Opera lighting

Opera Lighting
The ‘elite’
designers
?

Pieter Ploeg

Graduation dissertation

Bachelor Programme Theatre
theatre making, technical theatre arts
de Theaterschool
Amsterdam School of Arts

Opera Lighting – The ‘elite’ designers?

“A peculiar and creative energy flows from opera, an energy that I actually do not understand,
moreover because the realisation of opera requires so much energy from all concerned personnel. It
is fascinating to see that a total of two hundred operas on the world are performed again and again.
People continuously watch Carmen, La Traviata and La Bohème, knowing that these pieces have
been, are being, and will be performed in countless opera houses around the world. That gives me a
strange, surrealistic consciousness of a desire on which I don’t actually have an answer.”

Jean Kalman, summer 1999

1


Preface & Acknowledgements

First of all I simply love opera. To me opera is the most varied and versatile art
form currently existing. It is the genre where music, spoken word, movement and image
come together. A real ‘Gesamtkunstwerk’ (collective artwork) as Richard Wagner calls it.
Moreover, it is one of the few forms of contemporary theatre that can really captivate and
fascinate me.
Together with my interest in lighting design as part of the collaborative designing process
in opera I felt the need to examine the world of lighting design in the working environment
of contemporary opera. As a student in theatre technology I have many interests but most
of them are not particularly found within the working field of modern theatre technology.
Therefore I call myself a bit of an outsider when it comes to theatre technology, sound
design and lighting design. Opera, however, makes me experience the magic of theatre
and has a substantial influence on my cultural life. For this reason I experienced an
energetic drive while performing certain parts of the research for this dissertation. I
sincerely hope this dissertation is of any help to you in whatever form. The writing style is
kept quite formal.

I hereby thank Hugo van Uum for his helpful comments, Daphne Richter for her patience
and her great advises, Jelmer Tuinstra for his small but wise additions, Mike van Galen for
his encouragements, Reyer and Edith Ploeg for their compelling arguments and all of my
friends for their interest.

Pieter Ploeg, Amsterdam, Saturday, 12 January 2008

© Pieter Ploeg, Amsterdam, January 2008

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Contents

Preamble ..........................................................................................................................5

Introduction......................................................................................................................6

Chapter 1. Research origin & framework .......................................................................7

1.01. Subject resources ..............................................................................................7
1.02. Graphic analyses .............................................................................................10
1.1. The thesis .............................................................................................................12
1.2. Framework of the research ...................................................................................13
1.2.1. Consulted literature.........................................................................................13
Clearly defined literary research............................................................................13
1.2.2. Interviews .......................................................................................................14
1.2.3. Target group ...................................................................................................14
1.2.4. Representativeness of the research................................................................14
1.2.5. The outcome of the research ..........................................................................15
Chapter 2. Brief history of opera ..................................................................................16

2.1. What is opera? ......................................................................................................16
2.2. Origin of opera ......................................................................................................17
2.3. Globalisation of opera ...........................................................................................18
Chapter 3. History of opera lighting design.................................................................20

3.1. The memoirs of Richard Wagner...........................................................................20
3.2. The answer of Adolphe Appia ...............................................................................21
Chapter 4. Opera lighting design..................................................................................23

4.1. Opera houses, a condition for another lighting method?........................................23
4.2. Lighting an opera, a play, or dance as regards content .........................................24
4.2.1. The soloist ......................................................................................................24
4.3. The role of music in the designing process............................................................25
4.4. The economical aspect .........................................................................................27
4.4.1. State support ..................................................................................................27
Germany ...............................................................................................................27
United States of America ......................................................................................28
Italy .......................................................................................................................29
The Netherlands ...................................................................................................29
4.4.2. Planning in advance .......................................................................................30
4.4.3. Repertory........................................................................................................30
4.5. The internationality of the work circumstances ......................................................31
4.6. Origin of the current lighting designer....................................................................31
Chapter 5. Analyses of the interviews..........................................................................33

5.1. Duane Schuler, USA; the economic conditions .....................................................34
5.1.1. Short biographical introduction........................................................................34
5.1.2. The interview ..................................................................................................34
5.1.3. Interview notes ...............................................................................................36
Time......................................................................................................................36
Equipment.............................................................................................................36

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Quality ..................................................................................................................36
5.2. John B. Read, Great Britain; the accurate preparation ..........................................37
5.2.2. The interview ..................................................................................................37
5.2.3. Interview notes ...................................................................................................40
Time......................................................................................................................40
Equipment.............................................................................................................40
5.3.2. The interview ..................................................................................................42
5.3.3 Interview notes ................................................................................................45
Internationality.......................................................................................................45
Genre....................................................................................................................45
5.4. Jean Kalman, France; nothing is equal .................................................................46
5.4.2. The interview ..................................................................................................46
5.4.3. Interview notes ...............................................................................................49
Time......................................................................................................................49
Opera, the long planning .......................................................................................49
Conclusion .....................................................................................................................50

Investigation recommendation .....................................................................................53

Addendum......................................................................................................................54

Summary ........................................................................................................................55

Enumerative Bibliography ............................................................................................56

Literature ..................................................................................................................56
Websites...................................................................................................................57
Endnotes ........................................................................................................................58

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Preamble

This dissertation is part of the graduating process of the Bachelor programme
Theatre Making, technical theatre arts at the Amsterdam School of Arts. This process took
over a year from the first preparation until the final result. The subject of this dissertation
has been chosen in September 2006 in agreement with the dissertation supervisor.
Between September 2006 and January 2007 a pre-research has been executed on the
subject, which resulted in an action plan for the main research. The internal dissertation
supervisor approved this action plan in January 2007.
Beside the notes of the pre-research to a comprehensive subject and the action
plan written in January 2007, this preface was the first part of this dissertation. The action
plan has been used as a framework to define and refine the path to a fulfilling research in
the planned time schedule. The final version of the action plan included a further
investigation and plans for the representativeness of the research, a refined definition of
the thesis and an improved version of the planning and schedule. In the introduction the
subject of this dissertation will be explained, as well as the formulation of the thesis, the
research methods and the consulted sources.
This dissertation is written in English since the target group of this dissertation is
international.
To assist the author of this dissertation in the research process an external
supervisor has been invited. The external supervisor needed to be someone from the field
of study. Hugo van Uum, head of the lighting department of the Dutch national opera
house in Amsterdam, Het Muziektheater1, was willing to assist the author during the
research. As head of the lighting department he works with international lighting designers
for opera and dance. Because of his working experience and practical knowledge he is
able to reflect on the examined sources and help the author with helpful comments.

1
Het Muziektheater is the theatre of residence for De Nederlandse Opera (The Dutch Opera) and Het
Nationale Ballet (the Dutch National Ballet). This means they do not just present their Amsterdam
performances here, but they also produce them at Het Muziektheater. Gastprogrammering (the guest
programming organisation of Het Muziektheater) invites companies and productions from around the world.
Het Muziektheater is also the home base for the Holland Symfonia Orchestra.
 http://www.het-muziektheater.nl

5


Introduction

The subject of the field of study for this dissertation was chosen due to an interest
after having seen several opera shows in the opera house in Amsterdam where many
lighting designers from abroad appeared in the credits being responsible for the lighting
design. Therefore the first question that eventually led to the thesis was:

 Why are almost all lighting designers for opera in the opera house in
Amsterdam of foreign origin?

