Aesthetics of Opera in the Ancien Regime, 1647-1785 - Thomas, Downing A. (University of Iowa)

Thomas considers the use of operatic spectacle and music by Louis XIV as a vehicle for absolutism; the resistance of music to the aesthetic and political agendas of the time; and the long-term development of opera in eighteenth-century humanist culture, examining key works by Lully, Rameau and Charpentier, among others.