A Lost Art

Of Opera America's 20 most performed operas in North America, only one premiered after the onset of modernism in classical music, and that was Puccini's final opera, Turandot (1926). Of the same 20, the opera with the second most recent premiere is Puccini's Madama Butterfly, which happens to be the #1 most performed opera in North America. It premiered in 1904.

Opera was once known for its songs and its soaring melodies. Turandot features the famous tenor aria Nessun Dorma. Before that, there were Dvorak's enchanting Song to the Moon from Rusalka (1901) and Bizet's lively Habanera from Carmen (1875). Back then, opera was virtually synomynous with powerful, melodious arias. In fact, opera began that way. So, I must ask the question: Is Berg's opera Wozzeck really an opera? Being that it lacks opera's quintessential property, should not we have invented a new term for such a work? I do not mean to deprive Wozzeck of value; I am simply stating that it seems counter to definition to call it an opera. And if this is the case, then how many operas have truly been composed since Turandot? Thus, Opera America's list does not surprise me.

Nowhere did the modern trends of atonality, serialism, and minimalism have more of an effect than on opera, which, by its nature, lends itself to the expression of beautiful melodies by human voices, the most natural of all solo instruments.