This is an interesting fact because when one thinks of opera as being one of the
most well financed theatrical art forms, it is expectable that well-known lighting designers
work together with the famous directors and conductors contracted at the Amsterdam
opera house. Why don’t the Dutch lighting designers that work in the largest national
theatre -, dance - and musical productions also work in the national opera house? In this
dissertation the research is specifically about the national opera house in Amsterdam, Het
Muziektheater, not about De Nationale Reisopera, a considerably large Dutch opera
company based in Enschede. De Nationale Reisopera contracted eight foreign lighting
designers for twenty-one opera productions between 2004 and 2008, which is
approximately 62%. 2 The biggest theatre production company in the Netherlands,
Toneelgroep Amsterdam, contracted approximately 16%3 foreign lighting designers,
although this company often works with resident designers. Even the difference between
Toneelgroep Amsterdam and De Nationale Reisopera is already interesting, but this
difference is not particularly interesting or surprising compared to the foreign character of
Het Muziektheater. Het Muziektheater Amsterdam contracted approximately 95% foreign
lighting designers. Notice that some designers returned more or less, or did multiple
productions or cycles in a season, often together with specific directors.

2
Archive of De Nationale Reisopera, www.reisopera.nl
3
Archive of Toneelgroep Amsterdam, www.toneelgroepamsterdam.nl

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Chapter 1. Research origin & framework

To give an example of the interesting fact of the internationality in opera as
described in the introduction here follows a list of composers, directors and lighting
designers and their nationality that composed, directed and designed operas that have
been performed in the Muziektheater Amsterdam between 2000 and 2008.
The table is coloured to highlight particular attention points. The author of this
dissertation attended the productions in red. Coloured table cells are artists with the same
nationality in one production. Black outlined cells are recurring designing duos. Underlined
lighting designer have been interviewed during the research for this dissertation.

1.01. Subject resources
2000/2001 composer director lighting designer
Capriccio Richard Strauss Andreas Homoki Franck Evin
Król Roger Karol Szymanowski Johannes Schaaf Manfred Voss
Il barbiere di Siviglia Gioacchino Rossini Dario Fo Dario Fo
Peter Grimes Benjamin Britten Francesca Zambello Jennifer Tipton
Le nozze di Figaro Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Jürgen Flimm Franz Peter David
4

Tristan und Isolde Richard Wagner Alfred Kirchner Jean Kalman
Jevgeni Onjegin Pjotr Iljitsj Tsjaikovski Johannes Schaaf Gérard Cleven
L’incoronazione di Poppea Claudio Monteverdi Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Béatrice et Bénédict Hector Berlioz Tim Albery Jennifer Tipton
Boris Godoenov Modest Petrovitsj Moesorgski Willy Decker David Finn
Johnny & Jones Theo Loevendie Theu Boermans Gerhard Fischer

Alice in Wonderland Alexander Knaifel Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Jenufa Leoš Janáček Richard Jones Thomas Webster
Lear Aribert Reimann Willy Decker Wolfgang Gussman
5

Giulio Cesare Georg Friedrich Händel Ursel and Karl-Ernst Herrmann Karl-Ernst Herrmann
Salome Richard Strauss Harry Kupfer Wilfried Werz
6

Lohengrin Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Dialogues des Carmélites Francis Poulenc Robert Carsen Jean Kalman
Don Giovanni Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Alfred Kirchner Götz Loepelmann
7

Lulu Alban Berg Andreas Homoki Franck Evin
Turandot Luciano Berio, G. Puccini Nikolaus Lehnhoff Duane Schuler
L’elisir d’amore Gaetano Donizetti Guy Joosten Davy Cunningham

De zaak Makropulos Leoš Janáček Ivo van Hove Jan Versweyveld
Madama Butterfly Giacomo Puccini Robert Wilson Robert Wilson
De neus Dmitri Sjostakovitsj David Pountney Davy Cunningham
La clemenza di Tito W.A. Mozart, M. Trojahn Pierre Audi Jan Versweyveld
Tea Tan Dun Pierre Audi Jean Kalman

4
Head of the lighting department of the Staatsoper Berlin
5
Set designer, worked together with director Willy Decker and Friedewald Degen, ‘Beleuchtungsmeister’ from
the Opera in Dresen
6 st
Set designer, did the lighting together with director Harry Kupfer and Jan Koremans (1 lighter Muziektheater
Amsterdam)
7 st
Set designer, worked together on the lighting with Jack de Feber, 1 lighter of the Muziektheater Amsterdam

7


Fidelio Ludwig van Beethoven Robert Carsen Peter van Praet
Macbeth Giuseppe Verdi Luc Bondy Dominique Bruguière
Die Zauberflöte Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Die Soldaten Bernd Alois Zimmermann Willy Decker Wolfgang Gussmann
8

Euryanthe Carl Maria von Weber David Pountney Wolfgang Göbbel
Le Balcon Peter Eötvös Stanislas Nordey Stéphanie Daniel

Les Troyens Hector Berlioz Pierre Audi Peter van Praet
La bohème Giacomo Puccini Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Samson Georg Friedrich Händel Gerrit Timmers Paul van Laak
Iolanta Pjotr Iljitsj Tsjaikovski Ivo van Hove Jan Versewyveld
Der Rosenkavalier Richard Strauss Brigitte Fassbaender, Willy Decker Hans Toelstede
Idomeneo Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Ursel and Karl-Ernst Herrmann Karl-Ernst Herrmann
9

Peter Grimes Benjamin Britten Francesca Zambello Jennifer Tipton
Die Walküre Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
Don Carlo Giuseppe Verdi Willy Decker Hans Toelstede
Rêves d’un Marco Polo Claude Vivier Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Raaff Robin de Raaff, Janine Brogt Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Writing to Vermeer Louis Andriessen Saskia Boddeke Michael Simon

Siegfried Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
Mefistofele Arrigo Boito Graham Vick Matthew Richardson
Rigoletto Giuseppe Verdi Monique Wagemakers Reinier Tweebeeke
Lucio Silla Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Jossi Wieler, Sergio Morabito David Finn
Tea Tan Dun Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Götterdämmerung Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
Norma Vincenzo Bellini Guy Joosten Davy Cunningham
Die tote Stadt Erich Wolfgang Korngold Willy Decker Wolfgang Göbbel
Das Rheingold Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
L’amour des trois oranges Sergej Prokofiev Laurent Pelly Joël Adam
Rage d’amours Rob Zuidam Guy Cassiers Peter Missotten

Das Rheingold Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
Die Walküre Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
Siegfried Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
10
Götterdämmerung Richard Wagner Pierre Audi Wolfgang Göbbel
Tamerlano Georg Friedrich Händel Pierre Audi Matthew Richardson
Alcina Georg Friedrich Händel Pierre Audi Peter van Praet
The Bassarids Hans Werner Henze Peter Stein Duane Schuler
Het Sluwe Vosje Leoš Janáček Richard Jones Matthew Richardson
Cavalleria rusticana | Pagliacci R. Leoncavallo, P. Mascagni Guy Joosten Davy Cunningham
Elektra Richard Strauss Willy Decker Hans Toelstede
Simon Boccanegra Giuseppe Verdi Peter Mussbach Alexander Koppelmann
After Life Michel van der Aa Michel van der Aa Mark Truebridge
Lady Macbeth from Mtsensk Dmitri Sjostakovitsj Martin Kušej Reinhard Traub

8
Set designer, worked together with director Willy Decker and Friedewald Degen, ‘Beleuchtungsmeister’ from
the Opera in Dresen
9
Karl-Ernst Herrmann is director and set designer.
10
Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, Siegfried & Götterdämmerung are the four parts of Der Ring des Nibelungen
and could be considered as one production.

