Last Updated: Mar. 31, 2000

Annotated Bibliography of Printed Sources for Libretti and Other Texts

Including unpublished, copyrighted editions and translations

 Please do not send routine reference questions to the above address (questions like "Where can I find the libretto of this opera?"). Instead, browse this page (which is just a selection), see the bibliography under "Libretto" in The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, check reference sources at your local library, and look at online library catalogs. And don't overlook booklets that come with recordings, old and new!

• Key
• Mixed Collections
• Libretti/Texts by Composer or Librettist
• List of addresses to contact for unpublished items

• * = (apparently) unpublished; see address to contact at end
• E, F, G, I, R, Rt = English, French, German, Italian, Russian Cyrillic, Russian transliteration
• t = reading translation (i.e. "literal")
• s = singing translation
• ed. = edited by
• tr. = translated by/translation used by
• trt. = transliterated by
• st = if original text, stage directions translated (e.g. "I, st/E" = original Italian dialog given, but stage directions supplied only in English)

• Apter, Ronnie and Mark Herman: List of Their Singing Translations
• The book of 101 opera librettos : complete original language [sic] texts with English translations. New York : Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 1996. 1474 pages (Click here for list of titles included in this book.)
• Dix cycles de lieder = Ten cycles of lieder : Beethoven, Brahms, Mahler, Schubert, Schumann : traduction mot a mot, accent tonique par Marie-Terese Paquin. Montreal : Presses de l'Universite de Montreal, 1977.
• German opera, 1770-1880. Librettos. New York : Garland, 1985-
• Harrison, Donna Esselstyn. Poetry in song literature : a handbook for students of singing. Evanston, Ill. : Wm. Caxton, c1989.
• Italian opera librettos, 1640-1770 / introd. by Howard Mayer Brown. New York : Garland, 1978-
• Jeffers, Ron. Translations and annotations of choral repertoire. Corvallis, Or. : Earthsongs, c1988-
• Vol. 1. Sacred Latin texts.
• Kaldis, Cynthia. Latin music through the ages. Wauconda, Ill. : Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, c1991.
• Includes poetical works in Latin with English translation
• Masters of the Italian art song : word-by word and poetic translations of the complete songs for voice and piano / by Timothy LeVan. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1990.
• Miller, Philip Lieson. The ring of words : an anthology of song texts. The original texts selected and translated, with and introduction. New York : W.W. Norton, [1973].
• The opera libretto library : the authentic [sic] texts of the German, French, and Italian operas with music of the principal airs, with the complete English and German, French, or Italian parallel texts. New York : Avenel Books, 1980.
• Reprint of three vols. originally published: New York : Crown Publishers, 1939.
• Phillips, Lois. Lieder, line by line and word for word. 1st U.S. ed. New York : C. Scribner's Sons, 1980, c1979.
• Piatak, Jean and Regina Avrashov. Russian songs & arias : phonetic readings, word-by-word translations, and a concise guide to Russian diction. Dallas, Tex. : Pst...Inc., 1991.
• WARNING: This book has far too many problems to be useful to singers. Check the review by Laurence Richter in Slavic and East European Journal, v. 38, no. 2 (summer 1994), p. 401-404.
• Pocket Opera - Pippin English Versions
• Prawer, Siegbert Salomon. The Penguin book of Lieder. Edited and translated. New York : Penguin Books, [1964]. (Penguin reference book, R25)
• Russkii muzykal'nyi teatr 1700-1835 gg.: khrestomatiia / sostavil prof. S.L. Ginzburg. Leningrad : Iskusstvo, 1941.
• Contains brief histories, synopses, and libretto excerpts.
• Stikhotvornaia komediia, komicheskaia opera, vodevil' kontsa XVIII-nachala XIX veka : v 2 tomakh / . Leningrad : Sovetskii pisatel', Leningradskoe otd-nie, 1990. (Biblioteka poeta. Bolshaia seriia)
• Word-by-word translations of songs and arias, by Gerton Coffin, Werner Singer [and] Pierre Delattre. New York : Scarecrow Press, 1966-1972.

  ---

 Bach, Johann Sebastian

• Texte zu den Kantaten, Motetten, Messen, Passionen und Oratorien von Johann Sebastian Bach / vorgelegt von Christine Frode. 1. Aufl. Leipzig : Deutscher Verlag fuer Musik, 1986.

• Brahms-Texte : saemtliche von Johannes Brahms vertoenten und bearbeiteten Texte / die Sammlung von Gustav Ophuls, vervollstaendigt und neu herausgegeben von Kristian Wachinger ; mit drei Zeichnungen von Willy von Beckerath. Ebenhausen bei Muenchen : Langewiesche-Brandt, c1983.

