Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Opera/Archive 3

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Archive 3
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Contents

Contemporary/Historic singers

Taking the view that anyone who is dead must be historic rather than contemporary, I've moved Bastianini (d 1967) and Windgassen (d 1974) into the Historic category under the Can You Help subheading. There may be others that I haven't heard of who are also in the wrong category (and there are some rather odd names already there: how important is Rodney Gilfrey?). I've also rearranged both lists in alpha order, though some might query my treatment of those surnames with the prefix "de".

More importantly, I feel that there is a need for an alphabetical list somewhere of singers present/absent, as in the Opera Corpus/worklist. This could replace these two lists. The Opera Singers category is subdivided by nationality (among other things, groan), and there may well be other important singers without articles scattered around (especially, for historic singers, under The Record of Singing). Any thoughts?

--GuillaumeTell 23:04, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

As the perpetrator (but not the originator) of the two lists, I'd like to thank you for rationalizing/alphabeticizing them.
The idea of producing a proper, thorough-going list of singers present/absent is a good one. The Record of Singing article fulfills this purpose for the Caruso to Callas era (1899 to the early 1950s), however a good list of singers of the LP and CD eras would be desirable, and also a list of singers before the age of recordings. Can anyone suggest sources?
Regarding the question of whether Danielle de Niese is a D or an N, I suppose we need to look at her website etc. For present-day artists, I generally ignore the 'de', 'von', 'di' etc. In the case of historic singers we can consult Grove.
--Kleinzach 00:53, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
I am now working on a list of pre-recording age (pre-historic?) singers. Would anyone like to contribute? So far I have 42 sopranos, of whom 11 already have articles.
--Kleinzach 18:16, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Opera Project template

{{opera}}

I have created the Opera Project template (above) similar to those used by other projects. This can be added to the Talk pages of relevant articles.

The code is: {{opera}}

Any comments on the wording? (It can easily be edited - at Template:Opera)

Kleinzach 14:31, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Looks good. I have noticed, though, that most other WikiProject notice templates are completely in italics. It's a minor point, but still worth considering. I'll spend a moment fiddling. Microtonal 15:58, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Thanks. Italics looks better. On the other hand 'collaboration' seems better than 'attempt'. Surely we use attempt in a different context, for an endeavour that may fail. e.g. an attempt to climb Everest. In this case we are talking about 'developing' and we have already been successful. No? - Kleinzach 17:10, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Most of the other project tags I looked at used "attempt", so I assumed it was more-or-less standard. I see your point, though. Microtonal 00:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
OK I have restored 'collaboration' and also clarified the link - however it's strange that the second link appears as bold above, but as a link on other pages (e.g. Talk:Opera). I don't understand what is happening here! Kleinzach 00:20, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
The MediaWiki software automatically does that with recursive links. It's not because of something you did, and it's nothing to worry about. Microtonal 01:25, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Voice Types

It strikes me that there are possibly four important sub-divisions not given. Ignoring the in-between roles like Bass-baritone, lyric baritone, and so on, there is an important difference between a straight baritone and a patter baritone (Dulcamara, John Wellington Wells, Major-General Stanley, et cetera), and a dramatic soprano and a coloratura soprano will likely take different roles. Should we differentiate such things? Vanished user 18:26, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

This is a complicated technical field. I would not recommend getting involved in it unless you are really familiar with the Italian, German, French etc. classifications and how they are applied. See the excellent Fach article and (less impressive) Vocal range. - Kleinzach 10:26, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
...Have fixed some awkward errors in the Vocal range article. If that's the standard I'm being held to, I think I can proceed with reasonable confidence ;) Vanished user 22:00, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
In general I don't think we should give fachs for roles, as they tend to be controversial, not necessarily intended by the composer, and not necessarily useful. If you're talking about the vocal demands of a specific role, rather than just listing the voice part, then you can go into it more. Mak (talk) 22:47, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
Admittedly, I was thinking more of the more ovious ones, like patter baritone, etc. For one operetta in my list (Cellier's Dorothy, which was very popular up until 1950 or so) we can go farther: Parts are labelled as "heavy baritone" and such, since it's full of comic guardsmen and the like. Damn odd thing. Would almost call it a proto-musical.
Note! The writer of the above s half-asleep and may not be coherent. He is niw stepping away from the wiki. Vanished user 03:14, 4 April 2006 (UTC)


Bass or basso?

