Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to not 'get' Opera?

176 replies

ChaosTrulyReigns · 09/05/2011 22:56

I like all sorts of music, but I really can not learn to appreciate the genre that I perceive as caterwauling.

Blush

Is this a life skill to be able to appreciate all things cultural?

Or am I just too young, and it's something I'll learn to enjoy as I drift slowly to my twiglet years?

Confused

Is there a starter for numpties?

OP posts:
lurkerspeaks · 11/05/2011 18:59

I've loved Opera since childhood and go to a few productions every year in the UK. Obviously had more choice when I lived in London vs. parochial Scotland (although the Edinburgh Festival often gets some 'interesting' stuff).

I saw Aida at the Met last year and it was amazing.... the best production I've seen in the UK recently was Scottish Opera's Barber of Seville with a terribly enthusiastic Barber who looked like he was having a ball.

I'm 32.

Katisha · 11/05/2011 19:12

Wagner is great in the opera house - would happily sit through the Ring - you just have to move into a different time phase, where everything is veery sloow, like with the Ents in Lord of the Rings.
.
However I did get v cross with Lohengrin - just tell her your name FGS.

quirrelquarrel · 11/05/2011 19:55

Maybe try Nina Hagen! :) :)

FionaJT · 11/05/2011 20:08

Another opera fan here - I'm now 38 but have enjoyed it since I was a teenager. I love choral singing, and orchestral music, and theatre, so for me opera is the best of all worlds. In fact, I ended up with a (pre motherhood) career that mostly involved working for opera companies, and I hugely miss being immersed in it the whole time.

Effjay · 11/05/2011 20:22

I struggle with opera, but I love classical music. I just can't get past the style of singing, which I have enormous respect for (the greats just have incredible voices and they never cease to amaze me with what they can do with them). I've really, really tried to like it, but it's just not for me.

I worked for a professional symphony orchestra early in my career that did opera nights, so I've had plenty exposure to it.

I would still always choose a piece of classical music over opera to listen to, but if pushed my first choice opera would be Gluck Orfeo and Euridice, as it doesn't seem to involve the histrionics you get in many other operas!

Trinaluce · 11/05/2011 20:30

YADNBU! In the same way I hope people wouldn't consider me unreasonable to not 'get' rap! (Or, actually, to not like Mozart! This is seen as a CRIME by DH's family, but I just honestly don't enjoy it, it doesn't tick my boxes. The clarinet concerto, maybe, but otherwise... Meh.)

I ADORE Gilbert and Sullivan. Other opera... not so much. I've seen Strauss' Die Fledermaus and really enjoyed it, and I love excerpts of others, but I've tried watching them on Sky Arts and some do grate. I particularly loathe the 'who's in the wardrobe, shall we look in the wardrobe' that someone else mentioned - recit. Urgh. One of the reasons to give G&S a try - very light on recit (at least the earlier ones). I would recommend the Mikado, Pirates of Penzance or HMS Pinafore for a first timer. Easy plots, minimal recit and light on the screeching. Get the D'Oyly Carte recordings - Pinafore and Pirates have the dialogue as well so you get the plot too, and as others have mentioned it's ALL in English so you know what's going on.

I'm 27, for whoever wishes to know.

MissMarjoribanks · 11/05/2011 20:33

I don't think people who don't like Wagner are necessarily closing their ears to it. I love it. I don't love Britten, for example. He's alright, but doesn't do it for me in quite the same way. I can totally understand why someone could feel like that about Wagner.

Dilys - I think you're absolutely right about the visceral response though.

Sieglinde - I like Rheingold. The Rhinemaidens, the curse, the descent into Niebelung, the ascent into Valhalla. It's all there.

springydaffs · 11/05/2011 20:39

oh, I was just going to say that you 'get' it if you see it live and are part of the experience happening in the very room you're in, not on the telly - I can't stand it on the telly - but it doesn't work for everyone eh effjay!

I also don't like grand opera - all that OTT screeching, no thanks - but each to her own and all that. I adore early music and have been to some stunning operas sung by small companies in small-ish theatres - much more intimate.

