A Glimmer Of Hope For Opera In America

A few weeks ago, having just returned home from a trip, I received a phone call from my nine year old granddaughter. I am always ecstatic to get a call from her and was assuming it was a welcome home call (perhaps suggested by her parents). Much to my surprise, she very excitedly began, “Papa, my class is going to see “Lucia di Lammermoor”, and we have been listening to singers and know all about the story. I can hardly wait.”

I told her how happy I was that she would see “Lucia” and that I had sung Edgardo with Beverly Sills and Patricia Brooks at New York City Opera. She did not know Patricia Brooks (not surprisingly) but was impressed with Beverly Sills because her’s was one of the “mad scenes” that they had listened to in class. She added that Miss Sills was her favorite (but that could have been to please me). I thought to myself, “There is a God”. But in the next few days I realized that there may or may not be a God, but “thank God”, there is a Neill Warfield.

Neill teaches at Spruce Street School in downtown Seattle and is a very dynamic, engaging teacher who is also a confirmed “opera buff”. In fact, he wears an “opera rocks” tee shirt ala “AC/DC”. How cool is that to a 4th or 5th grader? For the last several years he has been taking his classes to opera dress rehearsals at McCaw Hall. They even have a few alumni of these opera excursions joining them. At my grand daughter’s urging, he invited me to talk to the students about opera and opera singing. I was very taken by how knowledgeable and interested they were. I had a chance to talk with Neill about opera, and although we have differing views on super-titles and contemporary staging etc., we both share a love of the art form and hope to pass this opportunity on to others. He also started me re-thinking some of my views and although it may not be “my cup of tea”, I realize there’s room for many old and new drinkers. Most importantly, we both realize that young people are great audiences and need not have their art “sugar coated”.

My aim here is not to praise Spruce Street School or to deify Neill Warfield, but to point out that here is proof that given the proper exposure and environment young people can get into opera and be enriched by it even in the era of “High School Rock” and “Hanna Montana”

I talked to my granddaughter the day after the performance and asked her how it was. Her reply was, “awesome, I even cried”.

Everyone gives “lip- service” to the importance of classical music in our society. It is time to put some action behind those words and insist that our schools, be they public or private, introduce our youth to classical music. There is a plethora of hard evidence pointing out that students that have classical music in their lives achieve more and mature into better, more caring and grounded adults. Opera, I feel, is especially relevant, since it, more than symphonic music, adds the dimension of staged drama that takes the audience, especially young ones, to a deeper emotional plane.

Look around at the age of the average opera audience these days. If opera is to continue, we need more Neill Warfields and environments in which they can inspire our youth.