{"id":45831,"date":"2024-08-02T14:35:45","date_gmt":"2024-08-02T12:35:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/a4885d63-0ce6-4fc5-8d03-b608f771556b"},"modified":"2024-08-02T15:08:30","modified_gmt":"2024-08-02T13:08:30","slug":"should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/rss_feed\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes\/","title":{"rendered":"Should opera always tackle big themes?\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Charlotte Smith\n <\/p>

Published: Friday, 02 August 2024 at 12:35 PM<\/p>

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In their new opera<\/a><\/strong> The Righteous<\/a><\/strong><\/em>, currently enjoying its premiere run at The Santa Fe Opera<\/a><\/strong>, composer Gregory Spears<\/a><\/strong> and Pulitzer Prize-winning author and librettist Tracy K. Smith<\/a><\/strong> tackle big themes of faith, power, love and betrayal.\u00a0<\/p>

The opera is set during 1980s America, a decade that witnessed the AIDS crisis, Reaganism and the war on drugs, and the rise of feminism. Against this backdrop, the work pits the lure of political power against the spiritual calling of the church.<\/p>

The greatest opera composers of all time<\/a><\/strong><\/li><\/ul>
Yet, it\u2019s the internal struggles and the nuanced relationships between the opera\u2019s intricately-drawn characters that lie at its heart.\u00a0<\/p>
And, as Spears explains, the grand form of opera shouldn\u2019t always be reserved for big themes, epic battles and grand love affairs, gods and kings. Sometimes, the personal can be epic\u2026<\/p>
<\/div><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The Righteous<\/em> at Santa Fe Opera<\/figcaption><\/figure><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-when-big-themes-become-personal\">When big themes become personal<\/h2>‘We thought about religion and politics, the collision of those two pillars, and the tensions between them,’ says Spears. ‘But in the end the piece became more internal. So rather than being a larger statement on America, politics and religion, it focuses on smaller characters struggling on a human scale with large forces.\u00a0<\/p><ul><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/works\/famous-opera-songs\">10 of the most famous opera arias<\/a><\/strong><\/li><\/ul>‘And sometimes the personal\u00a0is<\/em>\u00a0epic. That\u2019s the paradox. If you had your heart broken as a 15 year-old, that’s mythic. It\u2019s huge. And that’s how we live our lives. We\u2019re not all governors or presidents or kings.\u00a0<\/p>‘But the theatre can magnify that experience so that our inner world becomes as significant \u2013 as operatic \u2013 as we feel it to be.\u00a0<\/p><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Elena Villal\u00f3n as Sheila in The Righteous \u00a9 Curtis Brown \/ Santa Fe Opera<\/figcaption><\/figure>‘So, I think the idea that big themes should always tap into historical forces isn\u2019t necessarily the case. Though, of course, historical forces permeate all our lives. But how we deal personally with the invisible world of faith, with politics and religion \u2013 and how we figure out who we are in relation to the people around us \u2013 is, in itself, mythic.\u00a0<\/p><ul><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/works\/best-love-songs-in-opera\">Robin Ticciati picks his 10 favourite operatic love songs <\/a><\/strong><\/li><\/ul>‘There\u2019s no doubt that the technology of opera is massive. So rather than connecting the operatic form to equally big themes \u2013 stories of princes and presidents \u2013 we can use it to spotlight our own lives. And perhaps the art form can provide a connection and catharsis by telling our own stories.’<\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n<hr class=\"no-tts wp-block-separator\"\/>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Charlotte Smith Published: Friday, 02 August 2024 at 12:35 PM In their new opera The Righteous, currently enjoying its premiere run at The Santa Fe Opera, composer Gregory Spears and Pulitzer Prize-winning author and librettist Tracy K. Smith tackle big themes of faith, power, love and betrayal.\u00a0 The opera is set during 1980s America, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":45832,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"2"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes.jpg",1600,1068,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes-768x513.jpg",768,513,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes-1024x684.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes-1536x1025.jpg",1536,1025,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/should-opera-always-tackle-big-themes.jpg",1600,1068,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Charlotte Smith Published: Friday, 02 August 2024 at 12:35 PM In their new opera The Righteous, currently enjoying its premiere run at The Santa Fe Opera, composer Gregory Spears and Pulitzer Prize-winning author and librettist Tracy K. Smith tackle big themes of faith, power, love and betrayal.\u00a0 The opera is set during 1980s America,…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/45831"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}