# Why has BBC given up on Opera?



## Belowpar (Jan 14, 2015)

Apologies if this has been covered but as on many forums the search function isn't that helpful.


Have just enjoyed the BBC4 compendium of Domingo appearances and it reminded me of how long since the BBC showed Opera. I may have missed some but I can't recall anything for the last two years. Prior to that I think it was Christmas 2012 when they showed a watchable La Cenerentola. The real point of the Domingo show, was that it was mainstream entertainment not so long ago.


Plus for years I have enjoyed turning on R3 Saturday night and seeing how long it would take before I could figure out what was being relayed. Couldn't this forum please refer to The Texaco Matinee from now on? 

Long gone are the seasons on C4 from Verona. My first Opera on TV. Helped Issacs get the job. 


And this is what we get when Tony Hall has taken over?


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## Don Fatale (Aug 31, 2009)

(Commenting specifically about TV.) I was thinking the same thing recently. Sadly I think the guys at the BBC wield tremendous power over the cultural landscape in Britain. Sorry to have to used the phrase 'dumbed down', but it just is. Look at how BBC4 has changed from a high-brow and cultural channel to one that mostly shows reruns of Top of the Pops and documentaries of 70's rock.

Same applies to lack of coverage of theatre and ballet. It's not just that they don't show full performances, it's that they never get mentioned. It's as if they don't exist.


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## Speranza (Nov 22, 2014)

I also saw the Domingo programme which was interesting I hope you got the Domingo gala just before Christmas as well that was good. Personally I would like it if the BBC was slightly less Domingo focused but with low opera broadcasting I will take what I can get.
BBC4 showed Don Giovanni early last year that is the last one I remember, there was a short opera season a few years back. I find the BBC does about one opera a year at least, with a documentary or two thrown in. It is slightly better on ballet normally about two a year I think. They do a lot of opera on the radio though. I don't know if you have Sky but they do at least 10+ operas a year.

I have found BBC4 started doing an awful lot more repeats after BBC3 got axed, I know they promised they were keeping BBC4 but sometimes it just doesn't feel like they are.


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

When ROH announced what operas/ballets would be on TV over Christmas there were many disappointed people commenting on the fact that there were no operas on terrestrial TV.

It seemed it was the fault of the BBC and not ROH.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Perhaps like cricket Sky have got in with a better bid! Sadly the BBC seems to have given up almost as most of the music programs are repeats. Surely with the availability of DVDs of recorded opera they could show an opera at least once of month?


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## Guest (Jan 21, 2015)

I wonder whether the issue is not that they don't want to cover it, but there are issues with supply? There is a wealth of coverage during the Proms season, but as the BBC 'own' the festival, there's no issue. I'd be surprised if they have really decided that there is no audience for recordings of live performances.


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## Headphone Hermit (Jan 8, 2014)

I find it dificult to believe that supply (_per-se_) is the problem.

When I visit relatives in Poland, I watch an excellent channel on cable TV called _Mezzo_ that shows heaps of classical music, including operas, from a pretty wide range of sources - unfortunately, it seems to be completely unavailable in the UK - neither cable, satellite or on-line.

Perhaps the (perceived?) lack of audience may be partly to blame - if I go to see an opwera at the local cinema (broadcast by ROH) there are seldom more than a dozen people in the auditorium


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

I don't have Sky but it seems to show lots of opera and it must be getting viewers.

New documentary on Joseph Calleja.


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

Alexander said:


> (Commenting specifically about TV.) I was thinking the same thing recently. Sadly I think the guys at the BBC wield tremendous power over the cultural landscape in Britain. Sorry to have to used the phrase 'dumbed down', but it just is. Look at how BBC4 has changed from a high-brow and cultural channel to one that mostly shows reruns of Top of the Pops and documentaries of 70's rock.
> 
> Same applies to lack of coverage of theatre and ballet. It's not just that they don't show full performances, it's that they never get mentioned. It's as if they don't exist.


I almost agree with you: if there was anything like a 'cultural landscape' in Britain outside a few major cities, we could deplore the BBC's indifference to it. As it stands, the solution to the BBC's crapification is obvious: cancel your TV licence! Starve the beast! I did it partly to save cash, partly in protest at the news channel's blatant political bias in favour of the incumbent government, but whatever your reason for despising the BBC, the solution is the same: disintermediate them! Make them irrelevant! Get music for free on YouTube, and let's see how much power the BBC have when nobody is watching or funding them!


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## Don Fatale (Aug 31, 2009)

Figleaf said:


> I almost agree with you: if there was anything like a 'cultural landscape' in Britain outside a few major cities, we could deplore the BBC's indifference to it. As it stands, the solution to the BBC's crapification is obvious: cancel your TV licence! Starve the beast! I did it partly to save cash, partly in protest at the news channel's blatant political bias in favour of the incumbent government, but whatever your reason for despising the BBC, the solution is the same: disintermediate them! Make them irrelevant! Get music for free on YouTube, and let's see how much power the BBC have when nobody is watching or funding them!


