Word: torquato
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...opera put to music by that surprising genius, with the greatest of perfection, in only two weeks." The genius was George Frideric Handel, then 26. The opera was Rinaldo, conceived, composed and staged for London's Haymarket Theater in 1711. Based on an epic about the Crusades by Torquato Tasso, the opera tells the story of the Christian general Rinaldo and the Saracen queen Armida. It is a spectacular mixture of pagan magic, military pomp, vocal fireworks and other trappings of the Italian Baroque operatic style, then the rage in London. During the "Bird Song" of Almirena, Rinaldo...