!!!Operette

Operetta: In Austria, the genre operetta developed mainly out of the 
Singspiel - eighteenth-century comic opera with dialogue instead of 
recitative - and traditional, popular Viennese plays interspersed with 
musical numbers, but it was also influenced by grand  Opera. The 
popularity of French theatre in the second half of the eighteenth 
century also accounted for important precursors, such as the opera 
comique and vaudeville. Viennese operetta is marked by the frequent 
use of dance rhythms (waltz, polka, march, etc.). The term 
"operetta" was coined by the publishers of the works, most 
contemporary composers referring to the genre as "comic 
opera".

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The deciding impetus for the emergence of Viennese operetta came from 
France. The works of Jacques Offenbach, performed in the 1850s in 
Vienna at the  Carltheater, made this new type of musical theatre 
popular. The actual birth of Viennese operetta is considered to have 
been the performance of F. v.  Suppe´s "Das 
Pensionat" (24 November 1860) at the same theatre. Patterned 
after Offenbach´s opera bouffe, Viennese operetta soon developed 
its own characteristic local colour. After F. v. Suppe, whose 
works dominated the 1860s, the "golden age of operetta" 
dawned with "Indigo and the Forty Thieves, or A Thousand and One 
Nights" (often referred to simply as "Indigo") by  
Strauss, Johann the Younger in 1871. In addition to Johann Strauss the 
Younger and Karl  Milloecker, further representatives of the 
"golden age of operetta" were C.  Zeller, R.  Heuberger Sr., 
A.  Czibulka, A. Mueller Sr. and Jr., C. M.  Ziehrer, and the 
librettist R.  Genee. The Carltheater remained the most important 
theatre for operetta, while the  Theater an der Wien, the  Ringtheater 
(Wiener Operettentheater), and the Johann-Strauss-Theater were also 
important venues where famous luminaries of the operetta world such as 
A.  Girardi, K.  Blasel, J.  Matras, W. Knaack, K.  Treumann and 
C. A. Friese, the singers A. Grobecker, J.  Gallmeyer, A. Kraft, 
and v. a. M.  Geistinger gave celebrated performances. The turn 
of the century marks the onset of the second era of operetta, known as 
the "silver age of operetta", beginning with H.  Reinhardt's 
"Das suesse Maedel" (1901). Typical works of this period 
include F.  Lehár´s "The Merry Widow" 
("Die lustige Witwe"), "A Waltz Dream" ("Ein 
Walzertraum") by O.  Straus or L.  Fall´s 
"Dollarprinzessin"; other representatives are O.  Nedbal, R. 
 Benatzky, E.  Eysler and E.  Kálmán. Characteristic of 
this period are, on the one hand, a tendency to use folklore (e.g. 
gypsy music, Chinese and Russian musical elements), and, on the other 
hand, the incorporation of popular music of the time (jazz, popular 
dances, etc.). The storylines increasingly move away from genre 
portrayal (landed gentry, the upper classes, rural milieu) towards 
more "up-to date" musical theatre and revue; particularly in 
the works of N.  Dostal and R.  Stolz; Another representative of this 
late form is E.  Kálmán. In the twentieth century, the 
modern  Musical developed out of operetta and other musical trends.

!Literature
O. Schneidereit, Operette von Abraham bis Ziehrer, 1966; 
A. Bauer, Oper und Operette in Wien, 1955; A. Witeschnik, Dort wird 
champagnisiert, 1980; D. Zoechling, Operette, 1985; V. Klotz, 
Operette, 1992; A. Lamb, Light Music from Austria, 1992.


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