Maybe I'll be another non-subscriber, but as you know, even if we promise not to watch the BBC channels it's still a crime to watch the other channels without a license. It gets more bizarre the more I think about. But I guess I could get University Challenge and Only Connect on iPlayer. However, regardless of what I do, the problem remains that the BBC wants spend our license fee on soap operas and Formula One, but of course mainly on their selves!


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

The BBC have long done things on the cheap when it suited them - a large-scale wiping and reusing of film stock from the 1960's - 1980s rather than respectfully archiving it was one of the more shameful cutbacks for a corporation that often plays up its historical pedigree.


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

Alexander said:


> Maybe I'll be another non-subscriber, but as you know, even if we promise not to watch the BBC channels it's still a crime to watch the other channels without a license. It gets more bizarre the more I think about. But I guess I could get University Challenge and Only Connect on iPlayer. However, regardless of what I do, the problem remains that the BBC wants spend our license fee on soap operas and Formula One, but of course mainly on their selves!


You can watch for free online as long as you are not watching 'live', i.e. at the same time as it's being broadcast on TV. Catch up services are OK to watch without a licence. And you are right, the salaries of the top brass are outrageous, especially since the bloated corporation is always dishonestly pleading poverty.


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## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

Here in America, PBS does show occasional Met Opera performances.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

Figleaf said:


> You can watch for free online as long as you are not watching 'live', i.e. at the same time as it's being broadcast on TV. Catch up services are OK to watch without a licence. And you are right, the salaries of the top brass are outrageous, especially since the bloated corporation is always dishonestly pleading poverty.


I quite agree about the bloated salaries of the BBC, but then its also a government run enterprise funded at taxpayer expense, so I'm not surprised.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

albertfallickwang said:


> Here in America, PBS does show occasional Met Opera performances.


"Occasional" is the word. And that's all the opera there ever is on American TV. I'm old enough to remember when there was more, even before PBS. Classical music broadcasting of all sorts by major media has declined fairly continuously. In the 1970s the Boston area had three classical music radio stations and each of them broadcast an opera every week, frequently of new releases and including live performances from major houses and festivals. I was accustomed to hearing the entire Bayreuth Festival in the summer, courtesy of Bavarian Radio and NPR.

No surprise that the BBC is being sucked into the black hole of the Decline of the West. I wonder what's happening in China now?


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## Loge (Oct 30, 2014)

Why has BBC given up on Opera?

It hasn't, it is in with a deal with the ROH to air their operas on Radio 3. The most recent of which was Nina Stemme in Tristan und Isolde over Christmas. Radio 3 will also air Jonas Kaufmann in Andrea Chénier. Aslo expect La Boheme in the spring with Joseph Calleja and Anna Netrebko.

And then there is the BBC Proms that last year had three Strauss operas Rosenkavalier, Salome with Nina Stemme and Elektra. So who knows what this years Proms will bring.

Now you won't get operas from the ROH on BBC TV because they are beamed into cinemas first.

Here is the link to the iplayer Tristan, you have six more days to listen to it

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04vdkrb


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## Guest (Jan 22, 2015)

Loge said:


> Why has BBC given up on Opera?
> 
> It hasn't


Tch, tch, tch...you can't upset the applecart like this. You'll confound the idea that, for all its faults, the BBC is still a decent broadcaster and is good value for the licence fee.

What puzzles me is, if one thinks that the TV stations aren't providing the programmes one wants to watch, why would one want a TV licence in the first place?


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## Don Fatale (Aug 31, 2009)

MacLeod said:


> Tch, tch, tch...you can't upset the applecart like this. You'll confound the idea that, for all its faults, the BBC is still a decent broadcaster and is good value for the licence fee.
> 
> What puzzles me is, if one thinks that the TV stations aren't providing the programmes one wants to watch, why would one want a TV licence in the first place?


MacLeod, surely you're being disingenuous here. Some might still love Match of the Day, Doctor Who and Eastenders, and there's many other BBC programs I enjoy, but that doesn't change the point of this thread that (R3 aside) the BBC no longer seems interested in 'high culture'. It makes me sad to use such a term to refer to theatre, classical music, opera and ballet. I fear a generation is growing up with little notion that these things exist beyond as some obsolete activity for old posh people.


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## Guest (Jan 24, 2015)

Alexander said:


> MacLeod, surely you're being disingenuous here.


Not at all. Your own posts suggest that if you're not getting any of what you want, you should boycott the BBC. But if you're not getting _any _of what you want, why would you want the TV in the first place?

If, on the other hand, you do get some of what you want, that's great. And you could lobby instead of leave.

By my calculation, I get enough out of the BBC over a year to justify the sum I pay for it. I don't think broadcasting should be 'licensed' in the way it currently is, but, like essential utilities, it should be publicly owned - or, rather, there should be a reliable publicly-owned broadcaster, over which the public exerts some influence.


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