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Opera in decline ?
Posted by Jeffrey Lague on July 9, 2023, 11:54 am
"1. Opera (all opera) has declined greatly in popularity, and is now cherished only by a very tiny minority of the population, most of them moribund old fogeys like myself.
2. Historically informed stagings (i.e., stagings in the manner that the composer would have envisaged) have become rarer and rarer, to the point that Regietheater has now almost totally displaced them.
I fully acknowledge, and accept, that "our tastes" have changed in those respects, just as I fully acknowledge, and accept, that Handel's operas and Cherubini's no longer appeal to "our tastes" as they did in their own day." Evan Blackmore.
I have extracted this passage from a post on the thread about Cherubini's Les Abencerages which, from its innocent beginnings about a recent recording of the opera just growed like Topsy, in order to invite comments from others who either agree or disagree with Evan's views.
Along with most of the rest of us I feel sure that opera companies are "Feeling the pinch" and have responded by reducing the repertoire to a handful of popular works in shoestring-budget productions while expecting the public to stomach ever-increasing ticket prices.
In the 70s and 80s I was a regular opera-goer at both Covent Garden and ENO, the latter company producing such relative rarities as Smetana's Dalibor, Darghomisky's Stone Guest, Janacek's Makropoulos Case and Weber's Euryanthe. There were also productions of contemporary works such as Iain Hamilton's Royal Hunt of the Sun, David Blake's Toussaint, Henze's Bassarids and Ginastera's Bomarzo that I remember. I also recall some very elaborate and glamorous productions like Strauss' Salome, and Massenet's Werther, the latter starring Janet Baker. Dame Janet also appeared in the title role in Donizetti's Maria Stuarda.
I haven't been able to afford tickets to go to the Garden for many years (the last time I went there was courtesy of a friend who wanted a companion to see The Ring with....luckily he was able to afford reasonably comfortable seats! ) but on the few occasions I've been to ENO in recent years I have been extremely disappointed either with the standard of performance - Porgy and Bess with some principal singers who were barely of local music festival standard (although a few were very good indeed , especially the man who played Crown)- or of inappropriate or/and ineffably silly stagings such as The Queen of Spades where I remember, amongst other horrors, one scene being performed against a pile of old wooden chairs in the centre of the stage....why ??? Is it any wonder that people don't want to go out of their way to watch such things when they can buy cds and envisage the works much more appropriately in their mind's eye ? I would add that a smaller company like Holland Park opera put on a much more traditional production of Mascagni's Isabeau which shows what can be done if the will and imagination is there.
DVDs , too, ought to be issued with trigger warnings. Recently I considered buying a filmed production of Schumann's rarely-performed Genoveva until I saw some stills from it which appeared to be set in a whitewashed broom cupboard.
I wonder if , as Evan's post states, that tastes have changed in these respects. The last time I ventured abroad was before covid and saw a completely traditional production of Tosca in Budapest. The house was packed and the performance was very good. The best production I saw at ENO in recent years was of Prince Igor presented by a travelling company with traditional sets and costumes. I suppose what I'm attempting to say, amongst all this rambling, is that the problem with opera nowadays is not opera itself but the way it's presented.
I know that Handel's operas, in spite of some splendid music they contain, appear very stilted and need some updating with a bit of flesh on show and episodes of knockabout comedy (as in the dvd of Julius Caesar that I have) to make them "Go" but anything from Mozart onwards can , and in my opinion SHOULD be done, without deviating too much from the intentions of the original creators. Perhaps if we got back to that, opera might return to the popularity it enjoyed forty years ago.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Evan Blackmore on July 9, 2023, 12:54 pm, in reply to "Opera in decline ?"
Just to put my quoted remarks in context a little.
1. When I wrote the cited paragraphs, I was writing about changes "in the last seven decades," i.e. since the late 1950s (when I began operagoing). Whether these changes have continued to progress in the last 20-25 years I couldn't say.
2. I was speaking about "historically informed stagings (i.e., stagings in the manner that the composer would have envisaged)." At least as used in MWI reviews, "traditional" tends to be a broader term, encompassing just about anything in period costume.
Compare the recent Joyce DiDonato Covent Garden Massenet Cendrillon with the 1970s Canadian telecast with Frederica von Stade. Both have been called "traditional," but one ventures much further from anything Massenet would have anticipated than the other.
Or consider the 2017 revival of Karajan's 1967 Salzburg Easter Walküre. The sets and costumes are exactly the same, but the stage action is very different, and much further from Wagner's script (not that Karajan had adhered minutely to it in the first place!).
Jeffrey's comments are, as always, fascinating, and raise all kinds of thoughts. I don't know how true this is, but I've often seen it said that older operagoers tend to prefer historically informed stagings, whereas younger ones are more likely to be attracted by contemporary Regietheater. (Of course there are exceptions in both directions.)
You have the advantage of a few years extra opera-going over me Evan, my first experiences being the annual school G&S productions back in the mid 1960s !
Although I have the Frederica von Stade cds of Cendrillon I haven't seen either of the productions you mention so can't comment on the staging but I would have thought that any production that missed out on the fairy-tale wonderment of the plot and the glamour of the ballroom-scene would be completely at variance with Massenet's wishes - however mindful I am of the fact that Johann Strauss was willing to have his ballet Aschenbrodel (which he didn't live to complete)set in a Viennese department store.
To have our operas or plays done exactly in the way the composer or author envisioned them in performance - clanking stage machinery, lighting by candlelight, the claque occupying parts of the theatre - is of course not possible or desirable today and I feel sure that many composers would have been delighted to take advantage of the technical opportunities afforded by later ages. I feel confident that Wagner wouldn't have objected to the projection of film on to the scenery-as I've seen in a number of productions - if it had been available to him.
What I object to is when stage designers, producers and all the extra-musical crew take over to such an extent that the original conception of the work as a dramatic presentation is barely recognisable and results in such absurdities as the gods of Valhalla striding about in dinner-jackets and twin set and pearls while carrying spears and other items from the dawn of time about their persons. I have a dvd of a really rather good, traditional-style Polish production of Szymanowski's Hagith which shows however, in one scene a character entering in a modern wheelchair and, in another, somebody lighting a cigarette. I racked my brains to try to figure out what this could mean in the context of a centuries-old setting but the only explanation I could come up with is that, maybe, Szymanowski ruined his health by heavy smoking and needed to be conveyed in a wheelchair at the end of his life ! And this is one of the main troubles with these re-stagings/re-interpretations....they distract you from what should be the main business in hand of giving your full attention to the work of the composer/librettist or, at another level, the artists' interpretation. It's annoying enough when such treatment is given to a well-known piece by Verdi or Wagner but when something little-known like Schumann's Genoveva is subject to it, it's infuriating.
Previous Message
Just to put my quoted remarks in context a little.
