<p>My daughter and I recently attended an Italian opera at an undergrad only music school and it was presented in English. Is this the norm for undergrad operas?</p>
<p>Done often, yes, but not all time. Some ‘purists’ like to see this as a sign of weakness of the presenters, but I tend to give the artistic team that made this choice the benefit of the doubt. However, as a listener, of course I’d much rather hear a project in the original language that the libretist and composer collaborated in.</p>
<p>Depends on the opera too. Some have translated versions that work well, (in some rare cases the composer even wrote the piece intending for it to be performed in more than one language!) and have become popular on the stage in multiple languages even with world class opera companies. Strauss’ Die Fledermaus, e.g., is very commonly done in English.</p>
<p>At least one of the SUNY schools I know hasn’t done an opera in it’s original language in years! It’s All English, All the time!</p>
<p>SUNY Purchase generally does all operas in their original language.</p>
<p>at UCLA, undergrads (only voice performance majors though) even freshmen get a role in the opera production. this year, it is le nozze di figaro; fully staged in italian. so, undergrad voice majors do have opportunity here. though music ed is a different nasty story</p>
<p>Seconding stephmin’s point-- it all depends on the opera. For instance: The Met does The Magic Flute in English at special performances around Christmastime. But they’ll never do La Boheme in English.</p>
<p>I’m at Oberlin and we are doing Magic Flute in English. I would prefer the German since the adaptation that we are using is slightly ridiculous. :/</p>
<p>Magic Flute is pretty ridiculous in any language. In a fabulous way.</p>
<p>Northwestern does most of their operas in the original language.</p>
<p>I am a freshman voice student at Otterbein College. We just finished a production of Aaron Copeland’s Tender Land. We always perform our operas in English. I’m not a fan of it, but we do not have the amenities to translate during the performance. Next year we are rumored to do Magic Flute in English. Wish it was in German :(</p>
<p>One wonders why schools feel the need to “dumb down” for the audiences- which is what they seem to imply when the say that they can not offer translations of the libretto, line for line… People have always gotten along just fine with nothing more than a simple synopsis of the plot in their program and my suspicion is that they still would! It’s the students performing that are being short-changed by the need to always sing in English (although that’s not an issue with Copeland ) and I’d like to see some of them band together and go to the department chairs asking that the operas be performed in their original languages, since, presumably, said students are hoping for a career elsewhere which will demand that they sing as written. Just a thought.</p>
<p>Eastman’s Voice and Opera departmental page says:“Productions feature a wide range of musical styles, most are performed in the original language, and depending on the venue, many use full orchestral accompaniment.”</p>
<p>Further, “Eastman Opera Theatre utilizes a “class blind” approach to casting, meaning that roles go to the singer with the best audition, regardless of their year in school and pending the approval of their studio voice teacher.”</p>
<p>See [Voice</a> and Opera - Eastman School of Music](<a href=“http://www.esm.rochester.edu/voice/prospectivestudents/opera.html]Voice”>http://www.esm.rochester.edu/voice/prospectivestudents/opera.html) for the full text.</p>
<p>Oh, Don, be careful on that one; this is a classic case of “don’t believe everything you read”! Yes, for the most part, Eastman does perform the works in the language in which they were written, but it has been ages since any underclassman has done anything more than hold down the floor in one of their operas! That is because masters and doctoral students MUST perform a specific number of roles of certain levels of difficulty (or, it could be said, importance) in order to complete their degree, and those degrees have a set and much shorter, time period than the four years undergrads spend there. That is one of the things that happens when a school has a graduate school combined with an undergraduate teaching facility. For whatever reason, ESM’s Opera Theatre actually used several faculty members (and the Director of the Vocal Dept of another local college) in principle roles in their production of “Marriage of Figaro” last weekend! That raised more than a few eyebrows in the local music community, which felt that if that was needed, the school should be looking to deepen their talent-base so that only students cast. One can hope that that practice will be unnecessary in the near future.
In the past couple of years, ESM has done several shows by Sondheim and last year, did “Cabaret” (Sally was interestingly cast, since she is definitely NOT a traditionally operatic-type voice!).</p>
<p>I attended the fabulous performance of Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro at Eastman last weekend. In Eastman’s defense, the ONLY role cast with an ESM faculty member was Bartolo. Honestly, it made sense. Bartolo is a very low bass, and maybe they simply didn’t have a student that had the low notes to sing the role credibly. The only other professional was one of the Figaros. That is two professionals… not “several.” As for the rest of the principal roles, it was entirely students - all the way from juniors to doctoral students. And again, it was a truly wonderful performance. I was very impressed with the talent I saw on stage.</p>
<p>Mezzo’sMama, when we were there on Audition Day, the voice kids and parents met with Steve Daigle and Benton Hess in the black-box theater there for a Q & A session. They said there was a small opera (I don’t recall the name) about to open there with a junior in a lead role.</p>
<p>I really don’t expect the undergrads to beat out grad students for major roles very often (it would be a little scary if they did), but having the opportunity to at least audition is something I see as a good thing.</p>
<p>Open to dicussion! I’ve seen this at many music schools, for the past, well, let’s just say, over " more than I care to admit" years, and this one had some unexpected uneveness in it…Even two “professionals” is at least one too many, especially when one is the Figaro, a baisc staple in the rep of every performance bari (even if said Figaro is a terrific guy, which he is!) and one would expect a doctoral program to harbor a credible Bartolo within it’s folds- again, it’s the planning portion of their program I’m looking at under the lens.
Don, very good point and there is the freshman-sophomore choir, if that is an appealing option to students. For some, it is great, for others, it’s a point to run away. which is why there are schools offering different options, thankfully!!</p>