8


Il barbiere di Siviglia Gioacchino Rossini Dario Fo Dario Fo

Capriccio Richard Strauss Andreas Homoki Franck Evin
Così fan tutte Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Jossi Wieler, Sergio Morabito David Finn
Don Giovanni Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Jossi Wieler, Sergio Morabito David Finn
11
Le nozze di Figaro Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Jossi Wieler, Sergio Morabito David Finn
Tannhäuser Richard Wagner Nikolaus Lehnhoff Duane Schuler
Madama Butterfly Giacomo Puccini Robert Wilson Robert Wilson
Hercules Georg Friedrich Händel Luc Bondy Dominique Bruguière
Die Gezeichneten Franz Schreker Martin Kušej Reinhard Traub
Wagner Dream Jonathan Harvey Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Doctor Atomic John Adams Peter Sellars James F. Ingalls

L’Orfeo Claudio Monteverdi Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
L’incoronazione di Poppea Claudio Monteverdi Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Il ritorno dÚlisse in patria Claudio Monteverdi Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Madrigalen Claudio Monteverdi Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Lucia di Lammermoor Gaetano Donizetti Monique Wagemakers Reinier Tweebeeke
Daphne Richard Strauss Peter Konwitschny Peter Konwitschny
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Castor et Pollux Jean-Philippe Rameau Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
Die Entführung aus dem Serail Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Johan Simons Marc Van Renesse
Giulio Cesare Georg Friedrich Händel Ursel and Karl-Ernst Herrmann Karl-Ernst Herrmann
13

Kátá Kabanová Leoš Janáček Willy Decker Hans Toelstede
Un ballo in maschera Giuseppe Verdi Claus Guth Olaf Winter
Tristan and Isolde Richard Wagner Alfred Kirchner Jean Kalman
Saint François dÁssise Olivier Messiaen Pierre Audi Jean Kalman
La Commedia Louis Andriessen Hal Hartley Scott Zielinski

The international diversity of this list was the origin of the motivation to perform
research on this subject. In the following graph the percentage of nationalities working in
the opera house in Amsterdam between 2000 and 2008 is presented.

Many of the listed productions are reproductions and have not been not analysed for the
graphics. Some of the lighting designers are actually set designers or heads of lighting
departments and where also not considered as lighting designers.

11
Così fan tutte, Don Giovanni & Le nozze di Figaro where produced as one cycle around librettist Da Ponte.
12
Together with Bernd Hagemeyer, ‘Beleuchtungsmeister’ from the Opera house in Essen, Germany.
13
Karl-Ernst Herrmann is director and set designer.

9


1.02. Graphic analyses

Composers (Language of the opera) Directors (country of origin)

Interesting but expectable result in this graph is the amount of German opera and
opera directors. In spite of the amount of Italian operas there has only been a very small
amount of Italian directors in Amsterdam while, as visible in the above table, Dutch
directors direct many of the Dutch operas and tend to work with Dutch lighting designers.
Pierre Audi14 directed approximately 30% of the production in these eight seasons, and
worked in approximately 57% of these productions together with Jean Kalman from
France, and in approximately 29% together with Wolfgang Goebbel from Germany.

The nationalities of lighting designer’s shows an interesting shifting, although one
can criticize these statistics by stating that not all lighting designers in the above list are
working as freelance lighting designer. Some work as lighting chief in opera houses
outside the Netherlands and come to Amsterdam to reproduce the design, originally made
by himself or herself or the director.

14
Pierre Audi is the artistic director of De Nederlandse Opera.

10


Lighting designers (country of origin)

Suddenly the United States of America is on the third place of the list. Here we can see
the effect of the globalisation of opera together with the economical and technical
development, the age of opera culture in the United States and their market of technology.
Most operas can be considered as European and their directors still live in Europe.
Lighting designers however, are further away from the opera itself and more often have
their origin in countries with rather western culture and modern technology. More about
the origin of the current lighting designer in Chapter 4.6. Origin of the current lighting
designer.

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1.1. The thesis

The thesis of this dissertation describes the direction of the research. However, it
is not suitable as a title for the paper. The question ‘What are you writing a dissertation
about?’ would be answered with the following answer: “A research into lighting designers
for opera and their working method and cultural background, in comparison with other
lighting designers within the opera genre as well as in other theatre genres.”

The thesis is defined in two core enquiries:

 What is the distinction between the working methods of a lighting designer
within certain performance genres?

 Who is the lighting designer for opera; what are his/her specialities,
(cultural) backgrounds, working methods and work circumstances?

Two additional sub questions are added in order to give a more specific direction
to the research:

 What effect does the cultural background of a lighting designer have on the
working method or the design as regards to the content?

 Is there a fundamental cultural distinction traceable in the work of e.g. a
German lighting designer compared to a French lighting designer?

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1.2. Framework of the research

The content of this paper is based on a two-method way of research. One source
of information for this research is existing literature, partially written on the subject. The
second source is four interviews with four lighting designers. The main purpose of the
interviews is to create a divers overview of practical experiences and profound methods
from contemporary working situations in lighting design for opera. Analyses of these
interviews will lead to an image from which conclusions on the core investigation
questions can be defined. The literature research will be used to connect the interviews to
older guidelines and predefined working methods, formulated by lighting designers in the
consulted literature. The method of assimilating the aggregated information is further
explained in chapter 1.2.5. The outcome of the research.

1.2.1. Consulted literature
Most of the literature consulted are handbooks and opera-/theatre magazines,
containing information about the core questions of the research. A striking observation
while performing the literary research is that most of the handbook and essays written on
the subject are outdated. Most literature is written in the late twentieth century, when the
profession of lighting designer had its enormous globalisation. More about this
globalisation in chapter 2.3. Globalisation of opera
A lot has changed in the opera lighting branch since the late sixties, the time from
which the first handbooks and literature originate. In the time of the research there was
hardly any modern literature available on the subject of this dissertation. The consulted
literature can nevertheless be considered as valuable, as most of the literary information
has particular equalities with the outcome of the interviews and the consulted magazines
and articles. A certain timelessness has been discovered in the main literary sources.

Clearly defined literary research

In the search for information a clear definability is used to decrease the literary
research area to a few specific items. The selected pieces from handbooks on lighting
design had to contain a specific classification in designing for multiple theatre genres, with
a particular view on designing for opera. Aiming to realize a collection of usable
information several keynotes where used while conducting the literary research.
To give an example a few of these keynotes will be mentioned:

 Lighting design
 Opera lighting design
 The opera stage
 Lighting techniques
 Design problems: lighting musicals, ballet and opera
 Lighting practice

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1.2.2. Interviews
The most significant research area of this dissertation is four interviews with
international lighting designers. This area is of a significant value for the research because
the opinions and stories of contemporary lighting designers are valuable in the
representativeness of the research. The collection of lighting designers was arranged by
taking into account the origin, experience and internationality of the lighting designer.
These interviews will serve as references for the other chapters in this dissertation. The
lighting designers interviewed are:

 Duane Schuler, United States of America
 John B. Read, Great Britain
 Reinier Tweebeeke, the Netherlands
 Jean Kalman, France

Biographies of these lighting designers can be found in Chapter 5. Analyses of the
interviews. The representativeness of the collection of lighting designers is explained in
1.2.4. Representativeness of the research. The interviews with these lighting designers
will be analysed in chapter 4. The atmosphere of the interviews will be described, as well
as the author’s impression of the characteristic way of thinking of the lighting designers
interviewed

1.2.3. Target group
Target group of this dissertation is lighting designers for opera, students in lighting
design and students in opera or theatre technology. Lighting designers for opera could
use this paper to get a view on the work of their colleagues and the conclusions of the
research it may bring. Students in lighting design, opera or theatre technology can find a
view on the lighting designer and lighting design for contemporary opera. When lighting
for opera, a lighting designer could encounter a difference between working in other
genres and particular difficulties in the work circumstances. This dissertation tries to focus
on these differences and to put them in the correct context, complemented with practical
experiences, opinions and meanings of lighting designers from the field of study. A certain
foreknowledge of opera and or theatre lighting is demanded. The author of this
dissertation has taken the view that the future reader of this dissertation has knowledge of
theatre, opera and lighting in order to put the content in the correct context. Nevertheless
a historical framework of opera and opera lighting will be given to put the interview
analyses into a broader historical perspective.

