Book Review

Democracy at the Opera is one of several recent books undermining the "highbrow-lowbrow" theory of nineteenth-century American culture. Its persuasive thesis is that opera was "a commercial endeavor, sold by entrepreneurs on the Barnum model," which, like other forms of antebellum theater, had to appeal to a broad audience in order to succeed. Embedding opera in theater and theater in culture, Democracy at the Opera skillfully makes its way through the wide range of biases characterizing press coverage of antebellum theater, offering students of nineteenth-century America a wholly readable and musicologically informed cultural history.

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Karen Ahlquist's book begins with the English opera, which was sung by members of theater companies as part of the standard repertoire. Though challenging, English opera did not require the training of Italian opera, introduced to New York by the Garcia Company in 1825. The management at the Park Theatre (where the Garcia troupe performed for almost a year) recognized in Italian opera's innovative recitative, range of singing characters, and enormously popular stars an opportunity to convince New Yorkers that "a 'fit of passion' could be sung" and followed emotionally, even in the absence of language's appeal to the rational faculties.

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