1. When I wrote the cited paragraphs, I was writing about changes "in the last seven decades," i.e. since the late 1950s (when I began operagoing). Whether these changes have continued to progress in the last 20-25 years I couldn't say.
2. I was speaking about "historically informed stagings (i.e., stagings in the manner that the composer would have envisaged)." At least as used in MWI reviews, "traditional" tends to be a broader term, encompassing just about anything in period costume.
Compare the recent Joyce DiDonato Covent Garden Massenet Cendrillon with the 1970s Canadian telecast with Frederica von Stade. Both have been called "traditional," but one ventures much further from anything Massenet would have anticipated than the other.
Or consider the 2017 revival of Karajan's 1967 Salzburg Easter Walküre . The sets and costumes are exactly the same, but the stage action is very different, and much further from Wagner's script (not that Karajan had adhered minutely to it in the first place!).
Jeffrey's comments are, as always, fascinating, and raise all kinds of thoughts. I don't know how true this is, but I've often seen it said that older operagoers tend to prefer historically informed stagings, whereas younger ones are more likely to be attracted by contemporary Regietheater. (Of course there are exceptions in both directions.)
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Ralph Moore on July 10, 2023, 10:26 am, in reply to "Opera in decline ?"
I could not agree more. I, too, recall the wonderful naturalistic sets for the ENO's Werther and Mary Stuart with Janet Baker, but I am by no means opposed to inventive and even futuristic settings as long as they do not the confound or confuse the composer's clear intentions but so much Regietheater is vapid, puerile and essentially boring in its oh-so-predictable fixation with attempting to "shock" and subvert. For me, the only response equating to shock today is when a producer actually honours the composer's vision.
Regarding ticket prices, I could perhaps stretch to buying decent seats but mostly cannot see the point if I am to it there listening to mediocre singing and either grinding my teeth or yawning at the imbecility of the production. However, having asked me if I had any suggestions regarding upcoming performances we might attend, a very generous friend has just bought us tickets for the Rigoletto at the ROH in October: the best seats at £220 - way beyond any normal person's budget.
(Incidentally, Schumann's Genoveva is my candidate for one of the worst operas ever written by a major composer; I don't think you're missing much!)
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"1. Opera (all opera) has declined greatly in popularity, and is now cherished only by a very tiny minority of the population, most of them moribund old fogeys like myself.
2. Historically informed stagings (i.e., stagings in the manner that the composer would have envisaged) have become rarer and rarer, to the point that Regietheater has now almost totally displaced them.
I fully acknowledge, and accept, that "our tastes" have changed in those respects, just as I fully acknowledge, and accept, that Handel's operas and Cherubini's no longer appeal to "our tastes" as they did in their own day." Evan Blackmore.
I have extracted this passage from a post on the thread about Cherubini's Les Abencerages which, from its innocent beginnings about a recent recording of the opera just growed like Topsy, in order to invite comments from others who either agree or disagree with Evan's views.
Along with most of the rest of us I feel sure that opera companies are "Feeling the pinch" and have responded by reducing the repertoire to a handful of popular works in shoestring-budget productions while expecting the public to stomach ever-increasing ticket prices.
In the 70s and 80s I was a regular opera-goer at both Covent Garden and ENO, the latter company producing such relative rarities as Smetana's Dalibor, Darghomisky's Stone Guest, Janacek's Makropoulos Case and Weber's Euryanthe. There were also productions of contemporary works such as Iain Hamilton's Royal Hunt of the Sun, David Blake's Toussaint, Henze's Bassarids and Ginastera's Bomarzo that I remember. I also recall some very elaborate and glamorous productions like Strauss' Salome, and Massenet's Werther, the latter starring Janet Baker. Dame Janet also appeared in the title role in Donizetti's Maria Stuarda.
I haven't been able to afford tickets to go to the Garden for many years (the last time I went there was courtesy of a friend who wanted a companion to see The Ring with....luckily he was able to afford reasonably comfortable seats! ) but on the few occasions I've been to ENO in recent years I have been extremely disappointed either with the standard of performance - Porgy and Bess with some principal singers who were barely of local music festival standard (although a few were very good indeed , especially the man who played Crown)- or of inappropriate or/and ineffably silly stagings such as The Queen of Spades where I remember, amongst other horrors, one scene being performed against a pile of old wooden chairs in the centre of the stage....why ??? Is it any wonder that people don't want to go out of their way to watch such things when they can buy cds and envisage the works much more appropriately in their mind's eye ? I would add that a smaller company like Holland Park opera put on a much more traditional production of Mascagni's Isabeau which shows what can be done if the will and imagination is there.
DVDs , too, ought to be issued with trigger warnings. Recently I considered buying a filmed production of Schumann's rarely-performed Genoveva until I saw some stills from it which appeared to be set in a whitewashed broom cupboard.
I wonder if , as Evan's post states, that tastes have changed in these respects. The last time I ventured abroad was before covid and saw a completely traditional production of Tosca in Budapest. The house was packed and the performance was very good. The best production I saw at ENO in recent years was of Prince Igor presented by a travelling company with traditional sets and costumes. I suppose what I'm attempting to say, amongst all this rambling, is that the problem with opera nowadays is not opera itself but the way it's presented.
I know that Handel's operas, in spite of some splendid music they contain, appear very stilted and need some updating with a bit of flesh on show and episodes of knockabout comedy (as in the dvd of Julius Caesar that I have) to make them "Go" but anything from Mozart onwards can , and in my opinion SHOULD be done, without deviating too much from the intentions of the original creators. Perhaps if we got back to that, opera might return to the popularity it enjoyed forty years ago.
Quite. I might mention that, in the last couple of years, I have enjoyed the concert performances of some rarely-performed operas such as Puccini's Edgar and Tchaikovsky's Oprichnik (with English translations of libretti shown on an electronic display) that have been given at Cadogan Hall. The course of the action is easy to follow and the music and its performance can be concentrated on without the distraction of incongruous images (courtesy of some trendy producer who thinks he/she understands the work better than the original creators) being presented to the eye. What is regrettable in such latter cases is that the quality of the musical performance is often (although there are exceptions) of a very acceptable or even high standard.
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Regarding ticket prices, I could perhaps stretch to buying decent seats but mostly cannot see the point if I am to it there listening to mediocre singing and either grinding my teeth or yawning at the imbecility of the production.
I would like to thank Lee Denham for his informative and occcasionally amusing review of the 2019 production of Turandot from Liceu that has brought me to this page. At first I thought Mr Denham was one of those intolerant writers who cannot stomach any deviation from the written word, but then I noted in his (very comprehensive survey) of the opera how enthusiastic he was about Liceu’s previous production of this opera in which Turandot actually stabs herself at the end, so maybe not. However perhaps in 2022 they went too far. Evan Blackmore’s interesting comments does raise an fair point about younger audiences – yet these are the very ‘youngsters’ who have a fascination with realistic portrayals of dungeons and dragons, dwarves and elves featured in Netflix/Disney blockbusters such as Games of Thrones, as well as the Lord of the Rings, so I am not so sure if it is true.
