The Future of Opera

by Jonathan Reekie

Is opera a dead form? Is it a museum genre to be enjoyed only in glamorous old buildings with red plush auditoria and mainly by the privileged and the rich? Or does it have a future as a vibrant theatrical form that can address and satisfy contemporary audiences, deal with contemporary issues? Jonathan Reekie, Chief Executive of Aldeburgh Productions and Vice Chairman of the new Genesis Prizes for Opera in the Almeida Opera Festival shares some of his thoughts on the subject with us.

When discussing a subject as big as "The Future of Opera", it is difficult to know where to begin. I think the only way to be objective, and the way to reach any kind of conclusion is to speak from personal experience. Through my work at Almeida Opera and the Aldeburgh Festival I have had many opportunities to commission and develop new opera, and in recent years it has felt as if there is a shortage of young composers willing and equipped to write new works in this field.

After having discussed this with John Studzinski, creator of the Genesis Foundation, we agreed that one way to find out if there were young composers keen to work in this genre was to launch an international opera prize. The Genesis Prizes for Opera was born out of the hypothesis that there may be lots of composers who wanted to write works of music theatre but have no opportunity.

By requesting a proposal rather than a finished work, and through judicious use of the internet and viral marketing, we amassed a large database of composers from all over the world. In a way, the Prizes are a market research project into who is out there and who wants to write opera.

We received 210 applications from composer / librettist teams in 35 countries. The principal sources of applications were the UK (58), the US (55) and Italy (13). However applications were received from South America (8), Asia, (6), and Australia (6). We were expecting around 100 applications, so to receive this number was a fine start to the process.

Some interesting statistics emerge from these applications. 20% of the composers are female. 17.5% are adaptations; so the majority of proposals are based on original subjects. 22% of composers want to write their own libretto. 85% have a traditional narrative structure, by which I mean a structure where character and plot drive the action. This narrative structure would be instantly recognisable to Mozart or even Monteverdi. Admittedly, by calling the prize an opera prize we perhaps encouraged this slant toward conservative structure and subject matter.

The most common theme was a portrayal of a 20th century icon: Mandela, Stephen Hawking, Clinton and Milosevic, and even Liberace and James Bond featured. Adaptations were almost exclusively of great 20th century writers: Beckett, Camus, Kafka, Wilde and Borges, for example. Remarkably few proposals focused around TV or film subjects. Similarly, few contemporary political subjects were broached. Exceptions included several operas with ecological themes, the plight of refugees in the West, and the political icons I mentioned earlier.

It was striking listening to the submissions that there was little cultural distinctiveness between them. In other words, a lot of the time you couldn't tell where the applicant came from. There is not really such a thing as Italian, German or French opera any more. It is a global market and there seem to be a number of global idioms.

So the conclusion we came to from our research is that there are definitely a lot of people out there who want to write opera or music theatre of some sort. But can we trust them with opera's future? The honest answer is, I'm not sure. I think the experience of the entry process for the Genesis Prizes for Opera gives us a number of things to reflect on.

There is plenty of diversity in the languages of new music that is being written at the moment. My personal view is that there are very few composers around who have what I would call a strong, distinctive voice. Overall I must say that I was disappointed by the quality of music. I was particularly disappointed that a significant number of the strong composers had opera ideas that, in the view of the advisory panel, simply wouldn't work on stage as a dramatic piece. We also assessed the quality of librettists and again generally were also disappointed. Of course there were many exceptions - the intensity of the panellists' debate over the final shortlist was testament to this. Ultimately, one fact remained - there are successful operas with strong music and weak ideas but hardly any with weak music and strong ideas. Prima la musica.

The Genesis experience reinforces something that I have long considered to be a real problem in the creation of new opera. The worlds of music and theatre/ literature hardly touch. The majority of composers seem to have no idea what is happening in theatre or literature today. This is why I believe that when seeking a dramatic model and subject they fall back on what they experienced at school or university. What is even more damaging is that many never go to see opera or do something as basic as reading successful librettos. This is hardly a healthy state of affairs. Similarly most writers would not consider the libretto as a legitimate outlet for their talents.

