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The Operetta Empire: Music Theater in Early Twentieth-Century Vienna

By (author) Micaela Baranello

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CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title, 2022 ""When the world comes to an end,"" Viennese writer Karl Kraus lamented in 1908, ""all the big city orchestras will still be playingÂ The Merry Widow."" Viennese operettas like Franz LehÃ¡r'sÂ The Merry WidowÂ were preeminent cultural texts during the Austro-Hungarian Empire's final years. Alternately hopeful and nihilistic, operetta staged contemporary debates about gender, nationality, and labor. The Operetta Empire delves intoÂ this vibrant theatrical culture, whoseÂ creators simultaneously sought the respectability of high art and the popularity of low entertainment.Â Case studies examine works by LehÃ¡r, Emmerich KÃ¡lmÃ¡n, Oscar Straus, and Leo Fall in light of current musicological conversations about hybridity and middlebrow culture. Demonstrating a thorough mastery of the complex early twentieth-century Viennese cultural scene, and a sympathetic and redemptive critique of a neglected popular genre, Micaela BaranelloÂ establishes operetta as an important element of Viennese cultural lifeâ€”one whose transgressions helped define the musical hierarchies of its day.