Favorite Operas of the Past Century

Started by Kullervo, July 26, 2007, 02:34:16 PM

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Kullervo

Quote from: PerfectWagnerite on November 13, 2007, 04:57:01 PM
You think so? What an obscene, preposterous and totally incomprensible libretto and plot. Great music though.

With music that good I am willing to accept the absurdities of the libretto. :P

knight66

It is heartening in a way to see how many superb operas have been produced in the last 100 years. But very few of those from say the last 30 years. Possibly one problem is, I have read of quite a few operas getting a premier, then no other productions, so they disappear before people get a chance to evaluate them.

I suppose it is like the problem with the modern symphony. The composer gets the commission, it gets one outing, then silence.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

val

Regarding the last 100 years, these are my favorite:

SCHÖNBERG:  Moses und Aaron

ALBAN BERG:  Wozzeck

ENESCU:        Oedipe

RICHARD STRAUSS:  Daphne / Capriccio

HINDEMITH:    Cardillac

KURT WEILL:   Mahagonny

PROKOFIEV:    The Fiery Angel

SHOSTAKOVITCH:  The Nose

BRITTEN:        Peter Grimes / The turn of the screw

ZIMMERMANN:      Die Soldaten

some guy

Well Corey, since this thread seems miraculously to be still alive, I'll go ahead and fill in a gap or two myself.

Oh, it's fun!!

Janáček, Osud. Not as well known. I don't know why. There's some problem with different versions of the libretto or something. I don't remember things. Anyway, the music is sublimely seductive. I dare you not to love this opera!! (Just avoid Mackerras's Englished version. Not only is the English lame, but the performance is not up to Sir Charles generally lofty standards. There are two others, both in Czech, and they're different from each other but both good. I tend to favor František Jílek's. It was the first one I heard, and I prefer the soprano. But Albrecht's is superb. (Get both. It's only one CD.)
Prokofiev, Semyon Kotko. Wild and wildly beautiful. This is 1940 Prokofiev, at the top of his game.
Poulenc, Dialogues des Carmélites. Also tops. I usually don't pay that much attention to the story, but the ending of this won't let you ignore that element. (There's a moment in the Prokofiev that's like that, too. "Net net.")
Feldman, Neither. Pedants will assure you that this is not an opera. So shoot me. It's Feldman. It's great.
Nørgård, Nuit des Hommes. Good strong Nørgård. Makes me want his other, less readily available operas.
Kutavičius, Lokys, the Bear. Wildly addictive Lithuanian minimalism.
And (since I unfortunately do not know the Ashley operas) the pick of the opera crop, for me, Helmut Lachenmann's Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern. As good as Lachenmann gets, which means that it's as good an opera as it gets.

I'm sure I've left something really cool off this list, but it's late. Why am I still awake? Anyway, I'll add my voice to the chorus of Britten's Peter Grimes, which I saw three times when it was in L.A. a few years back. And Janáček's Katya Kabanova, which is so utterly gorgeous, I think I should listen to it now, just because I'm thinking about it. All Janáček's operas are good. Many of them are superb. And possibly the greatest opera of the twentieth century, Ligeti's Le Grand Macabre.

Kullervo

Thanks, those are some unconventional choices there. I didn't know Feldman wrote an opera. Is it plotless? I've also been meaning to get Nuit des Hommes for some time now, but keep putting it off for whatever reason. His other, larger operas are hard to find in the States.

Lethevich

I hadn't noticed this release a month back - very exciting to see one of his operas available on DVD finally.

Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

pjme



this is gorgeous from beginning to end!

some guy

Martinu! Of course. He wrote a ton of operas.

I want that Greek Passion DVD. What a cool opera that is, to be sure.

As for Neither, no. No plot. (It's words by Samuel Beckett, too, can't be bad.)

I left off Maderna's Satyricon from my list, probably because I've only listened to it once or twice and have no very clear recollection.

I just got Chaya Czernowin's opera, Pnima...ins Innere. I've only played it once, and only watched a few minutes of the opening, up to when the old man starts wandering in and out of a doorway. So I have nothing to say about the plotless action of that, either. But the music is very spare and interesting. Isolated notes and phrases. Interesting sparse textures.

BachQ

Katya Kabanova by Rudolf Jedlicka

scarecrow says:  "misogynist retrogressive peasantry refusing to understand the challenges of libidinal dimensions"


Kullervo

Quote from: D Minor on December 20, 2007, 06:22:23 AM
Katya Kabanova by Rudolf Jedlicka

scarecrow says:  "misogynist retrogressive peasantry refusing to understand the challenges of libidinal dimensions"



My favorite sociopathic Amazon reviewer!

BachQ

Quote from: Corey on December 20, 2007, 06:26:24 AM
My favorite sociopathic Amazon reviewer!

Yeah, he's one of my favorite sociopaths too! ..........

Kullervo

Quote from: D Minor on December 20, 2007, 06:28:18 AM
Yeah, he's one of my favorite sociopaths too! ..........

You know he used to review as a woman named "Rachael"?  :D

Spineur

#72
Quote from: knight66 on November 13, 2007, 10:58:01 PM
It is heartening in a way to see how many superb operas have been produced in the last 100 years. But very few of those from say the last 30 years. Possibly one problem is, I have read of quite a few operas getting a premier, then no other productions, so they disappear before people get a chance to evaluate them.

I suppose it is like the problem with the modern symphony. The composer gets the commission, it gets one outing, then silence.

Mike

I am discovering this very interesting thread.
A very recent opera is Alexander Raskatov "A dog's heart" after Michael Bulgakov novel which was created in 2010 at Netherland royal opera.   I saw it in Lyon last year and was highly impressed.  I havent seen any DVD or recording yet.  Its an amazing piece. The duch royal opera reprogrammed it.  The next step would be to see it at one of the summer festival and then the MET, but the road is going to be pretty long as you wisely observed.

Jaakko Keskinen

#73
Does Pelleas by Debussy count? Most of the music was completed at 19th century but it was finished by 1902.

Pelleas et Melisande
Fanciulla del west
Turandot
Salome
Elektra
Die Liebe der Danae
The Miserly knight
Golden cockerel
"Javert, though frightful, had nothing ignoble about him. Probity, sincerity, candor, conviction, the sense of duty, are things which may become hideous when wrongly directed; but which, even when hideous, remain grand."

- Victor Hugo

PerfectWagnerite

Wow someone revived a thread that is 9 yrs old.  This has to be a record.

Anyway mine are:

Lady Macbeth
Elektra
Wozzeck

Cato

R. Strauss: Elektra

Rachmaninov:The Miserly Knight

Schoenberg: Erwartung, Moses und Aron

Hindemith: Cardillac

Berg: Wozzeck

Prokofiev: The Fiery Angel

Hartmann: Simplicius Simplicissimus

Janacek: Katya Kabanova, Jenufa, From the House of the Dead

Herrmann: Wuthering Heights

Stravinsky: Oedipus Rex (opera-cantata)   8)

Martinu: Ariane, The Greek Passion

Birger-Blomdahl: Aniara (opera-cantata)  ??? 8)

Penderecki: The Devils of Loudun



"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)