Henry Purcell - Dido and Aeneas (1683 - 1688?)

Dido and Aeneas is an opera in a prologue and three acts, written by the English Baroque composer Henry Purcell with a libretto by Nahum Tate (1652 – 1715).  The dates of the composition and first performance of the opera are uncertain.  It was composed no later than July 1688, and had been performed at Josias Priest's girls' school in London by the end of 1689.  Some scholars argue for a date of composition as early as 1683.

The story is based on Book IV of Virgil's Aeneid. It recounts the love of Dido, Queen of Carthage, for the Trojan hero Aeneas, and her despair when he abandons her.  A monumental work in Baroque opera, Dido and Aeneas is remembered as one of Purcell's foremost theatrical works.  It was also Purcell's only true opera, as well as his only all-sung dramatic work.  One of the earliest known English operas, it owes much to John Blow's Venus and Adonis, both in structure and in overall effect.

Librettist Nahum Tate  was an Irish poet, hymnist and lyricist, who became England's poet laureate in 1692. Tate is best known for The History of King Lear, his 1681 adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear.

Originally based on Nahum Tate's play Brutus of Alba, or The Enchanted Lovers (1678), the opera is likely, at least to some extent, to be allegorical. The prologue refers to the joy of a marriage between two monarchs, which could refer to the marriage between William and Mary.  In a poem of about 1686, Tate alluded to James II as Aeneas, who is misled by the evil machinations of the Sorceress and her witches (representing Roman Catholicism, a common metaphor at the time) into abandoning Dido, who symbolises the British people.  The same symbolism may apply to the opera.  This explains the addition of the characters of the Sorceress and the witches, which do not appear in the original Aeneid.  It would be noble, or at least acceptable, for Aeneas to follow the decree of the Gods, but not so acceptable for him to be tricked by ill-meaning spirits. 

Although the opera is a tragedy, there are numerous seemingly lighter scenes, such as the First Sailor's song, "Take a boozy short leave of your nymphs on the shore, and silence their mourning with vows of returning, though never intending to visit them more."  Musicologist Ellen T. Harris considers the callousness and cynicism of the song to underline the "moral" of the story, that young women should not succumb to the advances and promises of ardent young men.