About half the articles (and categories) use the (voice type) bass and half use basso. Which do we prefer? - Kleinzach 19:18, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

I never heard basso until I joined opera-l, the New-York-based e-mail list. It seems to me that this term is mainly used by people who think that any opera that isn't Italian opera isn't worth bothering with (correct me if I'm wrong!). In England, as far as I'm aware, bass reigns supreme - but maybe that's because of the [German] oratorio tradition.
For those who prefer basso - what term do you use for bass-baritones? --GuillaumeTell 22:06, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
I prefer Bass. I would guess that basso was originally used for expediency, either because the 1911 Britannica had the article there, or because someone didn't want to bother disambiguating the different meanings of bass. I'm an American musician, and I never hear the term basso used. I agree with GuillaumeTell (I think this is what he's saying) that it seems somewhat elitist to use an Italian word when there is a perfectly servicable and commonly used English word to use. Mak (talk) 04:30, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
Good. 'Basso' sound like an affectation to me as well. It may take time but let's correct basso/bassos to bass/basses when we see the words being used. - Kleinzach 10:50, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
Use the ordinary term bass, as it is what normal people say. However, normal people also say "basso profundo". Just adding my thoughts.Moreschi 20:04, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
Yes indeed basso profondo or basso cantante or whatever is fine. We use Italian, German, French technical terms quite often here. What we want to avoid is mixing languages. - Kleinzach 08:47, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I would like to join.

I would like to join. Is this all that is needed, or do I need to do anything else? Kleinzach invited me. Moreschi Moreschi 10:27, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi and welcome. You should add your name to the list of participants on the main (project) page. It would also be good if you could introduce yourself on your user page. I see you have been writing about historic singers, which is good. This is an area that we need to work on. - Kleinzach 11:01, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Welcome indeed. Please let us have some of your background. You can check me out too...

Vivaverdi 04:46, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

CD and DVD cover images

CD and DVD cover images have been added to various opera articles. (One example is Orpheus in the Underworld). I am not against this, though I wonder if it would be better if the images were placed (with artist/release information) in separate sections devoted to recordings. What do other people think? - Kleinzach 15:26, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

It would be better but to make the articles more complete, the addition of CD and DVD cover images would hardly do any harm to it. --Siva1979Talk to me 14:52, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Producer's opera/Director's opera/Regietheater?

There's an article called Producer's opera. Is it clear what it refers to? I understand it means what I'd call Regietheater, or something like director-dominated opera or perhaps concept opera. What do other people think of this title? - Kleinzach 09:00, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Kleinzach's comments make sense. This is an awkward title, at best, and one not commonly found. However, I wonder if "Regietheater" is well-known outside of opera circles??? I'm open to discussion on this one: right now, it feels awkward.
Vivaverdi 01:18, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
I have changed the title to Regietheater. My logic is that an unfamiliar technical term is preferable to a title that is merely confusing. - Kleinzach 09:35, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
Good point. At least opera people are likely to know the term and search for it; others not particularly knowledgable re: opera would be unlikely to search for Producer's Opera anyway.
Vivaverdi 15:28, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
There is a redirect from Producer's opera to Regietheater so in the unlikely event that someone does search for it they will find it anyway. - Kleinzach 15:56, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Composers as 'opera managers'

We have a useful Category:Opera managers for people like Rudolph Bing, John Christie, and Joseph Volpe, however Jean-Baptiste Lully and Richard Wagner have now been designated managers - on the grounds that they oversaw the productions of their own operas.

Should composers be listed as opera managers? Or is this a case of category proliferation? If Lully and Wagner are managers, then perhaps many others qualify? Handel, Rossini, Richard Strauss, Gustav Mahler - just to name a few.

Does it matter? Maybe Wikipedia categories shouldn’t be taken too seriously? Any thoughts? - Kleinzach 09:09, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Idomeneo and Oreste.

