# Operas that talks about Opera.



## Bardamu (Dec 12, 2011)

I was listening to the funny L'impresario in angustie by Domenico Cimarosa which talks about an opera company (there is a manager, composer, libretist/poet and of course a few prime donna sopranos) and thought about what other operas are centered around opera itself.

I can think of a few centered around theatre/plays (Pagliacci, Adriana Lecouvreur and L'Orfeide) or opera composers (Rendine's Un segreto d'importanza or Rimsky-Korsakov's Mozart and Salieri) but nothing else that talks directly about opera.


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## Jobis (Jun 13, 2013)

That's a pretty meta request. I can only think of operas that parody other composers, to an extent. (the rake's progress and all that)


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Capriccio is about opera, no?


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## schigolch (Jun 26, 2011)

Indeed. As well as _Ariadne auf Naxos_. And there are others.

However, I would like to recommend two contemporary pieces that use 'metaopera' in their plots: Gerald Barry's _The Intelligence Park _and Judith Weir's _A Night at the Chinese Opera_.


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## deggial (Jan 20, 2013)

guythegreg said:


> Capriccio is about opera, no?


as well as Salieri's Prima la musica, poi le parole, which inspired Capriccio. Likewise, Mozart's super short Der Schauspieldirektor, which premiered together with Prima la musica, poi le parole. You could say these two are just divertimenti, but still.


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## Cavaradossi (Aug 2, 2012)

In _Ghosts of Versailles_, Beaumarchais is a character, along with Marie Antoinette. and the cast of Marriage of Figaro, for which he is in the process of writing a sequel opera. As I recall, the characters rebel against his plot and he steps in and becomes a character in his own opera. While Mozart himself is not a character, in the staging I saw he was an omnipresent cameo, enjoying the proceedings onstage and reunions with his beloved characters in his private box when they were not part of the stage action. Complicated yes, but vastly entertaining.


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Huh! The very same trick was turned with this Fierrabras, in which Schubert plays a part in the action but has nothing to say.


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## quack (Oct 13, 2011)

Listening to Stockhausen's _Samstag aus Licht_ I remembered this thread as it gets all self-referential which kind of fits the theme of the thread. At the end of scene 3 of 4 the production breaks down with cries of "you're over the time limit" and "just play for me, if you don't play for the administration, play for me" leading into a general argument with the opera superintendent. It certainly made me laugh when it gets into a very down to earth squabble after all that symbolic conflict between Lucifer and the archangel Michael.


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## MAuer (Feb 6, 2011)

guythegreg said:


> Huh! The very same trick was turned with this Fierrabras, in which Schubert plays a part in the action but has nothing to say.


That was pretty much my reaction to Claus Guth's staging -- has nothing to say.:lol:


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## guythegreg (Jun 15, 2012)

Exactly! WHAT was the POINT? Well, I'm sure he had one ...


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## deggial (Jan 20, 2013)

nah, he never has one. I dislike his superfluous style with a vengeance.


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## Bardamu (Dec 12, 2011)

deggial said:


> as well as Salieri's Prima la musica, poi le parole


Ah, yes it came to me only after I wrote the OP.


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## Sloe (May 9, 2014)

guythegreg said:


> Huh! The very same trick was turned with this Fierrabras, in which Schubert plays a part in the action but has nothing to say.


I must say I really hate that production. They made Franz Schubert to appear as a pathetic loser when he in fact made some of the most wonderful music ever. Yes his operas were not successfull but how many of the more popular operas were made by composers that were up to 31 years old at the time.


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## mountmccabe (May 1, 2013)

I know this thread is old, but:

Rufus Wainwright's _Prima Donna_ is about an opera singer that has been away from singing wanting to revisit the role that made her famous.

Jake Heggie's upcoming _Great Scott_ (Oct 2015) is about an opera singer revisiting the struggling opera company that launched her career.


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## Steatopygous (Jul 5, 2015)

guythegreg said:


> Capriccio is about opera, no?


More or less. It's really about primacy of words or music.


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## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

Actually, Wagner's Meistersinger is about opera or lyrical writing... self-referential in a subtle way.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Well there is always Tosca, which is about an opera singer.


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## Sloe (May 9, 2014)

Florestan said:


> Well there is always Tosca, which is about an opera singer.


I was thinking about that too but I don´t think they mention an opera.


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## graziesignore (Mar 13, 2015)

What about Donizetti's Viva La Mamma?


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Sloe said:


> I was thinking about that too but I don´t think they mention an opera.


Right, so I waited to post until Albert put up Meistersinger which is not about opera but about singing. I think we have to stretch the limits of the OP if we are going to get much mileage out of this thread. Of course, the OP was quite specific and I don't think there is much in that vein, but there are a lot of operas I don't know about.


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## DonAlfonso (Oct 4, 2014)

He doesn't mention the other operas by name but in the Act 2 finale of Don Giovanni Mozart has the 'on stage' band play selections from "Una Cosa Rara" and "Fra i due litiganti il terzo gode" (each followed some snide inside jokes); then by 'Non più andrai' from Le nozze di Figaro. Leporello comments 'I know this piece only too well' which would have been a huge in-joke at the Vienna premiere as the same singer, Francesco Benucci, was the original Figaro.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Also, in the middle of L'elisir d'Amore there is a small vocal number performed by Dr. Dulcamara and Adina. Now I am really stretching the OP but hey, thought it worth mentioning.


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## Azol (Jan 25, 2015)

Has anyone mentioned Britten's Let's Make an Opera yet?


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## graziesignore (Mar 13, 2015)

I think Viva La Mamma is the type of opera that the OP is looking for: it's about a regional opera company doing a new opera, and failing miserably. Rather old hat today, but it must have been a fresh and original concept in 1827...

Also known as _Le Convenienze ed Inconvenienze Teatrali_, the original title.


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## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

Judith Wier's A Night at the Chinese Opera. A fine example here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Night_at_the_Chinese_Opera


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Has anyone written an actual opera on _The Phantom of the Opera_?

Let us not speak of you-know-who.


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## HumphreyAppleby (Apr 11, 2013)

There's _L'Inutil Precauzione_ in _Barbiere_. I think that (the former - the latter isn't bad) is a great title for an opera. _Il tabarro_ also referenced _La boheme_. _La rondine_ doesn't really reference an opera other than itself, but it is about romantic dreams and practical relationships, and so is kind of a reflection on the romantic fantasy that is opera. Not saying it's the deepest thing around, mind you. Just a little meta there.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Speaking of Puccini, I neglected to mention that in "The music of the night" from _Phantom_ by you-know-who, you-know-who boldly rips off _Fanciulla del West_. I knew Minnie and Dick before I met the phantom, and was quite shocked when I heard the song in question. At least you-know-who recognized gold when he struck it in the Cloudy Mountains of California.


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## Guest (Jul 21, 2015)

Bernhard Lang: _I Hate Mozart_


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## Peer Gynt (Jul 29, 2015)

nathanb said:


> Bernhard Lang: _I Hate Mozart_


The revised version of Hindemith's "Cardillac" contains an extract of an opera-within-an-opera: that of Lully's "Phaeton".


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## Jorge Hereth (Aug 16, 2015)

This one by João Guilherme Ripper (Rio de Janeiro, 1959) _O Diletante_, from 2014 is adapted from a mid-19th century comedy about fantic opera lovers' ways; more information here: Contemporary Opera p. 20.

This video of _O Diletante_ has been made at the opera's premiere:


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