Opera --- recorded or live?

[Florestan]

I was sold to classical music more than 20 years ago by some recordings and a movie. The recordings (on vinyl) were Tchaikovsky's 1st PC, Chopin's Polonaise op. 53, Grieg's PC and Mozart's Symphony No. 40 --- don't ask me what performances, I don't remember. But the movie is as vivid in my memory as if I saw it yesterday (I saw it twice in movie theater, actually --- much to the dismay of my classmates: just imagine a 14-year kid paying the same ticket twice to watch an opera no less!): Zefirelli's Carmen with Placido Domingo and Julia Migenes-Johnson. Since then, I've been listening to, and watched, live or on DVD, many operas, but the thrill and excitement experienced back in those days with Carmen I've never felt again. I like the music, to be sure, but I somehow feel that most, if not all, operas, are artificial and conventional: someone who is stabbed in the back or a girl whose father has just been murdered --- to hear these characters singing is a little too contrived for me. Just as it is contrived to see a hundred-kilo prima tonna singing Carmen or Lucia di Lammermoor or an aging Placido Domingo singing the teenager Parsifal. So I usually tend to just dismiss the plot altogether and concentrate on the sheer pleasure of music, but I feel this is a somehow disconnected and incomplete way to experience operas, which after all were intended by their authors to be just as much seen as listened to.

What's your experience? Do you focus more on the plot or on the music, and as such do you love your operas recorded or live?

I voted CD.

[zamyrabyrd]

If it's less than top quality I'd rather not go to a live performance.
Singers struggling with diction (Slavic Italian drives me up the wall), a cast more or less thrown together from whatever was available, indifferent accompaniment--give me good DVD's anytime...

ZB

[Opus106]

I somehow feel that most, if not all, operas, are artificial and conventional: someone who is stabbed in the back or a girl whose father has just been murdered --- to hear these characters singing is a little too contrived for me. Just as it is contrived to see a hundred-kilo prima tonna singing Carmen or Lucia di Lammermoor or an aging Placido Domingo singing the teenager Parsifal.

In other words, Indian films set to the music of Bizet and Wagner.

[DavidW]

I voted banana because I've never had the pleasure of attending an opera.  But as far as all music and theater goes I strongly prefer live, I just rarely have the chance for it.  There is also something to be said about local performers, they take more chances.  I don't know how many times I had been to a concert where the local orchestra has really embellished something just because they could and they love to play.  I'd love to see an opera put on locally just to see what they would do.

[Wendell_E]

All of the above?  Except for "I hate operas", 'cause that's just crazy talk.  If I gotta pick, it'd be live (if only there were a way to dispose of audiences!), CD, then DVD in that order, though there are performances in DVD and CD I wouldn't want to be without.  Bananas are in a class by themselves.

[DarkAngel]

Easy choice for me...........DVD Opera (Blu Ray even better)

You have best seat in the house (better than the best) to see everything in great detail and hear greatest singers of all time and great conductors perform the work.

Also many important extra features like subtitles, stop pause replay functions, singer interviews and backgound special features....all for cheaper than price of one ticket.

[Drasko]

Good live performance tops everything, then CD, then DVD.

[Scarpia]

Easy choice for me...........DVD Opera (Blu Ray even better)

You have best seat in the house (better than the best) to see everything in great detail and hear greatest singers of all time and great conductors perform the work.

Also many important extra features like subtitles, stop pause replay functions, singer interviews and backgound special features....all for cheaper than price of one ticket.

I enjoy opera on DVD, but I don't think any AV system can match the immersive experience of being in the hall.

[Wanderer]

If it's less than top quality I'd rather not go to a live performance.
Singers struggling with diction (Slavic Italian drives me up the wall), a cast more or less thrown together from whatever was available, indifferent accompaniment--give me good DVD's anytime...

I totally agree with this. A live performance by a top orchestra and well-cast singers (plus a non-heinous staging) would be the best choice but how often is any one of us near one of those? So, recordings of noteworthy performances are the next best thing, on Blu-ray if possible.

That said, I also tend to concentrate on the music itself, played and sung, more so than on the actual words being sung or the plot, especially when the opera has a mediocre (or outright bad) libretto but happens to be clad in gorgeous music.