The synopsis of Act I of Idomeneo gives the name of one of the characters as "Electra". For the other two acts, however, she is referred to as "Elettra". Which is correct? Secondly, did Handel really write the role of Philoctetes in "Oreste" originally for countertenor? I'm sure that he did, but I'd like confirmation. Thank you.Moreschi 13:23, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Elettra is correct, it's the Italian form of Electra. I'm not a Handel expert, but as far as I know, there were no countertenors in his day. According to Grove, Philoctetes in Oreste was sung by a contralto. I'd recommend looking at the German pages as they are excellent on Handel and usually have this info. Regards - Kleinzach 15:03, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

An invitation to all members of this project

WikiProject Arts
Announcing the creation of WikiProject Arts, an effort to create a collaboration between all arts projects and artistically-minded Wikipedians in order to improve arts coverage. If you think you can help, please join us!

HAM Image:Icons-flag-wales.png 18:08, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Opera composer of the month

We have now completed some 389 articles (and stubs) on opera composers. I believe this gives us a good basis for continued development.

What comes next? My suggestion would be to have an ‘Opera Composer of the Month’ to focus on writing up articles on individual operas by a particular composer. (This could be announced on the popular Opera-L list and other internet groups - also relevant societies.)

How about starting with Handel (for April)? The Handel opera stubs are particularly short. Any thoughts on this? Any other ideas?

Kleinzach 10:49, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

I like the idea myself. I can start by talking about how basses singing Julius Caesar suck the role of castrati in Handel's operas. Would we include oratorios which are sometimes performed as operas? That's a lot to put on the plate, depending on how many people are working on it. Makemi 20:08, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
The idea would be to involve new people, and if we were doing a major figure like GFH I imagine we would be happy with contributions on opera, oratorio or whatever. Kleinzach 20:30, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
Handel, OK. Were you thinking of a special sub-project page, hopefully with easy links to individual works, that we can point people to? We ought to try to make things as easy as possible for newcomers - maybe have an "easy guide to editing Wikipedia pages" up our sleeves, volunteer mentors, that sort of thing. I'm not sure how much interest there would be from Opera-L people, who often seem to be only interested in Italian opera performed by dead singers at the Met, but who knows?
I'm not the world's biggest Handel fan, though I saw quite a good semi-staged Saul recently and will be seeing David Daniels as JC (or rather GC) later this year. I could certainly do a synopsis or two. --GuillaumeTell 20:53, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
Handel seemed an obvious choice because of the weakness of the present coverage (except the biographical page itself). Handel devotees are a well defined group - rather like Wagnerians. I wonder what other ways there would be to contact them?
I hadn’t thought of a sub-project page - other than the George Frideric Handel page itself. As for contributors, we have the Project page. However there is a Wikipedia device which hasn’t been used so far for opera: a portal (e.g. Music). This might be worth considering if someone was willing to work on it. - Kleinzach 21:50, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
I've checked and there is an American Handel Society website as well as a London Handel Society, English Handel Society, Dartmouth College Handel Society, Czech Handel Society (!) etc. so there is a lot of scope for publicizing a 'Handel Month'.
Kleinzach 20:03, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
My concern was that people knowledgeable about opera may not necessarily be very confident about doing things on computers (some of them are known to have problems with using email). The Handel page doesn't seem at all useful for that (and, actually, List of compositions by George Frideric Handel is a much better starting-point, and has an empty Talk page where we could put some hints if we wanted to). The Portal idea is certainly worth considering, but would require a lot of work. --GuillaumeTell 16:38, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
The purpose of a Handel month would be simply to develop the threadbare Handel opera articles (not the biography which is OK, and seemingly under the care of the Composers project which Makemi - of the blue and green links! - is involved in). It would not be for those who are particularly challenged by writing for Wikipedia. Pages have already been written for them and we are unlikely to improve on them.
I don't hold any particular brief for Handel - we could start with Donizetti instead or somebody else who is major and has a lot of opera title stubs or red links. Or perhaps you would like to suggest an alternative approach? Kleinzach 21:20, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
I don't have a problem with the choice of Handel. And 1 April is tomorrow, so let's get on with it and see what happens. --GuillaumeTell 17:26, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
I have posted a 'to do' box on the main page. It's an experiment. Let me know what you think. Kleinzach 18:07, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Who should be the 'Opera Composer of the Month' for May? One possibility might be Meyerbeer in view of the superb job Buondelmonte is doing with Grand Opera.

