# Best beginnings



## Gualtier Malde (Nov 14, 2010)

What are, in your opinion, the operas with the best beginnings? Please take _beginning_ in a very strict sense, as in first 10 seconds (at most) or so. I'm looking for strokes of genius that draw you in immediately, right away give you a feeling of "yes, this is it", without any analysis.

Some examples for the kind of thing I have in mind here would be:

1. Le nozze di Figaro
2. Der Rosenkavalier (perhaps the best first 4 measures ever)
3. Carmen
4. Parsifal or in fact almost everything by Wagner (Hollander also comes to mind immediately), but Parsifal as an example that it can be done with a slow tempo also

On the other hand, Norma and Ariadne auf Naxos would be examples for operas where we have unique masterpieces following rather non-descript overtures. So we have time to find the most comfortable position in our seats, and conversation and coughing can die down before things start in earnest.


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## Webernite (Sep 4, 2010)

Tristan, of course.


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## Gualtier Malde (Nov 14, 2010)

Webernite said:


> Tristan, of course.


Fortunately I said "everything by Wagner"


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## Almaviva (Aug 13, 2010)

I'm not sure if a full overture would count in your strict sense, but other than Wagner's famous overtures, I like many of the Rossini overtures (especially Il Barbiere di Siviglia) and I love Verdi's overture for La Traviata. Beethoven's Leonore number 3 is another one.


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## Gualtier Malde (Nov 14, 2010)

Almaviva said:


> I'm not sure if a full overture would count in your strict sense, but other than Wagner's famous overtures, I like many of the Rossini overtures (especially Il Barbiere di Siviglia) and I love Verdi's overture for La Traviata. Beethoven's Leonore number 3 is another one.


As I wrote, ideally I would like things with more shock value (in the positive sense), you hear the first few notes and they are already so stunning that you're immediately won over.
(Also, if the tempo is slow, you only have time for 3 or 4 notes, so they'd better be good.) 

I thought about Rossini myself, but his overtures are perhaps too interchangeable (as he himself would be the first to admit) to qualify in this strict sense.


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## Air (Jul 19, 2008)




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## World Violist (May 31, 2007)

Wagner overtures are incredible.

Also, the beginning of Per Norgard's "Nuit des Hommes" is quite interesting. It's only a single tone fluctuating up and down, creating all sorts of clashing overtones.


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

I like the two menacing drum rolls at the start of Il Trovatore & then just a few seconds later when Ferrando launches into _"All'erta! All'erta!" _


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## karenpat (Jan 16, 2009)

Carmen would also be on my list... it was the first opera I ever saw live and they had decided to not dim the lights but just turn them right off just as the overture started.
Other than that Die Zauberflöte and Mitridate are good candidates... Not only are the first 10 seconds especially interesting but those overtures can keep my attention to the very end - sometimes 7-8 minute overtures make me impatient.


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## Lipatti (Oct 9, 2010)

Out of those few I've seen, and which aren't yet nominated here, I'd like to mention Don Giovanni. The first few measures of the overture are quite dramatic and powerful.


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

karenpat said:


> Carmen would also be on my list... it was the first opera I ever saw live and they had decided to not dim the lights but just turn them right off just as the overture started.


That must have been spectacular! What a fantastic 'first' for you.


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## Almaviva (Aug 13, 2010)

Not at the very beginning but the first spoken line of Otello is quite impressive. Esultate!!


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## Gualtier Malde (Nov 14, 2010)

sospiro said:


> I like the two menacing drum rolls at the start of Il Trovatore & then just a few seconds later when Ferrando launches into _"All'erta! All'erta!" _


I didn't know this, I just checked it on youtube and I love it too (you stretched the rules a little, this is way more than 10 seconds  )

Tosca perhaps is similar to this, with the Scarpia motive opening the opera (of course, I guess you have to know that this is what it is, otherwise it's just three chords), so there he is right away and we're tense immediately.


