But isn't all opera twaddle? I was asked.

[richardfinegold]

How do people feel about the tendency of Producers to stretch to incredible lengths to try to update the plots to make them appear contemporary? Regietheater is one term for this. Most critics in the States routinely refer to this practice as "Eurotrash".

[David-G]

La Donna del Lago surely must be a front runner in the twaddle stakes .

Absolutely not. It has superb music and some very moving scenes. Perhaps you are not in sympathy with the Bel Canto style. I would not have gone to see twaddle six times.

[David-G]

How do people feel about the tendency of Producers to stretch to incredible lengths to try to update the plots to make them appear contemporary? Regietheater is one term for this. Most critics in the States routinely refer to this practice as "Eurotrash".

Occasionally it works, and when it does the result can be marvellous. The ENO Rigoletto (Jonathan Miller) comes to mind, this was set in a New York 1950s Mafia context. Or the ENO Rusalka (Pountney), which was mesmerising despite being set in a Victorian nursery. But I can count such productions on the fingers of one hand (maybe two). More often the result is ghastly, such as the recent Covent Garden Don Giovanni. It could I think be truthfully said that Holten reduced Don Giovanni, and Eugene Onegin before it, to twaddle.

[David-G]

My own early opera experience went like this (apologies to those who've heard all this before): age 11, Britten's Let's Make an Opera, which explains the conventions for children. Not converted. Age about 15, Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretel at school. Besotted. 22 or so - Gounod, Faust in Amsterdam. It's a marvel I ever went to another opera. Very bad performance, I suspect, and total twaddle as far as I was concerned then. Later the same year, Peter Grimes. Totally converted!

Some wise person once said that some opera is mainly about singing, and some is mainly about drama. I go for drama and meaning.

I am sorry that you had such a poor experience with Faust. I hope that it has not put you off Faust for life! The recent Faust at Covent Garden was thrilling and highly dramatic. The presence of evil on the stage seemed very palpable, and I found this very unsettling. All credit to McVicar and to Bryn Terfel for this.

[Sir Velo]

How do people feel about the tendency of Producers to stretch to incredible lengths to try to update the plots to make them appear contemporary? Regietheater is one term for this. Most critics in the States routinely refer to this practice as "Eurotrash".

It's treating the audience with contempt. The majority of opera-goers are extremely capable of drawing analogies with contemporary situations without being spoonfed with historical parallels. For some reason, opera directors even more than their theatrical counterparts seem unable to let well alone. We can see a watered down version of this with the way in which historical documentaries are presented increasingly in the present tense (e.g. "Henry VIII has taken a fancy to Anne Boleyn").

[french frank]

No, I was saying that it was the music - the breaking into song - that redeemed stories which in some cases, not all, range from the unconvincing to the absurd. There are also stories rich in symbolism and operas with poetic or witty libretti including works based on great works of literature. But I think there are quite a few where the plot and the libretto are pretty weak, where producers vainly try to assign coherence and significance but where in reality the structure is just a prop for a series of musical set pieces.

Though if you say 'unconvincing', it implies that somehow stories have to be true to life, and convince people that the narrative could happen, that it somehow 'true'; and what about absurdiist theatre - is that made 'twaddle' because it clearly not believable when set against real life?

It still seems to me to be unfamiliarity with the genre or non-acceptance of its function if, purely on the basis of the narrative, it's described as twaddle. Perhaps I object because it's no more than a subjective opinion anyway. I was talking to someone yesterday who said he was completely non-musical and never listened to music. Non-comprehension of one speaker only makes his pronouncements relevant to him personally. I'm only being pedantic in saying that: "As far as I'm concerned, all opera/this opera is twaddle" is a statement which can't be objected to, whereas: "All opera is twaddle" can. And even those who say "Some opera is twaddle" might not agree on which ones are.

[kernelbogey]

At the risk of displaying, once again, my pedantry, here is the OED definition of twaddle:

Senseless, silly, or trifling talk or writing; empty verbosity; dull and trashy statement or discourse; empty commonplace; prosy nonsense.

An additional entry adds 'worthless'.

However absurd the plot, none of this justly describes opera. As others have implied, this description would also rule out much other art, drama, fairy stories, legends and the like.

But in the case of opera, the music has the capacity to evoke other strong feelings in the audience than those engendered only by the action.

[ardcarp]

Top Gear: The Opera still might have some mileage

Yes! It would lend itself so well to the Glass treatment...and you could even have a principal character in a Viking helmet called Axelrod (with or without the plaits).

[teamsaint]

So the next time an opera is advertised as being, say, "thoroughly sensible", will it have the uncommitted flocking to the box office?


WH Auden says......

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/93544-no-opera-plot-can-be-sensible-for-people-do-not

[aeolium]

Though if you say 'unconvincing', it implies that somehow stories have to be true to life, and convince people that the narrative could happen, that it somehow 'true'; and what about absurdiist theatre - is that made 'twaddle' because it clearly not believable when set against real life?

