The answer to what you are discussing is quite simple - sometimes the background matters, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it helps a great deal, sometimes a little, sometimes not a bit. It depends on the work and the background.
In regards to _The Magic Flute_, the background info is interesting, but not necessary to enjoying the opera. The opera is, start to finish, some of the most divinely inspired music ever penned by a human being, regardless of the story it is hung on. (To see you dismiss it as " a not very good opera" makes me sad for you, David. You should get to hear it from the opera pit like I do, waiting for the priests to come onstage so the trombones finally play. Wonderful music to experience, every night.) The story, with or without the Masonic background, is just a simple tale of good and evil. That opera we do in a small hall in which I CAN watch the singers, especially during the rehearsals. Last time we had a great cast, and it was a real treat every day.
If one has never seen the gorgeous Ingmar Bergman movie, that is a great way to experience it. (It's on DVD.) Masonic background not needed.
(And if everyone ignores this post like they did my one about the overtone series and the pentatonic scale, then I will delete all of yours, too. Hmmph!)
Raymond Horton Louisville Orchestra
David W. Fenton wrote:
On 8 Feb 2005 at 13:06, Andrew Stiller wrote:
And to get the point of the music, do you need to know this about the origins of the idea?
If not, then it's not very important musically, in my opinion.
If so, then it's probably not very good music to begin with.
--
David W. Fenton
Depends what you consider important to know about different composers' styles. Is is important to know that Beethoven was influenced by French revolutionary composers? . . .
To get the point? Absolutely not!
. . . Is it important to know
that _The Magic Flute_ is full of Masonic symbolism? . . .
Perhaps, because otherwise, it's fairly incoherent. I would say that proves that it's not a very good opera.
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