In the reign of Queen Anne the musical life of London was developing in a
new fashion as compared with what it was in the last twenty years of the
previous century. The type of English opera which Purcell and Dryden
had created came to an end with Purcell's death in 1695. Italian music,
especially when sung by Italian singers, was gradually becoming more and
more popular with London concert-audiences, and in 1705 Thomas Clayton
produced at Drury Lane an opera called _Arsinoe, Queen of Cyprus_. Clayton
had visited Italy, and had brought back with him a collection of Italian
songs; he got Peter Motteux to translate for him an old Italian opera
libretto, and adapted these songs to it. How much of _Arsinoe_ was
Clayton's own work is not known; Burney speaks of the opera with nothing
but contempt. Yet it seems to have had some fair success, and was even
revived the following year; but Clayton's _Rosamond_, to a libretto by
Addison, did not survive three performances. It was followed by a series of
Italian operas composed by Buononcini, Scarlatti, and others; at first the
operas were in English, and sung by English singers, but gradually Italian
was introduced, as at Hamburg, and in 1710 an opera called _Almahide_, the
music of which Burney ascribes conjecturally to Buononcini, was given in
Italian with an entirely Italian company.
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