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#1
11-06-2005, 10:06 PM
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The Essential Music Library: Opera/Choral music
The Essential Music Library project is an attempt to get the many musical minds of the SDMB to sit down and discuss what works are absolutely necessary for a well-stocked musical library. There will be roughly 20 threads detailing a variety of genres so that we can get the depth that would be missing from a single-threaded discussion and the breadth necessary to cover what's out there.
This thread's topic is opera. Previous threads: Project Planning | Classical | Rock | Jazz | Modern Rock | The Blues | Punk/Post-Punk/New Wave 
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#2
11-06-2005, 10:18 PM
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#3
11-07-2005, 12:11 AM
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Solid recordings of Don Giovanni and Die Zauberflote.
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#6
11-07-2005, 03:48 AM
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What do you mean by opera? Is it just "people singing to music" or does it exclude oratorios and choral stuff and the like?
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#9
11-07-2005, 07:09 AM
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A few of those that would be on my essential list:
Bizet's Carmen: I enjoy Francesco Rosi's movie version of that. Britten's Peter Grimes: there are several good versions of that. Almost anything by Wagner. Yes, he;s differeent, and not everyone's favourite, but it's hard to avoid him. The Flying Dutchman is one of the more accessible ones, but you really need the Mastersingers of Nuremberg, the Ring of the Nibelungs and Parsifal. And for something lighter: I love Offenbach's Orpheus in the Underworld.
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#13
11-07-2005, 09:38 AM
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#14
11-07-2005, 10:06 AM
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#15
11-07-2005, 10:13 AM
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But that still depends on what "dramatic" means. If you're just listening to a recording, there isn't much difference between an opera and an oratoria; the difference is in the staging.
However, oratorios, masses, etc. were mentioned in the "Classical" thread, so maybe that's a reason to leave them out here. But are we including operettas? musicals? rock operas? (eg. what about Gilbert & Sullivan? Gershwin's Porky and Bugs? Bernstein's West Side Story? the Broadway musicals of, say, Rogers & Hammerstein?)
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#16
11-07-2005, 10:18 AM
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Just to keep it simple, let's expand this thread to cover other kinds of choral music. Could someone please report this post and ask that the thread title be changed to "The Essential Music Library: Opera/Choral Music" and that the second paragraph in the OP be changed to "This thread's topic is opera and choral music."?
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#17
11-07-2005, 10:45 AM
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Thanks! (although there are important exceptions to that rule...like the original Opera Comique version of Carmen, etc...) [/amg editor hat] If we're talking *truly* pared down and essential, here's my list, from early stuff to contemporary: (this is off the top of my head, so I'll probably find something missing as soon as I post...) -Claudio Monteverdi: either Orfeo (preferably conducted by Emmanuel Haïm, or John Eliot Gardiner) or L'incoronazione di Poppea (there's an awesome live version starring David Daniels that is hard to find...but it's my favorite) -Georg Frideric Handel: Giulio Cesare (Julius Caesar) no particular recommendation -W. A. Mozart: Gotta have both Don Giovanni and Le Nozze di Figaro, Cosí fan tutte is equally great, but less "perfect" in it's way, so it's optional. Personally, I think no one does Giovanni and Figaro better than John Eliot Gardiner on a purely musical level, but the singing is not to everyone's taste, and he tunes down a half step on period instruments. If you want a grander and more conventional sound, try Georg Solti. (if you want to branch out with Mozart a bit, try one of his serious operas - I'd start with Idomeneo. They're a very different experience.) -Gioachino Rossini: The Barber of Seville and any one of his serious operas, like Semiramide. If you dig the Barber, also try The Italian Girl in Algiers, etc. -Donizetti: The Elixir of Love and Lucia di Lammermoor. My favoriete Elixir is Roberto Alagna's on Erato (very early in his career - very fresh). Don't have one for Lucia. -Vincenzo Bellini: either Norma or La Sonnambula. Go with Maria Callas, whatever you do. You won't regret it as long as you don't stumble into a live performance recorded from the 10th row on someone's tape recorder. -Georges Bizet: Carmen. Domingo is a good starting point when looking for a recording. -Jules Massenet: Werther and Manon. Seriously beautiful stuff. -Giuseppe Verdi: The big man. Gotta have lots. Rigoletto, Aida, La Traviata, Otello, and Falstaff would be my picks for the essentials. I won't waste a page of space trying to recommend my favorites... -Richard Wagner: I'm going to go bare-bones here and just recommend hearing Tristan and Isolde. It encapsulates everything that was innovative about Wagner and contains the famous "Liebestod". Some might think the Ring Cycle is necessary, but I think it's overkill. Parsifal and Die Meistersinger, as well as the Flying Dutchman are all indelibly great, but we're making a small list here... -Ruggero Leoncavallo: I Pagliacci Whatever recording you buy is likely to come bundled with Pietro Mascagni's Cavelleria Rusticana, so if you get both you'll be well covered for the turn-of-the-century verismo style. -Giacomo Puccini: Gotta have La bohème, Tosca, and Madama Butterfly. Anything else of his is exponentially less popular. If you haven't heard these operas - you will like them. No one doesn't. (ok, there has to be someone out there...) -George Gershwin: Porgy and Bess. Go with Simon Rattle. And yes, Porgy is an opera, not a musical. People argue about it, and there was a broadway version, but it deserves to be here. -Modest Mussorgsky: Boris Godunov -Peter Tchaikovsky: Eugene Onegin -Claude Debussy: Pelleas et Melisande -Maurice Ravel: L'enfant et les sortilèges -Sergey Prokofiev: The Love of Three Oranges -Kurt Weill: The Threepenny Opera and Street Scene. -Benjamin Britten: Peter Grimes. I'd also recommend The Turn of the Screw, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Billy Budd, and Albert Herring, but Grimes was the breakthrough work. -Gian Carlo Menotti: Amahl and the Night Visitors is the only one that gets played often, though it is arguably not as good as some others. -Samuel Barber: Vanessa -Carlisle Floyd: Susanna -John Adams: Nixon in China -Philip Glass: Einstein on the Beach. It's long... brain dying...must stop now...(but there is lots of new stuff I'd like to recommend. Maybe later...)
