Opera: Suspending Reality a Few Hours at a Time

In my junior AP English class in high school, one of our assignments was to write and present an informative speech on a subject of our choice. I chose opera. In essence, I explained opera to the uninitiated as a hybrid of the arts (music, poetry/literature, drama, art, sometimes dance). As the primary example of opera, which I also recommended as a good first-time opera, I discussed Mozart's Don Giovanni in depth. And why not? It was my first live opera when I was six years old at the Santa Fe Opera. With no surtitles/subtitles. And I understood what was going on. And I was six. (Surtitles in live opera are an issue that I will not discuss in this post, but you can tell I have opinions.)

Anyway, ever since the idea of a catchy hook at the beginning of essays, speeches, etc., was introduced to me, I love a dramatic opening. (Is it any wonder a drama queen like me loves opera?) I rehearsed the opening to my speech much more than I did the speech itself. And it paid off.

It was my turn to present my speech on opera to my room full of nerdy AP English high school juniors. I walked up to the front of the room with my note-cards in hand, and then I stood quietly in front of them, staring at one of the desks in the front row. The other teenagers were being a bit noisy, so I stood there a bit before I suddenly let out a sob and covered my face with my hands. The room went silent. I had a captive audience. I took a couple of soggy breaths, removed my hands from my tear-stained face, and started to wipe my eyes.

"I'm sorry," I sniffled. My class was staring at me. My teacher was staring at me with eyebrows raised. "It's just that I'm really sick. Not just a cold or anything like that. I'm actually dying." Cough, cough, and wipe the flowing tears. I heard some gasps from various places throughout the room, and glanced at a few shocked looks from my closest friends in the class. "And the worst part is that my lover and I broke up before it got really bad, and I don't know if I'll ever be able to tell him how much I loved him." My hands went over my face again at this point, and I shook a couple sobs.

I knew they were buying it when my teacher from her desk in the back said, "Carolyn, uh, are you ok?"

I promptly shrugged my shoulders back, raised my head, removed my hands and tears from my face and said, "Or, on the other hand, I could be a care-free Bird-catcher, on the look-out for a nice lady-bird to catch and make my wife." Pause for total confusion/elucidation to take effect. "And such is the variety of moods and characters that one encounters in the wide spectrum of opera."

The rest of my speech went well, I think. But apparently the opening was too effective for one or two people who were asking me afterward if I was really dying. My teacher liked it. Don Giovanni ended up being a great opera to discuss. Humor, drama, romance, revenge, the bad guy getting dragged down to hell, talking statues of dead people, weddings, dances. Not to mention the wonderful music. My sister always thought that there should be an opera in which Don Giovanni and Carmen hook up and ruin each other with trying to out-do one another. Wouldn't that be a wonderful opera? Carmen is also a good first-time opera. People already know the music, it's got gypsies, bull-fighters, good girls and bad girls. Carmen was also a big favorite in our home growing up. In fact, my sister loved it so much that she used to watch the taped Met broadcast with Agnes Baltsa and Jose Carreras over and over (especially the stabbing scene for some strange reason -- maybe the justice of it?).

Which leads me to my other random opera story about when I coincidentally saw/heard in person Agnes Baltsa sing the role of Carmen at the Staatsoper in Vienna (state opera house). Programs cost money, and I normally did not research who was performing what (mostly because I was usually doing standing room anyway). So one show that I did sit for, the summer I was nineteen on study abroad in Vienna, was Carmen. Not long into Carmen's first aria, I almost jumped out of my seat when I realized and fortunately kept in my own mind, "That's her! She's THE Carmen of all Carmens! And I'm watching her in person! And I only paid 10 Euro for this seat!"

Afterward, my roommate almost ruined the entire experience. On the way to the U-bahn, she dared to say, "I didn't like the Carmen. She just wasn't convincing as someone who's supposed to be seductive." I don't believe I dignified her with a response. Probably just a Paddington hard stare, a roll of the eyes, and a taking of a seat on the U-1 for our two stops before transferring to the Schnellbahn, on which I knew the opera ignoramus would promptly fall asleep. At such moments I was severely tempted to leave her there to travel to the rural regions of Austria on that commuter train. But I always woke her up when we got to our stop on the outskirts. Agnes Baltsa is by far the best Carmen that ever was in my opinion. Seductive, aggressive, and sultry voice. And the moves too. Perfect. Let me say that Agnes is a beautiful Greek singer who sounded just as good as she had twenty years earlier. I don't remember that she looked all that different either. But then, I am willing to suspend reality whenever I step inside a theater or opera house. My roommate didn't understand this cardinal rule of the operatic stage. What she saw was a singer of average build in the twilight of her career. I saw Carmen, and she was devilish, and oh so sexy.

Note to any musicologists out there: This post was not intended to be scholarly in any way. Just musings on one of my favorite art forms. So don't go quoting Carrie Nation, renowned bourgeois Bavarian scholar, in any of your upcoming papers. Oh, and for laughs between finals, go read the ridiculous section on "pitch inflation" in the Wikipedia article on "pitch (music)".