Modern Opera Directors - Art Analysis of contemporary Opera Directing
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- čas přidán 20. 06. 2024
- Special thanks to CaitFirzzell for letting me use her video! Make sure to check out her amazing channel as well: / @caitfrizzell
Hi Opera lovers.
My name's Taro and I am an Opera Director with a classic music background (Parents both pro musicians) and as I was regularly very frustrated with "modern" opera directors some years ago as I was still aiming to become a professional opera singer, I decided to become a director myself. This is my story until now and I hope you find it interesting.
I had a lot of difficulties in writing this essay and making this video because there are a ton of more stuff I wanted to talk about but it didn't fit into this video, so maybe there will be another one.
Please write your opinion, as I hope that my channel can become a place for opera lovers to have the possibility to directly communicate with an active opera director.
My current favourite unknown new opera is "Der Revisor" by Werner EGK. What's your favourite new opera?
If you are interested, here is my website
www.morikawa.at
and you can find me here on instagram
tarodirected?ig...
Art discussion, essay about art
![Analyzing and Directing Opera - [Dido and Aeneas]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/UuHZfnR28uQ/mqdefault.jpg)
Taro. I watched everything. Congratulations for bringing relevant facts and issues in an intelligent, fun and objective way that leads the viewer to think a little outside the box. 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
New best director in the world!
Thanks for this clear insight in opera direction. I do think that modern audiences can cope with opera set in its original period. It's not like downton abbey and Lord of the Rings flopped because of lack of jeans and motorcycles in the production.
Great video Taro. Greetings.
Wow, what a channel! What a topic! What a video! Bravissimo, maestro!
Very nice Video, really like the format and the humor.
Great video! And yes, opera houses should do more new pieces! (it would make me as an opera composer very happy!) But for now I'm going to watch your Fledermaus!
Thank you very much ! hope you enjoy it too.
Sehr cooles Video Taro! Ich fühl mich echt angesprochen, obwohl ich jetzt nicht sooo operninteressiert bin! On point jungeee! :)
Thankyou so much, after reading lots of books for my masters research on opera direction this was highly refreshing and very informative!
Thank you for watching and commenting! I am glad I could help and good luck for your masters!
👏🏼🎉
(This is Roberto Neuburger writing, not Javier). Thank you very much dear Taro, your video is highly instructive, funny, witty and intelligent. Warmest kudos!!! As the woman you mention at the end, I´d love to give you a very warm hug... but since I´m very far away I have to send it from here!!! 🤗
1. 300 years ago would be 1723 - we're not talking much standard rep from that time.
2. Bringing the audience onstage and breaking the fourth wall does not enhance the drama - it enhances the experience - what are you going for, a rock concert vibe? As a comprimario who sang for over twenty years with the brightest and best, I would say that the experience of viewing the drama as a whole is much better served by seeing it from the audience's perspective, not next to the singers. Nilsson's voice, for instance, sounded tiny when you stood next to her and tremendous from the house.
3. I like a great deal of your FLEDERMAUS. The beginning scene with Falke was great fun - I quibble with it being over a potpourri overture since, if you know the piece at all, you're going to wonder how what is going on onstage has anything to do with this trio or that aria. (I am not a fan of any staging during the overture, but it seems to have become de reguer for all opera productions - the composers are turning in their graves.)
4. What of an opera like RIENZI or IDOMENEO, which take place in periods before the time in which they were written? Why do they have to be updated, like that dreadful Salzburg IDOMENEO?
5. It is patently absurd to say that, in the past, operas were performed in one season and then forgotten. LE NOZZE DI FIGARO had at least two revivals in Vienna during Mozart's short lifetime, as did most other major works. By the time of Puccini, the opera season always consisted of some new works and a large number from the standard repertory of the period.