1.2.4. Representativeness of the research
The research will concentrate on published literature and the work and working
method of four international lighting designers. It will not be representative for lighting
design or lighting designers for opera globally and/or in general. Moreover, the four
interviewed lighting designers do not represent their country; conclusions based on the
interviews will not be representative for any country. Nevertheless a certain image of the
cultural background of the examined lighting designers will be outlined in order to highlight
a characteristic difference between nationalities, since during the research period and the
interviews a characteristic difference was actually traceable between the four lighting
designers and their method of working.

14


This dissertation will not contain much statistic information because it has another
purpose. The results of the investigation do have need of further more statistic research
which will be further elucidated in the Investigation recommendation
This dissertation will highlight the differences and distinctions found during the
research. In the conclusion of this dissertation the value of these differences and
distinctions will be debated and reflected on the outcome of the interviews. The purpose of
accentuating the differences and distinctions between opera lighting and other lighting
methods is to show the nuances in current working methods and designing for opera.

1.2.5. The outcome of the research
The gathered information from the research will be used in two parts of this
dissertation. Chapter 2, 3 and 4 of this dissertation create a framework of the history of
opera lighting design and contemporary working methods of opera designers and
distinctions found in the literary sources. In Chapter 5. Analyses of the interviews the
interviews will be analysed in order to reflect this mostly outdated literary information to
contemporary work experience and opinions. The main points of research are the
interviews. Therefore the information gained from the interviews will have more
significance in the composition of the conclusions.

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Chapter 2. Brief history of opera

In order to assist the reader of this dissertation putting the information in the next
chapters in the correct historical context, a brief history of opera and an explanation of the
globalisation of opera are given in this chapter. Opera is a theatre genre with its origin in
the European renaissance and baroque, but the main and currently most performed
operas were written in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. These days several new
operas have their opening night in opera houses all over the world, but the famous
eighteenth and nineteenth century operas are still in favour.

2.1. What is opera?

Opera is a form of theatre where the drama is conveyed through music and
singing. The word opera means “works” in Italian, from the plural form of the Latin word
Opus, which means work or labour. The words of an opera are known as the libretto,
which literally means “little book”. Some composers have written their own libretti; others
have worked in close collaboration with their librettists, e.g. MozartI with Lorenzo da
PonteII. Opera has much in common with spoken theatre such as scenery, costumes and
acting. Opera is generally distinguished from other dramatic forms by the importance of
the singing and vocal techniques. The libretto may be serious or comic, although neither
form necessarily excludes elements of the other. Opera differs from operetta in its musical
complexity and usually in its subject matter. It differs also from oratorio, which is
customarily based on a religious subject and is performed without scenery, costumes, or
stage action. Although both opera and operetta may have spoken dialogue, in opera the
dialogue usually has musical accompaniment, such as the harpsichord continuo in the
operas of Mozart and RossiniIII.

„Opera is an extended dramatic composition, in which all parts are sung to instrumental
accompaniment, that usually includes arias, choruses, and recitatives, and that sometimes includes
15
ballet.”
16
„Opera: Dramatic work in one or more acts that is set to music for singers an instrumentalists.”

As a production, opera is often called a collective artwork (‘Gesamtkunstwerk’), a
combination of theatre, dance and music. More about opera as a collective artwork can be
found in Chapter 3.1. The memoirs of Richard Wagner. Opera is not just a music genre,
beautifully phrased by the Britisch poet W.H. Auden:

"If music in general is an imitation of history, opera in particular is an imitation of human wilfulness; it
is rooted in the fact that we not only have feelings but insist upon having them at whatever cost to
ourselves… The quality common to all the great operatic roles, e.g., Don Giovanni, Norma, Lucia,
Tristan, Isolde, Brünnhilde, is that each of them is a passionate and wilful state of being. In real life
17
they would all be bores, even Don Giovanni."

15
Definition from online dictionary on http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/opera
16 th
Definition from Concise Oxford Dictionary – 11 ed, Oxford University Press, 2006
17
W.H. Auden, Notes on Music and Opera, The Dyer’s hand, Vintage Books, 1968, page 470-471

16


2.2. Origin of opera

In the late sixteenth century a group of wealthy people in the city of Florence, Italy,
invented opera by trying to reproduce ancient Greek dramas. Sixteenth-century Europe
was experiencing the Renaissance. The sixteenth century Italians began to experiment by
reading the plays aloud and adding a few musical chords as accompaniment. This
practice led to singing the so-called “recitativo” in Italian, or recitative in English. Over
time, the music grew more complex and musical professionals became interested in this
combination of music and drama.

The first opera was probably a recitative work titled Dafne written in 1594 or 1597
by Jacopo Peri18. The score of Peri‘s opera has never been found, it’s existing is
recovered from comments in ancient literature about the performances of Dafne.
The first documented opera is called L’Orfeo and is written by the Italian composer
Claudio MonteverdiIV. He expanded the existing form and added arias to the music that
allowed the singers to express the emotions of their character. In the same time one
started to adapt the venues to the opera genre. The first ‘opera house’, a theatre venue
specifically built to host opera, was built in Venice, the Teatro San Cassiano.19 It opened
in 1637.

Later, other composers added chorus parts, dances, instrumental interludes,
etcetera, and opera continued to grow and change. The opera popularity quickly spread to
Germany, France, England, Russia and many other countries in Europe. Other
composers, from Germany and Austria wrote opera’s in Italian, because opera was
considered as an Italian art form. Eventually they wrote opera’s in their own languages. By
the late nineteenth century, composers like Guiseppe VerdiV in Italy, and Richard Wagner
(see next chapter) in Germany, were writing operas of tremendous length, with music and
stories that demanded huge, expensive productions, mature singers with big voices, large
choruses, large orchestras and complicated scenery and costumes. European immigrants
brought opera to the United States of America in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Most of today's famous and popular operas were written in the eighteenth and nineteenth
century by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Le nozze di
Figaro, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte, La clemenza di Tito and Die Zauberflöte), Giacomo
PucciniVI (La Bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly and Turandot), Guiseppe Verdi
(Rigoletto, La Traviata, Simon Boccanegra, Il Trovatore, Don Carlo, Aida and Macbeth)
and Richard Wagner (Der fliegende Holländer, Tannhäuser, Lohengrin, Tristan und
Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Der Ring des Nibelungen (Das Rheingold, Die
Walküre, Siegfried, Götterdämmerung, and Parsifal).

