Opera Singing

Opera

It could have started in Egypt, or in Portugal, but opera singing for one reason or another had to become recognized as an art form in Italy. At the turn of the 16th century, singers and other stage performers including their back-up musicians began evolving a form that combined dance, song, musical score, drama, choreography, the works, with elements of theatre and orchestra fused together into what is now known as opera.

Italy claiming opera’s rightful birth place, opera singing indeed became not only fashionable but a career-maker there. The likes of Rossini, Donizetti, and Bellini all created immortal operas that continue to be presented onstage today. With opera seria earning prestige for its advocates, Mozart introduced the opera buffa to lighten the air of drama, as in his famous works The Marriage of Figaro and Don Giovanni. The coming of age of the grand opera style ushered in opera’s golden age, not only in Italy, but as the opera singing virus spread across Europe, to even Germany and France.

The Italians introduced the public opera, with ticket sales skyrocketing as the art gained wider and wider recognition. The Italian Baroque era in opera was then marked by tragedy intertwined with comedy to create the high and low atmosphere that opera fanatics found so giddy that they kept coming back for more. As the working and merchant classes of Italy came to be fond of opera, those doing opera singing and acting had to be versatile anew to connect with these newfound audiences. Improvisation was allowed, as in comedia dell’arte and the intermezzi comic twist, to come up with new operatic productions that will suit different audience tastes.

Faustina Bordoni came to be known as a serious soprano conforming to the elevated and classic toned opera seria. Such was the standard set by the Italian baroque. Its libretti and tone dominated the era. But towards the century’s close, new forms were evolving elsewhere.

In Germany, even while opera singing was largely Italian-influenced, native forms of opera were surfacing. Aryan opera began mixing opera singing with straight spoken dialogues. Keiser, Telemann, and Handel came to be the most renowned opera composers of those times, as the 17th century segued to the 18th. Then came Mozart’s singspiele Die Zauberflote which earned international renown for the opera in Germany. Carl Maria von Weber set the tone for the romantic opera in Germany, and to this challenge rose the most significant and influential German operatic genius, Richard Wagner.

The ripples of change would not stop, as the waves of opera transcended boundaries, cultures, languages. While the rivalry with Italy was obvious, French opera undoubtedly had its Italian influences. Opera comique in France was then sort of a German singspiel, combining song and dialogue, but the Gluck influence found traces of Italian bel canto in French opera. The French likewise aspired for virtuoso opera singing much like their Italian competitors did.

Crossing the English Channel, opera also found a home in England, preceded by the 17th century English jig. Russia was not immune as even its imperial court laid vulnerable to the viral opera singing that spread like wildfire across Europe. By the 20th century, it was very clear that opera singing had gone beyond geographical and cultural barriers to encompass a globe that found a common tune in opera..

Opera

Tradition lashes out with hard and fast rules as far as opera singing can trace its roots. As it took wings in Italy and flew towards Germany and the rest of Europe, this taxing art form evolved from the simple, very basic and recitative opera, to the melodic, emotion-laden-through-music aria. Notwithstanding all the evolution that took place, the secco or dry recitative mode of opera singing, the accompagnato or strumentato that is duly accompanied by an orchestra, and the structured melodies of an aria have all retained that seemingly endless chain of melodies and rhymes and powerful stage acting.

The bases of the drama in opera lies in the tragedy or the comedy of the plot, intertwined with the extravagant stage costumes, stage designs, the choreography, the musical scoring. The libretto weaves the plot, the orchestra subtly induces the dreamscape, the singers and actors take the audience for the ride. Much like the oratorical theater, opera singing demands that the artist or opera singer remember the basics of hard work at honing this art form, close musical collaboration between the librettist, the composer, and the actors, attention to details in stage design, and the precise choreography that hundreds of hours of rehearsal had to master.

Italians will take the credit as pioneers but a lot of other nationalities have contributed to enriching the basics of opera singing. Opera in the German tradition, the Polish tradition, the Russian genre, will have nuances of their own but retaining the basics. The delivery may be further enhanced with a little help from the acoustics of the opera house or the concert hall. The basics of sight, of sound, of sense all need to be balanced for an opera to be able to reach out and tug at the heart of its audience.

Opera singing further demands the artists’ and composers’ unwavering recognition of the different voice types required to effectively portray a role. Thus, male opera singers will basically either be a baritone or a tenor, with little adjustments to effect a bass-baritone or a countertenor. The lady-performers will basically be within the vocal ranges of the sopranos. The voice quality of either a baritone or a soprano will associate the role with the timbre of the actor or actress to specific, loosely classed vocals of bass, baritone, tenor, soprano so that a “male” voice will stand out from the “female” voices or vice-versa.

Different nationalities share the basics of opera singing even while they differ in form and substance like how the Spanish opera distinguishes itself from German opera or the Russian for that matter. Despite all the innovations and new directions that opera singing wished to take, the basics will never change. An opera must be able to tug at the hearts of everyone, whether rich or poor, and that basic tug at emotions are all inherent in opera music.

