The German opera reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

German opera

Mozart's German singspiel The Magic Flute (1791) stands at the head of a German opera tradition that was developed in the 19th century by Beethoven, Weber, Heinrich Marschner and Wagner.

Wagner pioneered a through-composed style, in which recitative and aria blend into one another and are constantly accompanied by the orchestra. Wagner also made copious use of the leitmotif (Weber had used a similar device earlier), a musical device which associates a musical line with each character or idea in the story.

This article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

This is the "German opera" reference article from the English Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. See also our Disclaimer.