, or Forest Days in the Olden Time is a pastoral operetta in three acts. The words and music were written by W. H. Birch and the work was published by John Blockley of Argyll Street, London.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Heinrich Marschner
  Heinrich Marschner
  Heinrich August Marschner , was the most important composer of German Romantic opera between Carl Maria von Weber and Richard Wagner, and is remembered principally for his operas Hans Heiling , Der Vampyr , and Der Templer und die Jüdin...
  
  : Der Templer und die Jüdin
  Der Templer und die Jüdin
  Der Templer und die Jüdin is an opera in three acts by Heinrich Marschner...
  
  (as Lokslei)
• Sir Arthur Sullivan
  Arthur Sullivan
  Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...
  
  : Ivanhoe
  Ivanhoe (opera)
  Ivanhoe is a romantic opera in three acts based on the novel by Sir Walter Scott, with music by Sir Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by Julian Sturgis. It premiered at the Royal English Opera House on 31 January 1891 for a consecutive run of 155 performances, unheard of for a grand opera...
  
  (as Locksley)
• Michael Tippett
  Michael Tippett
  Sir Michael Kemp Tippett OM CH CBE was an English composer.In his long career he produced a large body of work, including five operas, three large-scale choral works, four symphonies, five string quartets, four piano sonatas, concertos and concertante works, song cycles and incidental music...
  
  : Robin Hood
  Robin Hood (opera)
  For the comic opera by Reginald De Koven, see Robin Hood .Robin Hood is a ballad opera by Michael Tippett based on the legend of Robin Hood. Composed in 1934, the score remains unpublished...
  
  

John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester

John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester

John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester , styled Viscount Wilmot between 1652 and 1658, was an English Libertine poet, a friend of King Charles II, and the writer of much satirical and bawdy poetry. He was the toast of the Restoration court and a patron of the arts...

, English writer, libertine

• Robert Planquette
  Robert Planquette
  Jean Robert Planquette was a French composer of songs and operettas.Several of Planquette's operettas were extraordinarily successful in Britain, including Les cloches de Corneville , the length of whose initial London run broke all records for any piece of musical theatre up to that time, and Rip...
  
  : Nell Gwynne
  Nell Gwynne (operetta)
  Nell Gwynne is a three-act comic opera composed by Robert Planquette, with a libretto by H. B. Farnie. The libretto is based on the play Rochester by William Thomas Moncrieff. The piece was a rare instance of an opera by a French composer being produced first in London...
  
  

Roderic

Roderic

Ruderic was the Visigothic King of Hispania for a brief period between 710 and 712. He is famous in legend as "the last king of the Goths"...

, Visigothic King of Hispania

• Alberto Ginastera
  Alberto Ginastera
  Alberto Evaristo Ginastera was an Argentine composer of classical music. He is considered one of the most important Latin American classical composers.- Biography :...
  
  : Don Rodrigo
  Don Rodrigo
  Don Rodrigo is an opera in three acts by Alberto Ginastera, the composer's first opera, to an original Spanish libretto by Alejandro Casona. Ginastera composed the opera on commission from the Municipality of the City of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The first performance was at the Teatro Colón,...
  
  

King Roger II of Sicily

Roger II of Sicily

Roger II was King of Sicily, son of Roger I of Sicily and successor to his brother Simon. He began his rule as Count of Sicily in 1105, later became Duke of Apulia and Calabria , then King of Sicily...

• Karol Szymanowski
  Karol Szymanowski
  Karol Maciej Szymanowski was a Polish composer and pianist.-Life:Szymanowski was born into a wealthy land-owning Polish gentry family in Tymoszówka, then in the Russian Empire, now in Cherkasy Oblast, Ukraine. He studied music privately with his father before going to Gustav Neuhaus'...
  
  : King Roger
  King Roger
  King Roger is an opera by the Polish composer Karol Szymanowski set to a libretto by Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz. It was first performed on 19 June 1926 in Warsaw, Poland...
  
  

Rogneda of Polotsk

Rogneda of Polotsk

Rogneda of Polotsk is the Slavic name for Ragnhild, whose father Ragnvald came from overseas and established himself at Polatsk in the mid-10th century....

, consort of Vladimir I of Kiev

Vladimir I of Kiev

Vladimir Sviatoslavich the Great Old East Slavic: Володимѣръ Свѧтославичь Old Norse as Valdamarr Sveinaldsson, , Vladimir, , Volodymyr, was a grand prince of Kiev, ruler of Kievan Rus' in .Vladimir's father was the prince Sviatoslav of the Rurik dynasty...

• Alexander Serov
  Alexander Serov
  Alexander Nikolayevich Serov – was a Russian composer and music critic. He and his wife Valentina were the parents of painter Valentin Serov...
  
  : Rogneda
  Rogneda (opera)
  Rogneda is an opera in five acts, composed by Alexander Serov during 1863–1865. The scenario, by the composer, was based on the novel Askold's Grave by Mikhail Zagoskin and the poem Rogneda by Kondraty Ryleyev...
  
  

Salvator Rosa

Salvator Rosa

Salvator Rosa was an Italian Baroque painter, poet and printmaker, active in Naples, Rome and Florence. As a painter, he is best known as an "unorthodox and extravagant" and a "perpetual rebel" proto-Romantic.-Early life:...

, Italian painter and poet

• Antônio Carlos Gomes
  Antônio Carlos Gomes
  Antônio Carlos Gomes was the first New World composer whose work was accepted by Europe.-Life:He was born in Campinas, Brazil, son of Maestro Manuel José Gomes and Fabiana Maria Jaguari Cardoso....
  
  : Salvator Rosa

Roxana

Roxana

Roxana sometimes Roxane, was a Bactrian noble and a wife of Alexander the Great. She was born earlier than the year 343 BC, though the precise date remains uncertain....

, wife of Alexander the Great

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Alessandro
  Alessandro (opera)
  Alessandro is an opera written for the Royal Academy of Music composed by George Frideric Handel in 1726. Paolo Rolli was the librettist and based the story on Ortensio Mauro's La superbia d'Alessandro...
  
  

Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor

Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor

Rudolf II was Holy Roman Emperor , King of Hungary and Croatia , King of Bohemia and Archduke of Austria...

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt is an opera in five acts by Paul Hindemith. The German libretto was by the composer....
  
  

Rudolf II, Count Palatine of the Rhine

• Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Holzbauer
  Ignaz Jakob Holzbauer was a composer of symphonies, concertos, operas, and chamber music, and a member of the Mannheim school. His aesthetic style is in line with that of the Sturm und Drang "movement" of German art and literature.Holzbauer was born in Vienna...
  
  : Günther von Schwarzburg
  Günther von Schwarzburg (opera)
  Günther von Schwarzburg is a Singspiel in three acts by Ignaz Holzbauer set to a German libretto by Anton Klein. Loosely based on events in the life of the 14th century German king, Günther von Schwarzburg, the opera premiered on 5 January 1777 at the Hoftheater in the Mannheim...
  
  

Paavo Ruotsalainen

Paavo Ruotsalainen

Paavo Ruotsalainen was a Finnish farmer and lay preacher.Born in Tölvänniemi as the oldest son of plain farmers, he received his first bible at age six. At the time of his confirmation he had already read it three times. His preoccupation with the words of the bible gained him the nickname...

, Finnish farmer and lay preacher

• Joonas Kokkonen
  Joonas Kokkonen
  Joonas Kokkonen was a Finnish composer. He was one of the most internationally famous Finnish composers of the 20th century after Sibelius; his opera The Last Temptations has received over 500 performances worldwide, and is considered by many to be Finland's most distinguished national opera.-...
  
  : The Last Temptations
  The Last Temptations
  The Last Temptations is an opera in two acts by Joonas Kokkonen to a libretto by Lauri Kokkonen. Along with Leevi Madetoja's Pohjalaisia and Aarre Merikanto's Juha, it is considered one of the most important Finnish operas. The opera deals with the life of the late eighteenth- and early...
  
  

Lillian Russell

Lillian Russell

Lillian Russell was an American actress and singer. She became one of the most famous actresses and singers of the late 19th century and early 20th century, known for her beauty and style, as well as for her voice and stage presence.Russell was born in Iowa but raised in Chicago...

, American actress and singer

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Rustichello da Pisa

Rustichello da Pisa

Rustichello da Pisa, also known as Rusticiano and Rustigielo , was an Italian romance writer best known for cowriting Marco Polo's autobiography while they were in prison together in Genoa. A native Pisan, he may have been captured by the Genoese at the Battle of Meloria in 1284, amid a conflict...

, Italian writer

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : Marco Polo
  Marco Polo (opera)
  Marco Polo is an opera by the Chinese-born composer Tan Dun set to an English libretto by Paul Griffiths. It premiered in Munich on 7 May 1996. Described variously as an "opera within an opera" and a "fantasia on an epic journey", the multi-layered storyline is loosely based on the journey of Marco...
  
  

S

Hans Sachs

Hans Sachs

Hans Sachs was a German meistersinger , poet, playwright and shoemaker.-Biography:Hans Sachs was born in Nuremberg . His father was a tailor. He attended Latin school in Nuremberg...

, German meistersinger

• Albert Lortzing
  Albert Lortzing
  Gustav Albert Lortzing was a German composer, actor and singer. He is considered to be the main representative of the German Spieloper, a form similar to the French opéra comique, which grew out of the Singspiel.-Biography:Lortzing was born in Berlin to Johann Gottlieb Lortzing and Charlotte Sophie...
  
  : Hans Sachs
• Richard Wagner
  Richard Wagner
  Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
  
  : Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
  Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
  Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg is an opera in three acts, written and composed by Richard Wagner. It is among the longest operas still commonly performed today, usually taking around four and a half hours. It was first performed at the Königliches Hof- und National-Theater in Munich, on June 21,...
  
  

Oliver Sacks

Oliver Sacks

Oliver Wolf Sacks, CBE , is a British neurologist and psychologist residing in New York City. He is a professor of neurology and psychiatry at Columbia University, where he also holds the position of Columbia Artist...

, British neurologist, writer

• Michael Nyman
  Michael Nyman
  Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...
  
  : The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat
  The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (opera)
  The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat is a one-act chamber opera by Michael Nyman to an English-language libretto by Christopher Rawlence, adapted from the case study of the same name by Oliver Sacks by Nyman, Rawlence, and Michael Morris...
  
  (as Dr. S.)

Louis Antoine de Saint-Just, French revolutionary figure

• Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem
  Gottfried von Einem was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz. He also composed pieces for piano, violin and organ.-Biography:...
  
  : Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod
  Dantons Tod is an opera by composer Gottfried von Einem to a libretto by Boris Blacher and Gottfried von Einem after Georg Büchner's 1835 play Danton's Death. Its first performance took place in Salzburg, August 6, 1947...
  
  

Ōtomo no Sakanoe no Iratsume

Otomo no Sakanoe no Iratsume

was a female Japanese poet, important in her time , with 79 poems in the Man'yōshū.-Life:In her teens, she married Prince Hozumi and after his early death, she married his half-brother. After he also died, she went to live with Ōtomo no Tabito....

, Japanese poet

• Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Sergeevich Korndorf was a Russian and Canadian composer and conductor. He was prolific both in Moscow, Russia and in Vancouver, Canada.-Biography:...
  
  : MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR is a chamber opera in one act by the Russian composer Nikolai Korndorf . The libretto by Yuri Lourié is in Russian, German, Ancient Greek and Japanese)...
  
  

Antonio Salieri

Antonio Salieri

Antonio Salieri was a Venetian classical composer, conductor and teacher born in Legnago, south of Verona, in the Republic of Venice, but who spent his adult life and career as a faithful subject of the Habsburg monarchy....

