ABSTRACT
Michael Balfe was the most prolific of all the composers of English opera during the period under review. Compared to Loder’s two substantial contributions and Wallace’s half-dozen, for instance, his total of twenty-one English operas, not to mention three French and four Italian works, is impressive. Balfe’s early teachers included William Rooke, best known for Amilie, or The Love Test, performed at Covent Garden in 1837, and C.F. Horn, a musician to the royal family. The salient features of Balfe’s English operas are melodic fecundity and, in general, a preference for the idiom of Italian opera, primarily the buffa and semiseria types. His early command of the Italian style is shown by the aria ‘Tutto parea sorridere’, published in London in 1835. A particular influence on Balfe’s operas was exerted by the tenor William Harrison. Harrison enjoyed an exclusive position at Drury Lane during the 1840s, and, like other composers, Balfe wrote his heroes’ parts for him.
