Shakespeare Inspired Operas
Shakespeare’s themes and stories have inspired numerous operas over the years. Here’s our list of operas that have used Shakespeare as inspiration:
The Tempest
The Tempest by Felice Lattuada (1922)
The Knot Garden by Michael Tippett (1970)
Un Re In Ascolto by Luciano Berio’s [A Listening King] (1984)
The Tempest by John C Eaton (1985)
The Enchanted Isle by Thomas Shadwell (1674)
Romeo and Juliet
Roméo et Juliette by Charles Gounod (1867)
A Village Romeo and Juliet by Frederick Delius (1901),
West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein (1957)
I Capuleti e i Montecchi by Vincenzo Bellini (1830).
Giulietta e Romeo by Nicola Vaccai (1825)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Benjamin Britten (1960)
The Fairy Queen by Henry Purcell (1692).
Macbeth
Macbeth by Giuseppe Verdi (1847)
Macbeth by Ernest Bloch (1910)
Hamlet
Hamlet by Ambroise Thomas (1868)
Othello
Otello by Giuseppe Verdi (1887)
Otello by Giulio Rossini (1816)
Much Ado About Nothing
Béatrice et Bénédict by Hector Berlioz (1862)
Timon of Athens
Timon of Athens by Stephen Oliver (1991)
The Taming of the Shrew
Kiss Me Kate by Cole Porter (1953)
Operas based on the character of Falstaff
At the Boar’s Head by Gustav Holst (1925)
Der Kustigen Weiber von Windsor by Otto Nicolai (1849)
Sir John in Love by Ralph Vaughan Williams (1929)
Falstaff by Giuseppe Verdi (1893)
See some Shakespeare inspired novel titles >>
5 Responses to Shakespeare Inspired Operas
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB07C6F71D7F37CD6&feature=view_all
Do please update your list of operas inspired by The Tempest to include Thomas Ades’s Inspired The Tempest, 2004, to be simulcast from the Met Live in HD series on November 10, 2012.
You need to add the Dublin born composer Michael W. Balfe’s opera Falstaff (1838) to your list.
It had its premiere at the Italian Opera in London in July 1838 with great success. Four of the most famous singers in Europe at the time sang in it. We also produced a revival of Balfe’s Falstaff in concert format with an international cast in Dublin in September 2008 for the composer’s bicentennial. The opera was also recorded and is available through Amazon.com worrld wide. Thanks.
Basil Walsh/Author/Florida
Michael W. Balfe: A Unique Victorian Composer (2008)
There is also an opera called ”Lear” , composed by Aribert Reimann and premiered on 1978
Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi was based on the same Renaissance sources from which Shakespeare based Romeo and Juliet but not from Shakespeare directly. It’s often included in such lists, but really, it shouldn’t count as one of the Shakespeare ‘inspired’ works.