I think you will find all kind of possibilities here.

If you are interested in the numbers, you can open a poll in the general forum, or convince Artmusic to open it for you.

Personally, I love opera (is my favorite genre), but also instrumental music, or indeed also vocal music outside of opera.

 

I would say that the original post is a good assumption to make.

I see how basically one group of people on TC (the same posting names) hang around the opera threads, rarely posting on the mainstream classical threads and vice versa.

It seems TC is divided into two segregated (by choice) camps: classical music lovers vs. opera lovers.

The two camps should get together for tea and scones once in a while.

 

I've tried to get into opera. I had a friend who said if you just take six months exploring it, you'll be hooked. I spend two years with the specific intent of getting into it, and as a result, I have a stack of dust-covered opera recordings.

There are a few that I do like and actually listen to, but as a rule, there's something about that genre that doesn't click with me. Maybe it's having to spend the length of the opera with my head buried in a libretto cross-referencing the text with the English version or else staring at subtitles on a screen. It's too much work.

I will listen to sacred music and oratorios, because the subject matter means something to me. But opera plots don't generally speak to me in a way that would make the effort involved worth my time.

Of course, I always hold out the hope that one day I'll see the light.

 

I've tried to get into opera. I had a friend who said if you just take six months exploring it, you'll be hooked. I spend two years with the specific intent of getting into it, and as a result, I have a stack of dust-covered opera recordings.

There are a few that I do like and actually listen to, but as a rule, there's something about that genre that doesn't click with me. Maybe it's having to spend the length of the opera with my head buried in a libretto cross-referencing the text with the English version or else staring at subtitles on a screen. It's too much work.

I will listen to sacred music and oratorios, because the subject matter means something to me. But opera plots don't generally speak to me in a way that would make the effort involved worth my time.

Of course, I always hold out the hope that one day I'll see the light.

Pretty much what I also happen to think. There is something fundamental in this, because I've always though human voice just as an instrument, nothing more, nothing less. I've never really listened to the words in songs, not even in my own language! So opera.... of course can be fine music, but if you cut the words and the whole story out of it, what's left?

Some vocal music, like masses I really like, but again.. I don't really care what that latin chanting really means. Well I kinda know, not exactly, but still. It just sounds wonderful (Bruckner's Te Deum just started to play in my head while typing this..)

 

As a teen I listened mostly to rock music. I was exposed to classical to some degree too. Later I wanted to pursue classical but did not have the patience for classical instrumental music, so I thought to attend operas as there would be music, singing and acting, and a story. That way I felt I would not get bored. Then I was away from most any music for many years. I came back to classical in the instrumental and religious choral works, but Beethoven's Fidelio was the gateway for me into opera. Once I got a DVD of it, I was hooked. That was about three years ago and now I have about 90 opera DVDs and probably 70 or more opera on CD. I spend most of my time listening to opera, with some excursions into instrumental, mainly symphony, and oratorio, mainly Messiah.

 

It is useful to get really familiar with an opera by watching on DVD. I have 12 DVD performances of Barber of Seville (4 still to be watched) and am so familiar with that opera, and the parts are so distinct, that when I listen to one of my 13 sets on CD I pretty much have the scene in my head and know exactly where I am in it. It produces immense enjoyment that way, but I do not have that kind of a handle on most of my opera recordings.

 

I feel the same way. I love seeing operas, both on DVD and by attending live performances. Listening to opera on CD is not nearly as enjoyable as watching it, unless I've seen the opera many times and can visualize the onstage action.

 

First of all, I'm not sure that classical music and opera are two different things. The latter is part of the former, is it not?
While I definitely appreciate opera and find many wonderful things in it, I can't really get into it. I find it rather obnoxious to listen to and can't help but feel a bit snobbish when I see one. I've had the pleasure of attending two world-class opera productions- I saw La Boheme and A Streetcar Named Desire at the Chicago Lyric Opera (the Streetcar production featured Renee Fleming as Blanche!) and I enjoyed them, but I felt like it wasn't my cup of tea. I like watching opera on television even less. Cameras and microphones do zero justice to the power and expressiveness of a singer's voice live in the flesh, which is to me the primary reason I would actually attend an opera.

 

First of all, I'm not sure that classical music and opera are two different things.

I have no doubt that opera is classical music. Concerning my own listening habits, I do listen to quite a lot of operas. However, I do it for the music. I'm not going to miss out on some of the most wonderful music around just because it has an opera umbrella hovering over it.

 

I'm not sure about this. Yes, there are some people who love orchestral and chamber music etc, but who don't like opera , but I'm not sure what percentage . But on the whole, classical music fans who aren't really into opera usually like at least several ones .
I enjoy all genres of classical music, period . Of course, I'm very big on opera , but my tastes are Catholic, or maybe Protestant LOL !