Previous Message
Quite. I might mention that, in the last couple of years, I have enjoyed the concert performances of some rarely-performed operas such as Puccini's Edgar and Tchaikovsky's Oprichnik (with English translations of libretti shown on an electronic display) that have been given at Cadogan Hall. The course of the action is easy to follow and the music and its performance can be concentrated on without the distraction of incongruous images (courtesy of some trendy producer who thinks he/she understands the work better than the original creators) being presented to the eye. What is regrettable in such latter cases is that the quality of the musical performance is often (although there are exceptions) of a very acceptable or even high standard.
Previous Message
Regarding ticket prices, I could perhaps stretch to buying decent seats but mostly cannot see the point if I am to it there listening to mediocre singing and either grinding my teeth or yawning at the imbecility of the production.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Hendrik Wagenaar on August 2, 2023, 10:51 am, in reply to "Re: Opera in decline ?"
I don’t know if opera is in decline. In terms of numbers we would need long-term surveys of different opera houses. In terms of great contemporary opera, the verdict is obvious. (Although I saw an impressive performance of Weinberg's The Idiot in Vienna this season. Qua opera flawed, but nevertheless gripping, impressive. Ticket prices: it is still difficult to get affordable tickets for the Staatsoper, but perhaps that venerable institution is an exception to the rule. The bugbear to my mind is staging. Not only do we pay high prices to sit through often mediocre singing, as Ralph Moore, right says, but also to endure spectacularly failing stagings. Failing in the sense that they distort or even pervert the intentions of the composer. Two example: a Meistersinger in Linz, last March. Musically not bad, decent, although not great singing, and the venerable satisfying Brucker Orchester Linz under Markus Poschner. But the staging. The action was situated in a young girl’s bedroom, teddybear and all. At later stages the action shifted to a kind of neon-lit barn, and then again to a cavernous pinball hall with 15 pinball machines on stage each with the name of great opera composer on it, and the singers busily working the machines. (it’s a singing context, remember). What always puzzles me is that no one in the run up to the premier, doesn’t pull the plug on such (expensive) nonsense. Exhibit 2: Lulu in the Theater a.d. Wien, this June. This was a failure with more serious intentions. The director was a the Spanish dance choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas. True to her vocation, she wheeled out a whole company of dancers on stage that literally took over the action. The singers had to find their way in between the dancers. That included a contortionist who tied herself into knots throughout the opera. (maybe a symbol of the situation of the protagonists?) A friend of mine, who was unfamiliar with the opera, said afterwards that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the opera was about. Sadly, or fortunately, musically the performance was superb, both the singing and the orchestra. I closed my eyes at some point. Lulu doesn’t need much. The interactions are shocking enough by themselves and don’t need any amplification or embellishment. I conclude that in every season you are lucky when you have one or at most two performances where everything works and the magic of opera takes off and transports you to another world. (This year it was the Lohengrin in the Staatsoper - Nina Stemme, Camilla Nylund, Piotr Beczalas and Tomasz Konieczny, under the unexpectedly magnificent baton of Omer Meir Wellber. I have long reached the point that I prefer concertante to staged operas. I can better concentrate on the singing and the music, and it’s more affordable. But nothing beats the experience of a staged opera where everything comes together.
My thanks to Hendrik and the previous contributors for their thoughts and examples of how the tyranny of Regietheater is rendering the art form jejune to cognoscenti and incomprehensible to tyros.
I question a mindset which starts from the inviolable principle that, come what may, the last thing a production must do is actually adhere to the vision and wishes of the librettist and composer. In, for example, the world of Wagner, as Ned points out, is there not already fascination and fantasy enough in the imaginative representation of dragons, dwarves, spells, magic potions, castles, forests and battlefields without the necessity of setting the tale in a shopping mall or a psychiatric ward with everyone dressed in boiler suits?
The really innovative and striking move would be to return to the original and render it with all the resources of a modern theatre - as long as the opera house which dared to do this was prepared to heed the response of its opera-going public instead of a tiny circle of chattering class critics, who would no doubt waste no time pouring scorn upon such reactionary traditionalism.
Previous Message
I don’t know if opera is in decline. In terms of numbers we would need long-term surveys of different opera houses. In terms of great contemporary opera, the verdict is obvious. (Although I saw an impressive performance of Weinberg's The Idiot in Vienna this season. Qua opera flawed, but nevertheless gripping, impressive. Ticket prices: it is still difficult to get affordable tickets for the Staatsoper, but perhaps that venerable institution is an exception to the rule. The bugbear to my mind is staging. Not only do we pay high prices to sit through often mediocre singing, as Ralph Moore, right says, but also to endure spectacularly failing stagings. Failing in the sense that they distort or even pervert the intentions of the composer. Two example: a Meistersinger in Linz, last March. Musically not bad, decent, although not great singing, and the venerable satisfying Brucker Orchester Linz under Markus Poschner. But the staging. The action was situated in a young girl’s bedroom, teddybear and all. At later stages the action shifted to a kind of neon-lit barn, and then again to a cavernous pinball hall with 15 pinball machines on stage each with the name of great opera composer on it, and the singers busily working the machines. (it’s a singing context, remember). What always puzzles me is that no one in the run up to the premier, doesn’t pull the plug on such (expensive) nonsense. Exhibit 2: Lulu in the Theater a.d. Wien, this June. This was a failure with more serious intentions. The director was a the Spanish dance choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas. True to her vocation, she wheeled out a whole company of dancers on stage that literally took over the action. The singers had to find their way in between the dancers. That included a contortionist who tied herself into knots throughout the opera. (maybe a symbol of the situation of the protagonists?) A friend of mine, who was unfamiliar with the opera, said afterwards that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the opera was about. Sadly, or fortunately, musically the performance was superb, both the singing and the orchestra. I closed my eyes at some point. Lulu doesn’t need much. The interactions are shocking enough by themselves and don’t need any amplification or embellishment. I conclude that in every season you are lucky when you have one or at most two performances where everything works and the magic of opera takes off and transports you to another world. (This year it was the Lohengrin in the Staatsoper - Nina Stemme, Camilla Nylund, Piotr Beczalas and Tomasz Konieczny, under the unexpectedly magnificent baton of Omer Meir Wellber. I have long reached the point that I prefer concertante to staged operas. I can better concentrate on the singing and the music, and it’s more affordable. But nothing beats the experience of a staged opera where everything comes together.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Jeffrey Lague on October 13, 2023, 9:03 pm, in reply to "Re: Opera in decline ?"
And now the rot spreads to the world of ballet. I understand that a Scottish ballet company is mounting a production of Prokofiev's Cinderella in which the principal role is to be danced by a male, so the two ugly sisters are now to be joined by an ugly Cinderella. The prospect of "Her" clumping around in size eleven glass slippers borders on the alarming. Somehow the magic and glamour of the piece seems in danger of being completely lost in this production.