18
Jacopo Peri (August 20, 1561 – August 12, 1633) was an Italian composer and singer of the transitional
period between the Renaissance and Baroque styles, and is often called the inventor of opera. He wrote the
first work to be called an opera today, Dafne (around 1597), and also the first opera to have survived to the
present day, Euridice (1600).
19
The Teatro San Cassiano or Teatro di San Cassiano in Venice was the first public opera house when it
opened in 1637. It was a wooden structure built with financial backing of the Venetian Tron family. It was
considered 'public' as an impresario, or general manager, for the paying public, directed it. […] Towards the
end of the seventeenth century Venice became the opera capital of the world as another ten opera houses
opened. The last performances in the Teatro San Cassiano were held in 1807 and it was demolished in 1812.

17


2.3. Globalisation of opera

The globalisation of opera is one of the most significant causes of the international
character of contemporary opera. In the last hundred years globalisation of the world has
had its effect on almost everything. States, economies and societies are increasingly
integrated; goods, capital, humans and cultural objects link everyone in a global system.
Due to this globalisation in the last century and the industrial revolution it is much cheaper
and easier to travel international these days. This information can be considered as
required foreknowledge to understand the remarkable internationalisation of opera.
The globalisation of opera is a logical tendency of the market taking some facts in
account. There is a small selection of operas performed in not more then a thousand
opera houses, festivals and venues all over the world20. The artists working in these
productions, and especially the singers, come from a small selection of the world’s best
conservatories and art schools. There is no language barrier in opera because of the
musical accompaniment. Operas, although originally composed for a national audience
(especially the famous early twentieth century ones), can be performed with subtitles in
every language, and the music makes it accessible for every nationality. Only a top
selection of singers sing the same operas all over the world.
Thirty years ago it was able to mount a production with e.g. only German singers in the
leading roles. That has become impossible to arrange, due to the globalisation of the
working field of the artists. It could even be impossible to mount a national production,
because artists with the required quality might not be available in the country itself,
because they are studying or working abroad. Moreover, managements find it cheaper to
borrow a piece or a singer from abroad than arranging something at home. For example, it
is cheaper and easier to hire a singer from a foreign country who knows the piece then to
pay a domestic singer to practice and study a piece. Although this may sound as if artistic
decisions are based on financial circumstances it often improves the quality of the
production. In a globalizing western society the status of famous opera singers travels far
ahead of them and when travel costs decrease it is easier to attract and contract the
international ‘stars’. Shortly after the singers, the directors started travelling in the
nineteen-seventieths and nineteen-eightieths. With them came designers,
choreographers, production teams, and etcetera. We can conclude that in contemporary
opera the artistic direction can always attract quality by selecting the best artist of the
world for a production. Opera is the only theatrical art form with such a global character.
Dance has become very international as well but theatre productions currently don’t travel
that much compared to dance and opera. This is because mainly because of the language
of the play.

Richard Fairman, contributor of the Britisch newspaper The Financial Times wrote
an article in 2003 called Opera: one size fits all wherein he asked the readers:

„Does it matter? Surely al this co-operation is simply a sign of the world getting smaller, of opera
companies making sensible decisions about sharing costs, of audiences willingly partaking of an art
form that transcends national boundaries? Is this not a worldwide common market that many would
like to see function as effectively when it comes to trade of other goods, such as food and
21
medicine?”

Some people say that contemporary performances are retreated to a neutral
middle ground. They argue that the composers of the great works wrote for specifically
national styles of singing and orchestral playing and their librettists generally expected
that the performers would be fluent in the language they were singing and that audiences

20
There are 980 Companies, Festivals and Venues worldwide according to the database of operabase.com
21
Opera: one size fits all, Richard Fairman, Financial Times, July 4, 2003

18


would understand it. However this is a very interesting discussion it won’t be part of this
dissertation.

To understand the rest of the chapters we can conclude that all national
boundaries disappeared in the global world of opera. There is a worldwide collaboration of
opera companies, opera houses, opera singers, directors, designers, and etcetera. More
information about the specific value of this internationality can be found in chapter 4.5.
The internationality of the work circumstances.

As an example of the global division of opera companies here is a map of opera
companies, festivals and venues all over the world in 2007:

Image I, Global opera activity,  www.operabase.com

As we can see, opera is very concentrated in the content where it was born, Europe. Here
is a map of the opera activity in Europe:

Image II, European opera activity,  www.operabase.com

19


Chapter 3. History of opera lighting design

In this chapter a framework will be created to understand the results from the
research on opera lighting design in the correct historical context. The actual history and
founding of lighting design goes back a hundred years to the time of Richard Wagner,
Adolphe Appia and Edward Gordon Craig22. It is a profession totally depending on the
development of artificial light and the invention of oil lamps, gas lamps and eventually
electrical light. Although one used fire torches in ancient Greek already and chandeliers in
the medieval theatres, lighting is one of the youngest theatre professions. Scenic design is
a much older profession. Since the old Greeks often performed in sunlight they invented
advanced scenery to improve and decorate the visual part of the performance, in the
renaissance further developed by Wagner, Appia and Craig among others. Lighting
design followed this development in the renaissance.

3.1. The memoirs of Richard Wagner

The history of opera lighting design goes back to the beginning of the eighteenth
century, when the ideas of Richard WagnerVII brought about a tremendous progress in the
opera development. Wagner was the founder of the Gesamtkunstwerk (collective
artwork), the collaboration of different art forms like music, architecture, poetry, dance and
theatre. He tried to reach ‘new poetical heights’ by bringing all disciplines together, and,
with that, accomplish the ‘ideal medium, the highest artistic inspiration’. He was the first
composer who added accurate notes on scene changes, effects, and light atmospheres in
the score. An example of this can be found in the lighting prescriptions added for the
Venusberg-Szene (Venus mountain scene) in the opera Tannhäuser.VIII, “Venus should lie
in a ‘soft red dusk’, the entire foreground had to be lit with a ‘clean reddish light,
penetrating from beneath, through which the emerald-green from the waterfall with a
foamy kind of white strongly enters; the far background with its sea-character is
illuminated with a glorified blue”.23

The possibility to shape the external appearance of illumination with light was
already discovered by Wagner in 1865. In a message about a music school in Munich,
Germany he said that the king, a “in this profession excellent experienced architect”
(Gottfried Semper24) was set to the task to design a theatre space in which from on the
one hand the ‘aesthetic unsightly and disturbing visibility of the orchestra’ could be
avoided and on the other hand, particularly through invention of lighting installations,
through which the scenography could be elevated to a real picturesque artistic
significance, the theatrical presentation itself could be ‘elevated to her absent art
competence’. With these words lighting design is still not an autonomous profession; it is
still a part of the scenography, but her significance for the scenographic activity is stated
very clear.
To avoid the “total distraction of the face of reality which surrounds the spectators
in the auditorium” Wagner introduced the darkening of the auditorium and hid the
orchestra partly under the stage. Owing of this the definition of sight substantially

22
Edward Gordon Craig (16 January 1872 – 29 July 1966), sometimes known as Gordon Craig, was a
English modernist theatre practitioner; he worked as an actor, producer, director and scenic designer, as well
as developing an influential body of theoretical writings.
23
„Licht im Theater“, Chapter 14 – Carl-Friedrich Baumann.
24
Gottfried Semper (November 29, 1803 – May 15, 1879) was a German architect, art critic, and professor of
architecture, who designed and built the Semper Oper in Dresden between 1838 and 1841. In 1849 he took
part in the May Uprising in Dresden and was put on the government's wanted list. Semper fled first to Zürich
and later to London. Later he returned to Germany after the 1862 amnesty granted to the revolutionaries.

