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Composer of the Month for March

Two particular options might be worth considering:

First Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868) for a second consecutive month because so much needs to be done on his articles.

Second the suggestion from Adam Cuerden (see above) to work on lesser-known English composers of the mid 18th to mid 19th centuries, including:

Charles Dibdin (1745-1814), Stephen Storace (1762–1796), Julius Benedict (1804-1885), Michael Balfe (1808-1870), William Vincent Wallace (1812-1865), Edward Loder (1813-1865) and Alexander Mackenzie (1847-1935).

Some other candidates:

I thought it might also be interesting to see which composers have the largest number of red links in The opera corpus. Here is a list of those with 7 or more red lnks.

  • Gioachino Rossini 16
  • Ruggiero Leoncavallo 15 (including some apparently rather minor works)
  • Christoph Willibald Gluck 12
  • Johann Strauss II 11
  • Saverio Mercadante 10
  • Paul Hindemith 9
  • Giovanni Pacini 9
  • Antônio Carlos Gomes 8
  • Niccolò Jommelli 8
  • Alexandre Charles Lecocq 8
  • Giovanni Paisiello 8
  • Stephen Storace 8
  • Florian Leopold Gassmann 7
  • Niccolò Piccinni 7
  • Ottorino Respighi 7
  • Tommaso Traetta 7

Any opinions/comments/ideas? --Kleinzach 04:16, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

That count surprised me, because Balfe was a very prolific composer who we have barely covered. However, it seems that noone had transferred over his list of works to the opera corpus page - if this is done, he tops the list at 19 redlinks. Adam Cuerden talk 14:47, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
The introduction of The opera corpus explains that it is "a selective [list] of notable works". it's not for every composer's complete works! I see you have now added 19 Balfe works to the The opera corpus. How many of these are really notable? How many of them are covered in Grove, Oxford, or Viking? Note that we are not limited to the titles in The opera corpus. It's just a rough road map. If you have good material on an unlisted opera it's certainly worth doing an article. On the other hand it's offputting to everybody to put a long list of red-linked works on Opera of the Month that no-one knows anything about. Nothing turns people off participating (in a broad-based project such as this) like the whiff of monomania. The purpose of Opera of the Month is to develop even coverage of the opera corpus. What we don't want is gaping holes alternating with incredible depth in obscurity. -- Kleinzach 00:36, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure of coverage offhand, but certainly a lot more have recordings and productions than the two that were given. The Amber Witch and The Maid of Artois, for instance, if I recall correctly. The list may be too long now, but the two-entry list we had before was surely too short. Adam Cuerden talk 02:41, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
I'd recommend checking out the titles - find out how many you have real info on (and want to write about) and just add those. As I said before we are not limited to Grove coverage, but we need positive reasons for listing. -- Kleinzach 09:50, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
Do we really need to decide this four months ahead? After all, we might have attracted some new members with their own specialist interests and knowledge by then and they might want to get involved in choosing Composers of the Month. Again, people who are enthusiastic for a particular composer to be chosen might not have the time come March due to unforeseen circumstances. Deciding these things this far in advance is not a good idea in my opinion. --Folantin 15:10, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
I agree. Why not wait until January? It still gives two months to make a decision, and people might have better/different ideas by then. Best, Voceditenore 18:56, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
Can we have some more opinions on the time lag? Up to now it has worked well. Adam Cuerden set up three slots and we've filled them. Interest has always been divided between the different composers lined up, with different editors concentrating on different figures. Usually there aren't more than two or three people working on any one month's composer(s). I can't remember any instance of everybody working together on the designated month on the designated composer, in the way that we have had list-article collaborations. When the work has been spread over three months or so, more work has been done overall on the operas. (BTW I started the discussion now at the beginning of the month because of the request (above).)
Having said all that, if it is decided to reduce the time lead I suggest we ask Adam Cuerden to help us remove the last slot. -- Kleinzach 00:07, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
Changing the number of slots shown is easy. Adam Cuerden talk 02:41, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
In my peregrinations for Leoncavallo's Are You There?, I noticed that the Wikipedia articles on Puccini's contemporaries: Leoncavallo, Cilea, Umberto Giordano, Alberto Franchetti, Wolf-Ferrari, and even Mascagni (which is currently written as a timeline) could use a lot of improvement. Likewise the articles on their operas, many of which are red-linked or stubs. My impression is that this repertoire is kind of a 'minority interest' on the Opera Project, but some or all of these composers would be my choice. I've only been a member for a while. Perhaps they've been CoM before? Best, Voceditenore 15:58, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
PS. I took the liberty of removing Leoncavallo from Category:Vaudeville performers ;-) Voceditenore 21:45, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
Leoncavallo and Mascagni have been CotM before. Umberto Giordano is lacking three operas, Alberto Franchetti a couple. We already have six Wolf-Ferrari articles, varying in length and quality. Mascagni has 13 articles and one red linked work, again like Wolf-Ferrari varying in length and quality. All in all I would say that this group is fairly typical of our depth of coverage at the moment: broad but with lots of room for development - but not an area obviously needing work as, for example, Rossini and some 18th-century composers. -- Kleinzach 22:54, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

