Klarinet Archive - Posting 000527.txt from 2004/10

From: Gary Truesdail <gir@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Opera productions that should be damned
Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 19:00:43 -0400

Don't put down a musical production unless you are aware of the reason
behind the scene that made it what it is that you dislike.

Many youngsters don't understand that at one time Opera and chamber
ensemble performances were the POP genre of their time. Maybe some of
the opera productions of today are trying to reach out to a new
audience. My hat is off to them as it must take a lot of "guts" to spend
big bucks on an experimental audience. There must be many of these
attempts made and over a period of time until a successful "hit" is made
and a new generation of ticket purchasers is enticed into the arena of
live musical performance and in an area of music that was once
considered "hoity toity".

I have played several operas and ballets and enjoyed every one of them.
They are permanently engraved in my memory as world class compositions.
It takes gimmics, pleading, free tickets, etc., to get new, unexposed
persona to participate in a musical form that is unfamiliar to them.
Sometimes a background scenery set, being designed to be "out of the
box" looking can draw in a different set of patrons. It must be very
difficult for set designers and coreographers to try to "top" all
previous attempts to make their version "new" and "fresh" worthy of
buying a ticket to see what you have already seen numerous times.

If the current comments regarding a dumb, non-functional set is truly a
comment about the set then OK.

GaryT

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