20


changed. The artistic image is much better recognizable from a darkened space. This had
a humungous positive effect on the developmental progress of lighting design. The
progresses theoretically demanded by Wagner were far ahead of the possibilities in stage-
and lighting technique. He overestimated the conditions that had to be available for the
fulfilling of his performances. Moreover, the preparations weren’t so far that the already
available material could be stowed.

3.2. The answer of Adolphe Appia

Adolphe AppiaIX studied music in Switzerland and came into contact with the
musical dramas of Richard Wagner, and his theoretical writings. He was deeply
impressed but recognized that the usual mounting (including Wagner’s) of the operas did
not properly embody Wagner’s theories. After years of thought, he published The Staging
of Wagner’s Musical Dramas in 1895, Music and Stage Setting in 1899 and The Work of
Living Art in 1921. In these works, he set forth ideas about theatrical production that were
eventually accepted almost everywhere.
Appia concluded that stage presentation involves three conflicting visual elements:
the moving three-dimensional actor; the perpendicular scenery and the horizontal floor.
He recommended replacing the painted two-dimensional settings, according to Appia one
of the major causes of disunity, by three-dimensional units like steps, ramps, platforms,
etcetera. Herewith he enhanced the actor’s movement and provided a transition from the
horizontal floor to the upright scenery.

In 1910 Appia designed the first theatre of modern times to be built without a
proscenium arch and with a completely open stage, the Festspielhaus in Hellerau,
Germany. In the 1920 Appia staged Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde in Milan, Italy and two
pars of the Ring-cycle in Basel, Switzerland. His work was not received very positive as
his ideas were quite revolutionary.

Above all, however, Appia emphasised the role of light in fusing all of the visual elements
into a unified whole. Since to him light was the visual counterpart of music, which changes
from moment to moment in response to shifting moods, emotions, and action, Appia
wished to orchestrate and manipulate light as carefully as a musical score. Attempts to
implement this theory, which requires control over the distribution, brightness, and colour
of light, have led to much of modern stage-lighting practice. Appia also argued that artistic
unity requires that one person be in control of all of the elements of the production. Thus,
his ideas strengthened the role of the director.25
Considering this we might call Adolphe Appia the founder if the profession lighting
designer, although, in his age, it was a task of the director. As he was inspired by Wagner,
and theatrical plays missed the advancement that was taking place in opera, due to
Wagner, he mostly worked within opera. Therefore we might note the first historical
distinction in lighting for opera and lighting for theatre, as opera functioned as the main
inspiration for Appia to initiate a first ideas on lighting design.
Lighting for Appia was the visual counterpart of music, and in the quotation below
we can find the first terminology used on describing the connection between lighting and
music;

Music: Shifting moods, emotions and action in the musical piece.
Light: Changes in the distribution, brightness and colour of light in lighting.

Nevertheless it took over sixty years before Appia’s visionary ideas where used in the
Bayreuth stage actuality. He had a profound formulation on the role and importance of
lighting in the total stage production; “lighting does not create a factual activity on our
25
History of the Theatre, chapter 17, Oscar G Brocket, Page 413

21


contemporary stage; her only purpose is to make the scenery visible.” The directions of
light had to illuminate certain painted parts of the scenographic environment; “this task
has nothing in common with the acknowledged role of light, she even contradicts her.”
Every aim to make a factual activity with light in the scenic system leads to the
expectation of a transition in the scenery. According to Appia lighting arrangements are
only there to illuminate the stage and scenery.
On the other hand Appia also expresses lighting as a, apart from her unordered activity for
the enlightening of dark spaces, true and al-powerful representation force. The notion
‘representation force’ is explained in comparison with music:
„What music is in a score is lighting in the empire of representation: the expressionistic element in
opposition to the elements or signs of orientation and indication. Light can, just as music, only
26
express what is in the ‘inner being of apparition’.”

To conclude this chapter we can state a few interesting items in the history of
lighting design for opera. From the operas and memoirs of Wagner and the theoretical
ideas of Appia and Edward Gordon Craig, who came up with similar theories and worked
with Appia, we can trace a small equality as regards designing in the founding of lighting
design for theatre and opera. Although very little lighting devices were available in the
early twentieth century a particular direction in lighting design existed from the beginning.
Lighting has been a practical solution, but due to the work of Wagner, Appia and Craig it
became an art form. The technical development and invention of new lamps and
trustworthy electricity brought new possibilities to the stages of the early twentieth century
opera houses. From there lighting design developed to the current profession. Until the
nineteen seventies lighting mainly remained a task of the director or scenographer. In
chapter 4.6. Origin of the current lighting designer a further explanation will be given on
the developments in the last fifty years.

26
Adolphe Appia, quoted in Licht im Theater, Carl-Friedrich Baumann, Chapter 14

22


Chapter 4. Opera lighting design

In this chapter the particular properties of lighting design for opera will be
explained. In many lighting handbooks the differences in lighting design per genre are
explained by dividing the working methods and circumstances in different chapters. A
remarkable equality has been found in the result of the literary research. To compare the
opinions stated in the consulted literature and interviews many quotations will be used in
this chapter in order to clarify the results of the literary research.

„Opera is about music, theatre, singing, acting and dance, and as such lighting design for opera is
typically a combination of theatre, dance and musical theatre lighting techniques. Fortunately for the
lighting designer, and due to the need for good acoustics, most professional operas take place in well
designed theatre or concert halls.” […] “Opera lighting must light the singers for clarity, the dancers
and chorus for interest and the scenery for atmosphere. Operas may be simplistic and straight
forward, or highly complex and stylized. It is not unusual for ‘visions’ to appear from out of ‘nowhere’.
Nor is it unusual to have the ‘devil’ frequently appear or disappear throughout the course of the
27
production. The opera lighting designer must be ready for this and for much more.”

A few framework issues are of great significance; the economical conditions such
as the repertory or commercial system, the financial possibilities and the international
character. One of the many mentioned distinctions between opera lighting and theatre or
dance lighting is the specific collaborative character of the genre. As Bill Williams states,
opera is a combination of many theatrical disciplines and therefore a ‘Gesamtkunstwerk’,
or collective artwork. One could say that this continues to affect in the lighting. Is opera
lighting a combination of lighting for theatre, music, singing, and acting and dancing?
According to Bill Willams it is: “Lighting design for opera is typically a combination of
theatre, dance and musical theatre lighting techniques”. On the other hand there are a few
things which really distinct opera from dance and theatre. It starts with the venue where it
is performed. Opera generally needs large stages and is therefore almost always
performed in specially build opera houses. These opera houses program, next to opera,
almost only classic or modern ballet, more seldom dance or even less; theatre. Is this the
big difference?

