Our Night at the Opera

Going to the Metropolitan Opera was one of the events that I was particularly excited about for this class. I really like opera, and I really like Shakespeare, so I figured the combination would be something I would really enjoy.

Although the sets were interesting and very original, and the singing was of course amazing, I found the production as a whole a bit underwhelming. There weren’t many tunes in the opera that were particularly memorable. The music never made me go “wow.” Even though opera is not exactly supposed to be catchy like a pop song, there are opera tunes that definitely stick in your head and make you go “wow.”

A problem I had with the opera that I didn’t think about before seeing it was that since A Midsummer Night’s Dream isn’t meant to be an opera, the singing of it sometimes felt awkward and forced. Not only that, but it lost the iambic beat that Shakespeare’s writing has to it. For me, that’s one of the best parts about Shakespeare’s writing–that there is a rhythm and it’s rather consistent. With opera, this was lost completely. Singing his words in a slow manner or with extended syllables made the dialogue lose so much of its cleverness and spice. After all, Shakespeare plays aren’t just the words themselves; they’re the way they are said.