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

Gualtier Malde said:


> I didn't know this, I just checked it on youtube and I love it too (you stretched the rules a little, this is way more than 10 seconds  )


:scold: If Almaviva can have _Esultate!!_ then I can have _"All'erta! All'erta!"_ 



Gualtier Malde said:


> Tosca perhaps is similar to this, with the Scarpia motive opening the opera (of course, I guess you have to know that this is what it is, otherwise it's just three chords), so there he is right away and we're tense immediately.


Oh yes! Once you know what's coming those few chords mean everything.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

Bellini's Norma has awesome overture ("sinfonia"?) and it's opening draws your attention from first seconds:






Paria by Moniuszko begis with kewl overture as well, all fireworks fired in first 50 seconds or so:






And Elektra - DI-DU-DAM! <sounds of falling rain>

Uhm, I know, there is no rain, it's just I recall Bohm's DVD.

And Otello, but author says it's about 10 seconds that we should consider so I'm not sure if I should mention this because first scene from this opera is written as crescendo of awesomeness, not decrescendo.


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## Gualtier Malde (Nov 14, 2010)

Aramis said:


> Bellini's Norma has awesome overture ("sinfonia"?) and it's opening draws your attention from first seconds:


Interesting. This was one of my two examples for an opening that invites you to get some rest before things start in earnest . So tastes _are_ different.


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## sharkeysnight (Oct 19, 2017)

Digging this thread out rather than starting my own, but I was thinking about this after listening to Billy Budd for the first time in a while yesterday and being taken by those _very_ first notes. It's such a strong break between whatever acoustic world you've been inhabiting before you sat down to hear it and everything that follows, it's like a sudden, harsh-cut opening in a movie, like Chunking Express. You're totally and utterly immersed within ten seconds.

The only other opera I can remember that did that for me is Satyagraha, which was one of the first operas I saw (after Tales of Hoffmann, which also has a wonderful opening to its overture, and Doctor Atomic, the beginning of which I remember nothing about). I was absolutely unsure of what I was about to see, but literally within the very first three notes I was utterly ravished. And then those grinding, up-and-down strings come in right after - the entire acoustic texture of the opera is detailed right then and there, and it's developed all the way to the end. It's so wonderful.

I also greatly enjoy the gloomy, eerie opening to Nixon in China, though the opening chorus itself doesn't do a great deal for me - the libretto is wonderful, but I almost wish the prologue had been left as an instrumental because the orchestral part has terrific vibe on its own.


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## Sloe (May 9, 2014)

Elektra is what first comes to mind.


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## davidglasgow (Aug 19, 2017)

The start of _Forza del Destino_ for me - I think that is a terrific beginning to an opera


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Gualtier Malde said:


> Fortunately I said "everything by Wagner"


Wagner's beginnings are usually really good even if what comes after can be tedious. For a dramatic opening which sums up the tragedy of the opera what about Rigoletto and its masterly prelude.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

*Der Rosenkavalier*, with its graphic depiction of the lovemaking of Octavian and the Marschallin.
*Tosca*, which opens with Scarpia's menacing theme.
*La Traviata*'s quiet opening is a perfect preface for the story that will unfold.
The storm that opens *Otello* is thrilling and exciting.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

There are two basic ways of beginning an opera: with an overture or prelude, and without. I don't know who was first to eliminate the pre-curtain introduction entirely; presumably in the interest of not holding up the action of the play, Verdi began around 1850 to utilize brief mood-setters in place of the musically developed overture, and he finally dispensed with introductions entirely in _Otello_ and _Falstaff,_ plunging us abruptly into the action. Few composers chose to write extended overtures after that time.

Wagner was predictably inventive in finding a unique solution to suit each of his operas, with no _vorspiel_ (his preferred term) like any other in form or substance. Some of them are extended tone poems outlining the opera's basic dramatic idea and/or evoking its physical setting, and they range in length and complexity from a few bars (as in _Gotterdammerung_) to an elaborately developed version of the traditional potpourri featuring the opera's major tunes (as in _Meistersinger_). Wagner also liked to open subsequent acts with orchestral introductions to set the scene or mood (_Walkure, Siegfried,Tristan, Meistersinger_) or even to tell us of actions transpiring between the acts (Act 3 of _Parsifal_).

