Michel Legrand (1932-2019): 6-10/1/25

[Sir Velo]

Presumably, by the same token you'd castigate Berlioz for translating Much Ado About Nothing into French, to make a libretto out of it; and how much did Boito "lose" by translating Othello and The Merry Wives of Windsor into Italian? Where would you draw the line?

No, because they are works of art in their own rights and not slavish translations. By the same token, would you want to hear either of the above translated back into English?

[vinteuil]

That 's the nub: we're dealing with theatre, not music as some holy art

... that is your assertion, your choice.

I don't care much for theatre as an art form. I enjoy opera for the sounds it makes, whether it be Monteverdi, Lully, or Wagner. I much prefer the original sounds the composer uses.

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[french frank]

Actually I agree with Vaughan Williams that there is a right and wrong here. He considered original-language opera as the height of snobbery, for dilettantes who were more interested in some false notion of musical purity and social exclusion than in opera as living theatre.

That sounds, on the contrary, like inverted snobbery. If you prefer to hear eg Bohême in Italian you are a dilettante 'more interested in some false notion of musical purity and social exclusion than in opera' rather than just a person who prefers to hear the opera in Italian? Why not have both available with neither side being judgemental about the other and imputing false attitudes to them?

[Master Jacques]

No, because they are works of art in their own rights and not slavish translations. By the same token, would you want to hear either of the above translated back into English?

"Works of Art?" That phrase is not one I would use to differentiate Berlioz's text from (say) Verdi's for Macbeth. If you're looking for artistry (the same thing?) I'd offer you Dent's Marriage of Figaro, so natural compared to Da Ponte, or Auden's Magic Flute, a definite big improvement on Schikaneder.

So of course I would want Otello and Falstaff translated into English, without any question. English-speakers can make notoriously little of Falstaff in Italian, because the text rattles along so fast without waiting for the "big tunes" that opera lovers long for. Yet melodically it is Verdi's richest opera, something which can only come over when you're not desperately trying to play catch-up with Boito's rather old-fashioned Goldonian text.

[Master Jacques]

That sounds, on the contrary, like inverted snobbery. If you prefer to hear eg Bohême in Italian you are a dilettante 'more interested in some false notion of musical purity and social exclusion than in opera' rather than just a person who prefers to hear the opera in Italian? Why not have both available with neither side being judgemental about the other and imputing false attitudes to them?

You probably know the Beecham story about the woman who liked to listen to "Shubér's Liedah" in German, because that was the right language for songs!

In my experience too many opera attendees are exactly such snobs - I often find them sitting behind me in the stalls at the Royal Opera, talking about how they'll be heading off next week to Geneva (or wherever) to hear "Jonas" in "Werther" (or whatever and whoever). Such folk convey to me that they are more interested in swanking around at the opera, in a nice comfy seat in a lovely old building after a nice dinner, than actually watching the stuff in front of them. Some of them audibly fall asleep.

This is a matter of observation, not inverted snobbery. And RVW was quite right to get angry about it. And so yes, (with all respect) I think that if an English person prefers to hear La boheme in Italian, they probably are a dilletante, as far as the art of opera is concerned. I certainly wouldn't have much to talk about with them about the piece, beyond whether Madame Y's top C was unusually radiant that night, or whether Mr X's production was a self-indulgent desecration.

(If you think I'm exaggerating, try reading the tweets which Covent Garden publish these days on their website, in preference to any comments from professional writer-reviewers. You'll lose the will to live, I promise!)

[Master Jacques]

... that is your assertion, your choice.

I don't care much for theatre as an art form. I enjoy opera for the sounds it makes, whether it be Monteverdi, Lully, or Wagner. I much prefer the original sounds the composer uses.

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Have we become quite so relativistic?

Your amusing line reminds me of Beecham again: "the English don't know much about music, but they do enjoy the noise it makes".

And I'm baffled: if you don't like theatre, why go to it at all? Opera is a form of theatre, first and foremost, after all. There are a few operas (Oedipus Rex, Akhnaten and some of Orff's Greek operas for instance) where the composer specifically wants his audience to relish the "oohs" and "ahhss" rather than get to grips with textual meaning, but these are few and far between. Wagner would be baffled and offended by such attitudes to his own works.

[vinteuil]

And I'm baffled: if you don't like theatre, why go to it at all?

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I don't

Opera is a form of theatre, first and foremost, after all.

So you assert.

My enjoyment of opera is sitting at home, ideally with a score or libretto, and the CDs of my choice
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[Roger Webb]

That one made me fervently wish that the Forum had a "like" button to press!

Yer 'tis!

[Master Jacques]

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I don't



So you assert.

