When Marie Antoinette was the Dauphine of France she took one of her rare determined stands on behalf of Composer Christoph Willibald Gluck. Gluck had been her singing master in Vienna and when he wanted to produce a new opera in Paris she saw that he had his way. Last week, when it was 163 years old, Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide was given its U.S. première by the Philadelphia Orchestra in Philadelphia.*
For all its age, the music impressed Philadelphians as being astoundingly fresh and vital. Gluck borrowed his characters from Euripides but he gave...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In