, Italian-Austrian composer

• P. D. Q. Bach
  P. D. Q. Bach
  P. D. Q. Bach is a fictitious composer invented by musical satirist "Professor" Peter Schickele. In a gag that Schickele has developed over a five-decade-long career, he performs "discovered" works of this forgotten member of the Bach family...
  
   (Peter Schickele
  Peter Schickele
  Johann Peter Schickele is an American composer, musical educator, and parodist. He is best known for his comedy music albums featuring his music that he presents as music written by the fictional composer P. D. Q...
  
  ): A Little Nightmare Music
  A Little Nightmare Music
  A Little Nightmare Music is an opera in "one irrevocable act" by Peter Schickele under the pseudonym he uses for parodies and comical works P. D. Q. Bach. The title of the work refers to the English translation of Mozart's famous Eine kleine Nachtmusik...
  
  
• Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five.The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie, refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César...
  
  : Mozart and Salieri
  Mozart and Salieri
  Mozart and Salieri is a one-act opera in two scenes by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, written in 1897 to a Russian libretto taken almost verbatim from Alexander Pushkin's 1830 verse drama of the same name....
  
  

Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury

Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury

Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, KG, PC was an English administrator and politician.-Life:He was the son of William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley and Mildred Cooke...

, Elizabethan minister

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : Gloriana
  Gloriana
  Gloriana is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Elizabeth and Essex by Lytton Strachey...
  
  
• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux
  Roberto Devereux is a tragedia lirica, or tragic opera, by Gaetano Donizetti...
  
  

Sardanapalus

Sardanapalus

Sardanapalus was, according to the Greek writer Ctesias of Cnidus, the last king of Assyria. Ctesias' Persica is lost, but we know of its contents by later compilations and from the work of Diodorus...

, king of Assyria

• Franz Liszt
  Franz Liszt
  Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
  
  : Sardanapale
  Sardanapale
  Sardanapale is an unfinished opera by Franz Liszt based loosely on the 1821 verse play Sardanapalus by Lord Byron.-Background:...
  
  

Girolamo Savonarola

Girolamo Savonarola

Girolamo Savonarola was an Italian Dominican friar, Scholastic, and an influential contributor to the politics of Florence from 1494 until his execution in 1498. He was known for his book burning, destruction of what he considered immoral art, and what he thought the Renaissance—which began in his...

, Florentine heretic and book-burner

• Sir Charles Villiers Stanford
  Charles Villiers Stanford
  Sir Charles Villiers Stanford was an Irish composer who was particularly notable for his choral music. He was professor at the Royal College of Music and University of Cambridge.- Life :...
  
  : Savonarola (1884)

Diane Sawyer

Diane Sawyer

Lila Diane Sawyer is the current anchor of ABC News' flagship program, ABC World News. Previously, Sawyer had been co-anchor of ABC Newss morning news program, Good Morning America ....

, American television journalist

• Curtis K. Hughes: Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say It Ain't So, Joe is a chamber opera in two acts by Curtis K. Hughes inspired by text drawn from the public record of the 2008 United States vice-presidential debate...
  
  

Sylvester von Schaumberg

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Mathis der Maler
  Mathis der Maler (opera)
  Mathis der Maler is an opera by Paul Hindemith. The libretto is also by the composer.The opera's genesis lay in Hindemith's interest in the Protestant Reformation...
  
  

Hans

Hans Scholl

Hans Fritz Scholl was a founding member of the White Rose resistance movement in Nazi Germany.-Biography:...

and Sophie Scholl

Sophie Scholl

Sophia Magdalena Scholl was a German student, active within the White Rose non-violent resistance group in Nazi Germany. She was convicted of high treason after having been found distributing anti-war leaflets at the University of Munich with her brother Hans...

, sibling co-founders of non-violent resistance movement The White Rose

• Udo Zimmermann
  Udo Zimmermann
  Udo Zimmermann was born in Dresden on October 6, 1943. He is a German composer, music director, and conductor.- Biography :Zimmermann was a member of the Dresdner Kreuzchor from 1954 to 1962. He then continued his music education at the Dresden Music School. He studied composition with Johannes...
  
  : Weiße Rose
  Weiße Rose (opera)
  Weiße Rose The title of the opera is often shown as Die Weiße Rose; however, the publisher, Breitkopf & Härtel, shows both versions as .is a chamber opera in one act by composer Udo Zimmermann...
  
  

Kurt Schwitters

Kurt Schwitters

Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters was a German painter who was born in Hanover, Germany. Schwitters worked in several genres and media, including Dada, Constructivism, Surrealism, poetry, sound, painting, sculpture, graphic design, typography and what came to be known as...

, German painter

• Michael Nyman
  Michael Nyman
  Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...
  
  : Man and Boy: Dada
  Man and Boy: Dada
  Man and Boy: Dada is a 2003 opera by Michael Nyman on a libretto by Michael Hastings. It tells the story of a friendship between aging dada artist Kurt Schwitters and a twelve-year-old boy. These two characters and the boy's mother make up the cast of the opera.It was first performed at the...
  
  

Scipio Aemilianus, aka Scipio Africanus the Younger, Roman general, nephew and adopted son of Scipio Africanus the Elder

Scipio Africanus

Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus , also known as Scipio Africanus and Scipio the Elder, was a general in the Second Punic War and statesman of the Roman Republic...

• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Il sogno di Scipione
  Il sogno di Scipione
  Il sogno di Scipione, K. 126, is a dramatic serenade in one act composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a libretto by Pietro Metastasio, which is based on the book Somnium Scipionis by Cicero. Mozart had originally composed the work at the age of 15 for his patron, Prince-Archbishop Sigismund von...
  
  , K. 126

Scipio Africanus

Scipio Africanus

Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus , also known as Scipio Africanus and Scipio the Elder, was a general in the Second Punic War and statesman of the Roman Republic...

, aka Scipio Africanus the Elder, Roman general

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Scipione
  Scipione
  Scipione is an opera in three acts, with music composed by George Frideric Handel for the Royal Academy of Music in 1726. The librettist was Paolo Antonio Rolli. Handel composed Scipione whilst in the middle of writing Alessandro...
  
  
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Il sogno di Scipione
  Il sogno di Scipione
  Il sogno di Scipione, K. 126, is a dramatic serenade in one act composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a libretto by Pietro Metastasio, which is based on the book Somnium Scipionis by Cicero. Mozart had originally composed the work at the age of 15 for his patron, Prince-Archbishop Sigismund von...
  
  , K. 126
• Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Maria Gasparo Sacchini was an Italian opera composer.Sacchini was born in Florence, but was raised in Naples, where he received his musical education at the San Onofrio conservatory. He wrote his first operas in Naples, thereafter moving to Venice, then London and eventually Paris, where...
  
  : Scipione in Cartagena

King Sebastian of Portugal

Sebastian of Portugal

Sebastian "the Desired" was the 16th king of Portugal and the Algarves. He was the son of Prince John of Portugal and his wife, Joan of Spain...

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Dom Sébastien
  Dom Sébastien
  Dom Sébastien, Roi de Portugal is a French grand opera in five acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The libretto was written by Eugène Scribe, based on Paul Foucher's play Don Sébastien de Portugal , a historic-fiction about King Sebastian of Portugal and his ill-fated 1578 expedition to Morocco...
  
  

Seleucus I Nicator

Seleucus I Nicator

Seleucus I was a Macedonian officer of Alexander the Great and one of the Diadochi. In the Wars of the Diadochi that took place after Alexander's death, Seleucus established the Seleucid dynasty and the Seleucid Empire...

, King of Syria, founder of the Seleucid Empire

Seleucid Empire

The Seleucid Empire was a Greek-Macedonian state that was created out of the eastern conquests of Alexander the Great. At the height of its power, it included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir and parts of Pakistan.The Seleucid Empire was a major centre...

• Étienne Méhul
  Étienne Méhul
  Etienne Nicolas Méhul was a French composer, "the most important opera composer in France during the Revolution." He was also the first composer to be called a "Romantic".-Life:...
  
  : Stratonice
  Stratonice (opera)
  Stratonice is a one-act opéra comique by Étienne Méhul to a libretto by François-Benoît Hoffman, first performed at the Théâtre Favart, Paris, on 3 May 1792...
  
  
• Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...
  
  : Les fêtes de Polymnie
  Les fêtes de Polymnie
  Les fêtes de Polymnie is an opéra-ballet in three entrées and a prologue by Jean-Philippe Rameau. The work was first performed on 12 October 1745 at the Opéra, Paris, and is set to a libretto by Louis de Cahusac...
  
  

Seneca the Younger

Seneca the Younger

Lucius Annaeus Seneca was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and in one work humorist, of the Silver Age of Latin literature. He was tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero...

, Roman philosopher, dramatist

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down
• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Octavia
  Octavia (opera)
  The Roman Unrest, or The Noble-Minded Octavia , commonly called Octavia, is a singspiel in three acts by Reinhard Keiser to a German libretto by Barthold Feind...
  
  
• Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Monteverdi
  Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, and singer.Monteverdi's work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the transition from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two individual styles of composition – the...
  
  : L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea
  L'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...
  
  

Sextus Pompey, Roman general, son of Pompey the Great

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno
  Pompeo Magno is an opera in three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Giulio Cesare (in Egitto)
  Giulio Cesare
  Giulio Cesare in Egitto , commonly known simply as Giulio Cesare, is an Italian opera in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel in 1724...
  
  (as Sesto)

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

, English playwright

• Tan Dun
  Tan Dun
  Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer, most widely known for his scores for the movies Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.-Early life in China:...
  
  : Marco Polo
  Marco Polo (opera)
  Marco Polo is an opera by the Chinese-born composer Tan Dun set to an English libretto by Paul Griffiths. It premiered in Munich on 7 May 1996. Described variously as an "opera within an opera" and a "fantasia on an epic journey", the multi-layered storyline is loosely based on the journey of Marco...
  
  

Fyodor Shaklovity

Fyodor Shaklovity

Fyodor Leontiyevich Shaklovity was a Russian diplomat best known as a staunch adherent of the regent Sophia Alekseyevna, who had promoted him from a regular scrivener to a member of the Boyar Duma and okolnichy...

, Russian diplomat

• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Khovanshchina
  Khovanshchina
  Khovanshchina is an opera in five acts by Modest Mussorgsky. The work was written between 1872 and 1880 in St. Petersburg, Russia. The composer wrote the libretto based on historical sources...
  
  

Andrey Shchelkalov

Vasily and Andrey Shchelkalov

Vasily Yakovlevich Shchelkalov and Andrey Yakovlevich Shchelkalov Vasily Yakovlevich Shchelkalov (Василий Яковлевич Щелкалов in Russian) (? – 1610 or 1611) and Andrey Yakovlevich Shchelkalov (Андрей Яковлевич Щелкалов) Vasily Yakovlevich Shchelkalov (Василий Яковлевич Щелкалов in Russian) (? –...

, Russian administrator, official

• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Boris Godunov
  Boris Godunov (opera)
  Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
  
  

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron...

, English poet

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury

John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury

John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury and 1st Earl of Waterford KG , known as "Old Talbot" was an important English military commander during the Hundred Years' War, as well as the only Lancastrian Constable of France.-Origins:He was descended from Richard Talbot, a tenant in 1086 of Walter Giffard...

, English soldier

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco
  Giovanna d'Arco is an operatic dramma lirico with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera....
  
  (as Talbot)

George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury

George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury

George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury, 6th Earl of Waterford, 12th Baron Talbot, KG, Earl Marshal was a 16th century English statesman.-Life:...

, English statesman

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda
  Maria Stuarda is a tragic opera, , in two acts, by Gaetano Donizetti, to a libretto by Giuseppe Bardari, based on Friedrich Schiller's 1800 play Maria Stuart....
  