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#18
11-07-2005, 10:54 AM
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Just so I'm actively contributing and not just being pedantic.
 Look no further than the Italians:(choose one of each) The essential works of Giacomo Puccini: La Bohème, Madama Butterfly, Tosca, Turandot Guissepe Verdi: Aida, Falstaff, Otello, Rigoletto, La Traviata Gioachino Rossini: Il Barbiere di Siviglia, L'Italiana in Algeri, and maybe La Cenerentola. I'd disagree with labelling Guillaime Tell as "essential" because despite being Rossini's best-known overture, the opera itself is excessively long, demanding on the performers and audience, and generally not well-liked, which is why it is infrequently performed nowadays. Pietro Mascagni: Cavalleria Rusticana, which is, unfortunately, his only well-known opera. I'll do another one for German opera later, but I want to mention one of my recent favorites, Engelbert Humperdinck's Hänsel and Gretel. It was essentially an opera for children, but at the time a rebellion against the Wagnerian style of gods and heroes and Norse legends. This is a particularly good recording. Thudlow, I think there will be another thread for musicals later. But "Bohemian Rhapsody"? Just..... no. And, on preview, Figaro covered just about everything I could have, and more.
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#19
11-07-2005, 12:22 PM
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Are we getting into recommendations of specific recordings?
If so: Carmen conducted by Sir Thomas Beecham, with Victoria de los Angeles in the title role. (Yes, I've heard the Callas recording. She's overblown and too full of herself, but that's an entirely different thread.) If not, ignore this post.
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#20
11-07-2005, 12:53 PM
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There really isn't much in the way of Russian opera, but since Boris Gudinov has been mentioned, let me put in a word for Prince Igor, by Alexandr Borodin.
If you're going to include light opera, there are the "Big Three" from Gilbert & Sullivan: H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance, and The Mikado. And I would give honorable mention to my personal favorite, The Gondoliers. In the non-English section we have Die Fledermaus by Johann Strauss and The Merry Widow by Lehar.
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#22
11-07-2005, 03:07 PM
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The G&S have been embraced more by Musical Theater culture than by the opera world, so they probably belong on a MT list instead. But that's debatable... Mozart's The Magic Flute was a big omission from my last list, by the way. (but I see it's already been mentioned), as was Carl Maria von Weber's Die Freischütz.
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#23
11-07-2005, 03:09 PM
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Um, as to everyone else, the key word should be "essential." It isn't "essential" if it includes everything written in the way of opera during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
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#25
11-07-2005, 04:43 PM
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#26
11-07-2005, 06:41 PM
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#27
11-08-2005, 08:54 AM
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I have heard many express the opinion that G&S is not opera. Part of the reason that this opinion holds sway is that the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company held an exclusive monopoloy on professional productions for nearly a hundred years. Therefore, while the world of opera was establishing its standards and preferences, the only productions of The Pirates of Penzance or Patience that most people ever saw were from amateur companies. So even though the monopoloy no longer holds, most people in operatic circles regard G&S as only worthy of amateurs. The Metropolitan Opera of NY, for example, has never performed a single production of a G&S opera. The NY Philharmonic actually played a piece composed by Sullivan this past year -- something that had never happened before. So at least some have awakened to the startling realization that G&S, while not, perhaps, as clever as Mozart or as tuneful as Strauss, are worthy to be in the same classification.
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#28
11-08-2005, 09:11 AM
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A strong second or third for Puccini's Tosca. A beautiful aria for the soprano, two arias for the tenor, and a duet. It don't get better than that.
 I like Shaw's recording of Verdi's Requiem. For lieder, may I suggest Strauss' Four Last Songs? I highly recommend this recording with Gundula Janowicz as soloist.
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#29
11-08-2005, 03:53 PM
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Randall Thompson, The Last Words of David and Alleluia.
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#30
11-08-2005, 05:56 PM
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#31
11-08-2005, 06:05 PM
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#32
11-08-2005, 08:40 PM
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is sublime music.
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#34
12-01-2005, 07:42 AM
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Didn't suggest it earlier since I didn't know where to put it, but since nobody seems to have suggested it anywhere the two Stabat Maters by Pergolesi and Vivaldi. Because they're both excellent, and because Vivaldi deserves to be remembered for something *other* than the Four Seasons.
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#36
01-08-2006, 11:47 PM
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#37
01-09-2006, 05:42 AM
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#38
01-09-2006, 03:29 PM
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Every now and again our choir does concerts where the program consists solely of the well-known "hummable" bits of choral music that people know from television advertisements, films etc. The idea of course is to get the audience interested enough to come back later to hear some more challenging works. Interestingly enough the most successful concerts we've done in recent years from this point of view (i.e. attracting non-musical punters) have been the performances of The Lord of the Rings Symphony. They came in their millions for that and I gather that we picked up quite a few new subscribers as a result.
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