Jacopo Peri

Jacopo Peri (1561–1633) was an Italian composer and singer whose experiments with sung drama helped establish opera. His surviving works include Euridice, the earliest opera to survive complete.

Florentine Camerata: A circle of Florentine humanists, musicians, and intellectuals active in the late sixteenth century. Its members’ discussions of ancient Greek drama shaped the musical experiments Peri joined.
Dafne (Peri opera): An opera by Jacopo Peri, first performed in Florence around 1598, whose music largely survives only in fragments. This lost-in-large-part work is commonly regarded as the earliest opera.
Ottavio Rinuccini: An Italian poet and librettist whose works include the librettos for Dafne and Euridice. His poetry gave Peri the dramatic texts that guided the new recitative style.
Florentine opera: The early operatic tradition that developed in Florence around the turn of the seventeenth century. Peri’s work belongs to the first experiments that formed this local tradition.
Monody: A style of solo song supported by instrumental bass, developed in Italy around 1600. Its expressive solo voice gave Peri a way to make dramatic words intelligible.
Euridice (Peri opera): An opera by Jacopo Peri, first performed in Florence in 1600, with a libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini. Its complete surviving score makes Peri’s early operatic style directly examinable.
Giulio Caccini: An Italian composer and singer who helped develop monody and early opera in Florence. His rival Euridice setting and competing musical ideals illuminate Peri’s innovations.
House of Medici: A Florentine dynasty that ruled Tuscany and became a major patron of European arts and politics. Medici court patronage provided the setting and resources for Peri’s theatrical work.
Basso continuo: A notated bass line realized with chords by one or more accompanying instruments. Continuo accompaniment underpins the speech-like singing in Peri’s early operas.
Il Rapimento di Cefalo: A court entertainment with music by Giulio Caccini and Jacopo Peri, performed in Florence in 1600. Peri contributed to this large-scale spectacle for the wedding celebrations that also featured Euridice.

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