I'd be inclined to Hindemith; Saint-Saens has a great many lacunae. Will Rossini take that long, given the coverage existing in it.wiki? If anyone deserves a second crack at CotM, I guess it would be Verdi first! Kleinzach has a good point above; should we be bold and replace CotM with various ongoing projects which could be removed from the project page after a certain period (10 days?) of inactivity? Sparafucil (talk) 22:11, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Category:Whistle register singers

I have recommended this for deletion, see Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 December 15. -- Kleinzach (talk) 03:25, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

A CALL TO ARMS!!! Everyone please check this out and give your support for this deletion. It is a horrible cattegory page with many ignorant fans supporting it so it is difficult to get rid of. It already failed to pass deletion once. I listed my reasons on the discussion page for deletion. Please add your support.Nrswanson (talk) 07:20, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your support, but hang on - we aren't allowed to canvass. This is just a notice - we aren't telling people how to vote! -- Kleinzach (talk) 08:55, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

If I might go a little off-topic: The Whistle-register article looks pretty good, but has somewhat infelicitous writing in places. Anyone a little more knowledgable up for some light copyediting? Adam Cuerden talk 16:12, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

I am a vocal pedagogist and I just spent several days improving the article. What exactly do you find unclear?Nrswanson (talk) 19:18, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Piceleo’s Davanto

I've prodded Piceleo’s Davanto as non-notable or a hoax, but I know that many sources for lesser known older works are not on line (and I know next to nothing about opera). If someone would like to do a spot of research to prove or disprove the existance of this, feel free. Thanks! --Fabrictramp (talk) 17:53, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that's a hoax. Clue: it's "not been staged since the 16th century" - as far as I know, there is only one opera from the 1500s, Jacopo Peri's Dafne (and that hasn't survived). --Folantin (talk) 18:07, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the help!--Fabrictramp (talk) 18:25, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Stubs: replacement of the opera stub by separate 'opera by language' stubs

Waacstats has removed the opera stub from all English and German operas and replaced it with 'English language opera' and 'German language opera' stubs. He was apparently about to do the same for French and Italian (but not other languages). I've asked him to hold off until this has been discussed here.

The main problem with the removal of the 'opera stub' is that it's used by the bot for automatic classification of stub articles - the red tab that appears in the bottom left of the banner. (This is specified in the banner code.)