I could go on and on, but I won't. Some of the points you made were excellent. Others were clouded by misinformation and exaggerations. or outright misrepresentations. Modern productions can be excellent, but only if, as you said, they are staged clearly, so the audience does not have to read a precis to understand what the director is going for. This, sadly, is often not the case, so we see act 2 of PARSIFAL taking place in Kundry's vagina, complete with an inch of blood on the floor that the singers have to wade through, or a DON GIOVANNI in a dining room, with ZERLINA now a member of the family. There are too many examples to mention. All opera companies are guilty of this, and while one in, say, five productions presents the story in a clear, concise modern way, the other four often are a director's flight of fancy, trying to be modern and failing miserably. The meaning of the libretto's words are ignored, the characters' motivation changed, and often, the work refitted to what the director's message is, not the composer's. Considering how much the great composers were concerned with the drama being perfect for their needs, and how much time they spent conferring with the librettist, this is reprehensible. (If I hear one more singer in a modern production sing “dammi un spada” in a twentieth-century local, with nary a sword in sight, I'll tear my hair out!)
Thank you so much for your time and effort for commenting! I really appreciate it. I'll try my best to answer some of your points.
As I went through Strauß Biography, he was basically like a Rock star. He played the violin with a huge showmanship and people danced to his music like crazy. And as I only had 4 singers for the choir, I thought, I'd use the entire audience to cover up and to show an opulent party this way. Additionally I wanted to give young people the experience, the joy and excitement of being on the stage with singers. So, I went for both. Experience and Drama. (with only 4 people as guests, nobody would have believed that Orlowsky is rich from the auditorium.) Nilsson's voice is amazing. I sadly never had the opportunity to hear her live. (But I had a similar experience with Gruberova.) Please don't compare her with 18-25 years old students. I received a lot of comments from the live audience that they never knew, how loud opera singers actually were and that they loved the experience, so at least for this production, it seemed to have worked out.
Regarding your 5th point. You are absolutely right. That's why I said. "rarely" and "majority of the time" and not "only once and forgotten". My main goal with this argument was to illustrate that we rarely play new pieces nowadays. Could you tell me more about where you think I am misinterpreting and exaggerating? It's quite hard to talk broadly about 4 centuries of opera history and the current situation in a 20min video but still I want to be as correct as possible, so please help me have the right informations for my next videos. I'd appreciate it very much.
Glad you enjoyed a great deal of my fledermaus. :) Thank you again for your time and for your love for opera.
I take your point. If I only had four chorus members for the grand party scene, I'd try to find a way to make it bigger too.
I wish there were more good modern works. When I was in Houston, the management had that philosophy, and we did a great many modern works - AKHENATEN, NIXON IN CHINA, THE PASSION OF JONATHAN WADE, WHERE'S DICK?, THE JUNIPER TREE, THE MAKING OF THE REPRESENTATIVE FOR PLANET 8, NEW YEAR and BEAUTY AND THE BEAST. Except for the first two, are any of the others ever done? And these were by major contemporary composers! I am sure if another Britten or Henze comes along, their works will be appreciated and performed. But as long as we get things like the above and others that the major opera houses tried and failed (with a few exceptions). it will be tough going.
As to your question - you sometimes exaggerate for emphasis. "300 years ago" - yes, operas by Handel, Monteverdi, and Purcell are done, but these works are in the minority. The young people that you are trying to attract, reading with the prejudice that all operas are ancient, would see their prejudice reinforced. Better to say 200 years, since ABDUCTION was written 241 years ago and that is really the oldest opera in the standard repertory.
Your story about the king is problematic (was this a production in Vienna?)
1. Your singer says 'gods' plural. An 18th or 19th-century audience would interpret this as pagan and probably agree with him.
2. In this period, a king derived his power from God, so the dethroning of a king would be considered blasphemous. I see no reason to change it for a modern audience unless you put the opera in a country that doesn't have a king.
3. How do you mean 'tweak' the story? If you mean changing elements of the libretto, either by staging or characterization, then you are no longer serving the opera. Example: I saw a production of IOLANTA at the Met a few years ago where Brigitta and Laura, Iolanta's friends, made mocking gestures to her, which she, of course, could not see because she was blind. This went completely against the music and words, and did not serve the opera - it served the director. This I, at least, consider heinous.
Also: I think that it is more than traditional staging that is keeping young people away - there's also the fact that they just don't like classical music or the operatic female voice (and why should they - they've never been exposed to it. It can sound like a foreign language to them.)
Anyway, these are MY thoughts and MY opinions. Many others feel differently, and that, of course, is their right.@@TaroDirected n
👍🏻👍🏻👊🏻👊🏻❤❤
Super. Danke für das tolle Video!