  (as Giorgio Talbot)

Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor

Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor

Sigismund of Luxemburg KG was King of Hungary, of Croatia from 1387 to 1437, of Bohemia from 1419, and Holy Roman Emperor for four years from 1433 until 1437, the last Emperor of the House of Luxemburg. He was also King of Italy from 1431, and of Germany from 1411...

• Fromental Halévy
  Fromental Halévy
  Jacques-François-Fromental-Élie Halévy, usually known as Fromental Halévy , was a French composer. He is known today largely for his opera La Juive.-Early career:...
  
  : La Juive
  La Juive
  La Juive is a grand opera in five acts by Fromental Halévy to an original French libretto by Eugène Scribe; it was first performed at the Opéra, Paris, on February 23, 1835.-Composition history:...
  
  

George Kastrioti Skanderbeg

Skanderbeg

George Kastrioti Skanderbeg or Gjergj Kastrioti Skënderbeu , widely known as Skanderbeg , was a 15th-century Albanian lord. He was appointed as the governor of the Sanjak of Dibra by the Ottomans in 1440...

, Albanian national hero

• François Francoeur
  François Francoeur
  François Francœur was a French composer and violinist.-Biography:He was born in Paris, the son of Joseph Francœur, a basse de violon player and member of the 24 violons du roy. Francœur was instructed in music by his father and joined the Académie Royale de Musique as a violinist at age 15...
  
  : Scanderbeg
• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Scanderbeg
  Scanderbeg (opera)
  Scanderbeg is an opera in three acts composed by Antonio Vivaldi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Salvi. It was first performed at the Teatro della Pergola in Florence on June 22, 1718 to mark the re-opening of the theatre to public performances...
  
  

Bengt Skytte, Swedish official

• Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Wilhelm Peterson-Berger
  Olof Wilhelm Peterson-Berger was a Swedish composer and music critic...
  
  : The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets
  The Doomsday Prophets is an opera by Wilhelm Peterson-Berger, to his own Swedish libretto, composed from 1912-17...
  
  

Mark Smeaton, English courtier

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena
  Anna Bolena is a tragedia lirica, or opera, in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Ippolito Pindemonte's Enrico VIII ossia Anna Bolena and Alessandro Pepoli's Anna Bolena, both telling of the life of Anne Boleyn...
  
  

Socrates

Socrates

Socrates was a classical Greek Athenian philosopher. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known chiefly through the accounts of later classical writers, especially the writings of his students Plato and Xenophon, and the plays of his contemporary ...

, Greek philosopher

• Georg Philipp Telemann
  Georg Philipp Telemann
  Georg Philipp Telemann was a German Baroque composer and multi-instrumentalist. Almost completely self-taught in music, he became a composer against his family's wishes. After studying in Magdeburg, Zellerfeld, and Hildesheim, Telemann entered the University of Leipzig to study law, but eventually...
  
  : Der geduldige Sokrates

Solon

Solon

Solon was an Athenian statesman, lawmaker, and poet. He is remembered particularly for his efforts to legislate against political, economic and moral decline in archaic Athens...

, Greek philosopher

• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Croesus
  Croesus (opera)
  Der hochmütige, gestürzte und wieder erhabene Croesus is a three-act opera composed by Reinhard Keiser...
  
  

Sophonisba

Sophonisba

Sophonisba was a Carthaginian noblewoman who lived during the Second Punic War, and the daughter of Hasdrubal Gisco Gisgonis...

, Carthaginian noblewoman, daughter of Hasdrubal Gisco

Hasdrubal Gisco

Hasdrubal Gisco or Hasdrubal son of Gisco was a Carthaginian general who fought against Rome in Iberia and North Africa during the Second Punic War. He should not be confused with Hasdrubal Barca, the brother of Hannibal....

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  

Agnès Sorel

Agnès Sorel

Agnès Sorel , known by the sobriquet Dame de beauté, was a favourite mistress of King Charles VII of France, for whom she bore three daughters....

, mistress of King Charles VII of France

Charles VII of France

Charles VII , called the Victorious or the Well-Served , was King of France from 1422 to his death, though he was initially opposed by Henry VI of England, whose Regent, the Duke of Bedford, ruled much of France including the capital, Paris...

• César Cui
  César Cui
  César Antonovich Cui was a Russian of French and Lithuanian descent. His profession was as an army officer and a teacher of fortifications; his avocational life has particular significance in the history of music, in that he was a composer and music critic; in this sideline he is known as a...
  
  : The Saracen
  The Saracen (opera)
  The Saracen , is an opera by César Cui composed during 1896-1898. The libretto was written by Vladimir Vasilievich Stasov and the composer, based on a play by Alexandre Dumas entitled Charles VII chez ses grands vassaux...
  
  
• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
  Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
  
  : The Maid of Orleans

Edmund Spenser

Edmund Spenser

Edmund Spenser was an English poet best known for The Faerie Queene, an epic poem and fantastical allegory celebrating the Tudor dynasty and Elizabeth I. He is recognised as one of the premier craftsmen of Modern English verse in its infancy, and one of the greatest poets in the English...

, English poet

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Arthur Stace

Arthur Stace

Arthur Malcolm Stace , otherwise known as Mr Eternity, was an Australian reformed alcoholic who converted to Christianity and spread his form of gospel by writing the word "Eternity'" in chalk on footpaths in Sydney over a period of approximately 35 years...

, Australian citizen who over 35 years chalked the word "Eternity" over 500,000 times on the footpaths of Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

• Jonathan Mills: The Eternity Man
  The Eternity Man
  The Eternity Man is a chamber opera in one act and seven scenes by the Australian composer Jonathan Mills to a libretto by Dorothy Porter. It deals with the life of Arthur Stace who was known as "The Eternity Man" because he chalked the word "Eternity" about 500,000 times in over 35 years on...
  
  

Stanisław I Leszczyński, King of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : Un giorno di regno
  Un giorno di regno
  Un giorno di regno, ossia il finto Stanislao is an operatic melodramma giocoso in two acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Felice Romani, based on the play Le faux Stanislas by Alexandre Vincent Pineu-Duval...
  
  (being impersonated by the fictional character the Cavaliere di Belfiore)

Stateira

Stateira I

Stateira I was the wife of Darius III of Persia of the Achaemenid dynasty. She was known as the most beautiful woman on Earth and, as was the custom for royal Persian women, accompanied her husband while he went to war. It was because of this that she was captured by Alexander the Great after the...

, consort of Darius III of Persia

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Statira principessa di Persia
  Statira principessa di Persia
  Statira principessa di Persia is an opera - more specifically, a dramma per musica - in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli, set to a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello. The opera was first performed in Venice at the Teatro SS...
  
  

Gertrude Stein

Gertrude Stein

Gertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...

, American writer

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

King Stephen I of Hungary (St. Stephen)

• Ferenc Erkel: István király
  István király
  István király is an 1886 Hungarian opera by Ferenc Erkel.-References: The following sources were given:*Till Géza: Opera, Zeneműkiadó, Budapest, 1985, ISBN 963 330 564 0...
  
  

Thaddeus Stevens

Thaddeus Stevens

Thaddeus Stevens , of Pennsylvania, was a Republican leader and one of the most powerful members of the United States House of Representatives...

, American politician

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Stigand

Stigand

Stigand was an English churchman in pre-Norman Conquest England. Although his birthdate is unknown, by 1020, he was serving as a royal chaplain and advisor. He was named Bishop of Elmham in 1043, and then later Bishop of Winchester and Archbishop of Canterbury...

, Archbishop of Canterbury

• Frederic Hymen Cowen
  Frederic Hymen Cowen
  Sir Frederic Hymen Cowen , was a British pianist, conductor and composer.-Early years:Cowen was born Hymen Frederick Cohen at 90 Duke Street, Kingston, Jamaica, the fifth and last child of Frederick Augustus Cohen and Emily Cohen née Davis. His siblings were Elizabeth Rose Cohen ; actress,...
  
  : Harold or the Norman Conquest
  Harold or the Norman Conquest
  Opera in four acts with music by the British composer Frederic H. Cowen with a libretto by Edward Malet, edited by Frederic Edward Weatherly, adapted into the German by L.A. Caumont, and first performed at Covent Garden, London on 8 June 1895.-Act 1.:...
  
  

Alessandro Stradella

Alessandro Stradella

Alessandro Stradella was an Italian composer of the middle baroque. He enjoyed a dazzling career as a freelance composer, writing on commission, collaborating with distinguished poets, producing over three hundred works in a variety of genres.-Life:Not much is known about his early life, but he...

, Italian composer

• Friedrich von Flotow
  Friedrich von Flotow
  Friedrich Adolf Ferdinand, Freiherr von Flotow was a German composer. He is chiefly remembered for his opera Martha, which was popular in the 19th century....
  
  : Alessandro Stradella
• Louis Niedermeyer
  Louis Niedermeyer
  Abraham Louis Niedermeyer was a composer chiefly of church music but also of a few operas, and a teacher who took over the Ecole Choron, duly renamed École Niedermeyer, a school for the study and practice of church music, where several eminent French musicians studied including Gabriel Fauré and...
  
  : Stradella
• at least 2 other operas

Stratonice

Stratonice of Syria

For other persons with the same name, see StratoniceStratonice of Syria was the daughter of king Demetrius Poliorcetes and Phila, the daughter of Antipater...

, wife of Seleucus I Nicator

Seleucus I Nicator

Seleucus I was a Macedonian officer of Alexander the Great and one of the Diadochi. In the Wars of the Diadochi that took place after Alexander's death, Seleucus established the Seleucid dynasty and the Seleucid Empire...

, King of Syria

• Étienne Méhul
  Étienne Méhul
  Etienne Nicolas Méhul was a French composer, "the most important opera composer in France during the Revolution." He was also the first composer to be called a "Romantic".-Life:...
  
  : Stratonice
  Stratonice (opera)
  Stratonice is a one-act opéra comique by Étienne Méhul to a libretto by François-Benoît Hoffman, first performed at the Théâtre Favart, Paris, on 3 May 1792...
  
  
• Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...
  
  : Les fêtes de Polymnie
  Les fêtes de Polymnie
  Les fêtes de Polymnie is an opéra-ballet in three entrées and a prologue by Jean-Philippe Rameau. The work was first performed on 12 October 1745 at the Opéra, Paris, and is set to a libretto by Louis de Cahusac...
  
  

Johann Strauss I

Johann Strauss I

Johann Strauss I , born in Vienna, was an Austrian Romantic composer famous for his waltzes, and for popularizing them alongside Joseph Lanner, thereby setting the foundations for his sons to carry on his musical dynasty...

, Viennese waltz composer (father)

Johann Strauss II

Johann Strauss II

Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...

, Viennese waltz composer (son)

• Johann Strauss I
  Johann Strauss I
  Johann Strauss I , born in Vienna, was an Austrian Romantic composer famous for his waltzes, and for popularizing them alongside Joseph Lanner, thereby setting the foundations for his sons to carry on his musical dynasty...
  
   and Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II
  Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...
  
  , arr. Erich Wolfgang Korngold
  Erich Wolfgang Korngold
  Erich Wolfgang Korngold was an Austro-Hungarian film and romantic music composer. While his compositional style was considered well out of vogue at the time he died, his music has more recently undergone a reevaluation and a gradual reawakening of interest...
  
   and Julius Bittner
  Julius Bittner
  Julius Bittner was an Austrian composer.-Life:The son of a judge, Bittner also initially pursued a career in law. Until 1920 he was a judge in Wolkersdorf im Weinviertel, in Lower Austria...
  
  : Valses de Vienne
  Valses de Vienne
  Walzer aus Wien is a singspiel pasticcio in three acts, libretto by Alfred Maria Willner, Heinz Reichert, and Ernst Marischka, music by Johann Strauss II , arranged by Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Julius Bittner, first performed at the Stadttheater in Vienna on 30 October 1930...
  