In any case is it useful to subdivide the stubs by language? Does it help us maintain and develop the articles (and keep statistics)? Probably more than half the creators of new articles remember to add stub tag. What will happen if they have to remember four, or five or more template tags (or whatever they are called) rather than one? -- Kleinzach (talk) 23:37, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, it shouldn't be all that hard to update the bot to use the new stubs, or o add the category the bot uses to the new stub tags in addition.
As for actually dividing them up... Well, it's somewhat useful, I suppose. There are some operas - especially in Donizetti's oeuvre, I believe - that exist in two versions in different languages both prepared by the composer, which could cause problems, and one wonders whether people will use it much outside of the English language cats. Oh, well. Let's see what others think. Adam Cuerden talk 13:19, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Kleinzach. I'm not really sure what the purpose of dividing these stubs up by language is. There's only one Project Opera. For me, the one benefit of this latest round of recategorisation has been bringing my attention to what a good job User:DJRafe has done in lifting so many articles way above stub status. Congratulations to him (or her)! --Folantin (talk) 13:38, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
It MIGHT be useful for making a head start on later categorisation, I guess. Adam Cuerden talk 13:53, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
Yes but we already have opera by language categories - which have been relatively well-kept and cover all languages. -- Kleinzach (talk) 15:40, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
It's not obvious to me what value there is in categorising the stubs by language. Has Waacstats been invited to put ther pov here.--Peter cohen (talk) 17:15, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
He's been told about the discussion. -- Kleinzach (talk) 01:15, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm, broadly speaking, in favour, because it breaks the large number of Opera stubs up. You can now go to, say, Category:German-language operas and there is the sub-category for the stubs (note that the stubs still appear in the cat as well as the sub-cat). Perhaps it would have been more useful if they'd done it by composer, e.g. Category:Operas by Richard Strauss stubs, though. Maybe one of us ought to join the Stub sorting project, but I do believe that they are trying to be helpful. --GuillaumeTell (talk) 19:16, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
I don't think anyone ever doubted their intent was good. Just a matter of figuring out whether there's enough ambiguities to cause significant problems, whether we have the skills to update the bot, how far we should divide it (e.g. Czech-language opera stubs?), and whether there's a will to take it on. Adam Cuerden talk 20:49, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
Verdi's operas are also in two different versions in many cases with one version in Italian and the other in French. I'm not sure that this use of more specific stubs isn't going to be a major headache in the future.Nrswanson (talk) 19:40, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
Just a small correction here for the record: the only Verdi opera which exists in two different versions, Italian and French, is I Lombardi/Jérusalem. The other operas that you're thinking of - Don Carlos and Les vêpres siciliennes, I presume - were written to French librettos and translated into Italian. Most (all?) of his operas have been translated into French, English, German and, no doubt, other languages. --GuillaumeTell (talk) 14:50, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Adam Cuerden is asking the right questions and the more I think about it the basic answers are in the negative. We have identified a lot of things that need doing - starting assessments, reforming the voice categories, adding IPA pronunciation for foreign-language title articles, and probably lots more - and stub template development has not been one of them.

Has anyone actually found the opera stub category too big for a specific purpose? Besides being useful for automatic assessment of a large number of articles, I've used it to see the percentage of stubs to total articles as an indicator of the 'maturity' of the project (and yes, it's still very young!)

IMO we are still at the first stage of development - concentrating on creating new articles (through CotM, SotM etc.) As we have seen, once articles are created other (outside) editors start working on them and a large percentage take off and become viable articles. So my conclusion is that we don't need stub development campaigns or new 'sub-stubs' - at least not now. -- Kleinzach (talk) 01:54, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

I apologise for not replying earlier. I am the editor who created the new stub cats, I was attempting to clear some of the Stub sorting projects to do list. I have been removing the opera-stub and replacing based on the existing categorisation, so if an Opera appears in both categories then it would get both stub tags. Two other categories appear on the todo list (Italian and French) I will await the end of this discussion before finishing this off. note I see no reason not to make templates for all languages in the Category:Operas by language. Waacstats (talk) 22:27, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Should we vote? GuillaumeTell is in favour of subdividing the stub tag/cat by language. I and Folantin are against. But what do other people want? (Incidentally I've checked and there are now 127 articles with the new stubs). Best -- Kleinzach (talk) 09:57, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

In the long run, it's not going to matter much - the ones people are interested in will expand out of stub status, and the ones that languish will languish however you categorise them. It doesn't hurt to categorise them, but it could end up as a lot of work for little actual gain, unless people think it would be useful to them. Adam Cuerden talk 10:23, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
Hmm. We are trying to reach a decision on this. Was that a negative vote? -- Kleinzach (talk) 11:03, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
More of a "Does it really matter either way, and if not, why bother going through all the trouble to do it?" Adam Cuerden talk 15:35, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm against. If the categories are felt to be getting unwieldy, then picking out important composers and recording their stubs would feel more intuitive to me.--Peter cohen (talk) 15:42, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

OK. In that case there is a clear majority against subdividing the stub tag/cat by language. -- Kleinzach (talk) 22:52, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Lists of operas

Following the discussion above (Opera navigation boxes/Ordering of works) I propose we add the following ('GuillaumeTell rules') to Section 10 (articles), with a link to Section 14 (navigation boxes), of the project page:

Chronological lists of operas (in articles and navigation boxes) are arranged by the date of first performance if the opera was first performed during the composer's lifetime, or shortly after his/her death. If the first performance was greatly after the composer's death, the date of composition is used. Non-chronological lists should be in alphabetical order.