Other candidates: Donizetti (who has lots of red links), Hans Werner Henze (barely covered so far), Offenbach, Richard Strauss (seven operas still in red). Who else? - Kleinzach 11:53, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Wonderful idea for Meyerbeer. The Grand opera article is facinating. (However, I'd also love to see an article on Le Cid having seen a Washington National Opera productiom a few years ago.)
Vivaverdi 01:10, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
Hans Werner Henze sounds like a great idea for May. I think that I could do a fair amount with his very sparse biography, and maybe a bit with the operas as well.Moreschi 20:28, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
OK, How about Meyerbeer for May and Henze for June? Handel, Meyerbeer and Henze certainly make for a good contrast! - Kleinzach 22:11, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Why not? Meyerbeer for May and Henze for June. Great ideas.Moreschi 09:54, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

List of opera directors

I have compiled a List of opera directors. I will be grateful for additional names/dates, also stubs/articles where they don't exist at present. This is a relatively neglected area. - Kleinzach 09:27, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Stay Vigilant!

Stay alert. I just got rid of an idiotic spoiler warning tag on Don Giovanni. I'm assuming that it was got rid of in the last sweep; so someone must have put it back in. When it comes to opera, I loathe the otiose things.Moreschi 14:35, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Russian Anthem

In the article Operait is written that the fact is that the Russian Anthem is taken from Glinka's Opera A Life for Tsar. This information is wrong, and it is necessary to cut it out. (Meladina 08:43, 8 May 2006 (UTC))

Refactor and archiving

I have "refactored' this page with sub-headings etc. to make it easier to use. I hope that is acceptable to everybody. If not please say. I have not deleted anything. - Kleinzach 20:31, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

I have established an archive - again without deleting anything. Kleinzach 21:52, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
I have moved the 2005 discussion about categories to the archive. Kleinzach 01:33, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
I have created a second archive. Kleinzach 18:29, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
I have created a third archive. Kleinzach 19:27, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Aida

The other day I corrected the spelling of the name of the title-character in the Aida article from Aïda to Aida and someone reverted it without explanation. I'm now proposing to do it again and would welcome support at Talk:Aida#Diacritics, where I've put forward my rationale (I've also asked the reverter for an explanation). --GuillaumeTell 11:07, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Antonio Maria Gaspare Sacchini/Encyclopædia Britannica 11th

We have a short article on Antonio Sacchini. I have now found there is a longer one on Antonio Maria Gaspare Sacchini apparently based on the Encyclopædia Britannica 11th. This latter one seems to be full of inaccuracies. Wrong birth/death dates (assuming Grove is correct), wrong biographical information (it says the composer's father was a fisherman, whereas Grove says he was a cook), and wrong titles of operas. I originally put the page up for a merger. Maybe it would be better to simply delete the information? Any ideas on this and on the subject of the unreliability of EB 11th? - Kleinzach 15:33, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Speedy Redirect!! Now! My ideas on the unreliability of EB 11th is that it's unreliable, and frequently far more difficult to unwind the inaccuracies and POV from those articles than it would be to create a reliable stub from reliable sources. It was a nice idea to use those articles, but the study of "Early" music was sort of in its infancy then, and the authors were amazingly colonialist/West-centric/England-centric/POV. This is not to fault them, just saying it's not exactly cutting-edge stuff. Mak (talk) 19:00, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Thanks. I have done the redirect. Kleinzach 17:35, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Articles about arias and characters

A few weeks ago, I asked SuggestBot for a list of things that I might like to do, and it produced a most interesting, (but, in part, inexplicable) list which others might find amusing (you can try it yourselves, too!). It's on my Talk page here.

One item listed under Cleanup was The Barber of Seville, and I've just done a bit of cleaning there, for example disentangling the Beaumarchais play into an article of its own, as suggested by Kleinzach. The page contained a complete text and translation of Largo al factotum, which I was loth to delete completely, but which seriously unbalanced the article. In the end I gave it an article of its own and put it in Category:Arias, where it joins a motley crew of odds and ends. My question: are any of these, or is any other aria, so Notable as to have its own article? Maybe Nessun dorma does, but that's about all, IMNSHO.

