Operahouse

“ On our last evening we attended the Royal Opera, occupying a box quite to ourselves, where we heard good singing and well-rendered music by the Royal Band, beheld a fashionably-dressed and intelligent-looking audience, and were stared at by old King Oscar who sat rigid in his box, and glared at us with a mighty black opera-glass until he had studied each feature of the stranger guests, and by his persistence thereby directed upon us the curiosity of every other pair of opera glasses in the house. ”

“ It is a peculiarity of her Majesty’s Theatre that whether the “house” be a good one or a bad one, there are always, before the termination of the first act of the opera, some occupants of the pit who are compelled to content themselves with standing-room.
Opinions are divided as to the place in the enceinte of the magnificent theatre where the greatest enjoyment of the performance can be obtained. To some, a box on the grand tier—vast, roomy, with space for six to sit abreast—is considered the superlative of operatic felicity. ”

“ The fickleness of the public taste, the popular craving for sensation, the egotism and rapacity of the artists, the lack of high purpose in the promoters, the domination of fashion instead of love for art, the lack of real artistic culture—all these things have stood from the beginning, as they still stand, in the way of a permanent foundation of opera in New York. The boxes of the Metropolitan Opera House have a high market value to-day, but they are a coveted asset only because they are visible symbols of social distinction. ”

“ It was an opera night, and the house was crowded to excess; but with some little management, I obtained a place in a box near the stage. The piece was "Les Franc Macons," which was certainly admirably supported, and drew down from the audience—no mean one as judges of music—the loudest thunders of applause. As for me, the house was a great a curiosity as the opera. The novel spectacle of some hundred (thousand?) people relishing and appreciating the highest order of musical genius, was something totally new and surprising to me. ”

“ The music is as stirring, the company as numerous, the spirits as light, the women as beautiful, as ever they were in the old days of prosperity, when the Opera-House was bright and fresh as paint and paper, tinsel and brocade, could make it. To the eyes which are not dazzled by the sight of so much youth and beauty and jollity, the broken stucco of the mouldings and the faded, musty cushions of the chairs may be visible. ”

“ Indeed, some of the wretched, slipshod performances that have been given under the name of grand opera in America, would be hissed from the stage in London, Paris, or Italy. In operatic performances in America, we have the parts of two or three principals well done, but all else slipshod and imperfect, and the effect of the opera itself too frequently marred by the outrageous cuttings, transpositions, and alterations made by managers to adapt it to their resources. ”

“ This in itself is not much to boast of, for the entertainment of the ballet is independent of language to a still greater extent; and La Gitana or Esmeralda can be as well understood by an Englishman at the Opera House of Berlin or of Moscow as at Her Majesty's Theatre in London; while perhaps the most universally intelligible drama ever performed is that of Punch, even when the brief dialogue which adorns its pantomime is inaudible.
Opera is music in a dramatic form; and people go to the theatre and listen to it as if it were so much prose. ”

“ Not all of them, by any means, have been through as severe a school as mine; few American singers at any rate, have made a career in a foreign country exactly as if they had been a native of it. Many have been engaged for special rôles in one of the larger opera houses, and after several years of experience, have sung but a few parts, all of which have been those most suited to them. I have sung, on the contrary, the entire repertoire of a typical German opera house, where operas are regularly given of which the Metropolitan audience has never even heard. ”

“ We have taken a suite of rooms in the Clarendon Hotel, so as to be near the opera-house, where I go to practise with the orchestra. You cannot imagine how intense the whole thing is.
To feel that I can hold a great audience, like the one that greeted me the first night, in my hand, and to know that I can make them laugh or cry whenever I please—to see the mass of upturned faces—is an inspiring sensation. The applause bewildered me at first, and I was fearfully excited; but one gets used to all things in the end. ”

“ In the opera house all is bustle and commotion. The officials are selling tickets, receiving tickets, and directing to their places bevies of ladies and gentlemen bewildered in a maze of passages. The audience is impatiently preparing itself for a delightful evening's entertainment. The dandies, who are so unfortunate as not to have accompanied ladies have already brought themselves up to the attack, and have levelled their opera-glasses on all the points where they know well-established objects of admiration are likely to be found. ”

“ Few of those who hear the first production of a new opera realize that the successful performance is the result not only of the singing of celebrities and perfect orchestration, but also of the patient care which has been bestowed upon the opera for months by the stage manager and those who have helped him.
When the director of the opera company decides to produce a new opera the libretto is given to those who are charged with the construction of scenery, costumes, and properties. ”

“ No one will dispute but that understanding Italian would render our entertainment at an opera more rational and more complete; but without that advantage, let it be remembered by the lovers of Music, that an opera is the completest concert to which they can go; with this advantage over those in still life, that to the most perfect singing, and effects of a powerful and well-disciplined band, are frequently added excellent acting, splendid scenes and decorations, with such dancing as a playhouse, from its inferior prices, is seldom able to furnish. ”

“ On the other hand, Cavalieri’s own instructions show his wonderful practical knowledge in the performance of opera, and give us an exact idea of the first operatic theatre: ‘The hall should not hold more than a thousand spectators comfortably seated, in the greatest silence. Larger halls have bad acoustics: they make the singer force his voice and they kill expression. Moreover, when the words are not understood the [Pg 336] music becomes tiresome. The number of instruments must be proportioned to the place of performance. The orchestra is invisible, hidden behind the drop. ”

