Music for Grownups: Opera Tube

By: Richard Gehr | Source: AARP.org | 2008-11-20

A world of larger-than-life opera magic lies at your fingertips, thanks to YouTube. Whether you're merely curious or have already converted to opera, the ever-expanding video archive offers a myriad of great performances. Start with seven immortal musical moments, and you'll soon be shouting “Bravissimo!”

A seven-minute glimpse of Maria Callas's famous 1958 interpretation of Verdi's tragic courtesan, Violetta Valéry, as immortalized in playwright Terence McNally's “Lisbon Traviata." Although the scenes' visuals are on the dark side, Callas's powerfully nuanced voice is on full display alongside co-star Alfredo Kraus in perhaps the most famous "Traviata" ever sung.

The late Luciano Pavarotti is generally acknowledged to own "Nessun Dorma," from Puccini's "Turandot." Disagree? YouTube makes it easy to compare and contrast several of Pavarotti's larger-than-life interpretations with those of everyone from tenor rivals Jussi Björling and Franco Corelli (my pick) to Andrea Bocelli and Aretha Franklin.

No soprano conveyed homesickness with more conviction than Leontyne Price did whenever she sang "O Patria Mia" in Verdi's "Aida." Price sounds immaculately devastated in gorgeous black-and-white clips from 1958 and 1963. But watch her 1985 farewell performance at the Metropolitan Opera to learn the true meaning of the overused term, "diva."

Everyone loves to hate Mozart's Queen of the Night, whose evil schemes will forever be foiled by the Magic Flute. Performing with London's Royal Opera, the magnificent German soprano Diana Damrau, famous for her coloratura, vocalizes high F's that sound as sharp as the dagger she wields during her menacing "Der Hölle Rache" (“Hell's Vengeance”) aria.

In 1955, beloved American baritone Robert Merrill donned his clown suit to sing the beautiful prologue to Ruggero Leoncavallo's "Pagliacci" on "The Voice of Firestone" TV series. Actors have feelings too, the clown reminds the audience, in a clip that sounds way better than you'd expect half-century-old video footage to sound.

Russian soprano Anna Netrebko and Mexican tenor Rolando Villazón pulled out all the stops for the "O Soave Fanciulla" duet, which provides the finale to the first act of Puccini's "La Bohème." The pair delivered an unusually strong concert performance of one of the most romantic melodies in all opera.

Chuck Jones's 1957 parody of Wagner's Ring Cycle, "What's Opera, Doc?" marks the single instance in which Elmer Fudd actually does "kill the wabbit." Everything noble and silly about opera is distilled into this brilliantly screwy and strangely moving masterpiece. And Bugs makes a lovely Brunhilde.                                               

I've raved previously about how the Metropolitan Opera Live in HD delivers one of the finest opera experiences outside the company's Lincoln Center hall itself. (Director Robert Lepage's critically acclaimed multimedia production of Berlioz's "The Damnation of Faust" screens November 22.) Continuing its digital parade, the Met recently made 13 high-definition videos (including Natalie Dessay and Juan Diego Flórez in "La Fille du Régiment" and Renée Fleming and Dmitri Hvorostovsky in "Eugene Onegin"), 37 classic videos (including Renata Scotto and Luciano Pavarotti's 1977 performance of "La Bohème"), and 120 radio broadcasts available via Met Player, an online subscription service. New titles will be added every month. Subscriptions begin at $14.99 a month, but you can also purchase individual operas separately.