# List your favorite operas by composer's birth nationality.



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

No arbitrary limit of 5 favorites per nationality. Just what ever number of operas suits you for each composer nationality. If you don't want to make a huge list, just put your very favorites. Here is my list (think I got Gluck in the right place):

ITALIAN
Donizetti's Maria Stuarda, La Fille du Régiment, L'elisir d'amore
Rossini's Barber of Seville
Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi, La Sonnambula
Mascagni's L'amico Fritz
Paisiello's Nina o sia La pazza per amore
Puccini's Tosca
Pergolesi's La Serva Padrona
Monteverdi's L'orfeo and Ulisse
Cimarosa's Il Matrimonio Segreto

GERMAN
Wagner's Ring, Parsifal, Lohengrin, Hollander
Flotow's Martha
Beethoven's Fidelio
Gluck's Orphee and Eurydice

ENGLISH
Handel's Giulio Cesare, Ariodante

FRENCH:
Saint-Saëns' Henry the Eighth
Auber's Dinorah, Haydee ou Le Secret

RUSSIAN:
Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov
Prokofiev's Betrothal in a Monastery

POLISH:
Stanislaw Moniuszko's Straszny Dwor (Haunted Manor)


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

*Italy:*
Monteverdi - Orfeo
Verdi - Aida
Verdi - La Traviata
Puccini - Madama Butterfly
Puccini - Turandot
Donizetti - Lucia di Lammermoor
Bellini - La sonnambula

*Austria:*
Mozart - Don Giovanni
Mozart - Die Zauberflöte
Mozart - Le nozze di Figaro

*Germany:*
Handel - Giulio Cesare (I'm not sure if this should go under England or Germany...)
Beethoven - Fidelio
Wagner - Tristan und Isolde
Wagner - Parsifal
Wagner - Ring Cycle
Strauss - Der Rosenkavalier

*France:*
Rameau: Les indes galantes
Saint-Saëns - Samson et Dalila
Delibes - Lakmé 
Bizet - Carmen
Massenet - Thaïs 
Debussy - Pelléas et Mélisande
Ravel - L'enfant et les sortilèges

*Czech Republic:*
Dvořák - Rusalka
Smetana - The Bartered Bride
Janáček - Jenůfa

*Russia:*
Borodin - Prince Igor
Tchaikovsky - Eugene Onegin
Mussorgsky - Boris Gudonov
Rimsky-Korsakov - The Snow Maiden
Glinka - A Life for the Tsar

*Hungary:*
Bartók: Bluebeard's Castle

*America:*
Copland: The Tender Land


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

Florestan said:


> I am thinking categories such as composer's nationality. No arbitrary limit of 5 favorites per nationality. Just what ever number of operas suits you. If you don't want to make a huge list, just put your very favorites. Here is my list (think I got Gluck in the right place):
> 
> ITALIAN
> Donizetti's Maria Stuarda, La Fille du Régiment, L'elisir d'amore
> ...


I wasn't sure where to classify Giulio Cesare in my list, because Handel was born in Germany, but he wrote it during his long career in England. I see that you put it in the English category, but I decided to go with Germany because your OP refers to birth nationality.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Bettina said:


> I wasn't sure where to classify Giulio Cesare in my list, because Handel was born in Germany, but he wrote it during his long career in England. I see that you put it in the English category, but I decided to go with Germany because your OP refers to birth nationality.


No matter. Guess it does not have to be birth nationality. Just was easier for me to google up where they were born than to read a lot of history to see where they lived during their musical career.

Looking at your list reminded me of a French opera I needed to add: Saint-Saëns' Henry the Eighth.

I just added a few more besides that.


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

Florestan said:


> No arbitrary limit of 5 favorites per nationality. Just what ever number of operas suits you for each composer nationality. If you don't want to make a huge list, just put your very favorites. Here is my list (think I got Gluck in the right place):
> 
> ITALIAN
> Donizetti's Maria Stuarda, La Fille du Régiment, L'elisir d'amore
> ...


Good list - and nice to see _Straszny dwór_ listed!