“ The stage rehearsals with the almost invariable and inevitable shouting and excitement are very trying to the nerves, especially when one is making two or three débuts a week, that is, singing a new part for the first time almost every other night as I did, at the beginning of my career. The better the theatre, of course, the greater the smoothness and lack of confusion at stage rehearsals. The singers and orchestra men are more experienced, and more competent, and the manners of the Kapellmeister improve in ratio to the importance of the opera house. ”

“ The production of the opera in London is made with an orchestra of nearly a hundred performers, a well-trained chorus of sixty voices, dresses of great elegance, and correct and appropriate costume and style, even to the humblest performer. The opera, in all its details, is well performed, and the music correctly given; the scenery and scenic effects excellent, the auxiliaries abundant, so that a stage army looks something like an army, and not a corporal's guard ”

“ A novel feature in our life was the frequent visits to the theatre with our friends. It was most remarkable that my husband should take such a sudden fancy to the Opera; he could not account for it himself, except by noticing that "he felt at home in it." We invariably took fauteuils d'orchestre, so that he only saw the musicians, actors, and scenery—hardly any of the occupants of the theatre, except those in the stage-boxes. It is a curious fact that in the space of a fortnight he heard more operas than in all the rest of his life. ”

“ There are many theatres where plays are given that are not only pure in tone, but exert a refining and educating influence on all who hear them. And as for operas, there is hardly one in the modern repertory that is open to censure on moral grounds. Mr. Carl Rosa refers to the curious fact that, when circumstances compel him to give an operatic performance in a hall instead of a theatre, the audiences are of quite a distinct character, including many who like opera, but do not wish to go to a theatre. ”

“ The Opera-house referred to in the extract above quoted, is the Academie Nationals de Musique, or French Opera-house, also sometimes called the new Opera-house. It is generally admitted to be the finest Opera-house in the world. The space covered by this magnificent building is 140 metres by 122, (about 470 feet by 410) , or nearly four and a half acres. It has seats for 2,520 spectators. The staircases, walls and ceiling are of the finest marble. The "house" for the spectators or audience is built entirely of stone and iron, rich in decorations and thick with gold. ”

“ The first requisite for the aspirant who wishes to follow the operatic career is undoubtedly a voice possessed of the three essential factors of Quality, Power and Compass; what is termed in Italy a “voce di teatro,” or voice for the theatre.
But an opera-singer is actor as well as singer, and in this direction more—much more—is now demanded of him than formerly. But to those possessed of what is known as the Instinct of the Theatre, or Scenic Instinct, the gestures and attitudes of the operatic stage, being largely conventional, are soon acquired. ”

“ After all, in an opera, the poetry must be the handmaid of the music. Why do Italian comic operas always please, in spite of their wretched librettos—even in Paris, as I was witness myself? Because the music is supreme, and everything else is forgotten. All the more then will an opera be likely to please in which the plan of the piece is well carried out, and the words are written simply to suit the music; not turned and twisted so as to ruin the composition for the sake of a miserable rhyme, which God knows does far more harm than good in a dramatic representation. ”

“ Dingy scenery, shabby and anachronistic costumes, an inefficient chorus, and a scanty orchestra had aided a small constellation of eminent singers to maintain Italian Opera at the King’s Theatre for the entertainment of a clique, not for the pleasure of a public. This was to be changed. The new undertaking promised perfection in every thing. Art was to be considered as well as the artist—the composer as well as the singer. ”

“ But the orchestra has become such an important factor in modern opera that musicians would be unwilling to have it reduced in size—the tendency being, in fact, the other way; and at the same time opera is such an expensive luxury that it can only be made to pay in a very large theatre, which obliges the singers to have stentorian voices. ”

“ Simple-minded folk, not up to this, wait in their stalls, and wonder why everybody else is going. Members of orchestra disappear, lights extinguished, brown-holland coverings descend, the fireman enters, the box-keepers retire, and suddenly it bursts upon the inexperienced Opera-goer that it's all over, except shouting for carriages, and that's over too by now, and that there is to be no more Opera to-night. ”

“ She occupied her opera-box this year, resplendent in satin and diamonds, radiating light on a tiara night from the circlet of stars and roses that trembled on their delicate wires as she turned her head from the stage to the auditorium. She had her visitors as of old: attachés, ambassadors even, literary men, musical men, painters, politicians. ”

“ Hence the origin of airs, choruses, symphonies, and of that enchanting melody which often embellishes modern music at the expense of its poetic accompaniment.
"At the birth of the Opera, its inventors, to elude that which seemed unnatural, as an imitation of human life, in the union of music with speech, transferred their scenes from earth to heaven, and to hell. Not knowing how to make men speak, they made gods and devils, instead of heroes and shepherds, sing. Thus magic and marvels became speedily the stock in trade of the lyrical theatre. ”

“ Why don’t you go back to washing? An artist! Corpo di Bacco! Why don’t you go back to scrubbing floors? You, who stand there dressed up like Marguerite! Where is your fur, where are your claws, where are your shiny yellow eyes, cat that you are!” All of this, disheartening and saddening as it is, only proves that social amenities at the opera are very much as they are with us all in real life.
THE SPELL OF MUSIC Why is it, we wonder, that the people in the first tier boxes at the opera always seem like human beings. ”

“ When you sit through a performance of grand opera—almost any one of those combinations of drama and music which retain their hold upon the public—you cannot fail to be impressed by the tragic misfortunes which pursue the hero and heroine. The wise composers of grand opera see to it that the principal tenor and the prima donna have troubles calculated to call forth their highest powers of vocal expression. ”