From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: The Met's "Semiramide"
Originator: news@nimaster
Reply-To: roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig)
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 03:44:28 GMT

In article <1993Jan21.233237.18487@news.columbia.edu> km34@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu (Keith Moulton) writes:

>	It has occured to me that if contemporary opera wants to succeed as
>an art form for everyone, and vitally connected to modern culture, it should
>follow the lead of, and even imitate Hollywood.

The way Andrew Lloyd Webber does?  (Now I've done it...)

>	I am so disappointed that the New York City Opera could not work out
>a deal with the Star Trek folks to put out 'Star Trek-the Opera.'  I forget
>the composer's name, but it's completely finished.  My understanding is there
>was a disagreement over rights/royalties, etc.  Here is an opera that could be
>done in Swahili, and everyone would _still_ know what was going on.

Would they care, though?  Seems to me, part of a Star Trek episode is 
seeing how the plot comes out; the rest is watching the shticks of the 
characters and the actors who portray them.  You'd get neither one in
an opera, which would have new singer/actors (Hampson as Kirk?) and
a libretto (pronounced: spoiler).

>	Now here's an idea:  How about "The Graduate" done as an opera?  (you
>can take my idea if you give me credit:).  No special effects are needed,
>and the characters and situations are immediately discernible to anyone who
>is aware of the significance of the cultural devlopments of the 60s.

Is it operatic material, though?  That is, is it a story worth *re*telling?

>	Of course, there is no need to copy the movies outright; but, at least
>some attempt should be made by librettists to mould their characters and
>situations from contemporary culture.  

We've had that.  Ever see Tippett's _The Ice Break_?  

Besides, B'way does a lot of this.  Again, ALW and Claude-Michel Schoenberg
(I shudder to type it) and so on.  (Of course, the musical version of 
_The Return of Martin Guerre_ is in Hartford right now, hoping to hit
B'way, which just shows to go you.)

>Consider the hit, "Ghosts of
>Versailles" which takes all its material from before 1800!  I liked it very
>much, however, most of my generation doesn't know who Marie Antoinette was
>let alone Beaumarchais.

Well, opera isn't written for most of your generation, and was never written 
for most of *any* generation.  Besides, basing an opera on contemporary 
characters was pretty radical when Mozart did it, and he used Beaumarchais'
play, which is set in a fantasyland Spain.  Very few operas are set in the 
present day of the composer, or anything like it.

>	Opera was not intended to be an "intellectual" art, and the art of

Which is why it was invented by a bunch of intellectuals for the 
delectation of royalty and nobility, with the purpose of reviving the
ancient Greek theatre?

>Hollywood most certainly is not.  

Some of it is.  What about it, though?  Why compare the mass art form
par excellence (movies) to an art form that was never for the masses?

(Actually, I'm not sure what an "intellectual art form" is.)

>It is only because of our distance from
>those opera-producing cultures in time that we have to "do a little homework"
>to enjoy opera to the same extent that those in, say, Mozart's time did.  Of

Or more -- most people who went to the opera in Mozart's day found his
music annoyingly complicated for their purposes, which involved seeing,
being seen, socializing, and hearing their favorite singers.  Sure, they
admired Mozart and all, but the idea of sitting in a darkened hall with
2000 others, and *not talking or eating* for an entire act (or two, as
they often do Figaro) was unthinkable. 

>course, I may be wrong.  Librettos concerning recent historical figures seems
>to me to be in the right direction (Malcolm X, Nixon, etc.), but still a
>cop out.

Well, the world is waiting.  Start writing!

Roger
>
>Keith Moulton.
>