It took me a long time to come round to opera, mainly because for my O level music we went to see La Traviata and I nearly ate the seat with boredom and pukeitude at the - or what I saw at the time - ridiculous histrionics. (I would probably feel the same now tbh).

Madame Butterfly had me sobbing long after the lights went up though Blush

sue52 · 11/05/2011 20:42

I'm off to see Faustus next week and I'm counting down the days. I'm 59, for what it's worth.

springydaffs · 11/05/2011 20:42

Marjoribanks - I didn't get/like Britten either until I heard a Britten piece in a live concert - completely turned me 180 degrees and love him now. I was there for the Bach and intended to endure the Britten but I was in for a surprise - what a treat!

I loathe the fact that classical music is elitist - it's no good saying it isn't because it is. There's a lot of snobbery in classical music, most often from the audiences.

giveitago · 11/05/2011 20:57

No - it's not a question of getting it or not (that implies some sort of cultural or intellectual superiority) - it's a question of you liking it or not.

End of.

No big deal.

mummymeister · 11/05/2011 20:58

I have always sung classical music in choirs and went to my first opera at 24. It was in English (Eng. National Opera, London) and i think that that really helped with the story line and understanding what was going on. i have been to ones with sur titles but find them too destracting. I enjoy the ones i know more - Don Giovanni, Carmen but willing to try new ones when i see them on. Best experience to start your opera appreciation is to go to ENO to a popular one and then go to Verona and listen to them in the Coliseum. Real horses, huge sets the lot and the Italians really know how to stage and enjoy an event. Aged 48 and three quarters (kids of 8,11 and 13)

giveitago · 11/05/2011 20:59

Oh and I like some- and I do know my music.

FurKnickersAndNoCoat · 11/05/2011 21:00

i have no knowledge at ALL but i know that some opera music (as i said - not knowledgeable so perhaps 'opera music' isn't the right term!) really moves me and some makes me want to stick pencils in my ears. sharpened pencils.

Maybeitsbecause · 11/05/2011 21:01

Italian opera makes me cry.

German opera - hmmm, bearable.

English language opera leaves me cold.

Matsikula · 11/05/2011 21:23

I wouldn't call myself an opera buff, but I've never been to one I didn't enjoy.

Even a Handel one with a woman singing the man's part which bored me rigid for the first half hour I ended up really enjoying - once I got used to the structure of the music I was able to enjoy it.

But what completely sold me was hearing the most comically fat middle aged singer (I could not contain my sniggers when she was literally wheeled on as the beautiful young heroine) fill the whole Royal Opera House with her incredibly lush, liquid voice. No way was this caterwauling, it was amazing and really it just wouldn't have been the same on CD.

I suggest that if you are new to opera, watch it first on a DVD so that you understand the story line (try to get one that's done as a film rather than just a film of a staged production as they really don't work on the telly) and then go and see something in the flesh.

You could also try Radio 3s 'Live from the Metropolitan Opera in New York' which I think is early evening on Saturdays - they do the whole production with a bit of interval chat, usually with people with ridiculous Lloyd Grossman style accents.

I'm 35 by the way and also like hip-hop, folk, soul, indie, soul...

Matsikula · 11/05/2011 21:29

Have just re-read that and I think I should clarify that one of the reasons why I haven't seen one that I didn't enjoy is that I haven't seen that many - maybe ten.

Kniternator · 11/05/2011 21:32

I studied vocal studies at Music College and mostly sang opera, however I am not really a fan.

I agree that you should start off with something like 'The Magic Flute'. Or try listening to 'Suor Angelica' by Puccini, beautiful music, sad story and it is in one act, so super short.

I am 34.

JumpJockey · 11/05/2011 21:39

I love opera, especially the early stuff (Monteverdi, Handel) and Mozart. Though the most recent thing I saw was Pelleas et Melisende by Debussy, and also love the Trojans by Berlioz. Not so hot on the most modern composers but I'm a bit conservative in that sense. I adore the way the emotions of the characters are portrayed through the music.