[Sergeant Rock]

You have best seat in the house (better than the best) to see everything in great detail...

That's why I usually don't like watching opera DVDs: too close, too detailed...way too much information (like noticing the barely pubescent Salome is actually 45 years old  ). I prefer not to look down a singer's throat; I don't want an anatomy lesson on how they produce that enormous sound.

Seeing an opera in the theater, from a distance, from the balcony is much better. But simply hearing opera is the best: my imagination is usually superior to any stage production and poor over-acting.

Sarge

[knight66]

I enjoy opera on DVD, but I don't think any AV system can match the immersive experience of being in the hall.

I agree. When it works well in the opera house, TV/DVD does not come close. But I enjoy seeing a lot of productions and singers on DVD that I would not otherwise see.

Mike

[DarkAngel]

I agree. When it works well in the opera house, TV/DVD does not come close. But I enjoy seeing a lot of productions and singers on DVD that I would not otherwise see.
Mike

This question is for anyone.....

Since most people say you can't beat a live performance.......
What exactly do you benefit from being there live that high quality AV system can't deliver?

I can generate quite a list of great benefits a high quality AV system can deliver that even best seat in the house won't match in live opera performance......including sound quality if your system is good enough

I will of course concede that there is a social benefit being with friends, night out, special occassion etc.

[knight66]

Well for one thing there is the high wire act of it. They will not be publishing a DVD of a performance that goes wrong. But this is not about hoping it will go wrong, quite the reverse. There is the spontaneity that can communicate itself when you sit there and the singer decides to try something out.

There is the corporate experience where there can be a collective hush, the audience holds it breath, or is collectively transported or thrilled. That is a powerful experience. Comedy in opera is funnier on the hoof than on a DVD.

Also there is the feeling that this is a once and only offer, never to be repeated in quite this way again. That holds an attraction.

The musicians connect, collude with the audience and often feed off it. That exchange can be palpable in concert or opera, as can all the other attractions I mention.

I find myself much less engaged on DVD than I am on CD where the opera goes on in my head, not visually, but emotionally.

Mike

[Scarpia]

I can generate quite a list of great benefits a high quality AV system can deliver that even best seat in the house won't match in live opera performance......including sound quality if your system is good enough

Now that statement, I cannot fathom.  Maybe your sound system can beat being in the back row under the mezzanine, but if you have a prime seat, say in the orchestra section 10 rows back, you will have a sonic experience that no audio system can match.  In the hall you have 80 or more individual sound sources arrayed in front of you, a carpet of individual violins, violas, cellos and bases, individual clarinets, oboes, horns, trombones, trumpets, timpani, bass drum, etc.  You have singers above them and the reverberation of a splendid hall to envelop you.   Maybe a skilled audio engineer can include enough audio cues in create some illusion of the sound stage, but in the end you are listening to a pair of cardboard (or kevlar, etc) cones glued to a metal coil.  There is so much more information in the origional 3D sound field.

I have many opera DVDs and value them because they give me the ability to see operas and productions I would otherwise never have the chance to see, but non of them to hold a candle to the relatively few opera productions I have seen live.

[DarkAngel]

Now that statement, I cannot fathom.  Maybe your sound system can beat being in the back row under the mezzanine, but if you have a prime seat, say in the orchestra section 10 rows back, you will have a sonic experience that no audio system can match.  In the hall you have 80 or more individual sound sources arrayed in front of you, a carpet of individual violins, violas, cellos and bases, individual clarinets, oboes, horns, trombones, trumpets, timpani, bass drum, etc.  You have singers above them and the reverberation of a splendid hall to envelop you.   Maybe a skilled audio engineer can include enough audio cues in create some illusion of the sound stage, but in the end you are listening to a pair of cardboard (or kevlar, etc) cones glued to a metal coil.  There is so much more information in the origional 3D sound field.

I have many opera DVDs and value them because they give me the ability to see operas and productions I would otherwise never have the chance to see, but non of them to hold a candle to the relatively few opera productions I have seen live.

Sounds like you have a very strong  preference for live..........

