The respected American conductor Joseph Rescigno, whose achievements include having served as Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of Milwaukee’s Florentine Opera for nearly 40 years, has laid down his considerable experience and wisdom in this new book detailing what it takes to lead a successful performance of an opera. 

Conducting Opera

Writing with clarity, style, and a touch of the polemic, Rescigno’s primary focus is on the standard repertoire, and there’s insight galore to be had. The ways in which he outlines his philosophy on preparation and performance will be compelling to readers both directly involved in the making of opera, and those with just an interest in the art form. His explications are neither too technical or too accommodating to the layman, achieving a difficult middle path that more or less answers any question that you may have about the medium. After all, his understanding of opera itself is satisfyingly simple but sophisticated, declared in the book’s preface – opera is “a fusion of music and drama such that the whole is greater than the sum of its part.” 

That understanding underpins the entire book, full of...