What a great video Taro!
My favorite "new" operas: Gerardo Gandini, "La Ciudad Ausente" (seen it 4 times in 3 different productions... and full orchestra score in my bookshelves), Oscar Strasnoy, "Cachafaz", Santiago Villalba, "Don Juan" (not based in Tirso, Molière or Mozart, but in Leopoldo Marechal ´s text which is quite different), Rufus Wainwright, "Hadrian" (a bit too long perhaps, bur grand) Charles Wuorinen, "Brokeback Mountain" (atonal and making no concessions, but bold) Giorgos Koumantakis, "The Murderess" (Η Φόνισσα), a masterpiece... but I´ve got the advantage of speaking and understanding Modern Greek), Xenakis, "Oresteia" (this is in Ancient Greek which I don´t understand, but anyway I love the work!)
¡Bravo por "La ciudad ausente"! Sin duda, es una obra maestra; desafortunadamente, no score in my bookshelf, jeje... aunque de "La casa sin sosiego", sí.
@@rodolfoacostar hola Rodolfo, muchas gracias! La tenés en PDF???
@@rodolfoacostar PS me suscribí a tu canal...
sumamente interesante tu actividad como compositor, pese a que has conocido a nuestros vecinos uruguayos Coriún y Graciela es muy, muy lamentable que tu obra no se conozca aquí. Y eres de Colombia! Visité tu país 2 veces y recorrí muchísimo... cómo puedo estar en contacto contigo, mail u otra posibilidad?
Y.. tampoco conocía a Leonardo Idrobo, quien asimismo ha conocido a Coriún y Graciela y a nuestro Erik Oña (que, de paso, dirigió "La Ciudad Ausente" en la ciudad de La Plata...
Sehr gut erklärt, Taro! Aber leider bin ich (65) weniger denn je bereit, mir "modern inszenierte" Opern anzusehen! Es gefällt mir einfach nicht! Einzige Ausnahme waren bisher "lustige Opern", mit ausgezeichneten Sängern, wo man aufgrund der hervorragenden Stimmen der Protagonisten auf die Inszenierung quasi "vergaß"! Es muss für mich die Bühne auch nicht mit "antiken Möbeln" vollgestellt sein, oder Kristallluster hängen, aber die Kostüme sollten schon passend sein! Ganz nebenbei wundert es mich immer, warum man bei Produktionen, wo die Sänger permanent in "Straßenkleidung" auf der Bühne erscheinen einen/eine Kostümbildnerin braucht!? Wünsche Ihnen weiterhin viel Erfolg und alles Gute, Sie sind sehr sympathisch! LG., Christian.
I’ve watched on CZcams your die fledermaus. I like the terror and fear projected by Orloffsky.
Hey Thank you so much! :) Glad you liked it.
1. Original language. Always. 2. Analyse and understand music and text. 3. Now it's getting difficult, because a story that worked 200 years ago doesn't necessarily work today. However, I don't need to see a car on stage, naked extras and people in everyday clothes in every work. So you have to think about how to translate the intention of the original into a relevance for today without creating a new version and shifting the perspective, for example. If a work is called "Lohengrin", the main character is not the Heerrufer, which I now use to invent a new perspective just because no one has done it before. It happened in Berlin and it's completely boring. And ridiculous anyway.
Hi Altonahh10. Thank you for watching and commenting.
Your point 2 and 3 I totally agree. I always try to think about the merit, when changing something. Regarding original language, I'm not sure. I'd say it depends on which piece. If it's Strauss, which you can't understand a single word anyways (I'm currently preparing "Frau ohne Schatten"), it's ok, but when I was a child, I saw a German version of Gianni Schicchi and found it hilarious, because I could follow the story by the sung text. I probably wouldn't have had that much fun, if it was in Italian...
All the best from Vienna!
Opera directors today are pathetic. Can’t speak the languages, don’t know music. Crappy productions won’t save a dying art form. And singers are weak and desperate for not standing up to them.
It seems to me that you care a lot for opera and its true values and I really appreciate it. Don't worry, there are people out there, young artists, who are doing their best to make great works but aren't well known yet. Singers don't have much of a choice, otherwise, they won't get jobs. (only superstars can afford that.)