Origins of opera
"Dafne" by Jacopo Peri was the earliest composition considered opera, as understood today, although with only five instrumental parts it was much more like a chamber opera than either the preceding intermedi or the operas of Claudio Monteverdi a few years later. It was written around 1597, largely under the inspiration of an elite circle of literate Florentine humanists who gathered as the "Camerata". Significantly, "Dafne" was an attempt to revive the classical Greek drama, part of the wider revival of antiquity characteristic of the Renaissance. The members of the Camerata considered that the "chorus" parts of Greek dramas were originally sung, and possibly even the entire text of all roles; opera was thus conceived as a way of "restoring" this situation. The libretto was by Ottavio Rinuccini, who had written some of the 1587 Medici intermedi, in which Peri had also been involved; Rinuccini appears to have recycled some of the material, at least from the scene illustrated at right. Most of the music for "Dafne" is lost (the libretto was printed and survives), but one of Peri's many later operas, "Euridice", dating from 1600, is the first opera score to have survived to the present day.
Opera in Cuba
The first documented operatic event in Havana took place in 1776. That presentation was mentioned in a note published in the newspaper "Diario de La Habana" on December 19, 1815: "…Today, Wednesday 19th of the current, if the weather allows, the new tragic opera of merit in three acts that contains 17 pieces of music, titled "Dido Abandoned" will be performed […] This is one of the premiere dramas from the French theater. In Italy, the one composed by renowned Metastasio deserved a singular applause, and was sung in this city on October 12, 1776." 
On August 9, 1807 another note was published in a Havanese newspaper that announced: "There is a Lyric-heroic drama in this printing shop titled "America and Apolo" which will be presented at this theater…", and on the following September 8 the premiere of the announced piece took place at the former "Coliseo" Theater, that had already changed its name to "Principal". That was the first lyric piece composed in Cuba that we have information about, and its composer was Manuel de Sequeyra y Arango, Captain of the Havana Infantry Regiment. The piece was really a "dramatic action" in the Metastasian style; a brief composition in which the choir participated occasionally.