American Opera Company

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The American Opera Company was a short-lived opera company founded in New York City in February, 1886.[1] It was the brain-child of Jeannette Meyers Thurber who had just founded the National Conservatory of Music of America a few months earlier. The American Opera Company was under the musical direction of Theodore Thomas. It rented the premises of the Academy of Music in New York City for local performances during 1886. It also toured, playing in April, May and June of 1886 in, among other cities, Boston, Indianapolis, Philadelphia and St. Louis. The repertoire included Verdi’s Aida, Wagner’s Lohengrin, and Gounod’s Faust. In August, the company announced an ambitious plan to travel to Paris, a trip that never came about.[2]

A succinct statement of Thurber’s vision for the American Opera Company appeared in August, 1886, when she was cited as “... [recognizing] the fact that the true conception of a national opera is opera sung in a nation’s language and, as far as practicable, the work of a nation’s composers, [and that she hoped]…in time to develop and patronize American composers.”[3]

Financial difficulties led to a reorganization and name change to the “National Opera Company” in December of 1887[4] and, ultimately, bankruptcy in March, 1887.[5]

In the mid-1920's, the name "American Opera Company" was revived by another New York City troupe, which produced what it termed "lyric drama", rather than true opera. It mounted adaptions of Faust in 1928 at the Gallo Theatre[6], and of Madame Butterfly and Yolanda of Cyprus at the Casino Theatre on Broadway in January 1930.[7]


[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ “American Opera Organized” in the New York Times, February 26, 1886.
  2. ^ “They May Go Abroad” in the New York Times, August 21, 1886.
  3. ^ “American Opera” in the New York Times, Aug 18, 1886.
  4. ^ “President Thomas No More” in the New York Times, Dec. 6, 1886.
  5. ^ “Its debts not discharged” in the New York Times, March 4, 1887.
  6. ^ “A New Version of 'Faust'” in the New York Times, January 11, 1928, pg 26.
  7. ^ “'Yolanda' Sung by Americans” in the New York Times, January 9, 1930, pg 28.