Please agree/disagree or propose any necessary changes. Thanks and regards. -- Kleinzach (talk) 02:23, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

I think we all prefer chronological in articles. The only major exception is The opera corpus which has a special function as a 'road map' and in any case would require a huge (and rather pointless) effort to make chronological. -- Kleinzach (talk) 10:53, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. I've now added this to the project page - section 9.7 and 14. -- Kleinzach (talk) 10:40, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

I of course dissent. Do we want to invite conflicts with the rest of the classical music world by extending this rule beyond navigation boxes to articles? GuillaumeTell, I think I follow your concern about complicated revision-composition histories, but what would be gained by re-assigning Šárka from 1887 to 1925? Sparafucil (talk) 08:12, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
I would tend to agree with you on this. Some operas are obvious early works. I think that common sense actually plays a role in implementation. Die Feen was first performed soon after Wagner's death but is sensibly early in the list.--Peter cohen (talk) 13:06, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
In fact, I originated the Janáček and the Wagner templates and seem to have applied common sense in both cases! So maybe the GuillaumeTell rules need a small amendment. Hard cases make bad law, of course, and there are lots of cases where date of composition would be problematic, too. --GuillaumeTell (talk) 22:20, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
Would you like to formulate the amendment yourself, or will this do? In general, chronology of operas is (like other works) by date of creation when this differs from premiere or publication. When the composition/revision history is especially complicated or controversial, the composer worklists in Grove should be consulted. As I've said before, there doesnt need to be a one-size-fits-all approach to this: premiere dates are more appropriate in the context of reception history, and who's to say that Donizetti might not be better navigated alphabetically? Sparafucil (talk) 21:57, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
I disagree with Sparafucil's proposed wording which IMO will confuse editors. -- Kleinzach (talk) 22:44, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Porgy and Bess Featured article review

Porgy and Bess has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • (Broken clamshells•Otter chirps) 17:12, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Query: lists of 'noted arias'

Just wanted to check about operas with "Noted arias" sections. This upsets my desire for precision, but, at the same time, many operas do not divide up easily, so this may be better than just giving a scene list, or giving the numbering used in the score, which may file the famous arias under the material leading into them. But it still seems a second-rate compromise at best, and so I think it best if it not be used where avoidable. Adam Cuerden talk 10:36, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

We have an established (and recently discussed, see 'Synopses: discussion needed?' above) practice of trying to integrate 'noted arias' etc. into synopses. (I don't think anyone likes to see separate lists.) -- Kleinzach (talk) 11:00, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
Oddly enough, the one I was looking at - I Lombardi alla prima crociata - did both. Adam Cuerden talk 15:34, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
Yes indeed, you will be able to find examples of almost any permutation of synopsis/arias. Much editing needs to be done. The root problem is the quality of the synopses (as discussed above). -- Kleinzach (talk) 23:47, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Adam mentions "giving the numbering used in the score, which may file the famous arias under the material leading into them". I wouldn't favour using the actual numbering at all, but I do favour formulations such as "Abscheulicher! ... Komm, Hoffnung" or "È strano ... Ah, fors'è lui ... Sempre libera". --GuillaumeTell (talk) 18:55, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, me too. -- Kleinzach (talk) 23:47, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
The “noted aria” section should be deleted once they have been incorporated into synopsis – that was what we discussed before. I have deleted noted aria section in I Lombardi alla prima crociata. - Jay (talk) 03:12, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
Using the numbering is a practice I picked up from my time in operetta. It's rather more useful there, as you can imagine, but some operas are broken up with dialogue, e.g. Der Freischutz, and for those, I'd recommend it. But it'd be fairly useless for something like Tosca, which grows organically. Adam Cuerden talk 22:53, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Her Majesty's Theatre

Her Majesty's Theatre is a current GA nominee, please feel free to improve the article. It has been adopted by this project and presented opera for many years, including many premières of Handel's operas. I would appreciate your input. Cheers Kbthompson (talk) 16:06, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Her Majesty's Theatre is currently a featured article candidate please help improve the article, or leave comments at its nomination page. Kbthompson (talk) 14:34, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Joan Sutherland controversial issue

I need project members to look at Joan Sutherland page – it is about her unpleasant feeling when she was interviewed by a Chinese or Indian officer for her Australian passport (pretty much controversial before). The page has been heavily edited and don’t forget to read comments in the talk page. I need members in here to stop edit warring that has been going on for many days - Jay (talk) 09:35, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Deletion of falsetto page