I also discovered that there is an article entitled Figaro (opera character). Hmm. Is he any more Notable than, say, Fiordiligi? I don't know how many other articles there may be about opera characters (I did find Giulietta by hunting around a bit, though the other character links on the, um, rather over-written Laura Claycomb page give some comical results), but, again, I'd suggest that we can do without these.

Whatever the consensus may be on these matters, I do think that we need some guidelines on the project page. (Speedy deletion is what springs to my mind.) --GuillaumeTell 17:25, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

What is wrong with having pages for specific opera characters? There can be individual pages devoted to other opera characters, such as Fiordiligi. There, are, after all, individual pages on Wikipedia devoted to individual characters in television progranmmes. Why should television characters be allowed individual pages on Wikipedia, and opera characters not? Figaro 23:35, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
I didn’t know about Figaro (opera character). And it is categorized as an opera! I am in favour of deletion because individual role articles would fragment material that properly belongs together in one article and invite trivialization. We have separate articles for historical personages who also appear in operas etc. but that’s a different case. (Likewise I’d suggest we delete Giulietta.)
If there is agreement on this we could put a sentence of the project page saying, We discourage starting separate articles on individual characters who only appear in operas (as opposed to historical or literary figures). or something like that.
I’d be inclined to leave the Aria articles as they are, although the quality is pretty low. They at least have a category and serve as examples of an opera term. - Kleinzach 00:24, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
I have now set up two new categoris - Characters in opera and Characters in plays - to take care of this subject.
I find the comparison between my article for Figaro, and the article devoted to Giulietta offensive. There is no comparison between the work done on both pages. I attempted, at least, to give an 'in depth' discussion about Figaro as a person on the article page about the character.
Also, there is an article page on Falstaff (in case you are interested), which also incorporated a lot of work on the creator's behalf. Are you also intending to suggest the Falstaff article for speedy deletion? Figaro 03:17, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
The Falstaff article is about Shakespeare's character, not Verdi's or Nicolai's, or Salieri's or Vaughan Villiams's or ... so it's not relevant here. --GuillaumeTell 08:33, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
I've just had another look at Figaro (opera character). About 80 percent of the article is (abbreviated versions of) opera synopses. However the Additional note on "The Marriage of Figaro" is interesting and could be moved to the opera title article. When this discussion started I had no idea that the Figaro (opera character) article was by User:Figaro. Is this is a kind of Wiki-totemism, perhaps? - Kleinzach 17:33, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
I have just put Merge tags on Figaro (opera character). I hope that is appropriate, if not please say so! - Kleinzach 10:27, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Here's my two cents on the matter - I think it's valuable to have separate pages for important opera characters. There's a lot of things that might be written about individual characters that would probably take up too much space on the pages devoted to the operas themselves - for instance, the entire debate over Peter Grimes' homosexuality. Which is why I'd prefer to see character pages kept intact; I think they can serve a useful purpose. As for the arias, I'd say the same - I think there are plenty of arias that would warrant further exploration outside of the articles on their respective operas. --AlbertHerring 23:30, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
Unlike some of the composer pages, there aren't any over-length opera articles at the moment (except possibly Porgy and Bess). So the issue of satellite pages hasn't come up. I agree that it might be a possibility in the future, but at the moment I think we should discourage unnecessary proliferation and splitting of articles that are not fully developed. - Kleinzach 23:15, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Lorenzo da Ponte

This article has disappeared - quite a serious matter! (though it's still in Google's cache). I discovered that the Deletion log says:

13:34, 15 May 2006 Jimbo Wales deleted "Lorenzo da Ponte" (serious copyvios from columbia encyclopedia alleged, please rewrite carefully!)

Any volunteers? --GuillaumeTell 23:52, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Hm, that really sucks. I'm always really paranoid about copyvios. I'll start a stub using Grove, and see if I can find some other sources to flesh it out. I can't seem to find the Columbia Encyclopedia on my colleges online resources, but I'd like to be able to compare the articles. The article started out as a stub, so I wonder when the copyvio was added? Mak (talk) 02:57, 24 May 2006 (UTC)