The Standard: At the height of the summer season Glyndebourne’s lawns look bleached. A panorama of pale, straw-like grass, bone Panama hats, white starched shirts, white linen tablecloths and, crowning it all, puffs of white hair. I watch men in mothballed tuxes negotiate the rose garden, unsteady on their feet, and fragile, bird-like women in pearls pushing their husbands’ wheelchairs, as I worry I should intervene.
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My brother is an opera singer. When he comes up in conversation, as he often does, and I mention what it is he does for work, I am often met with surprise. The idea of a young opera singer, though to play leads he’ll have to wait until at least his thirties, is something most people not involved in opera tend not to consider. This is, in turn, surprising to me. Vocal performance majors are everywhere if you know where to find them, and they nearly all have the same goal: Opera. But still, in the average person's mind, opera is the art of the elderly. I believe that this is a larger part of the equation than the author of this article believes it to be. While surely the death of intellectualism plays a part, I truly believe that part of the reason young people do not go to opera is that it is not portrayed as for them. And while it is addressed in the article that some companies have tried to make “opera for young people” I believe that this perpetuates the problem - “normal” opera is now something that must be modified for young people. I think we must change how we think about opera for it to entice new crowds.
I truly think that all of the problems that Americans have with reading and literacy was caused by COVID. Though I was a fresh preteen at the time, I was one of the most avid readers I knew, with the unique skill of being able to stay up all night and read. Covid changed this. Like everyone else in our generation, I got sucked into the world of 15 second tiktok, those short bursts of entertainment and serotonin. This is not only impacted by reading habits but also the ways that I looked at movies and most importantly, theater. This era of tiktok and instagram reels has made theater more inaccessible than ever. Not just from a financial standpoint, our brains have been trained and poisoned to hate long form video. Which is truly heartbreaking. Even when I'm about to go to a concert I find myself looking at how long the setlist is and going ‘wow that's long’. Which is an idiotic thing to say, because who wouldn't want to listen to 3 hours of their favorite artist. This is a thing that our generation deals with daily and it's truly very sad.
While I agree with most of the points that the writer makes, I think this article is very passive aggressive. I do think that Opera is starting to toe on the line of being seen as an “older” person activity and I do want that idea to stop. However, blaming the younger generation for not wanting to go is foolish. While there is an intellectualism issue happening with my generation and Gen Alpha, that is not necessarily why Operas seemed to be filled with an older crowd. Their parents never took them to see shows, operas, or ballets when they were younger and I think that is the point where the conversation needs to start. If a child goes to see a show and enjoys it they are going to want to see more and possibly get involved, if they know nothing of the world but that it brings in older crowds they won’t be interested. I saw Phantom of the Opera with my family, my youngest brother (who doesn’t like theatre as much as the rest of us) actually enjoyed that show, he liked the technical aspects of it–he only knew to look at the tech of the show because of how many others we’ve taken him to, now when he sees a show he is more likely to pay attention because of what he associates it with.
I would also like to shout out that the Timmy quote got brought up. Nothing makes me more upset than what he said about ballet and opera.
I have been very fortunate to have been exposed to opera at a young age, so I have developed a love for it. However, this article does raise some valid points. Younger generations have incredibly short attention spans. Like this article said, the problem does partially lie with the current education system catering to this change instead of trying to challenge it. As theatre makers, we can’t change the school system. What we can change is how we approach designing opera. I once researched a production of Mozart’s The Magic Flute, in which all of Mozart’s classic characters were represented as classic Nintendo characters. This company actively marketed to kids for this production and received great success. Some people critique this style of design, saying that we shouldn’t have to “dumb down” shows to reach new audiences. Yet, with approaches like these, children were introduced to the world of opera through something they loved, and therefore they had an enjoyable experience that they will remember for the rest of their lives. By changing the way we design and market opera, we can start planting seeds for the new generation to keep opera alive.