  

Giuseppina Strepponi

Giuseppina Strepponi

Clelia Maria Josepha Strepponi was a nineteenth century Italian operatic soprano of great renown and the second wife of composer Giuseppe Verdi...

, operatic soprano

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Risorgimento!

Nikola Šubić Zrinski

Nikola Šubic Zrinski

Nikola Šubić Zrinski , was a Croatian nobleman and general in service of Habsburg Monarchy, ban of Croatia from 1542 to 1556, and member of the Zrinski noble family...

, Croatian general

• Ivan Zajc
  Ivan Zajc
  Ivan Dragutin Stjepan Zajc or Ivan pl. Zajc , was a Croatian composer, conductor, director and teacher who for over forty years dominated Croatia's musical culture...
  
  : Nikola Šubić Zrinjski

Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent

Suleiman the Magnificent

Suleiman I was the tenth and longest-reigning Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, from 1520 to his death in 1566. He is known in the West as Suleiman the Magnificent and in the East, as "The Lawgiver" , for his complete reconstruction of the Ottoman legal system...

• Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek
  Ernst Krenek was an Austrian of Czech origin and, from 1945, American composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now , a study of Johannes Ockeghem , and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music...
  
  : Karl V
  Karl V
  Karl V is an opera, described as a Bühnenwerk mit Musik by Ernst Krenek, his opus 73. The German libretto is by the composer....
  
  (as Sultan Soliman)

Lucius Cornelius Sulla

Lucius Cornelius Sulla

Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix , known commonly as Sulla, was a Roman general and statesman. He had the rare distinction of holding the office of consul twice, as well as that of dictator...

, Roman general and dictator

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Silla
  Silla (opera)
  Silla is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel. The Italian-language libretto was by Giacomo Rossi. The story concerns the Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla as recounted by Plutarch.The opera appears to have been a pièce d'occasion, whicht may have been performed only once...
  
  
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Lucio Silla
  Lucio Silla
  Lucio Silla, K. 135, is an Italian opera in three acts composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto was written by Giovanni de Gamerra.It was first performed on 26 December 1772 at the Regio Ducal Teatro in Milan....
  
  

Louis Sullivan

Louis Sullivan

Louis Henri Sullivan was an American architect, and has been called the "father of skyscrapers" and "father of modernism" He is considered by many as the creator of the modern skyscraper, was an influential architect and critic of the Chicago School, was a mentor to Frank Lloyd Wright, and an...

, American architect

• Daron Hagen
  Daron Hagen
  Daron Aric Hagen , is an American composer, conductor, pianist, educator, librettist, and stage director of contemporary classical music and opera.- Early life and education :...
  
  : Shining Brow
  Shining Brow
  Shining Brow is an English language opera by Daron Hagen, first performed by the Madison Opera in Madison, Wisconsin, April 21, 1993. It is based on events in the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright...
  
  

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey

Henry Howard, KG, , known as The Earl of Surrey although he never was a peer, was an English aristocrat, and one of the founders of English Renaissance poetry.-Life:...

, English aristocrat, poet

• Camille Saint-Saëns
  Camille Saint-Saëns
  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
  
  : Henry VIII
  Henry VIII (opera)
  Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on El cisma en Inglaterra by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.-Composition history:...
  
  

Ivan Susanin

Ivan Susanin

Ivan Susanin was a Russian folk hero and martyr of the early 17th century's Time of Troubles.-Evidence:In 1619, a certain Bogdan Sobinin from Domnino village near Kostroma received from Tsar Mikhail one half of Derevischi village. According to the extant royal charter, these lands were granted...

, Russian folk hero and martyr

• Mikhail Glinka
  Mikhail Glinka
  Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka , was the first Russian composer to gain wide recognition within his own country, and is often regarded as the father of Russian classical music...
  
  : A Life for the Tsar
  A Life for the Tsar
  A Life for the Tsar , as it is known in English, although its original name was Ivan Susanin is a "patriotic-heroic tragic opera" in four acts with an epilogue by Mikhail Glinka. The original Russian libretto, based on historical events, was written by Nestor Kukolnik, Georgy Fyodorovich Rozen,...
  
  

King Svatopluk I

Svatopluk I

Svatopluk I or Zwentibald I was the greatest ruler of Moravia that attained its maximum territorial expansion in his reign . His career had already started in the 860s, when he governed a principality, the location of which is still a matter of debate among historians, within Moravia under the...

of Great Moravia

• Eugen Suchoň
  Eugen Suchon
  Eugen Suchoň was one of the greatest Slovak composers of the 20th century.-Early life:...
  
  : Svätopluk
  Svätopluk (opera)
  Svätopluk is a Slovak opera by Eugen Suchoň with the subtitle Musical drama in three acts. The libretto is by Eugen Suchoň, Ivan Stodola and Jela Krčméry-Vrteľová and is loosely based on Stodola's play Kráľ Svätopluk, which was in turn based on events in the life of King Svatopluk I. Suchoň...
  
  

King Svatopluk II

Svatopluk II

Svatopluk II ruled the Principality of Nitra from 894 to 906 and strove to control all of Great Moravia.Svatopluk II was a younger son of Svatopluk I. As Prince of Nitra, Svatopluk II was subordinated to his older brother Mojmír II, the King of Great Moravia which contained the principality as its...

of Great Moravia

• Eugen Suchoň
  Eugen Suchon
  Eugen Suchoň was one of the greatest Slovak composers of the 20th century.-Early life:...
  
  : Svätopluk
  Svätopluk (opera)
  Svätopluk is a Slovak opera by Eugen Suchoň with the subtitle Musical drama in three acts. The libretto is by Eugen Suchoň, Ivan Stodola and Jela Krčméry-Vrteľová and is loosely based on Stodola's play Kráľ Svätopluk, which was in turn based on events in the life of King Svatopluk I. Suchoň...
  
  

Syphax

Syphax

Syphax was a king of the ancient Algerian tribe Masaesyli of western Numidia during the last quarter of the 3rd century BC. His story is told in Livy's Ab Urbe Condita .-Biography:...

, king of the Libyan tribe of Masaesyli

Masaesyli

The Masaesyli were a North African tribe of western Numidia and the main antagonists of the Massylii in eastern Numidia.During the Second Punic War the Masaesyli initially supported the Roman Republic and were led by Syphax against the Massyllii, who were led by Massinissa...

• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano
  Scipione affricano is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The Italian libretto was by Nicolò Minato.-Performance history:...
  
  (as Siface)

Erzsébet Szilágyi, Hungarian noblewoman, wife of János Hunyadi

John Hunyadi

John Hunyadi John Hunyadi (Hungarian: Hunyadi János , Medieval Latin: Ioannes Corvinus or Ioannes de Hunyad, Romanian: Iancu (Ioan) de Hunedoara, Croatian: Janko Hunjadi, Serbian: Сибињанин Јанко / Sibinjanin Janko, Slovak: Ján Huňady) John Hunyadi (Hungarian: Hunyadi János , Medieval Latin: ...

• Ferenc Erkel: Hunyadi László
  Hunyadi László (opera)
  Hunyadi László is an opera in three acts by the Hungarian composer Ferenc Erkel. The libretto, by Béni Egressy, is based on a play by Lörinc Tóth. The opera was first performed at the Pesti Nemzeti Magyar Szinház, Budapest on 27 January 1844...
  
  

T

Horace Tabor, American businessman, politician

• Douglas Moore: The Ballad of Baby Doe
  The Ballad of Baby Doe
  The Ballad of Baby Doe is an opera by the American composer Douglas Moore that uses an English-language libretto by John Latouche. It is Moore's most famous opera and one of the few American operas to be in the standard repertory...
  
  

Alexandre-Antonin Taché

Alexandre-Antonin Taché

Alexandre-Antonin Taché was a Roman Catholic priest, missionary of the Oblate order, author and the first Archbishop of Saint Boniface in the Canadian province of Manitoba.In late 1844 Taché entered the Oblate novitiate...

, Canadian Catholic prelate

• Harry Somers
  Harry Somers
  Harry Stewart Somers, CC was the foremost English-Canadian composer of his period.He was born in middle-class Toronto in 1925 but did not become interested in music until his early teenage years, when he met a doctor and his wife, both pianists, who introduced him to classical music...
  
  : Louis Riel
  Louis Riel (opera)
  Louis Riel is an opera in three acts by the Canadian composer Harry Somers.This full length opera was written for the 1967 Canadian centennial. It concerns the controversial Métis leader Louis Riel, who was executed in 1885, and is one of Somers' biggest pieces.It is arguably the most famous...
  
  

Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore , sobriquet Gurudev, was a Bengali polymath who reshaped his region's literature and music. Author of Gitanjali and its "profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse", he became the first non-European Nobel laureate by earning the 1913 Prize in Literature...

, Indian writer

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Satyagraha
  Satyagraha (opera)
  Satyagraha is a 1979 opera in three acts for orchestra, chorus and soloists, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by Glass and Constance DeJong.Loosely based on the life of Mohandas K...
  
  

Eugene Talmadge

Eugene Talmadge

Eugene Talmadge was a Democratic politician who served two terms as the 67th Governor of Georgia from 1933 to 1937, and a third term from 1941 to 1943. Elected to a fourth term in 1946, he died before taking office...

, Governor of Georgia

• Michael Braz: A Scholar Under Siege
  A Scholar Under Siege
  A Scholar Under Siege is an opera in two acts by contemporary American composer Michael Braz. Braz also wrote the English language libretto for the opera which was composed for the centenary of Georgia Southern University...
  
  

Tamerlane: see under Timur

Tancred, Prince of Galilee

Tancred, Prince of Galilee

Tancred was a Norman leader of the First Crusade who later became Prince of Galilee and regent of the Principality of Antioch...

, Norman Crusade leader

• André Campra
  André Campra
  André Campra was a French composer and conductor.Campra was one of the leading French opera composers in the period between Jean-Baptiste Lully and Jean-Philippe Rameau. He wrote several tragédies en musique, but his chief claim to fame is as the creator of a new genre, opéra-ballet...
  
  : Tancrède
  Tancrède
  Tancrède is a tragédie en musique in a prologue and five acts by composer André Campra and librettist Antoine Danchet, based on Gerusalemme liberata by Torquato Tasso....
  
  

Tannhäuser

Tannhäuser

Tannhäuser was a German Minnesänger and poet. Historically, his biography is obscure beyond the poetry, which dates between 1245 and 1265...

, Medieval German poet

• Richard Wagner
  Richard Wagner
  Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
  
  : Tannhäuser
  Tannhäuser (opera)
  Tannhäuser is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg...
  
  

Lucius Tarquinius

Lucius Tarquinius Superbus

Lucius Tarquinius Superbus was the legendary seventh and final King of Rome, reigning from 535 BC until the popular uprising in 509 BC that led to the establishment of the Roman Republic. He is more commonly known by his cognomen Tarquinius Superbus and was a member of the so-called Etruscan...

, one of 3 kings of Rome

• Filippo Amadei, Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini was an Italian Baroque composer and cellist, one of a family of string players and composers. His father, Giovanni Maria Bononcini , was a violinist and a composer.-Biography:...
  
   and George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola
  Muzio Scevola is an opera in three acts about Gaius Mucius Scaevola. The Italian-language libretto was by Paolo Antonio Rolli, adapted from a text by Silvio Stampiglia. The music for the first act was composed by Filippo Amadei , the second act by Giovanni Battista Bononcini, and the third by...
  
  

Sextus Tarquinius

Sextus Tarquinius

Sextus Tarquinius was a Roman prince, the third and youngest son of the last king of Rome, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus . He is primarily known for his rape of Lucretia, daughter of Spurius Lucretius Tricipitinus, wife of Collatinus....

