Opera! (Not the Argento kind)

[iamnotthou]

I've yet to attend one, but the mere fact that the Met HD simulcast program exists makes me extraordinarily happy.  But then again, I feel the opera scene is significantly stronger than the contemporary classical scene these days. 

I agree, I fear the contemporary classical scene is becoming more and more limited to only those who study it, or who are somehow involved in that field.  Opera on the contrary, is doing quite while, which makes me glad that I work at a theater and watch all the Met shows for free. 

[Thermofusion]

Big difference is with corporate underwriting, I think: even in areas one would knee-jerkedly assume are culturally bankrupt, there are big company checkbooks helping out the neighborhood opera (an opera costs ridiculously amounts of money to put on when compared to your average symphony concert) but there's little corporate money being funneled to the new music scene.  Most new music is covered by grants, random acts of (usually non-corporate) philanthropy, a little bit of money set aside by an ensemble to commission new works or it's just completely gratis.

Not saying this is a bad thing (I love that opera is doing so comparatively well) but it's kind of a weird situation when the cost of commissioning a new work is typically so much less than putting on La Boheme.

[mountmccabe]

The Met does these live simulcast thingies with their whole schedule, playing in your local movie theatre. They're pretty fun. They had little glitches with the sound a couple times last year, but just smallish ones), but much, much cheaper than hitting up a real opera. And the Met is a fine little company.

Thanks for mentioning this and to everybody else for keeping on talking about it until I actually followed the link.  There are several theaters near me showing this (I'm pretty shocked) so I definitely plan on checking out the John Adams opera and if that goes well I hope to check out some of the others as the season progresses.

[girl]

The Metropolitan Opera is going to begin streaming operas as pay-per-view or subscription. There's an article about it here. I'm not sure how excited I'd be to watch an opera on my comupter, but I guess if you have a nice monitor. . .

[RoyBiggins]

Hey, so, I think I wanna buy a CD of Das Rheingold. 

Which one do I get?

[Thermofusion]

Dear Biggins,

Thank you for your interest in Das Rheingold.

I am not an expert on Wagnerian opera, but having been surrounded by opera majors in music school, I can tell you that much of the "best recording" debate of the entire Ring Cycle has centered around the Solti/Vienna and Barenboim/Bayreuth versions. For like the past decade or so.

I'd probably be biased toward Solti, but Barenboim is more of a Wagner fetishist, so perhaps his interpretation is better? I don't own either recording.

Cordially,
Thermofusion

[Thermofusion]

They aired the new Met staging of Doctor Atomic tonight on our PBS affiliate and I managed to catch most of the second half. Other than the production design and a few directorial/choreographical differences, it wasn't very different from the Dutch production that was released on DVD a few months ago. That said, I was pleased that, in addition to Finley as Oppenheimer, Jessica Rivera reprised her role as Kitty and, more so, think the filming of the Met performance was vastly superior, which is to say the cinematography was considerably more sensitive to the music, if that makes any sense. I'm holding out hope it makes it to DVD, otherwise hopefully somebody will record it and toss it on bittorrent.

[ellaguru]

A bunch of last year's Met series is on DVD (maybe the whole series, I don't know, I've only seen three or four on displays), so there's probably a good shot it'll be available, and soon.

[Thermofusion]

Heard a Met rebroadcast of Doctor Atomic on the radio today. First time listening to it sans visuals, actually. Now that I had a chance to focus my attention on the orchestral writing, it doesn't hold up as well as I'd have liked removed from its staging. The main thing I noticed was how the brass writing is very "generic Adams"...which is to say I think starting with Harmonielehre, he's developed an easily-identifiable thick, meaty polyrhythmic style of brass orchestration. This might be why when I first heard audio clips from the new Doctor Atomic Symphony (which has been cobbled together from snippets from the opera) I thought it was from the first movement of Harmonielehre.

Main point of all this, though: the Met broadcast went off at 4:15 and dude from our local public radio station comes on and says this (roughly verbatim): "Well...that was very...interesting! How wonderfully...dramatic! I've got about 45 minutes here to fill before All Things Considered, and I suppose we could play more John Adams but...I think I need a break. I think we all need a break. How about something more...melodious. More conventional? Here's some Rachmaninoff...(first attack of Symphonic Dances starts to play)"

Hey, fuck you, limpdicked DJ dude. The classical programming on your station sucks balls to begin with, but then you go and adopt this sissy passive-aggressive stance toward a John Adams opera, who for his modernity ain't exactly the most challenging composer out there? Fuck you, if you wanna hear some opera that'll really make you want the "conventional", I've got a copy of Stockhausen's Donnerstag Aus Licht with your name on it, dipshit. Sit still and listen to it gut your fat belly.