What purpose does it serve to have the role danced by someone of the opposite sex to the role as envisaged by the ballet's original creators, and why aren't ballerinas objecting to one of their prize roles being misappropriated ?
Previous Message
My thanks to Hendrik and the previous contributors for their thoughts and examples of how the tyranny of Regietheater is rendering the art form jejune to cognoscenti and incomprehensible to tyros.
I question a mindset which starts from the inviolable principle that, come what may, the last thing a production must do is actually adhere to the vision and wishes of the librettist and composer. In, for example, the world of Wagner, as Ned points out, is there not already fascination and fantasy enough in the imaginative representation of dragons, dwarves, spells, magic potions, castles, forests and battlefields without the necessity of setting the tale in a shopping mall or a psychiatric ward with everyone dressed in boiler suits?
The really innovative and striking move would be to return to the original and render it with all the resources of a modern theatre - as long as the opera house which dared to do this was prepared to heed the response of its opera-going public instead of a tiny circle of chattering class critics, who would no doubt waste no time pouring scorn upon such reactionary traditionalism.
Previous Message
I don’t know if opera is in decline. In terms of numbers we would need long-term surveys of different opera houses. In terms of great contemporary opera, the verdict is obvious. (Although I saw an impressive performance of Weinberg's The Idiot in Vienna this season. Qua opera flawed, but nevertheless gripping, impressive. Ticket prices: it is still difficult to get affordable tickets for the Staatsoper, but perhaps that venerable institution is an exception to the rule. The bugbear to my mind is staging. Not only do we pay high prices to sit through often mediocre singing, as Ralph Moore, right says, but also to endure spectacularly failing stagings. Failing in the sense that they distort or even pervert the intentions of the composer. Two example: a Meistersinger in Linz, last March. Musically not bad, decent, although not great singing, and the venerable satisfying Brucker Orchester Linz under Markus Poschner. But the staging. The action was situated in a young girl’s bedroom, teddybear and all. At later stages the action shifted to a kind of neon-lit barn, and then again to a cavernous pinball hall with 15 pinball machines on stage each with the name of great opera composer on it, and the singers busily working the machines. (it’s a singing context, remember). What always puzzles me is that no one in the run up to the premier, doesn’t pull the plug on such (expensive) nonsense. Exhibit 2: Lulu in the Theater a.d. Wien, this June. This was a failure with more serious intentions. The director was a the Spanish dance choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas. True to her vocation, she wheeled out a whole company of dancers on stage that literally took over the action. The singers had to find their way in between the dancers. That included a contortionist who tied herself into knots throughout the opera. (maybe a symbol of the situation of the protagonists?) A friend of mine, who was unfamiliar with the opera, said afterwards that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the opera was about. Sadly, or fortunately, musically the performance was superb, both the singing and the orchestra. I closed my eyes at some point. Lulu doesn’t need much. The interactions are shocking enough by themselves and don’t need any amplification or embellishment. I conclude that in every season you are lucky when you have one or at most two performances where everything works and the magic of opera takes off and transports you to another world. (This year it was the Lohengrin in the Staatsoper - Nina Stemme, Camilla Nylund, Piotr Beczalas and Tomasz Konieczny, under the unexpectedly magnificent baton of Omer Meir Wellber. I have long reached the point that I prefer concertante to staged operas. I can better concentrate on the singing and the music, and it’s more affordable. But nothing beats the experience of a staged opera where everything comes together.
A possible reason that ballerinas aren’t objecting to losing the role of Cinderella is that they will be gaining what is traditionally the chief male role of the ballet: the Prince will become a Princess. Also in ballet there is no shortage of wonderful roles for women.
Incidentally, there is at least one case of a creative artist not objecting to the sex of one his major characters being changed. I am thinking of Sondheim’s response to changing Bobby to a woman in the case of a London production of his musical “Company”.
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And now the rot spreads to the world of ballet. I understand that a Scottish ballet company is mounting a production of Prokofiev's Cinderella in which the principal role is to be danced by a male, so the two ugly sisters are now to be joined by an ugly Cinderella. The prospect of "Her" clumping around in size eleven glass slippers borders on the alarming. Somehow the magic and glamour of the piece seems in danger of being completely lost in this production.
What purpose does it serve to have the role danced by someone of the opposite sex to the role as envisaged by the ballet's original creators, and why aren't ballerinas objecting to one of their prize roles being misappropriated ?
Previous Message
My thanks to Hendrik and the previous contributors for their thoughts and examples of how the tyranny of Regietheater is rendering the art form jejune to cognoscenti and incomprehensible to tyros.
I question a mindset which starts from the inviolable principle that, come what may, the last thing a production must do is actually adhere to the vision and wishes of the librettist and composer. In, for example, the world of Wagner, as Ned points out, is there not already fascination and fantasy enough in the imaginative representation of dragons, dwarves, spells, magic potions, castles, forests and battlefields without the necessity of setting the tale in a shopping mall or a psychiatric ward with everyone dressed in boiler suits?
The really innovative and striking move would be to return to the original and render it with all the resources of a modern theatre - as long as the opera house which dared to do this was prepared to heed the response of its opera-going public instead of a tiny circle of chattering class critics, who would no doubt waste no time pouring scorn upon such reactionary traditionalism.
Previous Message
I don’t know if opera is in decline. In terms of numbers we would need long-term surveys of different opera houses. In terms of great contemporary opera, the verdict is obvious. (Although I saw an impressive performance of Weinberg's The Idiot in Vienna this season. Qua opera flawed, but nevertheless gripping, impressive. Ticket prices: it is still difficult to get affordable tickets for the Staatsoper, but perhaps that venerable institution is an exception to the rule. The bugbear to my mind is staging. Not only do we pay high prices to sit through often mediocre singing, as Ralph Moore, right says, but also to endure spectacularly failing stagings. Failing in the sense that they distort or even pervert the intentions of the composer. Two example: a Meistersinger in Linz, last March. Musically not bad, decent, although not great singing, and the venerable satisfying Brucker Orchester Linz under Markus Poschner. But the staging. The action was situated in a young girl’s bedroom, teddybear and all. At later stages the action shifted to a kind of neon-lit barn, and then again to a cavernous pinball hall with 15 pinball machines on stage each with the name of great opera composer on it, and the singers busily working the machines. (it’s a singing context, remember). What always puzzles me is that no one in the run up to the premier, doesn’t pull the plug on such (expensive) nonsense. Exhibit 2: Lulu in the Theater a.d. Wien, this June. This was a failure with more serious intentions. The director was a the Spanish dance choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas. True to her vocation, she wheeled out a whole company of dancers on stage that literally took over the action. The singers had to find their way in between the dancers. That included a contortionist who tied herself into knots throughout the opera. (maybe a symbol of the situation of the protagonists?) A friend of mine, who was unfamiliar with the opera, said afterwards that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the opera was about. Sadly, or fortunately, musically the performance was superb, both the singing and the orchestra. I closed my eyes at some point. Lulu doesn’t need much. The interactions are shocking enough by themselves and don’t need any amplification or embellishment. I conclude that in every season you are lucky when you have one or at most two performances where everything works and the magic of opera takes off and transports you to another world. (This year it was the Lohengrin in the Staatsoper - Nina Stemme, Camilla Nylund, Piotr Beczalas and Tomasz Konieczny, under the unexpectedly magnificent baton of Omer Meir Wellber. I have long reached the point that I prefer concertante to staged operas. I can better concentrate on the singing and the music, and it’s more affordable. But nothing beats the experience of a staged opera where everything comes together.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Ralph Moore on November 9, 2023, 10:17 am, in reply to "Re: Opera in decline ?"
