Two years later, a royal wedding was announced: that of Maria de' Medici of Florence and Henri IV of France. As part of the festivities, Peri's second opera, 'Euridice', was premièred, but it was not a success as the subject was not thought suitable for the wedding feast.

Monteverdi (1567–1643)
However, at the wedding there were two guests from Mantua who went away dreaming of commissioning their own opera. Working in Mantua at that time was the greatest composer of his age: Claudio Monteverdi. Opera was now to take a great leap forward. His 1607 prototype, 'Orfeo' was opera's big bang.

The story
Orfeo and Euridice have just got married and are very happy, but Euridice is soon to die and Orfeo resolves to go to Hades (the underworld) to get her back. He is allowed into Hades because of his powers as a singer. The King of the Underworld finally agrees to let Orfeo take his wife home providing he does not look back at her as he leaves. Sadly, he cannot resist doing so. In the fifth and final act of the opera, Orfeo laments broken-heartedly. Apollo, his father descends from heaven and tells his son that he will become immortal and when he is amongst the stars, will be able to see his beloved Euridice again.

Monteverdi insisted that this was a 'drama through music'. One of his breakthroughs was to find a way of moving the story on at high speed through a style called recitative. This is a style of vocal music where the composer tries to imitate the natural rhythms of speech. A song would not always be suitable and take too long, so rather than the more mundane moments of the opera being spoken (as they are now in musicals) this gave opera stylistic unity and cohesion. Also, it is easier to sing thoughts and ideas that are sensitive and difficult to speak.

'Orfeo' is really a humanist manifesto. Its premise is that music, arts and learning can have a positive and civilising effect on humanity: that by creating beauty, mankind could catch a glimpse of divine perfection.

Monteverdi soon moved to Venice where thousands of people flocked to see his operas and by the time he died, there were 19 opera houses in the city.

Opera and politics
Mozart (1756–1791)
In 1784, shortly before the French Revolution, a play by Pierre Augustin Beaumarchais called 'Le Mariage de Figaro' was premièred in Paris. It was immediately banned by monarchs and aristocrats all over Europe because of its revolutionary content. It shows how the employees of the rich and famous were treated like slaves but in this play, they eventually outwit and humiliate their master. Emperor Joseph II was shocked to learn that one of his court composers, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, was writing an opera based on this play. However, he loved opera so much, he let it go ahead. Mozart, by deliberately setting this play to music, was entering a political arena. Like Monteverdi before him, he realised that music drama could be the vehicle for a powerful message.

The story
Count Almaviva is trying to use his position to seduce his wife's maid and close confidante, Susanna. She is about to be married to the count's valet, Figaro, the popular barber of Seville, but he had previously promised to marry somebody else. The opera is full of disguises and intrigues. In the end, all is resolved and the count asks forgiveness.

Beethoven (1770–1827)
Beethoven's only opera, 'Fidelio', was written in 1806. It is set in a prison and the allusion to revolutionary Paris is clear. The theme is liberation and deliverance. It ends with a patriotic hymn to freedom and has ever since been associated with the overthrow of tyranny.

The story
The Spanish nobleman, Florestan, having incurred the wrath of Pizarro is secretly hidden in the prison of which Pizarro is the governor. Pizarro has told everyone that Florestan is dead, but the nobleman's devoted wife, Leonora, does not believe it, and disguising herself as a boy, Fidelio, she gets a job in the prison in order to free him.

One opera even sparked a revolution. In 1830, 'La Muette de Portici' by Daniel Auber was being staged at the Théâtre de la Monnaie in Bruxelles. At the end of a stirring, patriotic duet called 'L'Amour sacré de la Patrie', the audience ran out of the theatre to confront their Dutch oppressors. This resulted in the creation of a new nation: Belgium.

Verdi (1813–1901)
In Italy, Giuseppe Verdi turned grand opera into nationalist propaganda. Operas such as 'Nabucco', 'Simon Boccanegra' and 'Don Carlos' had plots that were thinly disguised allegories of the current political situation. The Italians felt that opera could give them a sense of identity. Opera had the ability to stir up nationalist pride.

Wagner (1813–1883)
This was also relevant for the operas of Richard Wagner. He used his operas to reinvent Teutonic culture, myth and legend. Fifty years later, his operas were used by the Nazis to promote their Aryan theories.

The changing face of opera
In France, Jacques Offenbach's operettas were reaching a huge new audience and in England, these were mirrored by the tuneful and witty operettas of Gilbert and Sullivan. These gave rise to the modern musical, which today enjoys universal success.

It could be said that the musical has superseded opera, but Howard Goodall disagrees. Opera is the parent of the musical and the two coexist side by side. Opera is enjoying great success now with the huge spectacles being put on at the Royal Albert Hall in London, which attract up to 80,000 spectators during a two-week run.

Contemporary composers are still writing music drama with a message.

Adams (1948– )
Perhaps the greatest living classical composer is the American John Adams whose opera 'Nixon in China', written in 1987, is one of the masterpieces of the late twentieth century. Composed in the minimalist style, the opera was written to commemorate President Richard Nixon's historic six-day visit to China between 21 and 27 February 1972.

The story
President Nixon arrives at Peking (Beijing) Airport. Premier Chou En-lai is there to meet him. An hour later he is with Chairman Mao. This is followed by a banquet during which President Nixon toasts the Chinese people and declares his hope for peace. The following day, Mrs Nixon is taken on a tour of important sites and later she and her husband attend a revolutionary ballet devised by Mao's wife. The opera ends during their last evening in Peking.

Howard Goodall ends by saying that the complex and sophisticated beauty of opera is an antidote to the crudeness and glibness of so much of the rest of our culture.