Today
There was a discussion on Radio Three this morning about listeners' first experience of opera. Responses varied from the magical to Radio Three's presenter Sarah Walker nearly having been put off for life by Pelias et Melisande as her operatic induction.
In My Day
Life at 4BH was permeated with music. My Parents ran the Henry Wood Gramophone Circle and my mother spent half the summer at the proms. So, when Daddy announced that he had bought a batch of tickets to hear the
Carl Rosa opera company, I accepted it as a treat that was well within the normal parameters of what might be expected. The company was performing at the Streatham Hill Theatre which made it both relatively cheap and very close by - just a few bus stops away from home. I think I was about nine or ten at the time.
I remember seeing Aida and La Boheme. I recall very clearly the final scene of Aida when Aida and Radames swear eternal love and agree to die together in the vault. Being so young I couldn't really understand why Radames might choose to die. But I do remember the slaves' chorus and could sing it.
The next time I remember going to the opera (if you exclude routine visits to hear G&S with D'oyley Carte) was when I went to Paris with Mamma and Daddy. We had tickets to see Madama Butterfly at L'Opera Comique. Half way there, Daddy realised that he'd left the tickets at the hotel, so we missed act one altogether. I mainly remember Co-Co Sian's death (I think they used a revolver) and the arrival of Mrs Pinkerton, looking puzzled, lost and alien.
Later Mamma took me to see Tannhauser and Die Meistersingers and the film (with Elisabeth Schwartzkopf) of Der Rosenkavalier; experiences which I remember much enjoying.
Now, I love opera, but I don't see these early experiences, patchy as they were, as having the kind of revelationary impact reported by contributors to this morning's programme. The enjoyment evolved slowly, alongside my own maturation.
Most operas deal with extremely adult themes and one needs to be an adult fully to engage with them.
My first deeply felt operatic experience was Monteverdi's "Orfeo" - the passion is expressed directly and I sometimes feel that no subsequent opera quite beats this first experiment with the medium. The only other opera that can compete, in my view, is Tosca - and I still listen to it spellbound. "Vissi D'Arte" will be with me on my desert island.
There was an interesting exchange in the film "The Quartet", along the lines that in opera and musical theatre, when you feel very strongly, you burst into song, whereas in rap you burst into speech.
What matters is that you can still feel strongly and find ways of expressing it
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Wednesday, January 09, 2013
Museum
Today
The move to Spencer House has highlighted what I already knew. Not only did we have too much stuff; a great deal of it had absolutely no function whatsoever in our daily lives. Much of it takes up significant space and adds a museum-like quality to the house; and the hundred and twenty teapots are still in store....
Paul's beautiful vitrine houses a collection of delicate cups, saucers and plates. There is a huge, quite unusable teapot filling up one window sill and a very pretty set of purple liqueur glasses and decanter on the landing cabinet that have never been used.
Looking at these glasses reminds me of one of those little niggling incidents of my childhood.
In My Day
At 4BH we did, indeed, have a "Museum". This was an ornate black lacquer and gold glass fronted cabinet that matched the hall table. It contained a number of items, not all of which I can remember - I expect family can help me out here. There was certainly an incendiary bomb that had landed on the roof of 4BH during the war (was it unexploded?). There were David's Coronation medals and Maundy Money from his time at St Paul's.
Sometime during my childhood - I think I was about six or seven - a friend of my parents gave me a delightful gift of a miniature decanter and glasses set on a cute tray. It was made of wood, hand-painted with red stripes and the whole thing was about eight inches in diameter. "Bohemian" Mamma called it, meaning it came from somewhere in Eastern Europe, I suppose.
How I looked forward to playing with it! I could give little tea-parties; a host of other fantasies crowded my brain. It was not to be. The gift was firmly taken away and placed in the Museum. I was allowed to look but certainly not touch.
In one respect, of course, Mamma and Daddy were wise; the item would probably have been lost or broken had I been allowed to play with with. But, on the other hand, if I couldn't play with it, what was it for? And I don't know what happened to it after Mamma and Daddy moved to Dorking.
And that's the whole issue surrounding these items; they have to play a significant part in our lives, at least the joy of handling and looking at them, if our homes aren't to turn into museums.
The move to Spencer House has highlighted what I already knew. Not only did we have too much stuff; a great deal of it had absolutely no function whatsoever in our daily lives. Much of it takes up significant space and adds a museum-like quality to the house; and the hundred and twenty teapots are still in store....
Paul's beautiful vitrine houses a collection of delicate cups, saucers and plates. There is a huge, quite unusable teapot filling up one window sill and a very pretty set of purple liqueur glasses and decanter on the landing cabinet that have never been used.
Looking at these glasses reminds me of one of those little niggling incidents of my childhood.
In My Day
At 4BH we did, indeed, have a "Museum". This was an ornate black lacquer and gold glass fronted cabinet that matched the hall table. It contained a number of items, not all of which I can remember - I expect family can help me out here. There was certainly an incendiary bomb that had landed on the roof of 4BH during the war (was it unexploded?). There were David's Coronation medals and Maundy Money from his time at St Paul's.
Sometime during my childhood - I think I was about six or seven - a friend of my parents gave me a delightful gift of a miniature decanter and glasses set on a cute tray. It was made of wood, hand-painted with red stripes and the whole thing was about eight inches in diameter. "Bohemian" Mamma called it, meaning it came from somewhere in Eastern Europe, I suppose.
How I looked forward to playing with it! I could give little tea-parties; a host of other fantasies crowded my brain. It was not to be. The gift was firmly taken away and placed in the Museum. I was allowed to look but certainly not touch.
In one respect, of course, Mamma and Daddy were wise; the item would probably have been lost or broken had I been allowed to play with with. But, on the other hand, if I couldn't play with it, what was it for? And I don't know what happened to it after Mamma and Daddy moved to Dorking.
And that's the whole issue surrounding these items; they have to play a significant part in our lives, at least the joy of handling and looking at them, if our homes aren't to turn into museums.
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