I am no ballet expert, but surely the choreography of major roles in classical ballet has been designed to suit specifically male and female physical attributes and characteristics so they are by no means automatically interchangeable: "athletic" leaps, turns, lifts, partnership skills for men; grace, poise and "stillness" for women who dance on point - even the shoes are differently designed for this purpose and men's additional weight is an issue if they attempt this. The point of the "travesty" roles whereby a dancer impersonates a character of the opposite sex, usually for comedic purposes, goes out the window, too. Of course, such an observation will immediately be classified as "gender stereotyping" and it is true that some of these qualities can be common to both sexes but for me this is all part of a general movement to blur all sexual distinction. Yes; Sarah Bernhardt played Hamlet, Glenda Jackson did Lear - but I doubt whether seeing Nureyev dance the Sugar Plum Fairy or Fonteyn as Romeo would have been that much of a triumph or treat.
Previous Message
A possible reason that ballerinas aren’t objecting to losing the role of Cinderella is that they will be gaining what is traditionally the chief male role of the ballet: the Prince will become a Princess. Also in ballet there is no shortage of wonderful roles for women.
Incidentally, there is at least one case of a creative artist not objecting to the sex of one his major characters being changed. I am thinking of Sondheim’s response to changing Bobby to a woman in the case of a London production of his musical “Company”.
Previous Message
And now the rot spreads to the world of ballet. I understand that a Scottish ballet company is mounting a production of Prokofiev's Cinderella in which the principal role is to be danced by a male, so the two ugly sisters are now to be joined by an ugly Cinderella. The prospect of "Her" clumping around in size eleven glass slippers borders on the alarming. Somehow the magic and glamour of the piece seems in danger of being completely lost in this production.
What purpose does it serve to have the role danced by someone of the opposite sex to the role as envisaged by the ballet's original creators, and why aren't ballerinas objecting to one of their prize roles being misappropriated ?
Previous Message
My thanks to Hendrik and the previous contributors for their thoughts and examples of how the tyranny of Regietheater is rendering the art form jejune to cognoscenti and incomprehensible to tyros.
I question a mindset which starts from the inviolable principle that, come what may, the last thing a production must do is actually adhere to the vision and wishes of the librettist and composer. In, for example, the world of Wagner, as Ned points out, is there not already fascination and fantasy enough in the imaginative representation of dragons, dwarves, spells, magic potions, castles, forests and battlefields without the necessity of setting the tale in a shopping mall or a psychiatric ward with everyone dressed in boiler suits?
The really innovative and striking move would be to return to the original and render it with all the resources of a modern theatre - as long as the opera house which dared to do this was prepared to heed the response of its opera-going public instead of a tiny circle of chattering class critics, who would no doubt waste no time pouring scorn upon such reactionary traditionalism.
Previous Message
I don’t know if opera is in decline. In terms of numbers we would need long-term surveys of different opera houses. In terms of great contemporary opera, the verdict is obvious. (Although I saw an impressive performance of Weinberg's The Idiot in Vienna this season. Qua opera flawed, but nevertheless gripping, impressive. Ticket prices: it is still difficult to get affordable tickets for the Staatsoper, but perhaps that venerable institution is an exception to the rule. The bugbear to my mind is staging. Not only do we pay high prices to sit through often mediocre singing, as Ralph Moore, right says, but also to endure spectacularly failing stagings. Failing in the sense that they distort or even pervert the intentions of the composer. Two example: a Meistersinger in Linz, last March. Musically not bad, decent, although not great singing, and the venerable satisfying Brucker Orchester Linz under Markus Poschner. But the staging. The action was situated in a young girl’s bedroom, teddybear and all. At later stages the action shifted to a kind of neon-lit barn, and then again to a cavernous pinball hall with 15 pinball machines on stage each with the name of great opera composer on it, and the singers busily working the machines. (it’s a singing context, remember). What always puzzles me is that no one in the run up to the premier, doesn’t pull the plug on such (expensive) nonsense. Exhibit 2: Lulu in the Theater a.d. Wien, this June. This was a failure with more serious intentions. The director was a the Spanish dance choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas. True to her vocation, she wheeled out a whole company of dancers on stage that literally took over the action. The singers had to find their way in between the dancers. That included a contortionist who tied herself into knots throughout the opera. (maybe a symbol of the situation of the protagonists?) A friend of mine, who was unfamiliar with the opera, said afterwards that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the opera was about. Sadly, or fortunately, musically the performance was superb, both the singing and the orchestra. I closed my eyes at some point. Lulu doesn’t need much. The interactions are shocking enough by themselves and don’t need any amplification or embellishment. I conclude that in every season you are lucky when you have one or at most two performances where everything works and the magic of opera takes off and transports you to another world. (This year it was the Lohengrin in the Staatsoper - Nina Stemme, Camilla Nylund, Piotr Beczalas and Tomasz Konieczny, under the unexpectedly magnificent baton of Omer Meir Wellber. I have long reached the point that I prefer concertante to staged operas. I can better concentrate on the singing and the music, and it’s more affordable. But nothing beats the experience of a staged opera where everything comes together.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Alex Segal on November 9, 2023, 12:44 pm, in reply to "Re: Opera in decline ?"
Do you think that what I said implies that I believe that the choreography of major roles in classical ballet has not been designed to suit specifically male and female physical characteristics? I did not mean to imply any such thing. I can only apologise for expressing myself so poorly.
(Incidentally I am sure that Scottish Ballet will not use the original choreography. But it had been common to not use the original choreography for a long time. Think of Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet. In saying this, I am not endorsing what MacMillan did.)
Previous Message
I am no ballet expert, but surely the choreography of major roles in classical ballet has been designed to suit specifically male and female physical attributes and characteristics so they are by no means automatically interchangeable: "athletic" leaps, turns, lifts, partnership skills for men; grace, poise and "stillness" for women who dance on point - even the shoes are differently designed for this purpose and men's additional weight is an issue if they attempt this. The point of the "travesty" roles whereby a dancer impersonates a character of the opposite sex, usually for comedic purposes, goes out the window, too. Of course, such an observation will immediately be classified as "gender stereotyping" and it is true that some of these qualities can be common to both sexes but for me this is all part of a general movement to blur all sexual distinction. Yes; Sarah Bernhardt played Hamlet, Glenda Jackson did Lear - but I doubt whether seeing Nureyev dance the Sugar Plum Fairy or Fonteyn as Romeo would have been that much of a triumph or treat.
