Thinking About People Who Hate Opera
By
Warren Boroson
When
people tell me that they cannot stand opera, I’m sympathetic. “I understand
perfectly,” I say to them.
Most operas, I assure them, are exquisitely
boring. So many operas still in the repertory have just one really good aria,
and some wildly popular diva or divo may insist on singing that particular
opera—perhaps because he or she is achingly bored by singing “Traviata” all the
time. Lauritz Melchior sang Siegfried 10,000 times (or thereabouts). No wonder
he wanted to sing “Otello”! I’ve read that Rosa Ponselle retired early because
the Met wouldn’t revive a particular opera just for her.
Besides which, going to the opera
can be expensive – especially going to the Met in New York City. Plus, many opera
plots are clearly nonsensical, like many Wagner operas, with their dragons and
dwarfs. Even Verdi operas may be musty and fusty. Remember “Il Trovatore”? And
the witch who throws the wrong baby into the fire? I tell people I have days
like that, days when I throw the wrong baby into the fire….
There may be only 20 absolutely wonderful operas,
good from beginning to end, I tell people—and most of these operas are by
Mozart, Verdi, Bizet, Donizetti, Rossini, or Puccini. As for the very worst
opera librettos (not necessarily the music), Michael Zwiebach, a senior editor
at San Francisco Classical Voice, has compiled a list of the bottom ten. Among
them: Puccini’s “Edgar,” Weber’s “Oberon,” Tchaikovsky’s “Maid of Orleans,”
Victor Herbert’s “Natoma,” Franz Shubert’s “Fierrabras,” and Gounod’s “La nonne
sanglante.” (I myself would add “The Death of Klinghoffer.”)
As for people who tell me they cannot abide any operas
at all, I urge them to listen to “La Boheme” (especially the Bjoerling-de los
Angles version, conducted by Sir Thomas Beacham), or “La Traviata” (what
gorgeous melodies!), or “The Marriage of Figaro” (the perfect opera—great
story, great music), or “Carmen.” Nietszche actually told Wagner how much
he admired “Carmen.” Wagner was not
amused.
I’m sympathetic to opera-haters because so many
self-styled opera lovers are phonies. They think that loving opera is a sign of
special sophistication. And great wealth. (Mark Twain, as usual, was an
exception. After visiting Wagner’s opera house in Bayreuth, he commented, “Wagner’s
music is better than it sounds.” He also confessed: “I haven’t heard anything
like it since the orphan asylum burned down.:”
The phonies are the people sitting in the
orchestra who leave before the last act and give their tickets to impoverished standees
(like me). The phonies are the people who deafeningly shout “Bravo!” or “Brava!”
or “Bravi!” at the end of almost any aria. Or who, instead of just applauding,
make strange screeching noises.
I once stood on line to get a drink at the Met—a
drink helps you appreciate any opera immeasurably—when a short arrogant old man
in a white tux walked to the front of the line and got served immediately. The
bartender looked at the man with awe. Probably a member of an exclusive club at
the Met for the very, very rich. I still have fantasies of what I would have
done to the man dressed in white if I were someone like Jack Reacher.
That Met opera singer, Helen Traubel, knew the
score.
One night, after the first act of
an opera, she visited the gallery (she wrote in her autobiography, “St. Louis
Woman,” 1959). And she concluded that less than 10% of the audience was really
enjoying themselves. “Nearly all of them -- students, socialites, tourists,
habitués -- were fonder of Sherry’s bar on the third floor than the
performance. Most of them were snobs. I was convinced then that it was chiefly
snobbery alone that supported the opera house….. The sweeping music and drama
on the stage were simply a background for chitchat and preening, entertainment
for a club for those who felt superior to keep them feeling so.”
During one
Met opening night, she noticed, the first row of the orchestra seats was filled
with beautiful women weighted down with jewelry. At the end of the first act,
almost all of them left. “They had come, been seen, admired, and fulfilled what
was for them the purpose of grand opera. There was really no reason to stay
longer.”
As for
opera itself, she called both the text and the music “too long.” She
recommended that the “creaky plots should be cleaned up. The acting and scenery
should be drastically revised.” (One of her other suggestions, that there be a
translation into colloquial English, has been fulfilled, via subtitles.)…
Helen
Traubel quit the Met and went on to have a successful career singing popular
songs.
Anyway, I once asked a very intelligent woman if she herself liked
opera.
“I
like certain operas a great deal,” she answered with a shrug. “I like people
who attend operas much less.”
A good, thoughtful answer.
Traubel Sings:
Traubel and Durante
Traubel (with Jose Ferrer), “Leg of
Mutton,” by Sigmund Romberg
“Hello, Young Lovers” (introduced by
Jerry Lewis)
Liebestod, Tristan und Isolde, Wagner
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