[Ignatius]

Yeah go fuck yourself DJ

[Thermofusion]

Yeah!

Seriously it struck me as hella unprofessional. So much scorn in his voice. Between this and the interviewing the VAMPS author, I'm thinking about a Ocean's 11-style infiltration to take back my pledge money. I'll leave the Car Talk mug next to the coffee machine.

[Lalitree]

Heard a Met rebroadcast of Doctor Atomic on the radio today

Dammit, I had been planning to listen to this for months, and then today, I forgot.

[Thermofusion]

Check out Opus Arte's DVD of the Dutch production, it's got the same leads as the San Francisco and Met stagings and even at $40 I feel it was worth it. I think this is Adams' best work in years and it's really exciting to see a new American opera generating so much publicity and discussion.

But as I said upthread, I thought the cinematography on the Great Performances/Met performance was superior so I'm holding out hope UNC-TV rebroadcasts the Met production at some point. I suspect it's not going to get released on DVD with the Dutch version already out there.

[ellaguru]

In the middle of my winter opera binge. Saw Beethoven's Fidelio last night at the Canadian Opera Company, also seeing their take on Dvořák's Rusalka, and then the Met simulcast of Massenet's Thaïs. I don't know anything about Thaïs, but Renée Fleming is singing the lead, and she's one of my favourite singers around, so I am excited about that.

Fidelio was good. My favourite part, though, was this extra bit in the finale. I don't know if it's often staged this way - it's not in the libretto or the music - but the first act of the opera sets up a love triangle (boy loves girl, girl doesn't love boy, she loves other "boy" named "Fidelio", "Fidelio" doesn't love girl back because "Fidelio" is really another girl, in disguise so that she can save her husband's life) that the second proceeds to totally ignore. The girl gets one line in which to express her surprise and sadness that her beloved not only doesn't love her, but isn't even a real boy. And that line is tossed into the middle of an otherwise triumphant finale about how awesome everything is for the heroine and her now-saved husband. So anyways: as the finale proceeds, off to stage right they run this huge psychodrama that has nothing to do with the song. The girl tries to rush to "Fidelio", but her dad catches her and she cries on his shoulder, then, apparently better, she breaks from him, but steals the pistol he had in his pocket, sits down and contemplates the pistol as the original boy who loves her (but who she didn't love) sneaks up behind her, just in time to grab it from her when she decides to put it to her head. So he takes it away from her and they embrace, and apparently they will end happily ever after, too. All the while, nobody who is actually doing any singing on stage is paying even the slightest attention to them. Then the curtain falls.

I don't know, maybe they do that all the time, but I thought it was a really funny way to address the fact that most of the story set up at the beginning gets totally dumped at the intermission.

[Andrew_TSKS]

I know that when I used to act in plays in high school, my drama teacher would sometimes add things into plays that weren't there for reasons like that--because she thought they played better or needed to be there or whatever. I wouldn't be surprised if that sort of improvisation is common in theater troupes, and is left up to the individual director. Hell, it happens in movies all the time too. I've heard that half of what happens in any Robert Altman movie is probably not in the script.

[Thermofusion]

In the middle of my winter opera binge. Saw Beethoven's Fidelio last night at the Canadian Opera Company, also seeing their take on Dvořák's Rusalka, and then the Met simulcast of Massenet's Thaïs. I don't know anything about Thaïs, but Renée Fleming is singing the lead, and she's one of my favourite singers around, so I am excited about that.

Fidelio was good. My favourite part, though, was this extra bit in the finale. I don't know if it's often staged this way - it's not in the libretto or the music - but the first act of the opera sets up a love triangle (boy loves girl, girl doesn't love boy, she loves other "boy" named "Fidelio", "Fidelio" doesn't love girl back because "Fidelio" is really another girl, in disguise so that she can save her husband's life) that the second proceeds to totally ignore. The girl gets one line in which to express her surprise and sadness that her beloved not only doesn't love her, but isn't even a real boy. And that line is tossed into the middle of an otherwise triumphant finale about how awesome everything is for the heroine and her now-saved husband. So anyways: as the finale proceeds, off to stage right they run this huge psychodrama that has nothing to do with the song. The girl tries to rush to "Fidelio", but her dad catches her and she cries on his shoulder, then, apparently better, she breaks from him, but steals the pistol he had in his pocket, sits down and contemplates the pistol as the original boy who loves her (but who she didn't love) sneaks up behind her, just in time to grab it from her when she decides to put it to her head. So he takes it away from her and they embrace, and apparently they will end happily ever after, too. All the while, nobody who is actually doing any singing on stage is paying even the slightest attention to them. Then the curtain falls.