Previous Message
A possible reason that ballerinas aren’t objecting to losing the role of Cinderella is that they will be gaining what is traditionally the chief male role of the ballet: the Prince will become a Princess. Also in ballet there is no shortage of wonderful roles for women.
Incidentally, there is at least one case of a creative artist not objecting to the sex of one his major characters being changed. I am thinking of Sondheim’s response to changing Bobby to a woman in the case of a London production of his musical “Company”.
Previous Message
And now the rot spreads to the world of ballet. I understand that a Scottish ballet company is mounting a production of Prokofiev's Cinderella in which the principal role is to be danced by a male, so the two ugly sisters are now to be joined by an ugly Cinderella. The prospect of "Her" clumping around in size eleven glass slippers borders on the alarming. Somehow the magic and glamour of the piece seems in danger of being completely lost in this production.
What purpose does it serve to have the role danced by someone of the opposite sex to the role as envisaged by the ballet's original creators, and why aren't ballerinas objecting to one of their prize roles being misappropriated ?
Previous Message
My thanks to Hendrik and the previous contributors for their thoughts and examples of how the tyranny of Regietheater is rendering the art form jejune to cognoscenti and incomprehensible to tyros.
I question a mindset which starts from the inviolable principle that, come what may, the last thing a production must do is actually adhere to the vision and wishes of the librettist and composer. In, for example, the world of Wagner, as Ned points out, is there not already fascination and fantasy enough in the imaginative representation of dragons, dwarves, spells, magic potions, castles, forests and battlefields without the necessity of setting the tale in a shopping mall or a psychiatric ward with everyone dressed in boiler suits?
The really innovative and striking move would be to return to the original and render it with all the resources of a modern theatre - as long as the opera house which dared to do this was prepared to heed the response of its opera-going public instead of a tiny circle of chattering class critics, who would no doubt waste no time pouring scorn upon such reactionary traditionalism.
Previous Message
I don’t know if opera is in decline. In terms of numbers we would need long-term surveys of different opera houses. In terms of great contemporary opera, the verdict is obvious. (Although I saw an impressive performance of Weinberg's The Idiot in Vienna this season. Qua opera flawed, but nevertheless gripping, impressive. Ticket prices: it is still difficult to get affordable tickets for the Staatsoper, but perhaps that venerable institution is an exception to the rule. The bugbear to my mind is staging. Not only do we pay high prices to sit through often mediocre singing, as Ralph Moore, right says, but also to endure spectacularly failing stagings. Failing in the sense that they distort or even pervert the intentions of the composer. Two example: a Meistersinger in Linz, last March. Musically not bad, decent, although not great singing, and the venerable satisfying Brucker Orchester Linz under Markus Poschner. But the staging. The action was situated in a young girl’s bedroom, teddybear and all. At later stages the action shifted to a kind of neon-lit barn, and then again to a cavernous pinball hall with 15 pinball machines on stage each with the name of great opera composer on it, and the singers busily working the machines. (it’s a singing context, remember). What always puzzles me is that no one in the run up to the premier, doesn’t pull the plug on such (expensive) nonsense. Exhibit 2: Lulu in the Theater a.d. Wien, this June. This was a failure with more serious intentions. The director was a the Spanish dance choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas. True to her vocation, she wheeled out a whole company of dancers on stage that literally took over the action. The singers had to find their way in between the dancers. That included a contortionist who tied herself into knots throughout the opera. (maybe a symbol of the situation of the protagonists?) A friend of mine, who was unfamiliar with the opera, said afterwards that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the opera was about. Sadly, or fortunately, musically the performance was superb, both the singing and the orchestra. I closed my eyes at some point. Lulu doesn’t need much. The interactions are shocking enough by themselves and don’t need any amplification or embellishment. I conclude that in every season you are lucky when you have one or at most two performances where everything works and the magic of opera takes off and transports you to another world. (This year it was the Lohengrin in the Staatsoper - Nina Stemme, Camilla Nylund, Piotr Beczalas and Tomasz Konieczny, under the unexpectedly magnificent baton of Omer Meir Wellber. I have long reached the point that I prefer concertante to staged operas. I can better concentrate on the singing and the music, and it’s more affordable. But nothing beats the experience of a staged opera where everything comes together.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Ralph Moore on November 9, 2023, 2:46 pm, in reply to "Re: Opera in decline ?"
No; sorry, Alex - that was just my response to a trend which I suspect will be hard to resist, whatever you or I think - unless audiences stop attending such shenanigans!
Previous Message
Do you think that what I said implies that I believe that the choreography of major roles in classical ballet has not been designed to suit specifically male and female physical characteristics? I did not mean to imply any such thing. I can only apologise for expressing myself so poorly.
(Incidentally I am sure that Scottish Ballet will not use the original choreography. But it had been common to not use the original choreography for a long time. Think of Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet. In saying this, I am not endorsing what MacMillan did.)
Previous Message
I am no ballet expert, but surely the choreography of major roles in classical ballet has been designed to suit specifically male and female physical attributes and characteristics so they are by no means automatically interchangeable: "athletic" leaps, turns, lifts, partnership skills for men; grace, poise and "stillness" for women who dance on point - even the shoes are differently designed for this purpose and men's additional weight is an issue if they attempt this. The point of the "travesty" roles whereby a dancer impersonates a character of the opposite sex, usually for comedic purposes, goes out the window, too. Of course, such an observation will immediately be classified as "gender stereotyping" and it is true that some of these qualities can be common to both sexes but for me this is all part of a general movement to blur all sexual distinction. Yes; Sarah Bernhardt played Hamlet, Glenda Jackson did Lear - but I doubt whether seeing Nureyev dance the Sugar Plum Fairy or Fonteyn as Romeo would have been that much of a triumph or treat.
Previous Message
A possible reason that ballerinas aren’t objecting to losing the role of Cinderella is that they will be gaining what is traditionally the chief male role of the ballet: the Prince will become a Princess. Also in ballet there is no shortage of wonderful roles for women.
Incidentally, there is at least one case of a creative artist not objecting to the sex of one his major characters being changed. I am thinking of Sondheim’s response to changing Bobby to a woman in the case of a London production of his musical “Company”.
Previous Message
And now the rot spreads to the world of ballet. I understand that a Scottish ballet company is mounting a production of Prokofiev's Cinderella in which the principal role is to be danced by a male, so the two ugly sisters are now to be joined by an ugly Cinderella. The prospect of "Her" clumping around in size eleven glass slippers borders on the alarming. Somehow the magic and glamour of the piece seems in danger of being completely lost in this production.
