Although Ireland has never had a purpose-built opera house (the Cork Opera House is a multi-purpose theatre), opera has been performed in Ireland since the 17th century. In the 18th century, Ireland was a centre for ballad opera and created important works that helped to develop the genre in the direction of operetta, with works by Charles Coffey and Kane O'Hara. Nationally identifiable Irish operas have been written by immigrants such as Tommaso Giordani and Johann Bernhard Logier as well as by native composers such as John Andrew Stevenson and Thomas Simpson Cooke, continued in the 19th century with works by John William Glover and Paul McSwiney. Michael William Balfe and Vincent Wallace were the most prominent representatives of mid-19th-century English-language operas.