I have nominated the falsetto page for deletion for the following reasons: This article contains material that is covered in other wikipedia articles, most notably the falsetto register page. Furthermore, this article fails to incoporate itself within the larger topic of vocal registration and is highly biased towards a vocal pedagological perspective that fails to incorporate the perspective of speech pathologists. I considered merging the two articles initially but the understanding of the term register between the two articles is so different I doubt this is possible. The falsetto article uses some controvercial perspectives on head voice and chest voice which are not widely embraced by the vocal pedagogical community. Read the vocal registration article for clarification.Nrswanson (talk) 03:47, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Aida authorship: Auguste Mariette vs Temistocle Solera

(Not sure if this is the logical place to post this,. If not, please re-post. Thanks.)
From Aida: "Aida ... based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette (although there are scholars who argue that the scenario was really written by Temistocle Solera)." -- Can anyone cite the assertion the scenario was really written by Temistocle Solera? (The Wikipedia article on Solera is a brief stub which does not mention this. Auguste Mariette also says nothing about any dispute on authorship.) Wikipedia:When to cite, Wikipedia:Citing sources -- Writtenonsand (talk) 15:52, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I've just checked this out and added the reference to the article. It's:
Mary Jane Phillips-Matz, Verdi: A Biography, 1992, Oxford University Press cited in Alexis Hamilton, Origins... Aida, Portland Opera, 2007
Here's what it says:
There is much evidence to dispute that Mariette’s story was purely original, though he claimed it as his own. This is not to say that he was a calculated plagiarist as his brother later accused, but an eminent Egyptologist who would have some knowledge of older Egyptian stories and legends. Charles Osborne points out an interesting coincidence of plot points between an 18th century libretto Nitteti by Metastasio and that of Aida. It is more than possible that Du Locle added some of the more human characteristics in Nitteti and also plot points seen in an opera Bajazet by Racine. Neither of these is the story of Aida, but Aida contains elements of both.
In her definitive 1992 biography of Verdi, Mary Jane Phillips-Matz puts forward the possibility that the entire scenario for Aida was by Temistocle Solera, erstwhile friend and librettist of Verdi’s who was living in Cairo at the time. Given the rancorous regard in which Verdi held Solera, it is no wonder that Du Locle would hesitate to credit the flamboyant librettist/composer with the work. She also adds a novel by Heliodorus, Aethiopica, as another source story for Aida.
Best, Voceditenore (talk) 16:53, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi all. I just joined opera project

Hi everyone. I just just joined your group and wikipedia for that matter. I look forward to working on articles related to opera with you all. I hope if I make any mistakes to begin with you will be forgiving. lol Just to let you know a little about me: I am a voice teacher in NYC and a lyric tenor and I I have degrees in voice from the Oberlin School of Music and Indiana University. If you have any suggestions for me in getting started please let me know.Ringnpassagio (talk) 17:09, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi and welcome to Wikipedia. My suggestion would be to join in with the composer or singer of the month exercises we hold, provided they are about people who interest you. However, what I did myself when I joined was to go through the libretti and programme books I had at home looking for operas without articles or synopses which I could provide. So if there are subjects you are particularly keen on, then go for them. You've obviously found our project page and can therefore look at the article layouts we prefer, though we do have the occasional vigorous disagreements.
If you look at WP:Welcome, you'll find links to various other material on Wikipedia in general. ANyway good editing.--18:29, 30 December 2007 (UTC)— Preceding unsigned comment added by Peter cohen (talk • contribs)
Thank you so much for your suggestions. I notice you are all tackling Gounod. I love Gounod.Ringnpassagio (talk) 18:44, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
Hi! And welcome from me too. Another way to help is to check our daily 'bot' results. This throws up all new articles from the last 24 hours which might be opera related. Some of them are fully formed, but others can really use a helping hand with copy-editing, internal linking, providing references, adding categories, marking them as stubs where necessary, etc. If they're about a living person, {{Blp}} needs to be added to the article's talk page, and all new opera related articles should also have {{WikiProject Opera}} added to the talk page as well as this helps us keep track of the articles within the project's scope. All the best, Voceditenore (talk) 18:48, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
PS. Despite my name, I'm not a tenor.;-) Best, Voceditenore (talk) 18:50, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
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