What purpose does it serve to have the role danced by someone of the opposite sex to the role as envisaged by the ballet's original creators, and why aren't ballerinas objecting to one of their prize roles being misappropriated ?
Previous Message
My thanks to Hendrik and the previous contributors for their thoughts and examples of how the tyranny of Regietheater is rendering the art form jejune to cognoscenti and incomprehensible to tyros.
I question a mindset which starts from the inviolable principle that, come what may, the last thing a production must do is actually adhere to the vision and wishes of the librettist and composer. In, for example, the world of Wagner, as Ned points out, is there not already fascination and fantasy enough in the imaginative representation of dragons, dwarves, spells, magic potions, castles, forests and battlefields without the necessity of setting the tale in a shopping mall or a psychiatric ward with everyone dressed in boiler suits?
The really innovative and striking move would be to return to the original and render it with all the resources of a modern theatre - as long as the opera house which dared to do this was prepared to heed the response of its opera-going public instead of a tiny circle of chattering class critics, who would no doubt waste no time pouring scorn upon such reactionary traditionalism.
Previous Message
I don’t know if opera is in decline. In terms of numbers we would need long-term surveys of different opera houses. In terms of great contemporary opera, the verdict is obvious. (Although I saw an impressive performance of Weinberg's The Idiot in Vienna this season. Qua opera flawed, but nevertheless gripping, impressive. Ticket prices: it is still difficult to get affordable tickets for the Staatsoper, but perhaps that venerable institution is an exception to the rule. The bugbear to my mind is staging. Not only do we pay high prices to sit through often mediocre singing, as Ralph Moore, right says, but also to endure spectacularly failing stagings. Failing in the sense that they distort or even pervert the intentions of the composer. Two example: a Meistersinger in Linz, last March. Musically not bad, decent, although not great singing, and the venerable satisfying Brucker Orchester Linz under Markus Poschner. But the staging. The action was situated in a young girl’s bedroom, teddybear and all. At later stages the action shifted to a kind of neon-lit barn, and then again to a cavernous pinball hall with 15 pinball machines on stage each with the name of great opera composer on it, and the singers busily working the machines. (it’s a singing context, remember). What always puzzles me is that no one in the run up to the premier, doesn’t pull the plug on such (expensive) nonsense. Exhibit 2: Lulu in the Theater a.d. Wien, this June. This was a failure with more serious intentions. The director was a the Spanish dance choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas. True to her vocation, she wheeled out a whole company of dancers on stage that literally took over the action. The singers had to find their way in between the dancers. That included a contortionist who tied herself into knots throughout the opera. (maybe a symbol of the situation of the protagonists?) A friend of mine, who was unfamiliar with the opera, said afterwards that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the opera was about. Sadly, or fortunately, musically the performance was superb, both the singing and the orchestra. I closed my eyes at some point. Lulu doesn’t need much. The interactions are shocking enough by themselves and don’t need any amplification or embellishment. I conclude that in every season you are lucky when you have one or at most two performances where everything works and the magic of opera takes off and transports you to another world. (This year it was the Lohengrin in the Staatsoper - Nina Stemme, Camilla Nylund, Piotr Beczalas and Tomasz Konieczny, under the unexpectedly magnificent baton of Omer Meir Wellber. I have long reached the point that I prefer concertante to staged operas. I can better concentrate on the singing and the music, and it’s more affordable. But nothing beats the experience of a staged opera where everything comes together.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Ralph Moore on October 14, 2023, 7:27 am, in reply to "Opera in decline ?"
As one of the regular grumpy old opera buffs on this site, I agree with your every word, Jeffrey, and have little to add. A generous friend of the kind you mention was my host for an excellent"Rigoletto" at Covent Garden last Thursday. The singing ranged between OK (Stefan Pop's Duke) to very good (Pretty Yende surprisingly strong and touching Gilda) to first-rate (Enkhbat's jester) and the sets were really quite striking, beautifully, very sombrely lit, employing huge Titian murals and a lovely freeze-frame tableau of Caravaggio's "Martyrdom of St Michael" in the opening, but the production was marred by excessive violence - the Duke's blinding of Monterone on stage rendered him monstrous, incapable of suggesting the charm that rake must exude - and the usual, superfluous on-stage rumpy-pumpy no modern production can do without. Nonetheless, it was a mostly faithful, valid interpretation and well received. Quite surprising, really - maybe the tide is turning.
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"1. Opera (all opera) has declined greatly in popularity, and is now cherished only by a very tiny minority of the population, most of them moribund old fogeys like myself.
2. Historically informed stagings (i.e., stagings in the manner that the composer would have envisaged) have become rarer and rarer, to the point that Regietheater has now almost totally displaced them.
I fully acknowledge, and accept, that "our tastes" have changed in those respects, just as I fully acknowledge, and accept, that Handel's operas and Cherubini's no longer appeal to "our tastes" as they did in their own day." Evan Blackmore.
I have extracted this passage from a post on the thread about Cherubini's Les Abencerages which, from its innocent beginnings about a recent recording of the opera just growed like Topsy, in order to invite comments from others who either agree or disagree with Evan's views.
Along with most of the rest of us I feel sure that opera companies are "Feeling the pinch" and have responded by reducing the repertoire to a handful of popular works in shoestring-budget productions while expecting the public to stomach ever-increasing ticket prices.
In the 70s and 80s I was a regular opera-goer at both Covent Garden and ENO, the latter company producing such relative rarities as Smetana's Dalibor, Darghomisky's Stone Guest, Janacek's Makropoulos Case and Weber's Euryanthe. There were also productions of contemporary works such as Iain Hamilton's Royal Hunt of the Sun, David Blake's Toussaint, Henze's Bassarids and Ginastera's Bomarzo that I remember. I also recall some very elaborate and glamorous productions like Strauss' Salome, and Massenet's Werther, the latter starring Janet Baker. Dame Janet also appeared in the title role in Donizetti's Maria Stuarda.
I haven't been able to afford tickets to go to the Garden for many years (the last time I went there was courtesy of a friend who wanted a companion to see The Ring with....luckily he was able to afford reasonably comfortable seats! ) but on the few occasions I've been to ENO in recent years I have been extremely disappointed either with the standard of performance - Porgy and Bess with some principal singers who were barely of local music festival standard (although a few were very good indeed , especially the man who played Crown)- or of inappropriate or/and ineffably silly stagings such as The Queen of Spades where I remember, amongst other horrors, one scene being performed against a pile of old wooden chairs in the centre of the stage....why ??? Is it any wonder that people don't want to go out of their way to watch such things when they can buy cds and envisage the works much more appropriately in their mind's eye ? I would add that a smaller company like Holland Park opera put on a much more traditional production of Mascagni's Isabeau which shows what can be done if the will and imagination is there.