 

I do not think classical lovers and opera lovers are 2 mutually exclusive groups. In fact the human voice could be addictive, especially Sopranos and Baritones. I think watching opera are more enjoyable than just listening to it. For me, opera is a subset of classical music with a story line, acting and character development etc. The challenge to me is that my default is listening rather than watching at home. If you give me a choice between a Mozart PC or a Mozart opera, I would pick the Mozart PC to listen.

However, for those opera lovers, can you identify the score on my profile picture?

 

I love both. I was intimidated of opera as a genre at first; but, already knowing and loving much of Mozart's instrumental and sacred music, and having read Mozart's own esteem of opera in his letters, I knew I'd be depriving myself of hours of some of his best music if I didn't at least try to listen to some of them.

I do not think classical lovers and opera lovers are 2 mutually exclusive groups. In fact the human voice could be addictive, especially Sopranos and Baritones. I think watching opera are more enjoyable than just listening to it. For me, opera is a subset of classical music with a story line, acting and character development etc. The challenge to me is that my default is listening rather than watching at home. If you give me a choice between a Mozart PC or a Mozart opera, I would pick the Mozart PC to listen.

However, for those opera lovers, can you identify the score on my profile picture?

I can barely see it, but the run of semiquavers looks a lot like the one from "O Zittre Nicht" from The Magic Flute. Actually, now that I've taken a closer look, that has to be it.

 

Opera is dominated by plot and dialogue. The music is subservient to that. That's why I'm not into it.

 

Exactly what I would have said.

I do like parts of operas like overtures and some arias but overall operas bore me and the visuals and non-musical plots do nothing for me.

(Too bad Wagner wrote so much opera instead of focusing his musical talent on symphonies)

 

There are two groups of people in the world, those who divide everything into two groups and those who don't.

The problem is that there is no absolute line between 'classical' and opera with a lot of works that sit in the hazy middle ground between them, the most obvious being orchestral excerpts from operas that are often performed on their own. There are some Berlioz works which usually are done in the concert hall but have also been staged (e.g. Damnation of Faust). There is Verdi's Requiem which is often considered to be his best opera! And then how about various cantatas and oratorios?

 

What I understand the classical music discussion forum is for all genres. However I notice that it is very little opera that is discussed there.

 

My own love of classical music started with opera. I learned to appreciate music plus voice plus storyline before I learned to love "pure" music. My journey has been somewhat in the opposite direction from that of Florestan: from opera to instrumental music to other vocal music, and most of my very recent listening has been both opera and non-operatic vocal works. So I am both a classical music lover AND an opera lover.

 

I only care for Puccini. I have not delved deeply into why this is so, but perhaps opera lovers far more knowledgeable than I (which will be a really big number) can explain why this might be. I do certainly love the big Puccini arias. The morbidezza perhaps?

 

I do certainly love the big Puccini arias. The morbidezza perhaps?

Arias are nice but I don´t think they are what essentially what makes an opera good but what is in between. Lots of operas have no distinguishable arias at all but are good because they have a great flow.

 

Opera is abstract for me because I don't understand the language or care about the plot. And I don't watch DVDs. I listen on CD only.

 

I like the music of some Opera, and sometimes even take in a performance; what bothers me about Opera are some of the people who "like Opera" but in the back of their minds they would much rather Opera didn't have the music part (the attitude comes across quite clearly when you talk to them and realize they're interested in everything but the music).

There are certainly a lot of people who also pretend to like classical music for social reasons, but I find that those are mostly social poseurs, while the Opera people who don't like the music are genuinely interested in the theatre and the whole production part, just the music that's not their thing.

The Opera itself, the music, is not at fault for the people it attracts, but this may explain partially why the people who like Opera in music forums tend to be set aside, even when these are the people within the Opera community who DO LIKE THE MUSIC. (Capitals because I don't want to be misunderstood as saying the Opera people don't like music; it's some of them that don't, and those are unlikely to hang out in a forum about music.)

By coincidence, my non-assigned-number ringtone is the second half of Piangeró la sorte mia from Handel's Giulio Cesare in Egitto. All assigned ringtones and texttones are chamber or orchestral pieces, though, except one that's a jet engine starting sound.

Cheers,
JCS

 

I like the music of some Opera, and sometimes even take in a performance; what bothers me about Opera are some of the people who "like Opera" but in the back of their minds they would much rather Opera didn't have the music part (the attitude comes across quite clearly when you talk to them and realize they're interested in everything but the music).

Not just here! Years ago, when I was studying Chinese, my teacher (a middle-aged Chinese lady from Beijing) said that in China you could always tell someone was unsophisticated when they talked about "listening to" opera. A true opera buff would always talk about "watching" opera.

