The verdict on Verdi’s still out
First, I have to admit I’m not an opera fan – and that’s not simply because it sounds like Oprah (though that doesn’t help.) No, as with musicals, I’ve never understood that urge to burst out in song while telling a story. For me, the combination of singing and story telling simply doesn’t work.
Apart from the fact that most of these singers can’t act and the type-casting makes for fat, middle-aged women “playing” the part of teenage, tuberculose hookers (as in Verdi’s ‘La Traviata’), I have two major problems with this story-singing.
The first is that, whenever you enter the realm of story, you need that famous ’suspension of disbelief.’ I can do that: I like all kinds of fantastical literature but the moment one of the characters interrupts the procedure of story telling by bellowing out a tune, that suspension is buggered beyond belief.
My second problem is that of articulation. Most of the time, it’s impossible to make out the lyrics – and I don’t find it particularly helpful if a story teller has a speech impediment.
Anyway, this is not about me not being a big opera fan – though the story that inspired these anti-operatic musings has to do with the world of Verdi et al:
Cheaper tickets, top-quality sound, a relaxed vibe: cinema screenings of operas have become a big hit. Quite apart from the material advantage of seats costing substantially less than they do in an opera house, the quality of sound and picture is superbly balanced and focused. You lose the unique excitement of being in the room when it’s happening, but the incidental compensations are considerable – a more informal and comfortable atmosphere, an etiquette which allows for popcorn, less risk of a blocked view, close-ups of the stars at full throttle, and glimpses backstage and informative little interviews with the participants during the intervals.
I foresee much grumbling (and breaking out in disapproving song) about this whole idea by opera buffs. Opera is a bit of an elitist enterprise, so I doubt that these privileged few will be enthusiastic about allowing the popcorn-loving hordes in but I think it’s a brilliant idea, that might actually work perfectly fine.
I’m sure that many sports enthusiasts also were totally against broadcasting football matches live on TV – and I can already hear the same type of arguments against it: That you miss the live atmosphere, that nothing beats actually being there while it happens, that it’s somehow against the whole spirit of the thing to even want to watch it at home without committing yourself to travelling to the designated arena, dressing up for the part in your glad rags, etcetera.
Well, I’ve been to many a football match and I’ve seen a Hell of a lot more of them on TV and while I’ve enjoyed going to the stadium, most of the time, you most definitely see more of the match on TV – with the added advantage that you can turn the bloody thing off when the match turns out to be boring beyond belief.
Anyway, being at a football game and watching it on TV can both be highly enjoyable (or useless.) I would still advise any football fan to at least go to a live match one or two times, just to discover what’s it like in the flesh, so to speak – but it’s a nonsense to suggest that watching football on TV is vastly inferior to going to the stadium.
I’m sure the same will prove to be true when it comes to opera.
Of course, in my case, this will also come with the added advantage that, whenever some fat git threatens to break out in song, I will be able to turn the sound off.
(Hansel and Gretel: Some things should not be allowed to (go) live…)
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