Molto Agitato: The Mayhem Behind the Music at the Metropolitan Opera (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781400032310)

If the opera world is full of "intrigue, double meanings, and devious dramatics," then no place exemplifies this more than the world-famous Metropolitan Opera, where politics, ambition, and oversized egos have traditionally taken center stage along with some of the world's richest music. Drawing on her fifteen years as its press representative, Johanna Fiedler explodes the traditional secrecy that surrounds the Met in this wonderfully entertaining account of its tumuluous history.

Fiedler chronicles the Met's early days as a home for legends like Toscanini, Mahler, and Caruso, and gives a fascinating account of the middle years when haughty blue-bloods battled stubborn adminstrators for control of a company that would emerge as America's premiere opera house. She takes us behind the grand gold-curtain stage in more recent years as well, showing how musical superstars like Luciano Pavarotti, Pl cido Domingo, and Kathleen Battle have electrified performances and scandalized the public. But most revelatory are Fiedler's portrayals of James Levine and Joseph Volpe and their practically parallel ascendancies--Levine rising from prodigy to artistic director, Volpe advancing from stagehand to general manager--and their once strained relationship. Weaving together the personal, economic, and artistic struggles that characterize the Met's long and vibrant history, Molto Agitato is a must-read saga of power, wealth, and, above all, great music.

Author: Johanna Fiedler
ISBN-10: 1400032318
ISBN-13: 9781400032310
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Language: English
Published: 09/09/2003
Pages: 448
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.89lbs
Size: 8.04h x 5.18w x 0.91d