, son of Lucius Tarquinius Superbus

Lucius Tarquinius Superbus

Lucius Tarquinius Superbus was the legendary seventh and final King of Rome, reigning from 535 BC until the popular uprising in 509 BC that led to the establishment of the Roman Republic. He is more commonly known by his cognomen Tarquinius Superbus and was a member of the so-called Etruscan...

, King of Rome

• Benjamin Britten
  Benjamin Britten
  Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
  
  : The Rape of Lucretia

Torquato Tasso

Torquato Tasso

Torquato Tasso was an Italian poet of the 16th century, best known for his poem La Gerusalemme liberata , in which he depicts a highly imaginative version of the combats between Christians and Muslims at the end of the First Crusade, during the siege of Jerusalem...

, Italian poet

• Gaetano Donizetti
  Gaetano Donizetti
  Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
  
  : Torquato Tasso
  Torquato Tasso (opera)
  Torquato Tasso is a melodramma semiseria, or 'semi-serious' opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti and based on the life of the great poet Torquato Tasso. The Italian libretto was written by Jacopo Ferretti, who used a number of sources for his text, including works by Giovanni Rosini, Goethe,...
  
  

John Taverner

John Taverner

John Taverner was an English composer and organist, regarded as the most important English composer of his era.- Career :...

, 16th century English composer

• Sir Peter Maxwell Davies
  Peter Maxwell Davies
  Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, CBE is an English composer and conductor and is currently Master of the Queen's Music.-Biography:...
  
  : Taverner
  Taverner (opera)
  Taverner is an opera with music and libretto by Peter Maxwell Davies. It is based on the life of the 16th century English composer John Taverner, but in what Davies himself acknowledged was a non-realistic treatment. The gestation for the opera dated as far back as 1956 during Davies's years in...
  
  

Dame Elizabeth Taylor

Elizabeth Taylor

Dame Elizabeth Rosemond "Liz" Taylor, DBE was a British-American actress. From her early years as a child star with MGM, she became one of the great screen actresses of Hollywood's Golden Age...

, British-US actress

• Michael Daugherty
  Michael Daugherty
  Michael Kevin Daugherty is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. Influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and Postmodernism, Daugherty is one of the most colorful and widely performed American concert music composers of his generation...
  
  : Jackie O
  Jackie O (opera)
  Jackie O is a chamber opera in two acts composed by Michael Daugherty to a libretto by Wayne Koestenbaum. The 90 minute work, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 1995 and premiered in 1997, is inspired by American musical and popular culture of the late 1960s and episodes in the life of...
  
  

William Tell

William Tell

William Tell is a folk hero of Switzerland. His legend is recorded in a late 15th century Swiss chronicle....

, Swiss national hero (disputed historical authenticity)

• André Grétry: Guillaume Tell
  Guillaume Tell (Grétry)
  Guillaume Tell is an opéra comique, described as a drame mise en musique, in three acts by André Grétry, The French text was by Michel-Jean Sedaine based on a play of the same name by Antoine-Marin Lemierre.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Gioachino Rossini: William Tell
  William Tell (opera)
  Guillaume Tell is an opera in four acts by Gioachino Rossini to a French libretto by Etienne de Jouy and Hippolyte Bis, based on Friedrich Schiller's play Wilhelm Tell. Based on the legend of William Tell, this opera was Rossini's last, even though the composer lived for nearly forty more years...
  
  

Edward Teller

Edward Teller

Edward Teller was a Hungarian-American theoretical physicist, known colloquially as "the father of the hydrogen bomb," even though he did not care for the title. Teller made numerous contributions to nuclear and molecular physics, spectroscopy , and surface physics...

, Hungarian-American physicist

• John Adams: Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic is an opera by the contemporary American composer John Adams, with libretto by Peter Sellars. It premiered at the San Francisco Opera on 1 October 2005. The work focuses on the great stress and anxiety experienced by those at Los Alamos while the test of the first atomic bomb was...
  
  

Beatrice di Tenda, Italian noblewoman

• Vincenzo Bellini
  Vincenzo Bellini
  Vincenzo Salvatore Carmelo Francesco Bellini was an Italian opera composer. His greatest works are I Capuleti ed i Montecchi , La sonnambula , Norma , Beatrice di Tenda , and I puritani...
  
  : Beatrice di Tenda
  Beatrice di Tenda
  Beatrice di Tenda is a tragic opera in two acts by Vincenzo Bellini, from a libretto by Felice Romani, after the play of the same name by Carlo Tedaldi-Fores...
  
  

Saint Teresa of Ávila

Teresa of Ávila

Saint Teresa of Ávila, also called Saint Teresa of Jesus, baptized as Teresa Sánchez de Cepeda y Ahumada, was a prominent Spanish mystic, Roman Catholic saint, Carmelite nun, and writer of the Counter Reformation, and theologian of contemplative life through mental prayer...

, Spanish mystic and theologian

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Four Saints in Three Acts
  Four Saints in Three Acts
  Four Saints in Three Acts is an opera by American composer Virgil Thomson with a libretto by Gertrude Stein. Written in 1927-8, it contains about 20 saints, and is in at least four acts...
  
  

Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla was a Serbian-American inventor, mechanical engineer, and electrical engineer...

, Croatian scientist

• Constantine Koukias
  Constantine Koukias
  Constantine Koukias is a Greek-Australian composer and flautist.He is the co-founder and Artistic Director of IHOS Music Theatre and Opera, based in Hobart, Tasmania. He is well known for his innovative work in contemporary opera and other forms...
  
  : Tesla - Lightning in His Hand

Themistocles

Themistocles

Themistocles ; c. 524–459 BC, was an Athenian politician and a general. He was one of a new breed of politicians who rose to prominence in the early years of the Athenian democracy, along with his great rival Aristides...

, Athenian general and politician

• Johann Christian Bach
  Johann Christian Bach
  Johann Christian Bach was a composer of the Classical era, the eleventh and youngest son of Johann Sebastian Bach. He is sometimes referred to as 'the London Bach' or 'the English Bach', due to his time spent living in the British capital...
  
  : Temistocle
  Temistocle
  Temistocle is an opera seria in three acts by the German composer Johann Christian Bach. The Italian text is an extensive revision of the libretto by Metastasio, by Mattia Verazi, court poet and private secretary to the Elector Palatine Carl Theodor.The opera was the first of two for the Elector...
  
  

James Thomson, Scottish poet

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : Lord Byron
  Lord Byron (Thomson)
  Lord Byron is an opera in three acts by Virgil Thomson to an original English libretto by Jack Larson, inspired by the historical character Lord Byron. This was Thomson's third and final opera. He wrote the opera on commission from the Ford Foundation for the Metropolitan Opera , but the Met...
  
  

Virgil Thomson

Virgil Thomson

Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...

, American composer and critic

• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

François Auguste de Thou

François Auguste de Thou

François-Auguste de Thou was a French magistrate. The eldest son of Jacques-Auguste de Thou, he was a councillor to the parliament of Paris in 1626 and a conseiller d'État shortly afterwards. He was unwise enough to link himself to cardinal Richelieu's enemies...

, French magistrate

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Cinq-Mars

Thusnelda

Thusnelda

Thusnelda was the daughter of the Cheruscan prince Segestes. Her father had intended her for someone else, but Arminius, who subsequently led a coalition of Germanic tribes to victory over Publius Quinctilius Varus and his legions in the Battle of Teutoburg Forest in 9 AD, eloped with her and...

, wife of Arminius

Arminius

Arminius , also known as Armin or Hermann was a chieftain of the Germanic Cherusci who defeated a Roman army in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest...

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Arminio
  Arminio
  Arminio is an opera composed by George Frideric Handel.- Performance History :Together with Giustino and Berenice, Arminio is one of three operas Handel wrote within a period of half a year in 1736. He began with the composition of Giustino on 14 August 1736, followed by that of Arminio on 15...
  
  

Timur

Timur

Timur , historically known as Tamerlane in English , was a 14th-century conqueror of West, South and Central Asia, and the founder of the Timurid dynasty in Central Asia, and great-great-grandfather of Babur, the founder of the Mughal Dynasty, which survived as the Mughal Empire in India until...

, aka Tamerlane, founder of the Timurid dynasty

Timurid Dynasty

The Timurids , self-designated Gurkānī , were a Persianate, Central Asian Sunni Muslim dynasty of Turko-Mongol descent whose empire included the whole of Iran, modern Afghanistan, and modern Uzbekistan, as well as large parts of contemporary Pakistan, North India, Mesopotamia, Anatolia and the...

• Iain Hamilton
  Iain Hamilton (composer)
  Iain Ellis Hamilton was a Scottish composer.He was educated in London where he became an apprentice engineer, and remained in that profession for the next seven years. He undertook the study of music in his spare time...
  
  : Tamberlaine
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Tamerlano
  Tamerlano
  Tamerlano is an opera in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music , with music by George Frideric Handel to an Italian text by Nicola Francesco Haym, adapted from Agostin Piovene's Tamerlano together with another libretto entitled Bajazet after Nicolas Pradon's Tamerlan, ou La Mort de...
  
  
• Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Sacchini
  Antonio Maria Gasparo Sacchini was an Italian opera composer.Sacchini was born in Florence, but was raised in Naples, where he received his musical education at the San Onofrio conservatory. He wrote his first operas in Naples, thereafter moving to Venice, then London and eventually Paris, where...
  
  : Tamerlano
• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Bajazet
  Bajazet (opera)
  Bajazet is an Italian opera composed by Antonio Vivaldi in 1735. Its libretto was written by Agostino Piovene. It was premiered in Verona, during the Carnival season of that year. This opera is presented in 3 acts, with a three-movement sinfonia as an introduction...
  
  

King Tiridates I of Armenia

Tiridates I of Armenia

Tiridates I was King of Armenia beginning in AD 53 and the founder of the Arshakuni Dynasty, the Armenian line of the Arsacid Dynasty. The dates of his birth and death are unknown. His early reign was marked by a brief interruption towards the end of the year 54 and a much longer one from 58...

• Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser
  Reinhard Keiser was a popular German opera composer based in Hamburg. He wrote over a hundred operas, and in 1745 Johann Adolph Scheibe considered him an equal to Johann Kuhnau, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann , but his work was largely forgotten for many...
  
  : Octavia
  Octavia (opera)
  The Roman Unrest, or The Noble-Minded Octavia , commonly called Octavia, is a singspiel in three acts by Reinhard Keiser to a German libretto by Barthold Feind...
  
  

Emperor Titus

Titus

Titus , was Roman Emperor from 79 to 81. A member of the Flavian dynasty, Titus succeeded his father Vespasian upon his death, thus becoming the first Roman Emperor to come to the throne after his own father....

 of Rome

• Antonio Caldara
  Antonio Caldara
  Antonio Caldara was an Italian Baroque composer.Caldara was born in Venice , the son of a violinist. He became a chorister at St Mark's in Venice, where he learned several instruments, probably under the instruction of Giovanni Legrenzi...
  
  : La clemenza di Tito
• Christoph Willibald Gluck
  Christoph Willibald Gluck
  Christoph Willibald Ritter von Gluck was an opera composer of the early classical period. After many years at the Habsburg court at Vienna, Gluck brought about the practical reform of opera's dramaturgical practices that many intellectuals had been campaigning for over the years...
  
  : La clemenza di Tito
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : La clemenza di Tito
  La clemenza di Tito
  La clemenza di Tito , K. 621, is an opera seria in two acts composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to an Italian libretto by Caterino Mazzolà, after Metastasio...
  
  
• Josef Mysliveček
  Josef Myslivecek
  Josef Mysliveček was a Czech composer who contributed to the formation of late eighteenth-century classicism in music...
  
  : La clemenza di Tito
  La clemenza di Tito (Mysliveček)
  La clemenza di Tito is an 18th-century Italian opera in 3 acts by the Czech composer Josef Mysliveček. It was composed to a libretto by the Italian poet Metastasio that was first performed in 1734 with music of Antonio Caldara...
  
