Famous opera masterpieces | Featuring many great opera singers
Opera is fairly familiar in Japan, even being included in school textbooks.
Still, many people may recognize the melodies without knowing much about the famous opera pieces themselves.
For those readers, we’ve selected a number of renowned opera masterpieces.
In addition to introducing the works, we explain them from various angles—the background of their creation, the appeal of the opera singers performing them, and more—so both regular opera listeners and those less familiar with opera can enjoy the content.
Please take your time and enjoy it to the very end.
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Famous Opera Masterpieces | Featuring Many Great Opera Singers (81–90)
Comedy The Mastersingers of Nuremberg (by Wagner)Bairoito Shukusai Kangen Gakudan

Because many pieces in The Mastersingers of Nuremberg use the diatonic scale, the musical structure is clear and bright.
The performance lasts about four and a half hours, unfolding as a grand and delightful drama.
It premiered at the Munich Court Opera in June 1868.
Opera Rinaldo (by Handel)Fenīche Gekijō Kangen Gakudan

Woven with the architectural beauty of a sublime symphony, this opera tells a love story between the knight Rinaldo and Almirena, the daughter of the Crusaders’ commander-in-chief Goffredo.
The aria sung in the opera, “Lascia ch’io pianga” (“Let Me Weep”), is so beautiful it could be called music of the heavens.
It premiered in February 1711 at the Queen’s Theatre in the Haymarket, London.
Tosca (by Puccini)Berurin Firuhāmonī Kangen Gakudan

The opera Tosca features many scenes where the orchestral music is beautifully rendered, and it remains a dramatic, captivating work that never grows tiresome, including famous arias such as Recondita armonia, Vissi d’arte, vissi d’amore, and E lucevan le stelle.
It premiered in January 1900 at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome.
The Bourgeois Nobleman (composed by Jean-Baptiste Lully)Mujika Furōrea

The comic opera-ballet The Bourgeois Gentleman is a work that delightfully sings and performs the story of the comical charm of Jourdain, a fabulously wealthy townsman who has succeeded as a merchant and longs to imitate the nobility, along with the love stories surrounding him and his family.
Its premiere was given by Molière’s troupe at the court of Louis XIV in the Château de Chambord in October 1670.
Comic opera The Merry Wives of Windsor (by Otto Nicolai)Yōroppa Shitsunai Kangengakudan

William Shakespeare’s comedy The Merry Wives of Windsor features an engaging, well-developed story, and the opera based on it by Otto Nicolai is renowned for its beautiful, graceful, and lively melodies.
It premiered on March 9, 1849, at the Royal Opera House in Berlin.
On a sunny dayRichia Arubanēze: Uta

This is an aria from the opera Madama Butterfly.
Although her husband, Pinkerton—an American naval officer—has returned to his homeland and married his lawful wife, without knowing this, Madame Butterfly remains in Nagasaki, steadfastly and proudly singing of her unwavering belief that he will come back to her.
Tears unseen by anyoneRuiji Aruva: uta

It’s a song from the opera “L’elisir d’amore,” in which the peasant Nemorino sings after seeing the tears of the woman he loves, Adina.
Adina’s tears come from realizing Nemorino’s purity, regretting her own aloofness up to now, and resolving to win back his heart—which has grown distant—by taking a distant attitude toward him herself.
Witnessing this, Nemorino recognizes her true feelings, making it a romantic aria.
Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District (by Shostakovich)Roiyaru Konserutohebou Kangen Gakudan

Katerina, who married into the wealthy Izmailov family, lived in despair amid a loveless husband and a spiteful father-in-law, spending her days in sorrow.
Then Sergei began working as a new hired hand, and he and Katerina became lovers, setting her on a gradual path to tragedy.
It’s a distinctive work that draws you deeper and deeper into the world of the opera.
Opera Fidelio by BeethovenRōma Kagekijō Kangen Gakudan

The only opera Beethoven completed is Fidelio, whose musical ideas are beautifully interwoven with form and rules.
For opera singers, it is difficult to perform and requires advanced technique, so it is said that those who master the role with their vocal ability are assured of praise and success.
Opera: The Rescue of Ruggiero (by Francesca Caccini)Vuwadisuwafu Kuwoshievichi

Composed during the Baroque period, Francesca Caccini’s The Liberation of Ruggiero is regarded as the first opera written by a woman.
The work was also performed in Warsaw in 1628, making it a landmark as one of the first Italian operas to be staged abroad.