That isn't what I intended to mean. Of course non-realistic, surrealist, or symbolical stories are as valid in opera as they are in the theatre. I was thinking more of conventional plots used in a number of baroque, classical and early romantic operas. Alcina, for instance, with its mix of knightly chivalry, love stories and enchantresses could well be one of those stories that Cervantes mocked in Don Quixote (and perhaps is, as it is loosely based on Orlando Furioso). These sort of plots are hard to stage for a modern audience even though Handel has provided superb music. Similar problems beset Haydn's La fedeltà premiata with its curious burlesque of classical myth, Schubert's tale of chivalric love in the time of Charlemagne, Fierrabras, and Weber's Euryanthe, where the composer has done his best to provide a powerful and durchkomponiert score to a wretched libretto. It's just that for some of these operas - and of course a whole host of others that have now sunk from the repertoire because the music hasn't been deemed good enough - the stories and libretti are essentially hack-work, mediocre adaptations which try to use the conventions and fashions of the day. Unless a modern audience has understanding of those conventions and fashions, the stories that unfold will often be meaningless and faintly ridiculous, though depending on the composer possibly enlivened by excellent music.

Charles Mackerras once said that he thought Weber's Der Freischütz was essentially unstageable for a modern audience. If scenes like that in the Wolf's Glen were performed "straight" then the audience would laugh, yet if it were performed ironically or surrealistically it would undermine the intentions of the librettist and composer. I don't think I agree with him, and I do think that opera ought to be staged, but his point does illustrate the problem.

I'm only being pedantic in saying that: "As far as I'm concerned, all opera/this opera is twaddle" is a statement which can't be objected to, whereas: "All opera is twaddle" can. And even those who say "Some opera is twaddle" might not agree on which ones are.

Of course I agree with you. I just think that there are shortcomings in some of the stories and libretti of operas that are in the repertoire today, which we would readily acknowledge if they were presented as theatre rather than opera. It is the music that hides the faults and ultimately makes them performable. Would we put up with the incoherent mess mixed in with Masonic ceremony and misanthrope that is Die Zauberflöte if a lesser composer than Mozart had penned the music?

[Sir Velo]

Charles Mackerras once said that he thought Weber's Der Freischütz was essentially unstageable for a modern audience. If scenes like that in the Wolf's Glen were performed "straight" then the audience would laugh, yet if it were performed ironically or surrealistically it would undermine the intentions of the librettist and composer. I don't think I agree with him, and I do think that opera ought to be staged, but his point does illustrate the problem.

I think that attitude patronises an audience who are surely sophisticated enough to realise that the historic development of opera requires a suspension of disbelief. It's a view which is also somewhat undermined by the same conductor's championing of Janacek, most of whose operas have significantly fantastic plot strategems - but are none the worse for that. Call it surrealism or what you will, but an audience is likely to be able to go with an intelligent production of most operas. Interestingly, Gardiner at the semi staged performance of Freischutz felt that the Wolf's Glen had the power to terrify an audience still; and with a little imagination, and "played straight" I would agree. For example, at the Proms, masked members of the cast burst in the auditorium at various points, which gave the prodution great impact.

[aeolium]

I think that attitude patronises an audience who are surely sophisticated enough to realise that the historic development of opera requires a suspension of disbelief. It's a view which is also somewhat undermined by the same conductor's championing of Janacek, most of whose operas have significantly fantastic plot strategems - but are none the worse for that.....Interestingly, Gardiner at the semi staged performance of Freischutz felt that the Wolf's Glen had the power to terrify an audience still; and with a little imagination, and "played straight" I would agree. For example, at the Proms, masked members of the cast burst in the auditorium at various points, which gave the prodution great impact.

Yes, I think so too, and the ROH production conducted by Colin Davis in the late 1970s/early 1980s which I saw played it pretty straight and quite effectively.

Call it surrealism or what you will, but an audience is likely to be able to go with an intelligent production of most operas.

If only more directors would give them some...

[MrGongGong]

intelligent production

Is a statement of opinion IMV

[Quarky]

At the risk of displaying, once again, my pedantry, here is the OED definition of twaddle:



An additional entry adds 'worthless'.

However absurd the plot, none of this justly describes opera. As others have implied, this description would also rule out much other art, drama, fairy stories, legends and the like.

But in the case of opera, the music has the capacity to evoke other strong feelings in the audience than those engendered only by the action.

Just to clarify, it was my impression that reference to "twaddle" may have been a clever indirect reference to G&Ss own evaluation of their Operettas:

Deems Taylor, in his preface to Gilbert’s Complete Operas, disagrees with Gilbert’s evaluation of his own work: “Occasionally, in the ballads, he is serious, either in attack or defense, and results are almost invariably unfortunate. Gilbert always affected to regard the Bab Ballads as inconsequential trifles, and was even heard to refer to his operettas as ‘twaddle.’

One person's twaddle is another person's enlightenment - unfortunately in my case, frequently twaddle.

[jean]

...an audience who are surely sophisticated enough to realise that the historic development of opera requires a suspension of disbelief...

A suspension perhaps more easily achieved by some audiences that by others - I think particularly of Donizetti's Emilia di Liverpool.