  
• and settings of La clemenza di Tito by about 40 other composers

Tiye

Tiye

Tiye was the daughter of Yuya and Tjuyu . She became the Great Royal Wife of the Egyptian pharaoh Amenhotep III....

, mother of Pharaoh Akhenaten of Egypt

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Akhnaten
  Akhnaten (opera)
  Akhnaten is an opera in three acts based on the life and religious convictions of the pharaoh Akhenaten , written by the American minimalist composer Philip Glass in 1983. Akhnaten had its world premiere on March 24, 1984 at the Stuttgart State Opera, under the German title Echnaton...
  
  

Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist...

, Russian novelist

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Satyagraha
  Satyagraha (opera)
  Satyagraha is a 1979 opera in three acts for orchestra, chorus and soloists, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by Glass and Constance DeJong.Loosely based on the life of Mohandas K...
  
  

Tomyris, Queen of the Massagetae

Massagetae

The Massageteans or Massagetaeans were an Iranian nomadic confederation in antiquity known primarily from the writings of Herodotus. Their name was probably akin to Thyssagetae.-Name:...

• Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti
  Alessandro Scarlatti was an Italian Baroque composer especially famous for his operas and chamber cantatas. He is considered the founder of the Neapolitan school of opera. He was the father of two other composers, Domenico Scarlatti and Pietro Filippo Scarlatti.-Life:Scarlatti was born in...
  
  : Tigrane
  Tigrane
  Tigrane, o vero L'egual impegno d'amore e di fede is an opera seria in three acts by the Italian composer Alessandro Scarlatti with a libretto by Domenico Lalli . It was first performed at the Teatro San Bartolomeo, Naples on 16 February 1715...
  
  (as Tomiri)

Titus Manlius Torquatus, Roman dictator

• Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Vivaldi
  Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...
  
  : Tito Manlio
  Tito Manlio
  Tito Manlio is an opera in three acts by Antonio Vivaldi, to a libretto by Matteo Noris. It was written in celebration of the marriage of Philip of Hesse-Darmstadt , the governor of Mantua, which he had announced at Christmas. Vivaldi quickly composed the opera within five days...
  
  

François Leclerc du Tremblay

François Leclerc du Tremblay

François Leclerc du Tremblay , also known as Père Joseph, was a French Capuchin friar, confidant and agent of Cardinal Richelieu...

, "Père Joseph", the original eminence grise

• Charles Gounod
  Charles Gounod
  Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...
  
  : Cinq-Mars

Olegas Truchanas

Olegas Truchanas

Olegas Truchanas was a Lithuanian-Australian conservationist and nature photographer.He was a key figure in the attempt to stop the damming of the ecologically sensitive Lake Pedder in South West Tasmania by the Hydro Electricity Commission...

, Lithuanian-Australian wilderness photographer

• Constantine Koukias
  Constantine Koukias
  Constantine Koukias is a Greek-Australian composer and flautist.He is the co-founder and Artistic Director of IHOS Music Theatre and Opera, based in Hobart, Tasmania. He is well known for his innovative work in contemporary opera and other forms...
  
  : Olegas
  Olegas (opera)
  Olegas is an opera based on the life of Lithuanian-born Tasmanian wilderness photographer Olegas Truchanas , by Tasmanian composer Constantine Koukias, with libretto by Natasha Cica....
  
  

Marina Tsvetaeva

Marina Tsvetaeva

Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva was a Russian and Soviet poet. Her work is considered among some of the greatest in twentieth century Russian literature. She lived through and wrote of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Moscow famine that followed it. In an attempt to save her daughter Irina from...

, Russian poet

• Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Sergeevich Korndorf was a Russian and Canadian composer and conductor. He was prolific both in Moscow, Russia and in Vancouver, Canada.-Biography:...
  
  : MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR is a chamber opera in one act by the Russian composer Nikolai Korndorf . The libretto by Yuri Lourié is in Russian, German, Ancient Greek and Japanese)...
  
  

Wat Tyler

Wat Tyler

Walter "Wat" Tyler was a leader of the English Peasants' Revolt of 1381.-Early life:Knowledge of Tyler's early life is very limited, and derives mostly through the records of his enemies. Historians believe he was born in Essex, but are not sure why he crossed the Thames Estuary to Kent...

, English leader of peasant revolution

• Alan Bush
  Alan Bush
  Alan Dudley Bush was a British composer and pianist. He was a committed socialist, and politics sometimes provided central themes in his music.-Personal life:...
  
  : Wat Tyler

U

Pope Urban VIII

Pope Urban VIII

Pope Urban VIII , born Maffeo Barberini, was pope from 1623 to 1644. He was the last pope to expand the papal territory by force of arms, and was a prominent patron of the arts and reformer of Church missions...

• Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
  : Galileo Galilei
  Galileo Galilei (opera)
  Galileo Galilei is an opera based on excerpts from the life of Galileo Galilei which premiered in 2002 at Chicago's Goodman Theatre. Music by Philip Glass, libretto by Mary Zimmerman and Arnold Weinstein. The piece is presented in one act consisting of ten scenes without break.-Production Notes:All...
  
  (appears as both Cardinal Maffeo Barberini and Pope Urban VIII)

V

Valdemar IV of Denmark

Valdemar IV of Denmark

Valdemar IV of Denmark or Waldemar ; , was King of Denmark from 1340 to 1375.-Ascension to the throne:...

, King of Denmark from 1340 to 1375

• Andreas Hallén
  Andreas Hallén
  Johan Andreas Hallén was a Swedish Romantic composer, conductor and music teacher, primarily known for his operas, which were heavily influenced by Richard Wagner’s music dramas.-Operas:*Harald der Wiking...
  
  : Valdemarskatten

Valentinian III

Valentinian III

-Family:Valentinian was born in the western capital of Ravenna, the only son of Galla Placidia and Flavius Constantius. The former was the younger half-sister of the western emperor Honorius, and the latter was at the time Patrician and the power behind the throne....

, Western Roman Emperor

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Ezio
  Ezio (opera)
  Ezio is an opera by George Frideric Handel written for the Royal Academy of Music to a libretto by Pietro Metastasio. Metastasio's libretto was partly inspired by Jean Racine's play Britannicus...
  
  

Theo van Gogh

Theo van Gogh (art dealer)

Theodorus "Theo" van Gogh was a Dutch art dealer. He was the younger brother of Vincent van Gogh, and Theo's unfailing financial and emotional support allowed his brother to devote himself entirely to painting...

, Dutch art dealer, brother of Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent Willem van Gogh , and used Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: , with a voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of his work was produced, it is...

• Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara is a Finnish composer of contemporary classical music, and is one of the most notable Finnish composers after Jean Sibelius.-Life:...
  
  : Vincent
  Vincent (opera)
  Vincent is an opera in three acts by Einojuhani Rautavaara first performed in 1990. The libretto was by the composer, and consists of scenes from the life of the artist Vincent van Gogh, told in retrospect....
  
  
• James Wilson
  James Wilson (composer)
  James Wilson was a notable Irish composer. Though born in England, Wilson was a resident of Ireland for over 50 years.-Early life:...
  
  : Letters to Theo

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent Willem van Gogh , and used Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: , with a voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of his work was produced, it is...

, Dutch painter

• Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara
  Einojuhani Rautavaara is a Finnish composer of contemporary classical music, and is one of the most notable Finnish composers after Jean Sibelius.-Life:...
  
  : Vincent
  Vincent (opera)
  Vincent is an opera in three acts by Einojuhani Rautavaara first performed in 1990. The libretto was by the composer, and consists of scenes from the life of the artist Vincent van Gogh, told in retrospect....
  
  
• James Wilson
  James Wilson (composer)
  James Wilson was a notable Irish composer. Though born in England, Wilson was a resident of Ireland for over 50 years.-Early life:...
  
  : Letters to Theo
• Christopher Yavelow
  Christopher Yavelow
  Christopher Yavelow , the son of a film professor and visual artist, is a composer and proponent of computer assisted composition....
  
  : The Passion of Vincent van Gogh
  The Passion of Vincent van Gogh
  The Passion of Vincent van Gogh is an opera in three acts and eighteen scenes by composer Christopher Yavelow. The opera was commissioned by the National Endowment for the Arts and composed at the Camargo Foundation in 1983 during a Camargo Fellowship in Cassis, France...
  
  

Publius Quinctilius Varus

Publius Quinctilius Varus

Publius Quinctilius Varus was a Roman politician and general under Emperor Augustus, mainly remembered for having lost three Roman legions and his own life when attacked by Germanic leader Arminius in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest.-Life:His paternal grandfather was senator Sextus Quinctilius...

, Roman general

• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Arminio
  Arminio
  Arminio is an opera composed by George Frideric Handel.- Performance History :Together with Giustino and Berenice, Arminio is one of three operas Handel wrote within a period of half a year in 1736. He began with the composition of Giustino on 14 August 1736, followed by that of Arminio on 15...
  
  

Tsar Vasily IV (Shuisky) of Russia

Vasili IV of Russia

Vasili IV of Russia was Tsar of Russia between 1606 and 1610 after the murder of False Dmitriy I. His reign fell during the Time of Troubles....

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Dimitrij
  Dimitrij
  Dimitrij is an opera by Antonín Dvořák in 4 acts, set a libretto by Marie Červinková-Riegrová. More specifically, it belongs to the genre of Grand Opera. The work was first performed in Prague, at the Nové České Divadlo on 8 October 1882, after Dvořák began composition during May 1881...
  
  
• Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Mussorgsky
  Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...
  
  : Boris Godunov
  Boris Godunov (opera)
  Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
  
  

Giuseppe Verdi

Giuseppe Verdi

Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...

, Italian composer

• Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero
  Lorenzo Ferrero is a contemporary Italian composer with a predilection for opera, a librettist, author, and book editor. He started composing at an early age and wrote over a hundred compositions thus far, including twelve operas, three ballets, and numerous orchestral, chamber music, solo...
  
  : Risorgimento! (not identified by name, appears as old Senator)

Johannes Vermeer

Johannes Vermeer

Johannes, Jan or Johan Vermeer was a Dutch painter who specialized in exquisite, domestic interior scenes of middle class life. Vermeer was a moderately successful provincial genre painter in his lifetime...

, Dutch painter

• Sir Harrison Birtwistle
  Harrison Birtwistle
  Sir Harrison Paul Birtwistle CH is a British contemporary composer.-Life:Birtwistle was born in Accrington, a mill town in Lancashire some 20 miles north of Manchester. His interest in music was encouraged by his mother, who bought him a clarinet when he was seven, and arranged for him to have...
  
  : The Second Mrs Kong
  The Second Mrs Kong
  The Second Mrs Kong is an opera in two acts, with music by Sir Harrison Birtwistle to a libretto by Russell Hoban. Glyndebourne Touring Opera first staged the opera on 24 October 1994. The cast included Philip Langridge, Helen Field and Michael Chance. Tom Cairns designed and directed the...
  
  

Micaela Villegas

Micaela Villegas

Maria Micaela Villegas Hurtado , known as La Perricholi, was arguably the most famous Peruvian woman of the eighteenth century. She was a celebrated entertainer and the famous mistress of Manuel de Amat y Juniet, Viceroy of Peru from 1761 to 1776...

, "La Perricholi", Peruvian actress and singer

• Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach
  Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....
  
  : La Périchole
  La Périchole
  La Périchole is an opéra bouffe in three acts by Jacques Offenbach. Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy wrote the French-language libretto based on the 1829 one act play Le carrosse du Saint-Sacrement by Prosper Mérimée, which was revived on 13 March 1850 at the Théâtre-Français...
  