I don't know, maybe they do that all the time, but I thought it was a really funny way to address the fact that most of the story set up at the beginning gets totally dumped at the intermission.

This makes me consider the possibility I've been too quick to dismiss Fidelio--probably because I'm tired of hearing the Overture and am basing the rest of my opinion on hearing snippets of the opera proper on radio or disc. I should seek out an actual production of it sometime.

As far as Thais goes, for me it's another one of those countless operas where I'm overly familiar with a musical sequence from it--the ubiquitous "Meditation from Thais"--but haven't actually heard the work in its entirety. The only helpful thing I can offer is I've seen Renee Fleming on video in the title role of another Massenet opera (Manon) and she was spellbinding, so there's that.

[ellaguru]

As far as Thais goes, for me it's another one of those countless operas where I'm overly familiar with a musical sequence from it--the ubiquitous "Meditation from Thais"--but haven't actually heard the work in its entirety. The only helpful thing I can offer is I've seen Renee Fleming on video in the title role of another Massenet opera (Manon) and she was spellbinding, so there's that.

She is spellbinding. I've seen her in recital twice plus once with the symphony, and she's coming back in April. Mostly I don't like that our big vocal recital hall thinks there are only, like, a dozen singers on the planet and only end up bringing Cecilia Bartoli to town all the time, but I'm down with seeing Renée Fleming any time she wants to stop by.

[ellaguru]

And Dvořák's Rusalka last night. It's an opera about a mute girl, which, possibly not the best idea. But it does convey a powerful message: that love between man and mermaid is doomed.

The staging was pretty fantastic. There were three (kinda) sets on a swivel, so they could move from locale to locale. The fantastic locale was the pond or whatever where the magical creatures lived. It was a wading pool about an inch deep, so there was much splashing of water, and people could come up through the water via lilypad bunches and fly down via big fireflies. It was all verdant and psychedelic. And there were a couple of fake intermissions where the curtains came down, the band kept playing, and then this couple sitting in the audience started singing about what had been going on on stage. Which was a little hard to figure out at first, as they were on the floor level and my seat was on the fourth balcony. I don't know that it worked dramatically, particularly, but it was a nice break to see these folk climbing through the orchestra pit to get back and forth from their seats to the empty stage and back while singing the synopsis from their show programs.

[YojimboMonkey]

And Dvořák's Rusalka last night. It's an opera about a mute girl, which, possibly not the best idea. But it does convey a powerful message: that love between man and mermaid is doomed.

Who needs opera when you've got Splash?

[ellaguru]

I believe that Dvořák was a great fan of Daryl Hannah's oevre.

[Thermofusion]

Oh damn, that sounds amazing. Canadian Opera Co. don't exactly play around with this shit, do they?

[ellaguru]

I think they are still excited about their new opera house (maybe two years old now - it's really nice and the place they played for the previous 30 years or so pretty much sucked ass) and new director (I think it's his first season after Richard Bradshaw conducted here for about eleventy billion years). They did a decent job before, but they seem to have stepped things up in the last couple years. They have this new, pretty, expensive opera house, and I think they are keen to prove they deserve it. The Rusalka is definitely the best-staged production I've seen there.

[Thermofusion]

Thomas Ades - The Tempest (new 2009 EMI recording)

So, five years after its premiere, my first time listening to this in semi-proper fashion. While I fell out of an Ades period four or five years ago, I gotta say this builds on his reputation from Powder Her Face as perhaps the boldest contemporary composer of opera. While I'm really missing the visuals (from the YouTube clips I've seen, I gather the original stagings were wonderfully bizarre), I'm focusing on the keen orchestral writing and, above all, Cyndia Sieden's virtuosic handling of what has to be one of the most difficult high dramatic colortura parts ever penned. My throat aches listening to it. Rewrites the definition of extended vocal technique in sections. Terrifying. The Met has this on their docket for the 2011 season.

A YouTube clip, Sieden as Ariel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdGD1XQVrag

[mountmccabe]

I have been listening to more opera recently and this is a good thing.  I had been getting a little overcooked on everything else, partially because I had been forgetting to keep some opera mixed in.  I often put in an act or two of something along side the other albums at work and save whole operas for when I am at home/etc.

Also despite not liking Richard Strauss' concert music I have recently been listening to his operas and am liking them.  I have heard Die Frau ohne Schatten and Ariadne auf Naxos.  Based on those and what I've read of the others he was doing with his opera what my favorite playwrites were doing with their plays around the same time.

Also Arizona Opera is putting on an Elektra around Thanksgiving; I am leaning towards attending.

[coldforge]

I find it really hard to listen to opera without seeing the performance.