Somehow the barriers have to be broken down. Writing works of music theatre must move away from the margins of cultural activity. Some organisations have attempted a 'dating service', where composers and librettist are brought together to create work for the stage. But even if a suitable text and opportunity can be found the chemistry has to be right for such a project to flourish. It's very difficult to enforce a successful working relationship between artists of different disciplines.

This creates a situation where lots of so-called new operas are really traditional operatic structures and ideas transposed into a modern setting. This hardly constitutes something of contemporary significance unless the music has something particular to say. There is a lot of operatic mutton dressed as lamb. Like Peter Eötvös I believe that traditional operatic conventions still have validity. But young composers don't seem to have the familiarity with those conventions to push their boundaries and evolve new ones.

Many years ago Boulez famously argued that the opera houses all need to be burnt down. In the context of thinking where new opera may go he may be right. Opera houses are structured around music. Most have music directors and Intendants, responsible for artistic and administrative matters. There is rarely someone to represent the theatrical element, apart from the dramaturg on the continent (a role that hardly exists in the UK), whose role is less visible. I believe that opera houses are not well equipped to produce new opera. It is hard for a new commission to turn out as something other than a modern version of the classical form.

In the future opera needs to reduce its reliance on the opera house. In the same way that a recent trend in theatre is to leave the theatres and find new performance spaces, so opera must reach out to new audiences. This is the age of the arts having to be events. The Tate Modern is an event. A Robert Wilson piece in an old prison is an event. Opera needs to embrace this notion, not to the exclusion of the opera house but as a complement.

Works such as The Silver Tassie, and Powder Her Face have demonstrated that new pieces can really capture the public's imagination. There is no recipe for this kind of success; it is the job of the producer. This is an underrated role and one that hardly exists in this country. Yet it is this person more often than not who is responsible for picking the composer, frequently matching him or her with a librettist, carrying out the editor's role during the creative process. Look at the international success of Shockheaded Peter. A totally improbable hit, the result of the work of a briliiant producer, Michael Morris.

For me opera has no future unless it can find its way back into the contemporary public consciousness. Without the new, the repertoire will continue to stagnate and in time can only become a museum piece, a ritual enacted before a coterie of devotees. There are only so many ways to reinterpret the classics.

I used to take the view that one judged the success of an opera by whether or not it joined the repertoire. Now I am not so sure. There is a new genre of music theatre that is very specific to a time, a place, or a particular composer/ performer/ creator. This is undoubtedly a good thing and encourages diversity and innovation. We live in a multi-media age, and opera is the original multi-media art form. There are infinite resources waiting to be harnessed by creative teams with the courage to innovate. When the blend of music, drama and theatre are right there is nothing that compares. I am also very encouraged by the fact that, despite the fact that they were only chosen on merit, the shortlist includes 9 composers from 9 countries across 4 continents. Opera has a global reach.

The greatest trouble with opera is that it is an art form where it is very easy to make mistakes. Largely for economic reasons there is little or no opportunity to try ideas out on stage; even the editing process of the workshop is a very hit and miss affair.

Of course, a good producer minimises that risk. I expect that the success rate of new opera (defined as a piece that has been and continues to be revived) is no less than in the 18th or 19th century. It's just that the economics have shifted. A new opera is virtually never a commercial proposition. In the 19th century the entrepreneur had certain advantages. His audience had fewer options for live entertainment; fewer media were clamouring for time and attention. One obvious response to this shift is the expansion of the chamber opera. They are more portable, more intimate and accessible and more cost-effective. Chamber operas are here to stay.

It is imperative that new opera breaks through as a popular, contemporary art form in the manner of the visual arts. The Genesis Prizes for Opera are there to help initiate and develop a process to encourage this breakthrough. Let's break down the barriers and give opera new definitions and a new buzz.