This lecture focuses on opera and the operatic voice, from the Romantic period to the present. Professor Wright integrates a discussion of one of the most often-performed and famous operas in the Western canon, Verdi's La Traviata, with a discussion of vocal performance practice. For the latter, he uses recordings of singers from the early to late twentieth century as examples of different types of voices and the ways in which aesthetic values about the voice have changed throughout the past hundred years. 00:00 - Chapter 1. Introduction to Opera 05:08 - Chapter 2. Verdi's La Traviata: The First Aria 19:36 - Chapter 3. The Scena in Opera 26:59 - Chapter 4. Critical Assessment of Vocal Performance 33:06 - Chapter 5. Major Opera Singers of the 20th and 21st Centuries

1. Introduction
2. Introduction to Instruments and Musical Genres
3. Rhythm: Fundamentals
4. Rhythm: Jazz, Pop and Classical
5. Melody: Notes, Scales, Nuts and Bolts
6. Melody: Mozart and Wagner
7. Harmony: Chords and How to Build Them
8. Bass Patterns: Blues and Rock
9. Sonata-Allegro Form: Mozart and Beethoven
10. Sonata-Allegro and Theme and Variations
11. Form: Rondo, Sonata-Allegro and Theme and Variations (cont.)
12. Guest Conductor: Saybrook Orchestra
13. Fugue: Bach, Bizet and Bernstein
14. Ostinato Form in the Music of Purcell, Pachelbel, Elton John and Vitamin C
15. Gregorian Chant and Music in the Sistine Chapel
16. Baroque Music: The Vocal Music of Johann Sebastian Bach
17. Mozart and His Operas
18. Piano Music of Mozart and Beethoven
19. Romantic Opera: Verdi's La Traviata, Bocelli, Pavarotti and Domingo
20. The Colossal Symphony: Beethoven, Berlioz, Mahler and Shostakovich
21. Musical Impressionism and Exoticism: Debussy, Ravel and Monet
22. Modernism and Mahler
23. Review of Musical Style

This course fosters the development of aural skills that lead to an understanding of Western music. The musical novice is introduced to the ways in which music is put together and is taught how to listen to a wide variety of musical styles, from Bach and Mozart, to Gregorian chant, to the blues.