   (she is not identified by name, and the remaining characters are all fictional)

François Villon

François Villon

François Villon was a French poet, thief, and vagabond. He is perhaps best known for his Testaments and his Ballade des Pendus, written while in prison...

, French poet and vagabond

• Rudolf Friml
  Rudolf Friml
  Rudolf Friml was a composer of operettas, musicals, songs and piano pieces, as well as a pianist. After musical training and a brief performing career in his native Prague, Friml moved to the United States, where he became a composer...
  
  : The Vagabond King
  The Vagabond King
  The Vagabond King is a 1925 operetta by Rudolf Friml in four acts, with a book and lyrics by Brian Hooker and William H. Post, based upon Justin Huntly McCarthy's 1901 romantic play If I Were King...
  
  
• Ezra Pound
  Ezra Pound
  Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet and critic and a major figure in the early modernist movement in poetry...
  
   and George Antheil
  George Antheil
  George Antheil was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author and inventor. A self-described "Bad Boy of Music", his modernist compositions amazed and appalled listeners in Europe and the US during the 1920s with their cacophonous celebration of mechanical devices.Returning permanently to...
  
  : Le Testament

Gaius Iulius Vindex

Vindex

Gaius Iulius Vindex, of a noble Gaulish family of Aquitania given senatorial status under Claudius, was a Roman governor in the province of Gallia Lugdunensis. In either late 67 or early 68, he rebelled against the tax policy of the Emperor Nero...

, Roman general

• Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Rubinstein
  Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
  
  : Neron

Filippo Maria Visconti

Filippo Maria Visconti

Filippo Maria Visconti was ruler of Milan from 1412 to 1447.-Biography:Filippo Maria Visconti, who had become nominal ruler of Pavia in 1402, succeeded his assassinated brother Gian Maria Visconti as Duke of Milan in 1412. They were the sons of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, Gian Maria's predecessor, by...

, ruler of Milan, husband of Beatrice di Tenda

• Vincenzo Bellini
  Vincenzo Bellini
  Vincenzo Salvatore Carmelo Francesco Bellini was an Italian opera composer. His greatest works are I Capuleti ed i Montecchi , La sonnambula , Norma , Beatrice di Tenda , and I puritani...
  
  : Beatrice di Tenda
  Beatrice di Tenda
  Beatrice di Tenda is a tragic opera in two acts by Vincenzo Bellini, from a libretto by Felice Romani, after the play of the same name by Carlo Tedaldi-Fores...
  
  

Vladimir I

Vladimir I of Kiev

Vladimir Sviatoslavich the Great Old East Slavic: Володимѣръ Свѧтославичь Old Norse as Valdamarr Sveinaldsson, , Vladimir, , Volodymyr, was a grand prince of Kiev, ruler of Kievan Rus' in .Vladimir's father was the prince Sviatoslav of the Rurik dynasty...

, Grand Prince of Kiev

• Alexander Serov
  Alexander Serov
  Alexander Nikolayevich Serov – was a Russian composer and music critic. He and his wife Valentina were the parents of painter Valentin Serov...
  
  : Rogneda
  Rogneda (opera)
  Rogneda is an opera in five acts, composed by Alexander Serov during 1863–1865. The scenario, by the composer, was based on the novel Askold's Grave by Mikhail Zagoskin and the poem Rogneda by Kondraty Ryleyev...
  
  

Vladimir III Igorevich

Vladimir III Igorevich

Vladimir III Igorevich was a Rus' prince . His baptismal name was Peter...

, Prince of Putivl and Halych

Vladimir Yaroslavich, Prince Galitsky, son of Yaroslav Osmomysl

Yaroslav Osmomysl

Yaroslav Osmomysl was the most famous Prince of Halych from the first dynasty of its rulers, which descended from Yaroslav I's eldest son. His sobriquet, meaning "Eight-Minded" in Old East Slavic, was granted to him in recognition of his wisdom...

, Prince of Halych

Halych

Halych is a historic city on the Dniester River in western Ukraine. The town gave its name to the historic province and kingdom of Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia, of which it was the capital until the early 14th century, when the seat of the local princes was moved to Lviv...

• Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Borodin
  Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin was a Russian Romantic composer and chemist of Georgian–Russian parentage. He was a member of the group of composers called The Five , who were dedicated to producing a specifically Russian kind of art music...
  
  : Prince Igor
  Prince Igor
  Prince Igor is an opera in four acts with a prologue. It was composed by Alexander Borodin. The composer adapted the libretto from the East Slavic epic The Lay of Igor's Host, which recounts the campaign of Russian prince Igor Svyatoslavich against the invading Polovtsian tribes in 1185...
  
  

Voltaire

Voltaire

François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

, French writer

• Leonard Bernstein
  Leonard Bernstein
  Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
  
  : Candide
  Candide (operetta)
  Candide is an operetta with music composed by Leonard Bernstein, based on the novella of the same name by Voltaire. The operetta was first performed in 1956 with a libretto by Lillian Hellman; but since 1974 it has been generally performed with a book by Hugh Wheeler which is more faithful to...
  
  

W

Konrad von Wallenrode

Konrad von Wallenrode

Konrad von Wallenrode was the 24th Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, serving from 1391 to 1393. Modern sources are friendly towards Konrad, although they claim he was hot-blooded, proud, and had tendencies to be cruel....

, Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights

• Amilcare Ponchielli
  Amilcare Ponchielli
  Amilcare Ponchielli was an Italian composer, largely of operas.-Biography:Born in Paderno Fasolaro, now Paderno Ponchielli, near Cremona, Ponchielli won a scholarship at the age of nine to study music at the Milan Conservatory, writing his first symphony by the time he was ten years old.Two years...
  
  : I Lituani
  I Lituani
  I Lituani is an opera consisting of a prologue and three acts by Amilcare Ponchielli to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on the historical poem Konrad Wallenrod written by Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz...
  
  (the character Walter is impersonating Wallenrode, referred to in the opera as "Corrado Wallenrod")

Albrecht von Wallenstein

Albrecht von Wallenstein

Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius von Wallenstein , actually von Waldstein, was a Bohemian soldier and politician, who offered his services, and an army of 30,000 to 100,000 men during the Danish period of the Thirty Years' War , to the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II...

, Bohemian military commander

• Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith
  Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...
  
  : Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt
  Die Harmonie der Welt is an opera in five acts by Paul Hindemith. The German libretto was by the composer....
  
  

Walther von der Vogelweide

Walther von der Vogelweide

Walther von der Vogelweide is the most celebrated of the Middle High German lyric poets.-Life history:For all his fame, Walther's name is not found in contemporary records, with the exception of a solitary mention in the travelling accounts of Bishop Wolfger of Erla of the Passau diocese:...

, Medieval German poet

• Richard Wagner
  Richard Wagner
  Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
  
  : Tannhäuser
  Tannhäuser (opera)
  Tannhäuser is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg...
  
  

Princess Wanda

Princess Wanda

Princess Wanda was the legendary daughter of Krakus, legendary founder of Kraków. Upon her father's death, she became queen of the Poles, but committed suicide to avoid an unwanted marriage....

, legendary Polish queen

• Antonín Dvořák
  Antonín Dvorák
  Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...
  
  : Vanda
  Vanda (opera)
  Vanda is a grand opera in five acts by Antonín Dvořák. The Czech libretto was written by Václav Beneš-Šumavský and František Zákrejs after a work by Julian Surzycki.-Performance history:...
  
  
• Max Vogrich
  Max Vogrich
  Max Vogrich was an Austrian pianist and composer.Max Vogrich was born in Hermannstadt, Transylvania . A childhood prodigy, he was an acclaimed pianist at the age of 14 years. He studied at Leipzig under Carl Reinecke, Hans Richter, Moritz Hauptmann, Wenzel, and Ignaz Moscheles, completing the...
  
  : Vanda

Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol

Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...

, American artist

• Michael Daugherty
  Michael Daugherty
  Michael Kevin Daugherty is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. Influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and Postmodernism, Daugherty is one of the most colorful and widely performed American concert music composers of his generation...
  
  : Jackie O
  Jackie O (opera)
  Jackie O is a chamber opera in two acts composed by Michael Daugherty to a libretto by Wayne Koestenbaum. The 90 minute work, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 1995 and premiered in 1997, is inspired by American musical and popular culture of the late 1960s and episodes in the life of...
  
  

Daniel Webster

Daniel Webster

Daniel Webster was a leading American statesman and senator from Massachusetts during the period leading up to the Civil War. He first rose to regional prominence through his defense of New England shipping interests...

, American statesman

• Douglas Moore: The Devil and Daniel Webster
• Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson
  Virgil Thomson was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music...
  
  : The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All
  The Mother of Us All is an opera by Virgil Thomson to a libretto by Gertrude Stein. It chronicles the life of Susan B. Anthony, one of the major figures in the fight for women's suffrage in the United States...
  
  

Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands

Wilhelmina of the Netherlands

Wilhelmina was Queen regnant of the Kingdom of the Netherlands from 1890 to 1948. She ruled the Netherlands for fifty-eight years, longer than any other Dutch monarch. Her reign saw World War I and World War II, the economic crisis of 1933, and the decline of the Netherlands as a major colonial...

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down

William the Conqueror (King William I of England)

• Frederic Hymen Cowen
  Frederic Hymen Cowen
  Sir Frederic Hymen Cowen , was a British pianist, conductor and composer.-Early years:Cowen was born Hymen Frederick Cohen at 90 Duke Street, Kingston, Jamaica, the fifth and last child of Frederick Augustus Cohen and Emily Cohen née Davis. His siblings were Elizabeth Rose Cohen ; actress,...
  
  : Harold or the Norman Conquest
  Harold or the Norman Conquest
  Opera in four acts with music by the British composer Frederic H. Cowen with a libretto by Edward Malet, edited by Frederic Edward Weatherly, adapted into the German by L.A. Caumont, and first performed at Covent Garden, London on 8 June 1895.-Act 1.:...
  
  (as William, Duke of Normandy)

William the Silent

William the Silent

William I, Prince of Orange , also widely known as William the Silent , or simply William of Orange , was the main leader of the Dutch revolt against the Spanish that set off the Eighty Years' War and resulted in the formal independence of the United Provinces in 1648. He was born in the House of...

(William I, Prince of Orange)

• Gavin Bryars
  Gavin Bryars
  Richard Gavin Bryars is an English composer and double bassist. He has been active in, or has produced works in, a variety of styles of music, including jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, historicism, experimental music, avant-garde and neoclassicism.-Early life and career:Born in Goole, East...
  
  , Philip Glass
  Philip Glass
  Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
  
   and others: The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down

Robert R. Wilson

Robert R. Wilson

Robert Rathbun Wilson was an American physicist who was a group leader of the Manhattan Project, a sculptor, and an architect of Fermi National Laboratory , where he was also the director from 1967–1978....

, American physicist

• John Adams: Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic
  Doctor Atomic is an opera by the contemporary American composer John Adams, with libretto by Peter Sellars. It premiered at the San Francisco Opera on 1 October 2005. The work focuses on the great stress and anxiety experienced by those at Los Alamos while the test of the first atomic bomb was...
  
  

Władysław I the Elbow-high (aka Ladislaus I), King of Poland 1320-33

• Józef Elsner
  Józef Elsner
  Józef Antoni Franciszek was a composer, music teacher and music theoretician, active mainly in Warsaw...
  
  : Król Łokietek

Wolfram von Eschenbach

Wolfram von Eschenbach

Wolfram von Eschenbach was a German knight and poet, regarded as one of the greatest epic poets of his time. As a Minnesinger, he also wrote lyric poetry.-Life:...

, Medieval German poet

• Richard Wagner
  Richard Wagner
  Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
  
  : Tannhäuser
  Tannhäuser (opera)
  Tannhäuser is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg...
  