4.1. Opera houses, a condition for another lighting method?

Opera houses have one important property that distinct them from theatres; their
scale. They have a much bigger physical acting area and therefore a consequent need for
more powerful instruments. The scenery is mostly much bigger, and often a production
has several sets that are placed on side stages for different scenes. The challenges
coming with this fact are a longer distance between audience and stage, higher bridges,
wider lighting angels, etc. There is a huge orchestra pit that has to be conquered and
there can be large groups of people on the stage. As such, opera may also be performed
in large concert halls, arenas and stadiums.
One could question why opera has this unique elite rank in the world of theatre
venues, by having the opportunity to have especially designed venues with multiple large
stages. In the history of opera this is easy to explain. Opera has simply grown to an elitist
form of musical theatre, with usually a high-class rich audience. In every opera country the
genre is very well financed by governmental, commercial or private funds. Tickets are
mostly expensive, and the look-and-feel of the theatre is usually quit luxurious. The
possibility to have a lot of financial goods at ones disposal has led to the enlargement of
sceneries, stages and thereby the opera houses. This enlargement created the
expectation of larger stages and nowadays opera just doesn’t really fit in the regular

27
Opera Lighting - Applied Design Methods, Bill Williams

23


venues anymore. Having opera demanding these large scales and therewith gaining a
certain monopoly profit on the market is a logical consequence.

A huge difference in lighting for opera is the economical condition of an opera
production; is the house stagione or in repertory? This will be elucidated in Chapter 4.4.
The economical aspect.

4.2. Lighting an opera, a play, or dance as regards content

In consulted literature on lighting design for opera recurring points are the role of
music in the designing process (see Chapter 4.3. The role of music in the designing
process), the position of the soloist on the stage, the presence of large groups of people
and large sceneries (the scale) and a certain style of great gestures. These facts outline
some main differences between opera and theatre or dance, of course always depending
on the production. These scale issues and great gestures are of course only possible with
the large financial conditions within opera and the liberal standard in which designers
create. A few things can be marked as significant for a typical opera design, like the
soloist and the music.
There have been standards in opera lighting; traditional opera lighting in the United States
around 1950 consisted of footlights, border lights and floodlights in the wings. There were
about four or five basic colour circuits (blue for the night scenes and pink or amber or
white for daylight). Joel E. Rubin, author of Theatrical Lighting Practice wrote in 1968 that
for modern opera lighting it was the problem of the lighting designer to ask himself several
questions:

1. What is the mood of the opera at any given moment? Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, for
example, is comic opera and the lighting needs heightened colour and brightness. Don Giovanni,
on the other hand, is a dramatic tragic-comic plot, which requires more sombre colours and less
intensity.
2. What naturalistic effects are required by the libretto (effects of nature and artificial light sources)?
How can they be utilized most dramatically?
3. How can soloists be pictorially illuminated and the chorus presented in the most effectively
modelled visual compositions? The centre of interest should be the only centre of visual
attention. Certainly a flat, evenly illuminated total stage area during an intimate duet is out of
place.

4.2.1. The soloist
One of the main differences between opera and theatre is the position of the
soloist. The soloist in opera is the singer, alone on the stage singing an aria, together with
an antagonist singing a duet, or guided by a choir. The singer alone on the stage singing
an aria usually needs good visibility to see the conductor. The position of this singer on
the stage is depending on the staging of the director but is mostly located downstage
centre, close to the orchestra to attract all attention to the singer, but most important, to
make it easier for the singer to hear the music of the orchestra. An often recurring style of
lighting design is to light this singer in a light colour and darken the rest of the stage. The
aria in opera is usually the most dramatic moment where, in the beauty of the music and
the singing all attention needs to go to the singer. “The aria, after all, is the soul of opera.”
(Richard Wagner). In theatre their can be monologues, but they can be anywhere on the
stage, and are not necessary the most dramatic moment in the piece. Dialogues in theatre
usually contain more energy, just as the arias in opera contain the most energy.
Remember, there are of course many exceptions.

24


It has not always been like this. In history, the attention in opera has been with the
music. The stage was equally lit with no special attention to the soloist, until the sixties,
when Franco ZeffirelliX and Luchino ViscontiXI placed a demand on the singers that they
should also act. (Lighting opera, page 126 – Stage Lighting – Richard Pilbrow) Even
conductors, like Georg Solti and Guilino began to show interest in staging and stage
lighting.

„Under the old regime the director, the set director and the chief electrician got together and in an all
too often haphazard manner decided how they would light the scenery and when necessary the
28
singers.”

4.3. The role of music in the designing process

In every single piece of literature consulted and in all four interviews the role of
music in opera is stated as the main difference between opera and theatre. The music in
opera motivates the lighting, determines the scene and is not used cinematically; it is the
primary source of sense experience. One could say (and generalise) that dance is based
on movement, theatre on text and opera on music. The cueing in these genres can be
taken back to this division; cues in dance are generally based on movement, on text in
theatre and on the music in opera.
Whether the music gives less or more freedom to the designer depends on the designer.
Some say the music points the designer in the way to a fulfilling design.

„Opera is very beautiful to work in, because it can have a greater gesture. In theatre you often have
to put something very subtle between the lines. You think of the design in another manner. The
29
music already filled in a few things.”

One could say that in theatre the design possibilities and scene or light changes often
occur between the lines. In opera the music continuously provides possibilities for scene
and/or light changes. The scene mood in opera depends on the mood, pace and rhythm
of the music. The music is a given fact that grows with the conductor. The conductor is
responsible for the pace of the music and therewith the pace of the direction and therefore
also the pace of the design. Many set designers and lighting designers need strong
communication with the conductor and director to get on the same artistic level about the
music. Opera is rather music in a theatrical form then the other way around.
The difference with for example musical and musical theatre is hard to explain. In
comparison with theatre one can of course rely on the origin of the piece. Does the piece
have a composer or an author? An opera always has a composer, just like most musicals
and musical theatre, in the last case nonetheless often in combination with a librettist.

„I don’t believe that in opera the text should follow the music, even not if that was originally the
intention. The music can have a total other mental space then the text. Moreover, it is possible that
the physical movements, the virtual space, the scenery and the gestures all have their own rhythm
and still make a whole, just in different mental spaces. It is just how you arrange those layers. ” […]
„It is just like a cheeseburger, you have the bread, the meat, the mayonnaise, unions, cheese and
mustard; together they make a sandwich. That are the different structures, different layers who
belong together, who complete each other or are in opposition sometimes. In opera it is the same.
De music can be fast while the singers move very slowly. That produces a certain tension. If it is
30
done well, you’ll hear the music better.”

This last quotation is interesting because it shows the substantial link between the visual
and audial within opera according to opera director and designer Robert Wilson. The

28
Lighting opera, In conversation with William Bundy – Design problems: lighting musicals, ballet and opera;
the repertoire – Stage Lighting – Richard Pilbrow – page 125
29
Mirjam Grote Gansey, set designer, quoted in Podium Produktie – Orfea ed Euridice
30
Robert Wilson, quoted in Odeon 46 – Moet de Puccini-fan vrezen voor Robert Wilson, August 2002

25


question remains whether the visual counterpart of the music in opera is there to support
the music by visualising it, or a real distinctive visual artwork that completes the collective
artwork. Robert Wilson also has an answer to that question:

How would you characterize the relationship between the songs and your own presentation?

I just picked settings that I thought were appropriate in some way for this music as a group of pictures
or tableaux but which didn’t necessarily illustrate the music. And everything had to be in scale to
31
Jessye . There were certain moods in the landscapes that helped in deciding what songs are not
meant to illustrate the background. The background is like a picture book that makes sense on its
own. In Great Day, the visual is as important as what we hear. I think it helps us hear and the singing
help us see. I think what I disliked about opera when I first went was that I couldn’t hear I was so
visually distracted. I heard best when I shut my eyes. It’s very difficult to see and hear at the same
time and mostly we do one or the other. What I try to do in all my work is make a balance between
32
what you hear and what you see, so that perhaps you can do both at the same time.