I find the article's breakdown of the layered issues of lack of attendance along with intellectual decline effective - I do think the article lacks some important context, though. With Western opera in particular, Opera can be understood as a fading art form; while not dying by any means, opera has shifted away from being a cultural priority. Additionally, opera is historically noted as wealthy and rather inaccessible. Rarely will you find a local opera production in a community/regional theatre setting; they are mostly independent organizations, meaning many have to seek out these productions. Moreover, many not in English tend to keep young new viewers shy of opera. With all this said, Opera is in no way less valuable than the live theatre many Americans value. Opera is home to some of the larget scale in the theatrical world and some of the most abstract/captivating designs - opera changed my outlook on how scenography functions as a whole, and I hope it is able to resonate with other viewers similarly. In the end, the article hits on important notes on the decline and underscores the educational importance needed in our society, but it lacks the full context, in my opinion, to fully encapsulate the core of the issue.
On top of the aggressive (yet eye catching) title, I disagree with this article. As someone how has studied opera performance and worked at multiple opera companies in my young career, I can confidently say young people are interested in performing and attending opera and more classical performances. While acknowledging personal bias, I looked to each of the three opera companies I've worked for and reflected on younger engagement.
My first experience was working as an education intern at Detroit Opera. I worked with and saw first hand middle schoolers learning and performing operatic music in front of full crowds of people the same age. This past summer I worked at Wolf Trap opera where I interacted with the next generation of opera singers, who performed to a sold out 7000-person audience of all ages. And now at Pittsburgh Opera, I've witnessed an ultra competitive young artists program with eager young performers.
I would recommend for Katie Glass to look outside of England before making her argument. While I agree AI can be extremely detrimental to the arts and youth, I would still give the youth some credit. GenAlpha isn't cooked yet.
I sort of disagree with this article. I do think the biggest issue with the dying audience of opera is the price. I think going to see opera – or most live performance for that matter is expensive so therefore it never becomes a regular part of people’s lives. Even though the price of opera has gone up, and I’m sure the people who still attend have noticed it, it was already a regular part of their routine to go see it.
I worked at a theatre this summer that sold out almost every performance. I couldn’t believe it because I come from a town whose local regional theatre has a lot of trouble putting butts in seats. As I got to know some of the donors, and they told me about how they had seen every single show since this theatre opened in the 90s, I realized that I might be less about the actual content, and more about the tradition.
If live performance started in education (like this article suggests), and becomes more accessible as a whole, maybe people would incorporate it more into their lives. Then again, people say that high school english classes made them stop reading so I don’t even know anymore.
With my background in opera from high school, I grew up loving the opera and every aspect about it. I thoroughly believe that the aging audience of opera is only a sign of a bigger problem concerning the way we enable producers and people in the older generation to price shows and media. The attention problem that my generation has is genuinely massive; everything about online learning and the way people are now trained to consume quick snippets of information and quick engagement, as well as the constant need to have everything be sped up for convenience/lack of attention span, is truly mind-boggling. This is all true. However, people, I would argue, are more interested in various performance forms now than ever. I think this article/author is very tunnel visioned/biased and is blaming/taking “the easy way out" on an issue that's rooted in show pricing and isn't highlighting the fact that young people can't afford to go see these events because they are too worried about being priced out of their apartments.
I feel like this article is ignoring a lot of nuances, while yes it is true literacy levels for for a portion of Gen Z are worrying, most Gen Z do have proficient levels of literacy, enough to enjoy a lot of the physical media that they do. Gen Z is the generation that sees/has interest in performances the most, concerts, plays, movies and yes even opera(even if many don’t go in person). I feel like this article is a little weird because I feel like it’s not taking into account that when opera was on the up and up a large portion of the population wasn’t considered highly intellectual, but opera still flourished at its prime despite that, I’d say that in current times more people are far more open to the arts then back then. In my opinion opera has just been on the decline because the way Gen Z chooses what to consume is changing for a lot of people opera is just a thing of the past and for those who still want to see performances price is a big factor to why they don’t.
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