DVDs , too, ought to be issued with trigger warnings. Recently I considered buying a filmed production of Schumann's rarely-performed Genoveva until I saw some stills from it which appeared to be set in a whitewashed broom cupboard.
I wonder if , as Evan's post states, that tastes have changed in these respects. The last time I ventured abroad was before covid and saw a completely traditional production of Tosca in Budapest. The house was packed and the performance was very good. The best production I saw at ENO in recent years was of Prince Igor presented by a travelling company with traditional sets and costumes. I suppose what I'm attempting to say, amongst all this rambling, is that the problem with opera nowadays is not opera itself but the way it's presented.
I know that Handel's operas, in spite of some splendid music they contain, appear very stilted and need some updating with a bit of flesh on show and episodes of knockabout comedy (as in the dvd of Julius Caesar that I have) to make them "Go" but anything from Mozart onwards can , and in my opinion SHOULD be done, without deviating too much from the intentions of the original creators. Perhaps if we got back to that, opera might return to the popularity it enjoyed forty years ago.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Paul Corfield Godfrey on October 14, 2023, 12:39 pm, in reply to "Re: Opera in decline ?"
Ralph Moore may care to note that I reviewed the video version of the same production in some detail on this site earlier this year, and made much the same observations on elements in the staging. At least the directorial excesses were not so egregious as to invalidate the whole experience; but it is depressing to think that the same errors of judgement are still being perpetrated in the theatre when they might so easily be obviated in the process of revival. Why are directors so resistant to second thoughts and reconsideration of elements that simply serve to undermine their achievement? Composers and performers regularly revisit their work as a matter of course following experience in the theatre and the concert hall.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Ralph Moore on October 14, 2023, 2:31 pm, in reply to "Re: Opera in decline ?"
I missed PCG's review of the production with a different cast, because I rarely, if ever, watch opera DVDs, but I am glad to see that our responses chime so nearly. Egregious lapses of artistic judgement on the part of the producer should be correctable, indeed; the additions are crass.
This is Dame Judy Dench, interviewed in the Daily Telegraph by Rupert Christiansen today:
.... But although she is adamant that “there is no right way of performing Shakespeare”, she confesses to a nostalgia for the directorial style of her heyday when the likes of Peter Hall, Trevor Nunn and John Barton were at the helm. “All too often these days,” she complains, “people want to twist the play into their version.” She also crisply disapproves of Shakespearean actors who can’t project to the back row of the circle – “if you want to mumble, stay at home.”
It appears that the rot has broken out into other theatrical forms too.
LD
Previous Message
I missed PCG's review of the production with a different cast, because I rarely, if ever, watch opera DVDs, but I am glad to see that our responses chime so nearly. Egregious lapses of artistic judgement on the part of the producer should be correctable, indeed; the additions are crass.
Re: Opera in decline ?
Posted by Nick Barnard on October 16, 2023, 7:05 pm, in reply to "Opera in decline ?"
I'm sure UK members have seen this news but perhaps those away from this country have not;
In case the article is not loadable..... English National Opera plan to cut 19 jobs from the orchestra with the remaining contracts changing from full time to part time posts.... Musical Director Martyn Brabbins has resigned is response to this
Brabbins said; “This is a plan of managed decline, rather than an attempt to rebuild the company and maintain the world-class artistic output for which ENO is rightly famed.
“I urge ACE to reassess this situation and recognise the devastating implications their funding decisions will have on the lives of individual musicians, as well as the reputation of the UK on the international stage.”
Previous Message
"1. Opera (all opera) has declined greatly in popularity, and is now cherished only by a very tiny minority of the population, most of them moribund old fogeys like myself.
2. Historically informed stagings (i.e., stagings in the manner that the composer would have envisaged) have become rarer and rarer, to the point that Regietheater has now almost totally displaced them.
I fully acknowledge, and accept, that "our tastes" have changed in those respects, just as I fully acknowledge, and accept, that Handel's operas and Cherubini's no longer appeal to "our tastes" as they did in their own day." Evan Blackmore.
I have extracted this passage from a post on the thread about Cherubini's Les Abencerages which, from its innocent beginnings about a recent recording of the opera just growed like Topsy, in order to invite comments from others who either agree or disagree with Evan's views.
Along with most of the rest of us I feel sure that opera companies are "Feeling the pinch" and have responded by reducing the repertoire to a handful of popular works in shoestring-budget productions while expecting the public to stomach ever-increasing ticket prices.
In the 70s and 80s I was a regular opera-goer at both Covent Garden and ENO, the latter company producing such relative rarities as Smetana's Dalibor, Darghomisky's Stone Guest, Janacek's Makropoulos Case and Weber's Euryanthe. There were also productions of contemporary works such as Iain Hamilton's Royal Hunt of the Sun, David Blake's Toussaint, Henze's Bassarids and Ginastera's Bomarzo that I remember. I also recall some very elaborate and glamorous productions like Strauss' Salome, and Massenet's Werther, the latter starring Janet Baker. Dame Janet also appeared in the title role in Donizetti's Maria Stuarda.
I haven't been able to afford tickets to go to the Garden for many years (the last time I went there was courtesy of a friend who wanted a companion to see The Ring with....luckily he was able to afford reasonably comfortable seats! ) but on the few occasions I've been to ENO in recent years I have been extremely disappointed either with the standard of performance - Porgy and Bess with some principal singers who were barely of local music festival standard (although a few were very good indeed , especially the man who played Crown)- or of inappropriate or/and ineffably silly stagings such as The Queen of Spades where I remember, amongst other horrors, one scene being performed against a pile of old wooden chairs in the centre of the stage....why ??? Is it any wonder that people don't want to go out of their way to watch such things when they can buy cds and envisage the works much more appropriately in their mind's eye ? I would add that a smaller company like Holland Park opera put on a much more traditional production of Mascagni's Isabeau which shows what can be done if the will and imagination is there.
DVDs , too, ought to be issued with trigger warnings. Recently I considered buying a filmed production of Schumann's rarely-performed Genoveva until I saw some stills from it which appeared to be set in a whitewashed broom cupboard.
I wonder if , as Evan's post states, that tastes have changed in these respects. The last time I ventured abroad was before covid and saw a completely traditional production of Tosca in Budapest. The house was packed and the performance was very good. The best production I saw at ENO in recent years was of Prince Igor presented by a travelling company with traditional sets and costumes. I suppose what I'm attempting to say, amongst all this rambling, is that the problem with opera nowadays is not opera itself but the way it's presented.
I know that Handel's operas, in spite of some splendid music they contain, appear very stilted and need some updating with a bit of flesh on show and episodes of knockabout comedy (as in the dvd of Julius Caesar that I have) to make them "Go" but anything from Mozart onwards can , and in my opinion SHOULD be done, without deviating too much from the intentions of the original creators. Perhaps if we got back to that, opera might return to the popularity it enjoyed forty years ago.