Summer Opera Film Festival

This program devotes ten consecutive early evenings (excluding the weekend) of the summer to presentations and discussions of a specific annually selected operatic theme. The theme for 2012 is LOVE’S OPERATIC EMBRACE. The fundamental objective of this year’s festival is to examine the profoundly different contexts of love within a selection of romantic operas that include Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette, Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, Lully’s Armide, Gluck’s Alceste, Handel’s Acis and Galatea, and Handel’s Theodora. We shall examine each of these operas from the following perspectives: 1) enjoyment of the music; 2) analysis of the clash between love’s embrace and perceived societal responsibilities; and 3) a relaxed and informal environment that fosters constructive and friendly discussion. A syllabus (Summer Opera Festival) provides a detailed schedule and summary descriptions of materials. Recommended texts include 1) Romeo and Juliet in SHAKESPEARE: The Invention of the Human (Harold Bloom; Riverhead Books, a Member of Penguin Putnam; New York, 1998, pp. 87-103); and 2) Tristan and Isolde, in The Wagner Operas (Ernest Newman; Princeton University Press; Princeton, NJ, 1991, pp. 69-278). Dr. Richard Adelman presents the DVDs and leads the discussion sessions in UL’s Cultural Center. This discussion series is a new official course co-sponsored by the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at the University of Michigan.