Ballad opera
a theater entertainment of 18th-century England, consisting of popular tunes, folk songs, and dialogue.
Historical Examples
Charleston also claims the first performance of ballad opera on record in America .
Annals of Music in America Henry Charles Lahee
It may be regarded as a species of prototype of the burletta or ballad opera of later days.
A Book of Burlesque Willam Davenport Adams
Hallam and Chapman joined in partnership, and produced Fair Rosamond and a ballad opera.
The Old Showmen and the Old London Fairs Thomas Frost
noun
an opera consisting of popular tunes to which appropriate words have been set, interspersed with spoken dialogue
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a four-line stanza consisting of unrhymed first and third lines in iambic tetrameter and rhymed second and fourth lines in iambic trimeter, often used in ballads. Historical Examples These specimens show the ballad stanza, which is made of a sort of septenary resolved into short lines of four and three accents. English Verse Raymond MacDonald […]
- Ballade
a poem consisting commonly of three stanzas having an identical rhyme scheme, followed by an envoy, and having the same last line for each of the stanzas and the envoy. Music. a composition in free style and romantic mood, often for solo piano or for orchestra. Historical Examples The ballade consists of three stanzas, and […]
- Balladeer
a person who sings ballads. noun a singer of ballads
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any light, simple song, especially one of sentimental or romantic character, having two or more stanzas all sung to the same melody. a simple narrative poem of folk origin, composed in short stanzas and adapted for singing. any poem written in similar style. the music for a ballad. a sentimental or romantic popular song. noun […]
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a person who sings ballads. noun a singer of ballads