Fusing together poetry, music, design, plot, musical convention, is very essential to achieving success in opera singing. Forget the basics and you’re back to pop music or mere oration..

Opera

The audience is rapt in attention as Figaro pledges his undying love to the Countess. Tension is building as the Count calls for arms to preserve his territorial claim for the lady. Each and every note of the opera singing reverberates in the acoustics of the Metropolitan and the audience is swept in the drama. Soon enough, the opera house explodes in acclamation.

It has always been the same, the scene onstage and the scene unfolding among the audience, in the world’s most magnificent opera houses. From the very beginning of opera, from the first opera house that opened to the public, the Teatro San Cassiano in Venice, opera singing will always bring that effect to its patrons. The goosebumps, the constricting throats, the welling eyes, the emotions, notwithstanding the acoustic effects, opera delivers the highs and the lows.

With grand productions basic to opera, and spectacular music and acoustics basic to opera singing, an opera house need to be not only large, acoustically enhanced, but at the same time classically constructed to suit the tastes of its habitués. In the Big Apple, the Metropolitan Opera House stands as a testament to the grandness of opera. Contended to be the biggest opera house in the world, and the premier stage at that, the Met is home to the Metropolitan Opera Association of New York, and several opera productions each season. The stage facilities are world-class, the crew and technical staff some of the most professional in the world, the Met for the technical crew simply means state-of-the-art support for opera singing.

Operas of old are brought to life in modern surroundings in the Sydney Opera House. Contemporary expressionist design, trend-setting architecture, seamless construction, outstanding acoustics, the Sydney Opera House is every opera company’s dream venue to do their opera singing. The spectacular exteriors are matched only by the world-class interiors. The Concert Hall has been meticulously designed to adhere to ideal ceiling height requirements, acoustic specifications, and seating space dimensions. The Sydney Opera House also offers minor venues for smaller productions, including the Drama Theater, the Studio, and the Playhouse.

In Italy where it all began, the most conducive opera houses to opera singing include the Teatro Alla Scala in Milan, the Teatro Di San Carlo in Naples, and the Teatro La Fenice in Venice. The Scala was instrumental in nurturing the opera buffa, the operatic comedy, in the 18th century. The Fenice or the Phoenix is a drama in itself having literally risen from the ashes like the proverbial phoenix after being burned down in the 1800s.

Elsewhere in Europe where opera singing also rages, there are other magnificent opera houses that feature several productions every year for opera lovers. There’s the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden in London. In France, there are the Opera Garnier and the Opera Bastille. In Brussels, there is the Theatre de la Monnaie which even famously hosted the 1830 rebellion against the Dutch, through a call to arms in one opera that sparked the audience’s nationalism.

The size, the grandeur, the spectacle, wherever opera singing reverberates, a grand opera house is alive..

Opera

Not every singer can do opera singing; nor can every actor do it anytime either. It takes more than voice alone or acting on its own. The opera brings out the best actor in a singer and the best singer in an actor. Blending both singing and acting will work in Broadway, but it takes a lot more to shine at the opera. The energy, the stamina, the audacity – many a singer aspired to combine these and be the tenor other tenors will look up to. From its birth in Italy in the 16th century to its 19th and 20th century contemporaries, opera has sustained that mystique and charm for its audiences and that challenge and exacting toll for its artists.

The opera exudes all hues of colors, paints different landscapes, plays at various feelings and takes its audiences through an emotional roller-coaster. From opera seria to opera comique, be ready to teeter on the verge of tears or rib-cracking laughter. As if that fluctuation of emotions is not enough, the costumes, the sets, the spectacular music all add to the wonder of the opera. That’s why opera singers hone their craft like no other so that they are able to bring their audiences for that spectacular ride.

Back in time opera singers could not cough up a living through opera singing alone. But the art was to take a surprising turn as 17th century commercial opera and onwards made it as lucrative a career and name-maker as any other. Nobody thought a Siena barber’s son who just sang at the cathedral choir will make it in the field and Senesino surprised them all as he debuted in Venice, earned a European following, trotted throughout the continent to make a name for himself and for his operatic art, not to mention a hefty payroll along with it. A natural onstage, Senesino, or Francesco Bernardi in real life, made his reel life one to envy as one of the greatest pioneers of opera singing.

Such may have been the same come-on for Farinelli who later turned out to be one of the most distinguished Italian sopranos who rose to fame in the 18th century. Although money would have been no consideration for this member of the nobility, Carlo Maria Broschi took to the Farinelli screen name and the excitement and fame of operatic life with much passion, decorum, and respect for his art.

And who can forget the three tenors, that consortium of the greatest opera singers of Italy and Spain. Luciano Pavarotti made waves in Italy, and so did Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras in Spain. Given the chance for a collaboration, these three rose to fame as The Three Tenors who made the eve of the 1990 FIFA World Cup as explosive as the day itself when they performed as a trio in Caracalla, Rome. Eventually, the three would join the ranks of the stalwarts of opera singing and claim their rightful place amongst the best of the best of opera, later on extending to Broadway, and even later towards pop music.

These five made opera singing their singular art, passion, and life..

Opera