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Ballad Operas Go Online
Ballad Operas Online (BOPO) is a new electronic resource supported by the Faculty of Music. Designed by Berta Joncus (Lecturer at St Anne's and St Hilda's) and hosted by the Oxford Digital Library, BOPO catalogues for the first time ballad operas (1728–60) and their music.
Ballad operas stimulated what was arguably the earliest modern commercial song industry in Europe. Merging high- with low-style music, ballad opera created song 'hits' marketed through stars singing in ballad style. In seven years, ballad operas generated over 3,500 songs whose historical background – including the role played by composers such as Handel – is captured on this resource. Besides supplying data on composers, casts, premieres and theatres, BOPO supplies general information concerning ballad opera.
Directed by Michael Burden (Principal Investigator, New College) and Berta Joncus (Co-Investigator), BOPO was funded by the John Fell OUP Research Fund. Please click on the link above to find out more.
(Picture above: John Gay, The Beggar's Opera, Act III. Print. After William Hogarth, by William Blake, 1790 [original picture, 1728]. © Trustees of the British Museum.)