Re: [OPE] intermission: value of knowledge

Gerald Levy wrote:
>> Why do operas survive - because there is a large and very expensive input
>> of labour put into re-staging them.
>>
>
>
> Hi Paul C:
>
> Operas have survived *despite* the high cost for staged performances,
> not *because* of it. A huge percentage of those who love opera - a
> majority, I think - have either never heard a live opera performance or
> have attended a performance only once or a few times.This has been
> the case for many decades: the popularity of this music form has continued
> by virtue of people listening to it on various mediums (records, tapes, CDs,
> DVDs, FM radio, online, etc.). Indeed, some of the most loved performances
> were originally recorded in the mid-20th Century.
>
> What would account, by your reckoning, for the fact that some operas
> with huge overhead production costs fail while others (e.g. by Verdi,
> Puccini, Wagner, and other dead composers) succeed? SURELY, it
> has more to do with the music itself (and the plot) than the cost of
> production.
>
>
What I am saying is that the production of live operas and the copying
of these
onto disks is and has been a substantial business for some two or three
centuries.
How long would opera as an artform survive were all opera companies to
close.

> In solidarity, Jerry
>
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Received on Tue Nov 17 11:03:07 2009