Donald Satz wrote: >For me, it's the music that counts, and many composers have written >masterful music to the librettos they had to work with: Verdi, Puccini, >Handel, Mozart, Berg, Rossini, Donizetti, etc. The world of classical >music would be greatly diminished if the opera form had never been >utilized. Nobody could really "take a fence" @ some of handel's or Bononcini's London Nonsense Operas - i play chunks of "Susannah" as I read B4 "nodding off". & what about the Beecham reworkings and the Mozart "Improvements"?? Bill(Y).