 

I want to like opera, I really do. It almost feels like an obligation if you love classical music (of which its a subset). It's the most extreme form of program music. But unlike the Pastoral Symphony (for example), my imagination is not allowed to run free. It must follow some of the most inane, silly, trivial, and self-serving plot lines imaginable. This is the difficulty I have with it.

 

Opera directors have no problem letting their imagination run free. There was for an example a production of The Abduction from the Seraglio that ended with a massacre.

 

Given that Mozart, Wagner and R.Strauss are all a part of the German symphonic tradition, I can't help wondering if the subtext here is more specifically about Italian opera.

 

I both love and hate opera, depending on the quality of the singing. Many people dislike "operatic" singing, by which they generally mean insensitive bellowing and shrieking loaded down with vibrato that can even make the pitch of the sung note indecipherable. I'm completely sympathetic to this. Truly great singing is relatively uncommon, but when you do hear it, it can go the heart like no other form of music-making.

 

I agree with your comment about vibrato - it can be a huge irritant. Would love to hear some opera sung without it - or at least toned down a bit.

Unfortunately, my immediate response to hearing most opera is usually that it sounds ridiculous.

Having said that, Wagner's Tristan has grabbed me (though I haven't got through all of it yet). I was drawn in by the prelude.

 

in my opinion this definitely not true at all. Many CM lovers do like opera very much, some love only opera, other like other genres too, but most often the beginning of love for CM begins with opera, because it´s synthetic genre , less abstract than let´s say absolute music. Well, the answer is what to hate in opera? after lots of thinking about all that, not just about opera but how people react on something I do realize that if a person has feeling of hate or anger in his life then it will project on many things around them including music - they would hate this or that genre, and the opposite is true as well - the more contentment there is in life the more it will project on other stuff around, at least will not generate hate.

 

I dare to say not quite many of us who don't get opera really hates any of it. We are just jealous

OTOH there is so much instrumental and absolute music to explore.. so personally I don't see my disinterest in opera any problem. For sure I don't run out of music in my lifetime!

 

My biggest difficulty with opera has always been that I only speak english

 

There are some very good operas in English. Have you tried Benjamin Britten's operas? Aaron Copland's The Tender Land is also worth checking out.

 

I love all kinds of classical music. Including vocal: Lieder, art songs, choral, oratorios, masses, cantatas....
But I just don't like opera. I find it irritating. I can do Wagner's Ring once in a while, and a bit of Baroque opera. But I really don't like opera.

 

This is interesting. What specifically about it do you find irritating that the other forms of vocal music you cite above lack?

:tiphat:

Kind regards,

George

 

I'm a fan of opera, but I'm not an "opera fan". As in, I listen to opera for the same reasons I listen to instrumental classical or lieder or choral works but I don't have a list of favorite diva sopranos, or top 5 favorite productions of such and such. I don't really pay much attention to the non-musical aspect of opera, save for the libretto of course, so I know what's going on.

 

I remember really enjoying some live opera performances when I was a student and for a few years after that. Operas and symphonies were the first professional performances of classical music I experienced. There were some thrilling arias and choruses but all too frequently singers indulged in (Woodduck's words) "shrieking loaded down with vibrato that can even make the pitch of the sung note indecipherable" which particularly made duets, quartets, opera choruses sound ugly to the ear of an amateur ensemble singer like myself.

I've heard some lovely performances on DVD but I lack the attention span to attend to most operas and the empathy to care about the characters. Also, I get the most out of music when I try to "see" its patterns and colours - opera is clearly wasted on somebody who is dead set on listening to music, even live performances, with their eyes closed.

My favourite genres of classical music these days are chamber music of all varieties, Lieder and choral. I moved recently and didn't bring any of my opera DVDs or CDs with me.

 

For me, instrumental music and opera are unrelated phenomena: music versus musical theater. There is no opera I would bother listening to as music, although there are excerpts and suites I enjoy. Without the dramatic and scenic elements and full comprehension of the text and situations, there would be no point in it — like listening to the soundtrack of a movie without the movie. I can't stand "numbers operas;" if it isn't good drama, the music only rarely will save it for me. There are a number of operas I enjoy a lot, but 98% of my listening is instrumental music or songs.

 

I got into opera quickly after discovering the concertos of Mozart at the age of 25. I think it was a highlights CD disc of nozze di figaro (in German) that opened up that world for me. My greatest love is in fact singing and in particular Mozart sopranos - I find more variety and riches in alternative opera performances than, say, different readings of great symphonies. I dont visit the opera section much because it is dominated by can belto and wagner so I tend to lurk of this section and make snide comments about anyone who says anything against Mozart.