The 'caterwauling' is a bit of an aquired taste - some singers can be quite over the top, but you need vibrato to fill an opera house with just your own voice - that's where I find 'musical theatre' less impressive as they have microphones, but a singer who can fill a building with the quietest sound or be heard over a full orchestra, that's quite something. If you prefer a more 'straight' sound, try early opera as the bands were much smaller (as were the theatres) so the singers didn't need such a 'big' voice, and performers now are aiming to recreate that style in their productions of these works.

I will admit that a lot of the time it can seem like tosh; the first opera I saw live was Traviata at the English National Opera, and still find it hilarious that a bloke wandered through some doors and sang "I just came back to see if you were alright"... works better in Italian somehow!

I'm 34, but am generally more of a classical music person than a pop one. I have no idea what's in the top ten and could't sing you Lady Gaga if my life depended on it, but can happily sing one-to-a-part renaissance madrigals. To me, someone like Mariah Carey (bad example but am out of touch! Blush) sounds like caterwauling... Different strokes etc :)

jellycat · 11/05/2011 22:02

springydaffs, if you're still around, hope you don't mind me asking, but which Britten piece was it that converted you? I love Britten too.

Someone said earlier in the thread that they resented opera lovers who think that if you don't like opera you just haven't listened to enough, and I totally agree. My ex thought this. I sat through maybe 20 operas, hating every minute (except the overtures) until my ex was finally convinced that I didn't like opera. I hate the way they sing, the tone of their voices and the fact they are usually some way away from the note they should be on. I hate the way the plot moves so slowly. I hate the way it is so contrived.

I am very musical, and love singing and listening to other forms of classical music (particularly choral and orchestral).

I just hate opera!

Sorry opera lovers!

MissMarjoribanks · 11/05/2011 22:48

I'd be intrigued to know what the Britten piece as well, springydaffs. I've played in Noyes Fludde (many years ago) and was bought a recording of Peter Grimes but I still just don't get it.

The one thing that does get my snob hackles rising though is opera not sung in it's intended language. G&S in English, Verdi in Italian, Wagner in German. Otherwise it's just wrong.

DilysPrice · 11/05/2011 23:02

I love Britten's orchestral works, including the bits in the operas when they stop singing (notably the Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes), but I can't stand the way he writes for the voice - I can't hear the musicality in it at all, and for me it verges on the laughable.

MercurySoccer · 11/05/2011 23:26

Actually giveitago why shouldn't there be something to "get"? Why should music be quick-fix enjoyment handed to listeners on a plate, and why pretend there's no difference? Do you really think that all music exists at the same level of complexity and intellectual level? A Eurovision chorus based on three chords is not, IMHO, at the same cultural level as La Traviata. Of course, there's some pretty rubbish opera and some pretty fantastic pop music too, but I certainly think some music has something to "get" whereas with other music there's very little to it. Given two pieces of music I don't like, one banal and simplistic, the other written with skill and complexity, I'd be far more interested in the second, regardless of whether I "like" it.

"No - it's not a question of getting it or not (that implies some sort of cultural or intellectual superiority) - it's a question of you liking it or not."

aloiseb · 11/05/2011 23:29

It looks like it's a bit of a Marmite thing, doesn't it OP?

I'd say, to anyone who hasn't, give something a try...you may like it, and it's not going to kill you if you don't.

As to the noise.....is it just me who has to take ear defenders to the cinema these days? There is so much high level sound out there, that I wouldn't have though an unamplified soprano could create that much aural havoc?

I am 40 + and I love opera but not all opera. Mozart, Britten, Janacek, John Adams....Wagner is v v special and fab, but you can have most Verdi and Puccini free with a pack of PG tips as far as I'm concerned. Too stagey by half.

Does anybody think there might be a connection between certain types of opera and Scandi crime drama, anyone??
Mortenwearsniceshirts couldn't help noticing you over here....!

springydaffs · 11/05/2011 23:47

I don't remember what the Britten piece was - but I@m the type of person who is reading an amazing book, tells everybody about it and, when they ask me what it's called, I have no idea.

As for the live horses etc - bleurgh, that's exactly what I can't stand!

I've also found out recently that I relate to the world predominantly through my brain, less so my emotions (to shorten it to a simplistic level!), and major sop just doesn't do it for me. However, give me a well-constructed piece and I'm smitten. Even if I can't remember what it's called.