What Makes Opera Special?

By Leo, Rene, Liz, Fatima

There are several things that separate opera from other types of art. Here are a few:

1. Lack of Stigma/Politics- Many other forms of art-music, poetry, writing, painting, photography- are used to bring attention to some type of social situation or to bring about political or economic change. We have discussed several examples in class, especially with photography. I feel that opera lacks this social stigma and that opera is not really used to call people to action. I think it is important to note the wording there- to call people to action. I do not deny that opera can be used to comment on political or social events but I don’t think that opera is meant to make people do something about that specific event. For example, Les Huguenots is a French grand opera by Offenbach, that goes over the events prior or leading to The St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre (an event when French Catholics in Paris slaughtered French Protestants). While the opera does make political commentaries about the event, it does not call the listener to go and do something about the Huguenots being slaughtered, because the opera was written many years after the actual event took place.

2. Passion- Operas are always passionate. This was the hardest for me and my group to define because none of us could put into words what the word passion meant. I won’t try to do that here but I will say that even when the opera is comic, the beauty of the voice and the music transforms the opera beyond slapstick humor or crude jokes. There is a floating around of human feelings-love and hatred and many others. There is always great feeling in opera and that makes it passionate.

3. Elaborate Costumes, Set, and Music- another defining feature of opera is its overall complexity. There are so many different factors that come together to make an opera. This is a stark difference between the other forms of art that were discussed which have overtime become generally accessible to everybody. Opera still remains a highly collaborative effort- and an expensive one!