  

Thomas Wolsey, English cardinal

• Sir Peter Maxwell Davies
  Peter Maxwell Davies
  Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, CBE is an English composer and conductor and is currently Master of the Queen's Music.-Biography:...
  
  : Taverner
  Taverner (opera)
  Taverner is an opera with music and libretto by Peter Maxwell Davies. It is based on the life of the 16th century English composer John Taverner, but in what Davies himself acknowledged was a non-realistic treatment. The gestation for the opera dated as far back as 1956 during Davies's years in...
  
  (not identified as such)

Catherine "Kitty" (Tobin) Wright (1871–1959), American socialite, social worker, first wife of Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture...

 

Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture...

, American architect

• Daron Hagen
  Daron Hagen
  Daron Aric Hagen , is an American composer, conductor, pianist, educator, librettist, and stage director of contemporary classical music and opera.- Early life and education :...
  
  : Shining Brow
  Shining Brow
  Shining Brow is an English language opera by Daron Hagen, first performed by the Madison Opera in Madison, Wisconsin, April 21, 1993. It is based on events in the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright...
  
  

Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher

Joe the Plumber

Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher , is a conservative activist, author, and commentator. A resident of Holland, Ohio, United States, he gained significant attention during the 2008 U.S. presidential election after he was videotaped questioning then-Democratic candidate Barack Obama about his small...

, aka "Joe the Plumber", American plumber, television celebrity

• Curtis K. Hughes: Say It Ain't So, Joe
  Say it Ain't So, Joe
  Say It Ain't So, Joe is a chamber opera in two acts by Curtis K. Hughes inspired by text drawn from the public record of the 2008 United States vice-presidential debate...
  
  

X

Malcolm X

Malcolm X

Malcolm X , born Malcolm Little and also known as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz , was an African American Muslim minister and human rights activist. To his admirers he was a courageous advocate for the rights of African Americans, a man who indicted white America in the harshest terms for its...

, African-American human rights activist

• Anthony Davis
  Anthony Davis (composer)
  Anthony Davis, better known as Tony Davis , is an American composer, jazz pianist, and student of gamelan music.-Biography:...
  
  : X – The Life and Times of Malcolm X

King Xerxes I "The Great" of Persia

Xerxes I of Persia

Xerxes I of Persia , Ḫšayāršā, ), also known as Xerxes the Great, was the fifth king of kings of the Achaemenid Empire.-Youth and rise to power:...

• Johann Christian Bach
  Johann Christian Bach
  Johann Christian Bach was a composer of the Classical era, the eleventh and youngest son of Johann Sebastian Bach. He is sometimes referred to as 'the London Bach' or 'the English Bach', due to his time spent living in the British capital...
  
  : Temistocle
  Temistocle
  Temistocle is an opera seria in three acts by the German composer Johann Christian Bach. The Italian text is an extensive revision of the libretto by Metastasio, by Mattia Verazi, court poet and private secretary to the Elector Palatine Carl Theodor.The opera was the first of two for the Elector...
  
  
• Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini
  Giovanni Battista Bononcini was an Italian Baroque composer and cellist, one of a family of string players and composers. His father, Giovanni Maria Bononcini , was a violinist and a composer.-Biography:...
  
  : Xerse
  Xerse (Bononcini)
  Xerse is an opera in three acts by Giovanni Battista Bononcini. It was designated as a dramma per musica. The libretto was written by Silvio Stampiglia after that by Nicolò Minato which had been used for the 1654 opera of the same name by Francesco Cavalli...
  
  
• Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli
  Francesco Cavalli was an Italian composer of the early Baroque period. His real name was Pietro Francesco Caletti-Bruni, but he is better known by that of Cavalli, the name of his patron Federico Cavalli, a Venetian nobleman.-Life:Cavalli was born at Crema, Lombardy...
  
  : Xerse
  Xerse
  Xerse is an opera by Francesco Cavalli - specifically, a dramma per musica about Xerxes I. The libretto was written by Nicolò Minato, and was later set by both Giovanni Battista Bononcini and George Frideric Handel. Minato's plot outline is loosely based on Book 7 of Herodotus's Histories...
  
  
• George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel
  George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
  
  : Serse
  Serse
  Serse is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel. It was first performed in London on 15 April 1738. The Italian libretto was adapted by an unknown hand from that by Silvio Stampiglia for an earlier opera of the same name by Giovanni Bononcini in 1694...
  
  
• Hugo Weisgall
  Hugo Weisgall
  Hugo David Weisgall was an American composer and conductor, known chiefly for his opera and vocal music compositions...
  
  : Esther
  Esther (opera)
  Esther is an American opera in 3 acts composed by Hugo Weisgall, with a libretto by Charles Kondek. Esther was premiered by the New York City Opera in October 1993...
  
  

Xiphares

Xiphares

Xiphares was a Pontian Greek prince, who was the son King Mithridates VI of Pontus from his concubine and later wife, Stratonice of Pontus. His mother turned over the stronghold of Mithridates at Coenum that had been entrusted to her protection to the Roman forces under Pompey. In revenge,...

, son of Mithridates VI of Pontus

Mithridates VI of Pontus

Mithridates VI or Mithradates VI Mithradates , from Old Persian Mithradatha, "gift of Mithra"; 134 BC – 63 BC, also known as Mithradates the Great and Eupator Dionysius, was king of Pontus and Armenia Minor in northern Anatolia from about 120 BC to 63 BC...

• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
  
  : Mitridate, re di Ponto
  Mitridate, re di Ponto
  Mitridate, re di Ponto , K. 87 , is an early opera seria in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The libretto is by Vittorio Amadeo Cigna-Santi after Giuseppe Parini's Italian translation of Jean Racine....
  
  

Y

Yaghi-Siyan

Yaghi-Siyan

Yaghi-Siyan was the governor of Antioch during the First Crusade.He was a Turkic slave of the Seljuk sultan Malik Shah I, who had captured Antioch in 1085 and appointed Yaghi-Siyan governor around 1090. Malik Shah died in 1092, and his successor Tutush I granted Yaghi-Siyan more territory around...

, Governor of Antioch

• Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Verdi
  Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
  
  : I Lombardi alla prima crociata
  I Lombardi alla prima crociata
  I Lombardi alla prima crociata is an operatic dramma lirico in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera, based on an epic poem by Tommaso Grossi. Its first performance was given at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan on 11 February 1843...
  
  (as Acciano)

Ōtomo no Yakamochi

Otomo no Yakamochi

was a Japanese statesman and waka poet in the Nara period. He is a member of the . He was born into the prestigious Ōtomo clan; his grandfather was Ōtomo no Amaro and his father was Ōtomo no Tabito. Ōtomo no Kakimochi was his younger brother, and Ōtomo no Sakanoe no Iratsume his aunt...

, Japanese poet, diplomat

• Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Korndorf
  Nikolai Sergeevich Korndorf was a Russian and Canadian composer and conductor. He was prolific both in Moscow, Russia and in Vancouver, Canada.-Biography:...
  
  : MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR (Marina and Rainer)
  MR is a chamber opera in one act by the Russian composer Nikolai Korndorf . The libretto by Yuri Lourié is in Russian, German, Ancient Greek and Japanese)...
  
  

Yaroslav I the Wise

Yaroslav I the Wise

Yaroslav I, Grand Prince of Rus, known as Yaroslav the Wise Yaroslav I, Grand Prince of Rus, known as Yaroslav the Wise Yaroslav I, Grand Prince of Rus, known as Yaroslav the Wise (Old Norse: Jarizleifr; ; Old East Slavic and Russian: Ярослав Мудрый; Ukrainian: Ярослав Мудрий; c...

, Grand Prince of Kiev

• Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Maiboroda
  Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or Heorhy Maiboroda or Mayboroda Heorhiy Ilarionovych Maiboroda, sometimes transcribed in English as Georgiy or...
  
  : Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy
  Yaroslav Mudriy is an opera in eight scenes, comprised in three acts, by the Ukrainian composer Heorhiy Maiboroda, written in 1973 and premiered in 1975...
  
  

Aleksey Petrovich Yermolov

Aleksey Petrovich Yermolov

Aleksey Petrovich Yermolov , or Ermolov , was a Russian Imperial general of the 19th century who commanded Russian troops in the Caucasus War.-Early life:...

, Russian general

• Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Prokofiev
  Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
  
  : War and Peace
  War and Peace (Prokofiev)
  War and Peace is an opera in two parts , sometimes arranged as five acts, by Sergei Prokofiev to a Russian libretto by the composer and Mira Mendelson, based on the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy...
  
  

Yuri II, Grand Prince of Vladimir

• Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
  Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five.The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie, refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César...
  
  : The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevroniya
  The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevroniya
  The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevroniya is an opera in four acts by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. The libretto was written by Vladimir Belsky, and is based on a combination of two Russian legends: that of St. Fevroniya of Murom, and the city of Kitezh, which became invisible...
  
  

Z

Zenobia

Zenobia

Zenobia was a 3rd-century Queen of the Palmyrene Empire in Roman Syria. She led a famous revolt against the Roman Empire. The second wife of King Septimius Odaenathus, Zenobia became queen of the Palmyrene Empire following Odaenathus' death in 267...

, Queen of the Palmyrene Empire

• Gioachino Rossini: Aureliano in Palmira
  Aureliano in Palmira
  Aureliano in Palmira is an operatic dramma serio in two acts written by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto in which the librettist was credited only by the initials "G. F. R." The libretto has generally been attributed to Giuseppe Felice Romani, but sometimes to the otherwise...
  
  

Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai was the first Premier of the People's Republic of China, serving from October 1949 until his death in January 1976...

, Chinese political leader

• John Adams: Nixon in China
  Nixon in China (opera)
  Nixon in China is an opera in three acts by John Adams, with a libretto by Alice Goodman. Adams' first opera, it was inspired by the 1972 visit to China by US President Richard Nixon. The work premiered at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987, in a production by Peter Sellars with...
  
  (as Chou En-lai)

Zoroaster

Zoroaster

Zoroaster , also known as Zarathustra , was a prophet and the founder of Zoroastrianism who was either born in North Western or Eastern Iran. He is credited with the authorship of the Yasna Haptanghaiti as well as the Gathas, hymns which are at the liturgical core of Zoroastrianism...

• Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau
  Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...
  
  : Zoroastre
  Zoroastre
  Zoroastre is an opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau, first performed on 5 December 1749 at the Opéra in Paris. The libretto is by Louis de Cahusac. Zoroastre was the fourth of Rameau's tragédies en musique to be staged and the last to appear during the composer's own lifetime...
  
  

Venerable Zosimas of Palestine

Zosimas of Palestine

Venerable Zosimas of Palestine, also called Zosima, is commemorated as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox and Byzantine Catholic Churches on April 4....

• Ottorino Respighi
  Ottorino Respighi
  Ottorino Respighi was an Italian composer, musicologist and conductor. He is best known for his orchestral "Roman trilogy": Fountains of Rome ; Pines of Rome ; and Roman Festivals...
  
  : Maria egiziaca
  Maria egiziaca
  Maria egiziaca is an opera "in three episodes" by the Italian composer Ottorino Respighi. The libretto, by Claudio Guastallo, is based on a Medieval life of Saint Mary of Egypt by Domenico Cavalca. The work was originally intended as a concert piece although it has been fully staged in some revivals...
  
  (as Abbot Zosimus)

Nikola Šubić Zrinski: see under Šubić Zrinski

Further reading

• Jellinek, George, History Through the Opera Glass: From the rise of Caesar to the fall of Napoleon, Pro/Am Music Resources, 1994. ISBN 0912483903
• Morgan, Christopher, Don Carlos and Company: The true stories behind eight well-loved operas, Oxford University Press, 1996. ISBN 0192880098
• Heller, Wendy, "Tacitus Incognito: Opera as History in L'incoronazione di Poppea", Journal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 52, No. 1 (Spring, 1999), pp. 39–96