This book was the first comprehensive survey of Purcell's dramatic music. It is concerned as much with the London theatre world - playhouses, poets, actors, sin

This book discusses literary and dramatic aspects of musical works for voices and instruments performed in English theatres (c.1650 and 1750).

Using a mix of broad stylistic observation and detailed analysis, Adams distinguishes between late-seventeenth-century English style in general and Purcell's st