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As well as a large number of shorter musical additions to various plays, it was mainly with his four ‘semi-operas’ that Purcell made his essential contribution to English music for the theatre: The Prophetess, or the History of Dioclesian (1690), King Arthur (1691), The Fairy Queen (1692) and The Indian Queen. The last of them dates from 1695, also the last year of Purcell’s life, and as a result of his extremely premature death on 21st November of that year it was never completed. He probably started on it in the winter of 1695, in close cooperation with Thomas Betterton, who, as a producer, director and actor, had played an important part in the first three semi-operas for the Theatre Royal. In spring 1695 Betterton was engaged in setting up a new theatre company at Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and after some time lost interest in this new work. We do not know who ultimately wrote the script, but the libretto is quite bombastic and highly anachronistic. Purcell was nevertheless able to provide this unlikely story with some exceptionally powerful music, though he left the fifth act incomplete when he died. His younger brother, Daniel Purcell, added a concluding masque so that the work was made ready for the stage after all, and the first performance was in spring 1696. Purcell’s own music includes some of his darkest and most sophisticated writing, and the cheerful masque in honour of a marriage, which Daniel added to the end, contrasts sharply with the rest. Even so, he managed to surpass himself and came up with a striking ending for his lamented brother’s swansong.
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