• Angelo [*R & Rt, LN]
• The Captain's Daughter [*R, E, s, tr. LN]
• Feast in Time of Plague
• Neff, Lyle K. "César Cui's Opera Feast in Time of Plague," in The Pushkin Review, v. 1, 1998,
• Contains entire libretto in Russian (Cyrillic) with parallel English singing translation.  Includes introductory article and annotations.
• Little Red Riding-Hood [*E, s, tr. LN]
• Mademoiselle Fifi [*E, s, tr. LN]
• The Mandarin's Son [*R & Rt, LN; *E, t, tr. LN]
• Mateo Falcone [*E, s, tr. LN]
• The Prisoner of the Caucasus [*R & Rt, LN]
• William Ratcliff [*E, t, tr. LN]

• The poetic Debussy : a collection of his song texts and selected letters / edited by Margaret G. Cobb ; translations by Richard Miller. Rev. 2nd. ed. Rochester, N.Y. : University of Rochester Press, 1994. (Eastman studies in music, 1071-9989)
• The singer's Debussy / edited, with introductions and translations, by Marie-Claire Rohinsky. 1st ed. New York : Pelion Press, 1987.

• Lysistrata and the War (informational web site)

• *Russlan and Lyudmilla [E, s, tr. Opera Company of Boston]

• The librettos of Handel's operas : a collection of seventy librettos documenting Handel's operatic career / general editor, Ellen T. Harris. New York : Garland, 1989. 13 v.

• The librettos of Mozart's operas / general editor, Ernest Warburton. New York : Garland Pub., 1992. 7 v.

• The complete Puccini libretti / edited by Nico Castel. Genesio, NY : Leyerle Publications, 1993-
• Includes IPA transcription.

• The singer's Rachmaninoff / edited, with introductions and translations by Natalia Challis. 1st ed. New York : Pelion Press, 1989.
• WARNING to singers: the IPA transcriptions in this book are not accurate.

• Christmas Eve
• The Night before Christmas = Noch' pered Rozhdestvom : an opera in four acts (nine scenes) based on a story from Nicolai Gogol's "Evenings on a farm near Dikanka" / by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov ; English version by Peteris Silins and Richard Strawn. 1977.
• Photocopy of Russian/German vocal score: Leipzig : M.P. Belaieff, [19--], with interlinear English singing translation added by hand.
• Available at Indiana University Music Library.
• Taylor, Philip. Gogolian interludes : Gogol's story "Christmas Eve" as the subject of the operas by Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov. London : Collets, 1984. [Rt, st/E; E, t]
• The Russian libretto contains numerous errors.
• The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevronia
• Skazanie o nevidimom grade Kitezhe i deve Fevronii. / Vladimir Ivanovich Bel'skii ; opera-misteriia N.A. Rimskogo-Korsakova. Photocopy of typescript, 25 p. [R]
• Available at Indiana University Music Library.
• May Night [*E, s, tr. LN]
• The Noblewoman Vera Sheloga [*E, t & s, tr. LN]
• Pan Wojewoda [*E, t, tr. LN]
• The Tale of Tsar Saltan [*E, t & s, tr. LN]

• Buehnenwerke : kritische Gesamtausgabe der Texte / herausgegeben von Christian Pollack. Tutzing : Hans Schneider, c1988. (Veroeffentlichungen des Internationalen Franz Schubert Instituts ; Bd. 3)
• Franz Schubert : die Texte seiner einstimmig komponierten Lieder und ihre Dichter. Vollstaendig gesammelt und kritische hrsg. von Maximilian und Lilly Schochow. Hildesheim ; New York : G. Olms, 1974. 2 v.
• Schubert: the complete song texts -- texts of the Lieder and Italian songs. With English translations. Trans. by Richard Wigmore. Forword by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. Schirmer Books: New York, 1988.

• The singer's Schumann / edited, with introductions and translations by Thilo Reinhard. 1st ed. New York, NY : Pelion Press, 1989.

• Die Texte der Lieder. Kritische Ausgabe von Reinhold Schlotterer. Pfaffenhofen : W. Ludwig Verlag, 1988. (Veroeffentlichungen der Richard-Strauss-Gesellschaft, Muenchen ; Bd. 10)

• Asimov's annotated Gilbert and Sullivan / notes by Isaac Asimov. 1st ed. New York : Doubleday, 1988.
• Authentic [sic] libretti of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. With a foreword by Frederick Hobbs ... Including famous musical selections and original "Bab" illustrations by Sir. W.S. Gilbert. 1st ed. New York : The Bass Publishers, [1934].
• "The D'Oyly Carte edition."
• Dixon, Geoffrey. The Gilbert and Sullivan concordance : a word index to W.S. Gilbert's libretti for the fourteen Savoy operas. New York : Garland Pub., 1989. 2 v.

• Cherevichki
• Cherevichki : opera in four acts / by Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky ; libretto [by Yakov Polonsky] ; translated by Philip Taylor. London : Collets, 1981. [E, t]
• Reissued, along with original text [Rt, st/E] in Taylor's Gogolian interludes : Gogol's story "Christmas Eve" as the subject of the operas by Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov. London : Collets, 1984.
• Vakula the Smith [E, t, tr. LN]
• This translation not recommended; see Philip Taylor's translation of "Cherevichki" above.
• Richter, Lawrence R.  Tchaikovsky's complete song texts : Russian texts of the complete songs of Peter Ilych TTchaikovsky with phonetic transcriptions, literate and idiomatic English translations. Geneseo, N.Y. : Leyerle Publications, c1999.

• The complete Verdi librettos. Ed. by Nico Castel. Geneseo, NY: Leyerle Publications, 1994-
• Includes IPA transcription.

Addresses for unpublished items

• LN = Lyle Neff (lneff@indiana.edu)