Auber's _Dinorah_?


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

GERMAN / AUSTRIAN
Gluck : Iphigénie en Tauride
Mozart : Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte 
Beethoven : Fidelio
Weber: Der Freischütz
Meyerbeer : Les Huguenots, Le Prophète, Dinorah, Vasco da Gama
Offenbach : Ba-ta-clan, La belle Hélène, La vie parisienne, Les brigands, La Périchole, Les contes d’Hoffmann, Christopher Columbus (pastiche)
Lortzing : Zar und Zimmermann
Wagner : Lohengrin
Strauss : Salome, Der Rosenkavalier, Friedenstag, Die schweigsame Frau, Daphne

FRENCH
Berlioz : Benvenuto Cellini, La damnation de Faust, Les troyens
Boieldieu : La dame blanche
Halévy : La juive
Gounod : Faust
Bizet: Carmen
Massenet : Amadis, Ariane, Cendrillon, Don Quichotte, Esclarmonde, Grisélidis, Roma, Thaïs

ITALIAN
Rossini : L’italiana in Algeri, La Cenerentola, Mosè in Egitto, Semiramide, Guillaume Tell
Donizetti: Lucrezia Borgia, La favorite
Bellini : I puritani
Verdi : I due Foscari, Macbeth, Un ballo in maschera, Don Carlos, Aida, Otello
Puccini : Gianni Schicchi, Turandot

RUSSIAN
Glinka : A Life for the Tsar
Mussorgsky: Boris Godunov
Borodin : Prince Igor
Rimsky-Korsakov : Sadko, Kashchey the Deathless

POLISH
Moniuszko : Straszny dwór

BRITISH
Gilbert & Sullivan: The Pirates of Penzance, Patience, Princess Ida, The Mikado, The Grand Duke

AMERICAN
Glass: Akhnaten
(If Sondheim is performed in opera houses, can we list him?)

Omissions: There are some great operas that I haven't heard for a decade.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Italian: Boito: Mefistofele 
Verdion Carlo/Otello/La Traviata/Simon Boccanegra/Un Ballo in Maschera/Rigoletto/Il trovatore/La forza del destino
Puccini: Madama Butterfly/Tosca/La Boheme/Turandot/La Fanciulla del West/Manon Lescaut
Bellini: Norma/Lucia di Lammermoor
Giordano: Andrea Chenier
Cilea: Adriana Lecouvreur
Mozart: Don Giovanni

French:Gounod: Romeo et Juliette/Faust
Poulenc: Dialogues des Carmelites
Bizet: Carmen
Massenet: Manon
Halevy: La Juive

Russian: Tchaikovsky: Eugene Onegin
Mussorgsky: Boris Godunov

English: Menotti:The Consul/The Saint of Bleecker Street
Barber: Vanessa
Handel: Giulio Cesare
Britten: Peter Grimes

German: Wagner: Parsifal/Gotterdammerung
R. Strauss: Salome
Berg: Wozzeck

Czech: Janacek: Jenufa/Katya Kabanova


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

*Germany/Austria*
Parsifal
Tristan und Isolde
Der Ring des Nibelungen
Die Meistersinger
Lohengrin
Dr Fliegende Hollander
Der Freischutz
Fidelio
Die Zauberflote
Die Frau ohne Schatten

*Italy*
Otello 
Falstaff
Norma
La Fanciulla del West

*France*
Les Troyens
Pelleas et Melisande

*Russia*
Boris Godunov
Pique Dame
Eugene Onegin

*"Bohemia"* 
Rusalka

*Romania*
Oedipe

*Hungary*
Bluebeard's Castle

*England*
Peter Grimes
Savitri

*America*
The Tender Land


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Mozart was Viennese who wrote in Italian operas. So the three daPonte operas would be my favourite, along with Zauberflote.

For Italian operas there is Rigoletto, Otello, Don Carlos (but is it French?), and Falstaff. Also Cenerentola And Boheme.

In German Fidelio ranks high.

But what about Handel? A German Englishman who wrote in Italian. Julius Caesar and Rinaldo?


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