Page 180 - Weiss, Jernej, ur. 2019. Vloga nacionalnih opernih gledališč v 20. in 21. stoletju - The Role of National Opera Houses in the 20th and 21st Centuries. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 3
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vloga nacionalnih opernih gledališč v 20. in 21. stoletju
St. Francis, who is often reprogrammed, thus, does not seem the measure of
his gestation, considerable and almost exclusive, of eight years: 1975-83, per-
haps a period of extreme drought. This opera was especially the symptom
of “a loss of creative confidence23” according to Christopher Dingle.
Is contemporary opera, in general, as an aesthetic-historical category,
a problem, as Boulez thought? The only case of Britten contradicts this idea.
But was Britten an avant-garde or a neoclassical composer? Saint-François
at least finds, for the cultural programming institutions, this place of op-
era - unique - of iconic composer. The place is comparable, from this point
of view only, to Stravinsky‘s The Rake‘s progress (1948-51) (and to a lesser ex-
tent to Ligeti‘s Mysteries of the macabre, 1974-7). The problem was not the
modernist opera. The relative and – to this day unparalleled – universal im-
pact of Berg‘s operas demonstrated this very early (Wozzeck before 1925 and
Lulu in 1935). The problem may really have been opera for the contemporary
avant-gardes (between 1945 and 1980 approximately).
Opera, show and postmodernity
In France, opera was probably again more fashionable in 2000 than in 1980.
Some figures clearly show it24. And this fashion was certainly more accen-
tuated in the USA, so in the entire western world. For a composer, to make a
career mainly through “opera”, not to mention the atypical case of Britten,
was made possible again, in our opinion, because of the American mod-
el and its propagation by globalization. The starting point was probably
1976, in postmodernist aesthetics25. It was thanks to Einstein on the beach
(1976) that Phil Glass really became famous. It is also thanks to this opera,
his first, that he passed from a „minimalist“ (modernist) style to a „maxi-
malist“ (postmodernist) style, according to K. Robert Schwarz26. Today, the
lyrical production of Glass, still growing, exceeds 20 works. These operas,
in terms of prestige, already seemed to culminate with The Voyage (1992),
composed for the five-hundredth anniversary of the so called “discovery
of the Americas”. It was a “consecration” for the composer. Glass was then
better paid by the Metropolitan Opera than any other musician in history,
23 Messiaen’s final works (Burlington: Ashgate, 2013), 315. But according to Dingle,
Messiaen will solve the crisis in his latest style which will culminate in these Éclairs
sur l’Au-delà, completed in 1991.
24 See again footnote 19.
25 Americans preferred to call this aesthetic “post-minimalist”.
26 K. Robert Schwarz, “Philip Glass, Minimalist” and “Philip Glass, Maximalist,” in
Minimalists (London: Phaidon, 1996), 108–168.
178
St. Francis, who is often reprogrammed, thus, does not seem the measure of
his gestation, considerable and almost exclusive, of eight years: 1975-83, per-
haps a period of extreme drought. This opera was especially the symptom
of “a loss of creative confidence23” according to Christopher Dingle.
Is contemporary opera, in general, as an aesthetic-historical category,
a problem, as Boulez thought? The only case of Britten contradicts this idea.
But was Britten an avant-garde or a neoclassical composer? Saint-François
at least finds, for the cultural programming institutions, this place of op-
era - unique - of iconic composer. The place is comparable, from this point
of view only, to Stravinsky‘s The Rake‘s progress (1948-51) (and to a lesser ex-
tent to Ligeti‘s Mysteries of the macabre, 1974-7). The problem was not the
modernist opera. The relative and – to this day unparalleled – universal im-
pact of Berg‘s operas demonstrated this very early (Wozzeck before 1925 and
Lulu in 1935). The problem may really have been opera for the contemporary
avant-gardes (between 1945 and 1980 approximately).
Opera, show and postmodernity
In France, opera was probably again more fashionable in 2000 than in 1980.
Some figures clearly show it24. And this fashion was certainly more accen-
tuated in the USA, so in the entire western world. For a composer, to make a
career mainly through “opera”, not to mention the atypical case of Britten,
was made possible again, in our opinion, because of the American mod-
el and its propagation by globalization. The starting point was probably
1976, in postmodernist aesthetics25. It was thanks to Einstein on the beach
(1976) that Phil Glass really became famous. It is also thanks to this opera,
his first, that he passed from a „minimalist“ (modernist) style to a „maxi-
malist“ (postmodernist) style, according to K. Robert Schwarz26. Today, the
lyrical production of Glass, still growing, exceeds 20 works. These operas,
in terms of prestige, already seemed to culminate with The Voyage (1992),
composed for the five-hundredth anniversary of the so called “discovery
of the Americas”. It was a “consecration” for the composer. Glass was then
better paid by the Metropolitan Opera than any other musician in history,
23 Messiaen’s final works (Burlington: Ashgate, 2013), 315. But according to Dingle,
Messiaen will solve the crisis in his latest style which will culminate in these Éclairs
sur l’Au-delà, completed in 1991.
24 See again footnote 19.
25 Americans preferred to call this aesthetic “post-minimalist”.
26 K. Robert Schwarz, “Philip Glass, Minimalist” and “Philip Glass, Maximalist,” in
Minimalists (London: Phaidon, 1996), 108–168.
178