I have spent a lot of money on current home AV system and for pure audio enjoyment like my home stereo sound more than live performance of opera pit orchestra, it is ideally set-up to my preferences and I hear more inner details.

How many times have you been able to see the absolute best opera singers under ideal conditions with best conductor and best production, unless you live in NY or other large opera center be very hard.........you can see that any night in the comfort of your home with opera DVDs 

[Scarpia]

Sounds like you have a very strong  preference for live..........

I have spent a lot of money on current home AV system and for pure audio enjoyment like my home stereo sound more than live performance of opera pit orchestra, it is ideally set-up to my preferences and I hear more inner details.

How many times have you been able to see the absolute best opera singers under ideal conditions with best conductor and best production, unless you live in NY or other large opera center be very hard.........you can see that any night in the comfort of your home with opera DVDs 

As I mentioned in the passage you quoted, I do appreciate that DVDs and Blu Ray allow me to enjoy many performances that it would have been impossible to see.   But the experience is not nearly comparable. 

I think you've posted a photo of your rig on one of the threads.  My setup is of similar configuration, not quite as elite in brand name, within a factor of 3 in price.   I don't think I am hearing dramatically less when I listen to my stereo.  But great live recordings are something that I remember to this day, even if they occurred 20 years ago.  I don't have any memories of listening to my stereo 20 years ago.

[bricon]

This question is for anyone.....

Since most people say you can't beat a live performance.......
What exactly do you benefit from being there live that high quality AV system can't deliver?

Opera is an acoustic experience – natural (unamplified) voices singing with and (often soaring over) acoustic orchestras. A recording may portray a very good approximation of reality but the sound will be inherently different from hearing the same from an unamplified source – furthermore recordings (audio and video) are often "engineered", so you get to hear what someone thinks a piece should sound like rather than what the conductor/performers really delivered. This is often apparent with the balance between orchestra and singers – recordings often have the voices further forward in the soundscape than they actually are in performance.

An AV recording of an opera provides an electric/electronic approximation of an acoustic artform.

[Florestan]

Thank you for the replies, ladies and gentlemen, most interesting comments.

A supplementary question for those of you who prefer it live: do you manage to immerse completely in the action to the point of forgetting the world around?

My experience with live operas are rather bad, but not because of the music or action per se, but because of the performances and the environment. Singers of the Bucharest Opera, with minimal exceptions, are third or fourth tier at best. Still, what displeases me the most and discourages me from going to opera is the behaviour of the audience. Constant whispers, coughs, sneeze, body movements --- not to mention the myriads of coke or mineral water bottles opening, or that horrendous sound of unwrapping a pack of crackers, all right in the middle of an aria. I don't know about other audiences, but that of the Bucharest Opera is a horror.

[Wendell_E]

Still, what displeases me the most and discourages me from going to opera is the behaviour of the audience. Constant whispers, coughs, sneeze, body movements --- not to mention the myriads of coke or mineral water bottles opening, or that horrendous sound of unwrapping a pack of crackers, all right in the middle of an aria. I don't know about other audiences, but that of the Bucharest Opera is a horror.

See my remark above:  "if only there were a way to dispose of audiences!"     Still, sometimes in a really good performance, all those little distractions do seem to fade away.

[Franco]

This question is for anyone.....

Since most people say you can't beat a live performance.......
What exactly do you benefit from being there live that high quality AV system can't deliver?

I can generate quite a list of great benefits a high quality AV system can deliver that even best seat in the house won't match in live opera performance......including sound quality if your system is good enough

I will of course concede that there is a social benefit being with friends, night out, special occassion etc.

IMO there is only one way to truly experience music - in live performance. 

This is especially true for opera, but is true for all forms of music, again IMO. 

There are many intangibles aside from the very real sound quality issue - but music if experienced as a reproduced sound through even the very best system is not going to provide the full experience of being in the concert hall or theater and hearing the sound live.

Specifically for opera, the live experience is vastly superior to watching on DVD, or listening to a CD - and part of this is the audience participation.  Of course I understand the convenience of listening in your home, but there is no doubt in my mind that music loses much in the translation from live to canned.