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Cuban Zarzuela:

Performing Race and Gender on Havana's Lyric Stage

ISBN-13: 9780252033315
Publisher: UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS PRESS
Imprint: UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS PRESS
By Susan Thomas
Price: AUD $95.99
Stock: 0 in stock
Availability: This book is temporarily out of stock, order will be despatched as soon as fresh stock is received.
Local release date: 14/01/2009
Format: Hardback 264 pages Weight: 0g
Categories: Music [AV]

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Google Preview: On September 29, 1927, at Havana's Teatro Regina, Cuban soprano Rita Montaner sang the premiere of Eliseo Grenet's tango-congo ''Ay Mamá Inés'' with her features obscured with blackened glycerin and her body clad in a coachman's tight pants, boots, and riding jacket. The blackfaced, cross-dressed actress's performance heralded the birth of the Cuban zarzuela, a Spanish-language light opera with spoken dialogue popular in Havana during the early twentieth century. Susan Thomas explores zarzuela's function as a pedagogical tool, through which composers, librettists, and business managers hoped to control their troupes and audiences by presenting desirable and problematic images of both feminine and masculine identities. Focusing on character types such as the mulata, the negrito, and the ingenue, Thomas uncovers the zarzuela's richly textured relationship to social constructs of race, class, and especially gender.; ''No other author addresses the Cuban zarzuela in such a distinctive manner. Susan Thomas offers revelatory musical and cultural analyses in a captivating narrative replete with unexpected twists and illuminating conclusions. Her interviews with performers are invaluable to the historical record and her methodology provides a model for others to follow. What a powerful contribution to the fields of musicology, ethnomusicology, gender studies, theater studies, and Latin American studies!'' Janet Sturman, author of Zarzuela: Spanish Operetta, American Stage; Google Preview content

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Cuban Zarzuela:

Performing Race and Gender on Havana's Lyric Stage