My enjoyment of opera is sitting at home, ideally with a score or libretto, and the CDs of my choice
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Opera takes place in a performance space, even if that space is in your own head, as you sit in your own study. People used to prefer reading Shakespeare to seeing it in the late 17th century, but none of this gets it away from the idea of drama. That's not assertion, but fact. Of course how much of the ideal staging you imagine while you're listening to these alien noises, only you can say!

[vinteuil]

People used to prefer reading Shakespeare to seeing it in the late 17th century...

... and some of us still do



re opera : I'm with Salieri and Strauss - Prima la musica e poi le parole

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[Master Jacques]

... and some of us still do

Good for you!

Mind you, it's not just listeners who like the noise more than the drama.

I'll share a little anecdote, as it's so long ago (c.1990) that none of the singers involved is still singing any more (or hardly at all). I was directing Carmen in Tokyo, in French, with the Giraud recitatives, and with three alternating casts. We had a spare hour in the schedules, so as a theatre person, I thought I'd give my pairs of Carmens and Don Josés a little exercise: to speak- rather than sing - the crucial Act 3 recitative between the lovers, where it becomes apparent that not all is rosy in the garden.

Fascinatingly, only one of the singers could even remember the words without tying it to Giraud's very functional recitative line (they kept humming each line before saying it, very much as they sang it). The exception was a mezzo-soprano who had played Carmen for Peter Brook in Paris. But by the end of the hour, they'd "got it", and were acting the scene marvellously well.

At the end I was surprised when the first cast José (a world famous tenor, by the way) came up to me and said that he'd learned an incredible lesson in that session, which he wouldn't forget - to really treat the text as the drama, with the music as support - rather than the other way round.

[Master Jacques]

I'm with Salieri and Strauss - Prima la musica e poi le parole
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Both of 'em terminally second-rate as musical dramatists, for that very reason. The prosecution rests, mi'lud!

In reality, it's rare for the music to be written before the words (except for occasional scenes "monstered" by composers, such as the final duet of Aida). Off hand, I can think of one number in Utopia Ltd. (and it happens to be Gilbert's worst text in the piece, though perhaps he was making a point), some passages of Goyescas, and that's about it.

[Serial_Apologist]

I agree with french frank: for opera lovers who want translation into their own tongue, this should ideally be available, as should be the work in its original language, although recognising the relative scarcity and expense of opera as a barrier. While not myself an opera fan I am surprised to hear that Wagner was not particular about having his works performed in different languages - after all, he made a big point about the German language being the one specifically suited to the new form he called music drama - that would have to replace the outworn opera medium with its set forms - in which the contours and consonants would be inseparable from the melodic and harmonic idiom; indeed, it was with this that Debussy had difficulties in marrying French to Wagnerian musical utterance while composing Pelleas. Numerous studies have been made - none of which I've read - linking musical specifics to spoken language - Janacek being one of the clearest exemplars given that he devoted his mature work to basing the former to his native tongue - to a greater degree than even Bartok did.

... that is your assertion, your choice.

I don't care much for theatre as an art form. I enjoy opera for the sounds it makes, whether it be Monteverdi, Lully, or Wagner. I much prefer the original sounds the composer uses.

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Yes, for once we are of the same mind! The importance of the translation issue to posters here may well indicate the significance in which they hold opera to be unique in identifying the cultural ethos of given eras; different forms of art song, Lied, chanson I do have among my musical loves, mainly because to my probable ignorance they are more akin to poems, or poem sequences in the case of song cycles, and are more easily digestible without the need for credibility I am forced to suspend unwillingly with opera; and I like "the sound" of poetry, be it naturalistic, realist, symbolist or expressionist, and the gutteral or otherwise sounds associated with the languages with which these movements are associated, along with their cultural baggage and underlying sociopolitical narratives.

[french frank]

You probably know the Beecham story about the woman who liked to listen to "Shubér's Liedah" in German, because that was the right language for songs!

In my experience too many opera attendees are exactly such snobs - I often find them sitting behind me in the stalls at the Royal Opera

But no one would surely deny that there are 'opera snobs' who do the usual cultural rounds to be seen by all the right people in the right places. It's the lazy generalisation that to prefer to hear opera in the original language makes you a snob who just wants to keep the great unwashed out.

I've only been once to the ROH, I wore jeans and wasn't aware of anyone glaring or tutting because I was improperly dressed. But as Sir Velo described, I liked to prepare for whatever I was going to see, in my own way. Beecham was clearly looking down his nose and poking fun at someone whom he perceived to be a snob. Which made him the different sort of 'we know better than they do' snob.

[vinteuil]

as a theatre person...

... ceci explique cela, as we say in Shepherd's Bush

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