Between the good and bad, that's where you'll find me, Reaching for Heaven

Icon directed at the cause of the rant.

So... An old headspace dweller has returned after fifteen years of silence, namely Klingsor from Wagner's "Parsifal". In order to deal with the warlock wars breaking out between him and Muraki, I decided to send the newcomer some place where there are people from his world. And for the heck of it, I've been doing a bit of a canon review, including listening to the opera and reading a relevant chapter on it in a study of the Grail legends, "The Grail" by Norma Lorre Goodrich.

I wonder if she'd actually heard the opera before she wrote the chapter about it. She seems hung up on Kundry as an antagonist, when it's Klingsor who's the one who set everything in motion; like Dracula in the Bram Stoker novel, or Darth Vader in the original "Star Wars" trilogy, he might not be on scene much, but he has an incredible amount of influence over the course of the story. He's the one who started shanghai'ing unwary Grail Knights, the one who filched the Holy Spear, the one who wounded Amfortas. It's almost like Kundry has become the magician's lovely assistant who distracts the audience from what the magician is up to. I don't see Kundry as this anti-feminist figure that the writer makes her out to be, especially when you look at the wider context of Wagner's operas: up until "Parsifal", his operas are about women saving men from the terrible mistakes they've made. It's as if, in this last of his works, Wagner decided to show the favor being returned. Granted, Klingsor uses Kundry as a tool to get his revenge on the Knights of the Grail, but she's not happy about it (the writer somehow mistook *Klingsor's* glee at the prospect of trying to snare Parsifal, for *Kundry's*, which leads me to think she just read the libretto, rather than listened to the opera, or watched a performance of it.). She fights to resist him, she mocks him: listening to their lines at the beginning of the second act is almost like listening to a prostitute arguing with her pimp. Kundry is the victim here, not the victimizer. She's no damsel in distress, but she does need to be rescued. And that, ultimately, is just what Parsifal does...

One opera I've always wanted to see live is Puccini's "Tosca", and some years back, an enterprising director devised a production set in the actual locations and times, in Rome, specified in the libretto. I've been trying to find it on video or DVD, but I haven't had much luck. Untill now... Here's a clip of one of my favorite arias from it, featuring Ruggiero Raimondi as the villainous Scarpia:

Started this a while back, but I never finished it for some wierd reason...

Favorite Opera: Hah, hard to narrow it down to just a few. I'd have to say, in no particular order, Puccini's "Tosca", Wagner's "Der Ring des Nibelungen" (Yes, I count all 16 hours of it as one opera; we all know I'm a little wierd) and "Parsifal", Johann Strauss, jr's "Die Fledermaus", Richard Strauss's "Der Rosenkavalier", and Mozart's "Marriage of Figaro"

Favorite Role (that you sing): Hm. I'm more suited to "trouser roles" considering my looks and my vocal range, ie. Cherubino in "Marriage of Figaro" and Count Orlofsky in "Fledermaus"

Favorite Role (that you could potentially sing many many years from now): I'd love to sing the role of Baron Scarpia in "Tosca" someday, but I'm the wrong gender and the wrong range!

Favorite Role (that you will never sing): The Queen of the Night, from "Die Zauberfloete": too many freakin' high notes! (Though I once sang "Die Holle Rache" when I was on a mad chocolate high.)

Favorite Aria (to listen to/will never sing): Zerbinetta's aria from "Ariadne auf Naxos" (the one with the, what is it, a high F that very few sopranos can hit)

Favorite Aria (you could potentially sing in the future):

Favorite Aria (to sing right now): "Voi che Sapete" from "Marriage of Figaro"

For Gals : Favorite Tenor and Bari/Bass Roles:

Tenor: Cavaradossi in "Tosca", the title character in "Parsifal", Siegfried in "Der Ring"

Bari/Bass: Scarpia in "Tosca" ('nuff said...)

Favorite Female singers: Jessye Norman, Marilyn Horne, Sarah Brightman (Shuttit, purists!), Marian Anderson, Christa Ludwig, Rosalind Elias... Gad, that's four mezzo-sopranos out of six singers. (Guess why?)

Favorite Male Singers: Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. Mario Lanza, Graham Clark, James Morris, Anthony Laciura (I know, "Who's he?" He's a comprimario tenor at the Metropolitan Opera, always plays the secondary tenor characters, but he's got an interesting voice and he's a great actor, too.)

Favorite Italian Art Songs: Hm. I'm not familiar with any per se...

Favorite Lied(er): Selections from Schubert's "Die Winterreise", but the titles escape my mind

Favorite French art songs: I don't think I know of any (Quelle horreur!)

Favorite Opera Composer: Verdi and (Don't hate me) Wagner

Favorite Musical Period: Romantic through mid-20th Century

Least Favorite Opera: Hmm... Y'know, I try to find something good in every opera I've ever listened to, so the next few questions are tough to answer. Some of Verdi's early operas ("I Lombardi") leave me cold, but I still didn't mind listening to them.

Least Favorite Role (to listen to):

Least Favorite Role (that you see looming in your future):

Least Favorite Aria (To listen to):

Least Favorite Aria (To sing):

Least Favorite Composer:

And all this talk about opera puts me in mind of "Talia", a fanfiction writer over on ff.n (one of the rare great writers on there), who used to translate Mozart's operas into different fandoms. She reworked both "The Marriage of Figaro" and "The Abduction from the Seraglio" into the "Nightmare Before Christmas" universe, and she did an utterly excellent job of both! I'd have to go back and check them, but the "Seraglio" one featured Jack and Harlequin venturing into Valentine's Day Town to rescue Sally and Sally's ghost gal-pal (Harlequin's sweetheart and a non-Mary Sueish OFC) from Cupid. The "Marriage of Figaro" one featured Jack and Sally a few years down the road in the same marital uproar as the Count and the Contessa.

Heh. I even twiddled with a few opera-transmogrifications myself. In the pre-sequels era of the "Matrix" fandom, I toyed with the idea of resetting "Tosca" in that universe, with Neo as Cavaradossi, Trinity as Tosca and Agent Smith as Scarpia, but that somehow didn't seem right. I suppose it would work better if you set the fic in the MxO-era of the universe and had some male Redpill as Cavaradossi, cast Tosca as a Bluepill who's become aware of what's really going on in her world... and the universe has it's own Scarpia, viz. the Merovingian. They might as well be twins, their personalities and tastes are so similar. Even the secondary characters would translate well: Flood would make a perfect Spoletta (ie. Scarpia's 2IC), and I could see the Sacristan as being some goofy Exile who happens to live in/maintain the church in the first act (he even has his own purpose-specific honorific). But I'm glitching on how to translate Napoleon's off-stage victory at the battle of Marengo; would the General stand-in for Napoleon? Only problem is, the bit with Tosca nailing Scarpia would wind up looking like one of those nine jazillion "Mary Sue nails the Merv" fics cluttering up ff.n.

The one opera-reset-in-the-"Matrix"-verse that works right now would be -- Yep! -- "The Marriage of Figaro", with (but of course!) the Merv and Persephone as the Count and the Contessa, and I was seeing Sieges and her boyfriend Nucl3ar as Susanna and Figaro. But who would be Cherubino? Lucien (My OMC from the DegSep-verse)? The idea just tickles me. I might write this one, once I'm finished with "This Shouldn't Be Happening..."