Smorg's 7 Favorite Light-Hearted Moments in Opera

To prove that opera is such a vast music genre that it has something for everyone, those who had put up with my recent list of 7 weepiest dramatic scenes from the opera will find the scenes on this list quite a depression-busting perk. Included below are 7 fun scenes from opera buffa and operetta for those of us who would rather die of laughter than of heart-break. Clicking the name of the scenes will bring you to a sample clip at Youtube.

1. MOZART: Le nozze di Figaro: Count Almaviva & Cherubino's Musical Chair Scene
Poor Susanna is besieged by men who don't want to be discovered alone with her (she's about to get married to Figaro, see?). First young and terminally horny page-boy Cherubino, who hides in the covered easy chair when his boss, Count Almaviva, waltzes in to hit on his valet's bride-to-be. The Count himself takes to hiding on the other side of the same chair (without noticing that Cherubino is hiding just inches away) when they are surprised by Don Basilio, the Countess' music teacher. Slick Basilio's allusion to Cherubino's crush on the Countess Almaviva has jealous Count erupting from his hiding place. A few more upmanship maneuvers later, and Cherubino is discovered. How does it all turn out for unlucky Susanna? Click on the link above and find out.... then go and book a seat for the next performance of this opera at the theater near you!

2. Johanns STRAUSS II: Die Fledermaus: Adele's Laughing Song
Adele the maid runs into her boss, Gabriel von Eisenstein, at Prince Orlofsky even though she's supposed to be home taking care of an ailing mother (which was, of course, the excuse she used to get out of having to work that night). She attempts to convince him that she is really someone else by feigning exasperation in a most pretentiously exaggerated manner. Actually called 'Mein Herr Marquis', this slick little piece for a coloratura soprano isn't dubbed 'the Laughing Song' for no good reason. Have a listen to the sample clip and see if you yourself won't buy her little ruse and agree that anyone who can laugh all the way up to a high D couldn't possibly be working as a maid even in Vienna!

3. ROSSINI: Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville): Rossini's Music Lesson
Young Rosina wants to run off with 'Lindoro' (actually Count Almaviva in disguise), but she is being (mostly) carefully watched by her boring and old guardian, Dr. Bartolo, who wants to marry her (or, rather, her inheritance) so much he's even sitting in on her music lessons to make sure nobody makes a pass at her. Unfortunately for him, Lindoro has now taken another disguise as the temporary replacement music teacher and the two young lovers manage to flirt heavily with each other right under the snoring nose of the old geezer. If you enjoy this, the entire opera is like it and worth checking out!

4. ROSSINI: L'Italiana in Algeri (The Italiana in Algiers): Pappataci
Isabella, the Italian girl stranded in Algiers with her beloved Lindoro (apparently Rossini had a fondness for that name!), devises a plan for them to escape from being captives of Mustafa, the Bey of Algiers, by fooling him into believing that her naming him to the rank of the Italian 'Pappataci' is a great honor, though the rank comes with the obligation to eat, drink, and be merry while completely oblivious to everything else. Mustafa is then put to a test and has to ignore whatever Isabella and Lindoro do to try to distract him... with the last distraction being their running off, of course! It's hard to believe that anyone who rises to the rank of the Bey would be such a brain-vacuum... but when the whole thing is put to such amusingly tongue-twisting music as Rossini does, suspension of disbelief is an easy thing to do!

5. OFFENBACH: La belle Helene: It's all Menelaus's fault... Is It?
What do you do if you're caught canoodling around with a foreign prince while you thought your husband is 'out of town'? You turn around and blame the victim, of course! At least that's what Offenbach's beautiful Helen of Sparta does when her husband, Menelaus, returns home unexpectedly to find her in bed with Paris of Troy. I don't know how effectively this trick would work for us ugly lots who won't be mistaken for the most beautiful woman in the world even by a blind lapdog, but if you can sing this sultry music convincingly... Well... perhaps it's worth a shot, ay?

6. OFFENBACH: Les contes d'Hoffmann (Tales of Hoffmann): Olympia's Doll Song
If it is okay for boys to be in love with their car... Well, then, why not with a robot? In the first of the three tales Hoffmann tells in the course of the opera, he is in love with Olympia the robot, who, with the aid of Coppélius's magical glasses, appears convincingly real to him.... even though, as you'll see in the sample clip, she has a very robotic habit of running out of coil at the worst of time. Don't let Natalie Dessay fool you into thinking that this thing is easy to sing, though. It's the French soprano's extraordinary versatility that makes it appear that way!

7. OFFENBACH: Orphée aux enfers (Orpheus in the Underworld): Il m'a Semble sur mon Epaule
Better known as the Fly Duet, this wittily infectiously insect-edelic number between Jupiter in disguise as a particularly amorous fly and the lustily beautiful Eurydice is musically x-rated... Eurydice, as those who are familiar with the Myth of Orpheus would know, had 'died' from a snake bite. In the real myth, Orpheus is so distraughted that he obtains a permission from Jupiter to descend down to Hades to rescue her under the condition that he may not look at her before they had crossed the River Styx back to the land of the living. In this riot of an opera, however, the pair had a rough marriage going when Eurydice is happily bitten by one of the snakes Orphee had set into the field to get at her lover, Aristee (who turns out to be the god of the underworld!). Both parties are content to move on, but Orphee is pressured by the ever-nosy Public Opinion into putting in an effort to restore her to life. Eurydice, meanwhile, is getting rather bored down below since Jupiter (who, like just about every other male in the story, has a big crush on her) had decreed for Aristee to act like a proper god (whatever that means!)... And who should come to pay her a visit but good old Jupiter in disguise as a particularly big and unnaturally cute (ugghh!) fly! But when a lady is bored and ...er... sexually frustrated, she can't be so picky as to who to play around with! (warning: the sample clip is rather racy for US audience standard. Natalie Dessay and Laurent Naouri are married in real life, though. So there you are!)

Voila! If these scenes don't do the job of obliterating the popular misperception that the opera-going crowds are a stiff bunch who don't know how to have fun, then nothing will do. Check the theater near you and see if you can't catch a fun opera live!