I don't know what I'd choose as the best operatic beginning - most of the great operas begin arrestingly - but I'd have to cite Wagner's as the greatest orchestral introductions, climaxing the form just when it was going out of style. Wagner the traditionalist... Now there's a thought for the day.


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## Dimace (Oct 19, 2018)

1. *Boito, Mefistofele - Prologo in Cielo.* (I believe is the only opera, the introduction is an integral part of the libretto.)
2.* Wagner, Tannhäuser - Ouvertüre *(mostly a Vorspiel)
3. *Wagner, Rienzi - Ouvertüre mit dem March über Motiv.* (which somehow acts like a Vorspiel)


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Fidelio.


Maria Stuarda

Alternate Maria Stuarda beginning.

La Fancuilla del West


Ivan Susanin -Glinka

Die Frau ohne Schatten


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Listen to the beginning of Die Walkure. Terrific! The music falls asleep for a time after but the beginning raises expectations.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Listen to the beginning of Die Walkure. Terrific! The music falls asleep for a time after but the beginning raises expectations.


How would Wagner rest comfortably for a single day without a classic DavidA backhanded compliment? 

It isn't the music that falls asleep. May I suggest a lighter dinner before attending the performance? When we get old we have to make these little adjustments to our living habits.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Just listened to Verdi's Otello again and the storm sequence at the beginning is utterly remarkable. What's more, this applies to the whole opera. Verdi's music makes the whole plot seem more credible than Shakespeare's play.


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

Glinka's Ruslan & Lyudmila!


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

The beginning of the Ring which grows out of nothing has to be one of the most interesting and appropriate beginnings.

N.


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## aussiebushman (Apr 21, 2018)

Almost too many to mention, but perhaps the most memorable for me are:

The first few bars of Electra AND
The spine-tingling opening notes of Gotterdammerung


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## Sloe (May 9, 2014)

Aramis said:


> Bellini's Norma has awesome overture ("sinfonia"?) and it's opening draws your attention from first seconds:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Sorry but the beginning of Elektra is TAN TAN TAN.


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## Pawelec (Jul 14, 2015)

Pretty much everything by Mozart starting with "Idomeneo", that is, if I'm allowed to skip the initial fanfares (that's not Mozart's fault, the composers did that to make the audience stop talking), what stretches the beginning to about 20-30 seconds. Most overtures make great use of imitation techniques and these moments when the theme goes into minor key are... I have no suitable word.

I think this question actually comes down to asking which overtures have the best openings. If so then "Le nozze..." and "Don Giovanni" are above anything else.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Mefistofele
Parsifal
(skipping the Fontainebleau scene) Don Carlo
Pagliacci
Tosca
T & I Prelude


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## Sieglinde (Oct 25, 2009)

Agree on Don Carlo - I love having five acts (especially if they include the Lacrimosa) but the four-act beginning is much better.

Also love Onegin - it's very melancholy and I love the blend of female voices.

Billy Budd too, especially since the Prologue/Epilogue is a nice framing device.

Don Giovanni - one of the rare overtures that absolutely slaps, and I love the Commendatore's "motif" even if it was probably a case of "****, premiere's tonight, let's reuse this bit because I'm lazy. We can say it's Foreshadowing(TM)".


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## NLAdriaan (Feb 6, 2019)

Der Freischutz & Carmen

I might not be objective, given my avatar, but Carlos Kleiber was the magician of ouvertures, also in both examples in this thread. The ouverture in fact sets the stage for the whole story and could be a mini version of the whole work. A good overture is played very subtle with the right dynamics
Just look at this beginning of Carmen:




And the entire opera if you have time


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Sieglinde said:


> Agree on Don Carlo - I love having five acts (especially if they include the Lacrimosa) but the four-act beginning is much better.


Even with the original beginning with the chorus (unfortunately cut after the dress rehearsal)?

N.


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## Agamenon (Apr 22, 2019)

Tristan: a revolution on the way!
Don Giovanni: a real nightmare!


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

Giuseppe Verdi,La Traviata Ouverture
In short you have the whole story. Stunning.


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## Barelytenor (Nov 19, 2011)

The beginning of _La Bohème._

Kind regards, :tiphat:

George


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