FRANCESCO ALGAROTTI: AN ESSAY ON THE OPERA (Saggio sopra l'opera in musica) The editions of 1755 and 1763

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This book is the first translation into the English language of a comprehensive study of opera and its constituent parts by an accomplished writer of the eighteenth century. Francesco Algarotti was concerned with developing opera as drama and a move away from the elaborate formality of the Baroque to a more naturalistic style. The Essay in its original Italian had considerable influence on the reform opera of Christoph Willibald Gluck.