Comments on: Tweet if you like opera

By: CruzSF

CruzSF — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 01:35:26 +0000

You’re too young. It’s very popular with the 30-50 year old set.

By: javier

javier — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 01:21:02 +0000

Who here actually uses twitter? It doesn’t even make any sense.

By: The Vicar of John Wakefield

The Vicar of John Wakefield — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:28:10 +0000

SDO has far too few Commonwealth castings this season but they are offering Alan Opie as a deluxe Germont and the irreplacable Sarah Castle as Stephano — North America has not one lyric mezzo who could possibly do justice to the part.

By: LittleMasterMiles

LittleMasterMiles — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 05:20:35 +0000

As traditionally defined, the “baroque” era in music is marked by, among other stylistic and aesthetic developments, the invention of the stilo recitativo by Jacopo Peri in the first so-called operas, Dafne (1598, lost) and Euridice (1600), produced in Florence. “Late renaissance opera” and “late 1580s-1600 opera” are both misnomers.

However, musicologists (and yes, I am one) these days generally prefer not to use terms like baroque and renaissance to define periods, but rather certain aspects of style. To characterize Monteverdi’s music as “not highly ornamented” overlooks an awful lot of his music (e.g., “Possente spirto” and the apotheosis from Orfeo, the concertato pieces in the Vespers, and most of the Seventh Madrigal Book, for a start). Seventeenth-century music and art are first and foremost about emotional affect (not the same thing as romantic “expression”) and dazzling artifice. That’s less true of Monteverdi than of, say, Alessandro Scarlatti, but the beginning of the style is certainly there.

By: Will

Will — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:47:00 +0000

Baroque art is not highly ornamented. It is the next phase after the fairly strict neo-classic revival of the early renaissance–a time when the shapes expand, ie the Roman round dome into the extended oval dome of St. Peter’s but ornament is still subservient to the line. The highly ornamented style was the Rococco, in which restless ornamentation spread out into three dimensions to the point if obliterating the line.

Monteverdi is definitely Baroque.

By: midispiace molto

midispiace molto — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:10:10 +0000

i don’t think this post takes any pot shots at SD opera does it? i mean, it’s just a funny/fun news item…

By: Lindoro Almaviva

Lindoro Almaviva — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:51:59 +0000

I anyone having issues with parterre.com? The Lucia Threat is not giving me any spaces to post comments.

By: leboyfriend

leboyfriend — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:29:12 +0000

You may bitch an nit-pick all you want. San Diego Opera totally rocks and if more companies were like them the art form would not be in the parlous state many claim it to be in. And no, I am in no way connected with them.

By: Sanford

Sanford — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:27:56 +0000

Peri is listed on baroque-music.com, but he might be a bridge. However, Baroque music covers fairly long time period, and the highly decorated music we typically think of as Baroque was fairly late in the period.

By: richard

richard — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:03:32 +0000

Well, I think anything prior to 1600 would be called late Renaissance. I don’t really think of Monteverdi as being typically baroque, perhaps the early 17th century is sort of a bridge between late Renaissance
and Baroque. Maybe I’m off but I think of Baroque as being very ornate and heavily decorated and that type of music developed during the years of the 17th century. But the style was very much in place at the end of the century but not so much at the start.

By: Sanford

Sanford — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 23:38:22 +0000

Only in America? Hardly…http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/news/overtures-arias-and-tweets-the-worlds-first-twitter-opera-1769693.html

I like this “1580 to mid-1600′s – mostly Baroque operas”

Weren’t all operas written during that time Baroque operas?

By: wenarto

wenarto — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 22:23:55 +0000

only in America!

By: Monica Rivers

Monica Rivers — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 21:12:09 +0000