A rant from the Balcony Box - guest blog by Meche Kroop

A Rant from the Balcony Box

Some people have religion. Some have sports. I have opera. I take it seriously. I rarely miss one. I generally feel satisfied and sometimes I feel thrilled. Occasionally I feel angry and ripped off. It is not usual for me to complain about vocal imperfections or conducting. What irritates me the most is directorial "originality", i.e. the "concept" opera.

We read the anticipatory hype and the enthusiastic reviews in which critics try to convince us that they have witnessed something "artistic" and "relevant"; we sit through these misguided conceptual failures and then vow never to see them again. We have been "treated" to updatings of works of perfection from earlier epochs that now make no sense whatsoever, in the interest of "relevancy".

In "La Traviata", does it make any sense for a woman of the 21st century to be considered a "fallen woman"? Do Flora's friends need to wear black leather and snort cocaine for us to understand that they are wealthy degenerates? Does Violetta need to do cartwheels across cement boulders for us to relate to her? In "Tosca" do we need to see Scarpia being fellated to know that he is a tyranical scumbag? In "Don Giovanni", do we want to see the Don huddled on the floor of a church basement with the rest of the cast participating in what appears to be an AA meeting? Can we not be trusted to make the connections between other generations and our own?

I believe each opera was set in a time and place that had an authenticity of its own. By honoring this concept, instead of some hot-shot director's, we can arrive at an appreciation of another culture and another epoch AND we can learn that certain human qualities of nobility, greed, rage, betrayal and self-sacrifice transcend time and place. We are different in some respects but the same in others.

There are people in power who express fears that opera will become irrelevant, as in "museum piece". What on earth is wrong with that? We trek through the Metropolitan Museum awestruck by sculptures thousands of years old and paintings hundreds of years old. Does anyone propose ripping a Degas off the walls and replacing it with a more modern "concept" of a dancer? So, why do we need to update operas that represent their own time and place in history?

Down with whoever decided that opera is a director's medium. Let these directors go back to film where they can express their egos. Leave opera to the singers and the conductors-- with just enough direction to make the story dramatically valid! Let us honor the intentions of the composer and librettist to the maximum possible.