„The lighting is an outgrowth of the music you hear. Certainly the cueing, which is the establishing of
different looks for different moments within the opera, is all based on the music. In some music, you
can hear a light cue a mile away. You can hear it’s time to do a build or it’s time to fade to cool
because there is a key change. I always listen to the music. I listen to it over and over and just sort of
think about what it should look like, what it should feel like. Then the cues are all timed as well. When
you write light cues, it's not just a sudden shift of light from one cue to another. You can do very
XII
sudden shifts like in Nabucco when the crown falls off the head. That's a one-count cue. You can
also have a three-minute cue to do just a slight fade to show the time of day or the lights outside the
windows are just going down slowly or whatever. But all of that is definitely based on the music and
33
all those cues are actually put into a score.”

We can conclude that the lighting in opera is based on the music, just like the set and the
staging is based on the composed music. None of the different disciplines in opera stand
on themselves; the meaning of the collective artwork is that all forms of art work together
and produce one ‘work’. In case of opera a lyrical, musical artwork. The lighting in opera
does not stand on its own; it is of no meaning without the music, just like the set design
and the staging. Of course that is the same in theatre with the text or in dance with the
movement.
This strong connection between the music and the lighting is of great importance in the
designing process. When a lighting designer designs for theatre the first links are
available in the script. Just in the rehearsals, and eventually in the staging of the piece a
definitive design can be made, because the cues and moods in the design depend on the
style and mood of the direction and are therefore not traceable in the original script. It can
only grow in conversation with the director and or set designer and in the rehearsals and
staging period.
In dance, the design has to grow with the choreography and staging. As a lighting
designer in dance, you start with even less information, maybe a concept, or a piece of
music. The movement, which is the inspiration source, develops within the rehearsals and
mounting.
In opera there is one important thing available for one of humans strongest sense
perceptions; the music. The music gives a lot of information as regards mood; the style
and pace is to be brought by the director, set and light designer and the conductor.

E.g., a change in light can occur directly after the end of a musical scene, but also during
the scene, after or during a movement of the singer or actor. The lighting cue can be
sudden or take very long, during slow or fast music. It is not easy to give an example of
this, but when viewing opera is something one can focus on. A view on the use of music
of the interviewed lighting designers will be given in Chapter 5. Analyses of the interviews.

31
Jessye Norman, celebrated American soprano.
32
Robert Wilson: Current Projects. Interview with Laurence Shyrer, Theater, Summer/Fall 1983, page 84 - 91
33
Duane Schuler, lighting designer, Conversation Piece, Bruce Duffie, The Opera Journal, December 1998

26


4.4. The economical aspect

Perhaps the biggest difference between opera and theatre/dance is the
economical aspect. Because opera is such a large scaled art form it needs long
preparation. The international opera agenda is tight and strict. To prepare an opera with
the most qualified director, conductor, singers, designers, etc, for the production one
needs to think in years of preparation. Opera houses need to plan at least a few years in
advance to plan the human logistics. When it comes to preparing a new opera multiple
departments need to start working. It just takes a lot of time to go from the initial idea to
the opening night.
Since in this period of time the opera house is not reserved for the preparation of this
particular opera, it has a huge overlap with other opera and (mostly) ballet productions.
This is organised in the repertory 34 or the stagione35 system. Each country has a different
way of handling the repertory or stagione system, depending on the financial situation of
opera in that country and the countries ‘strictness’. Three determining factors will be
explained in this chapter: the planning in advance, the commerciality of opera and the
repertory or stagione system.

4.4.1. State support
It is important to understand the economical position of the opera in particular countries
because it determines the financial pressure on the repertory or stagione system and
therewith the working circumstances of the travelling lighting designer.

Germany

The repertory in Germany, the country with the highest opera activity in the world, is one
of the strictest forms of economical conditions in theatre. Most German cities have one
ore more large theatre venue and or opera house, so every citizen is offered access to a
nearby opera. Many theatre organisations in Germany are listed in the Deutscher
Bühnenverein, a German theatre and orchestra association. Opera houses belong to the
community and often have a programme of dance, drama and orchestral concerts
alongside opera. Public funding keeps the ticket price reasonable. These houses have a
fixed group of actors, designers, staff and technicians, mostly depending on the artistic
vision of the contracted intendant. Resident lighters, heads of lighting departments of the
opera houses often make the lighting designs together with the director and the set
designer. This differs from the situation in many other countries, e.g. the United States or
the United Kingdom, since they rather don’t contract international lighting designer,
because of their repertory system and because directors, set designers and lighters are
under limited or unlimited contract in the same building.
To be able to run the opera house financially different shows are produced at the same
time. This means a different production every evening, filling the complete season. This
puts an enormous pressure on the venue and on production time, since all designing time
depends on the free time between performances.
The Semperoper in Dresden is a good example of the repertory system: in season
2005/2006 they gave 178 performances of 43 operas, 70 ballet performances, 44

34
More about the repertory system in chapter 4.4.3. Repertory.
35
Stagione (Italian for 'season') is an organisational system for presenting opera, often used by large
companies. Typically each production is cast separately and has a brief but intensive run of performances. By
contrast, companies that use a repertory system maintain a permanent company and rotate productions over
many months or even years.

27


symphony concerts, chamber music, theatre and children project. A total of 300 events,
more then 90% of the theatre capacity. Since public funding decreased Semperoper is
sponsored by a local beer brand.

United States of America

To understand the working situation in American opera houses nowadays a short
summary of the history of opera in America and the current union system will be given.
Opera in the United States is relatively young. With the first British colonies in the
eighteenth century came some British opera, but the Italian American García family
performed the first public opera in 1825 in New York. In 1935 America launched ‘The New
Deal’, a funding project for the arts, where artists were entitled to employment as artists
and where the arts were the legitimate concern of the federal government. Opera,
however, was limited by the fear that it would be too expensive. Many of the operas were
performed in concert form and the venues where these concert operas were performed
were mostly not adequate for opera performances. The New Deal was also responsible
for civic buildings, so they replaced old opera houses into Public Works Administration
Auditoriums. These civic auditoriums later became the focal point of the proliferation of
civic opera associations in the 1960s. In the 1930s and 1940s America contracted many
singers, conductors and directors from Europe, since there just were not enough available
in the nation itself. The New Deal was partly there to give the arts a more American
character.
Then the Second World War changed everything. Some artists went back to Europe, but
even more artists came from Germany and Italy to the relatively safe United States. This
created some stability in the opera development in the roaring years of the war. Just in the
1950’s opera was in the greatest period of growth. America was short after the Second
World War and the appreciation for music grew wildly, also because of new technology
like the long-playing record and the compact disc. The New York City Opera tried to
compete with the popular Metropolitan opera by producing operas by American
composers and forgotten European operas. They reorganised their finances and while the
city and state governments waived their annual rent they turned to public fundraising.
Between 1962 and 1987 the number of companies with budgets exceeding 100.000
dollars grew from 27 to 154; attendance at operas given by these companies rose from
4,5 million to 13 million; opera performances increased from 4,000 to 13,000 per year. In
1949 New York built the Lincoln Centre for the Performing Arts, a building where the
Metropolitan Opera House, the Philharmonic Hall, the Vivian Beaumont Theatre and the
Juilliard School of Music would house. The total building price of $ 184 million was gained
from city, state and federal governments ($40 million), the Ford Foundation ($25 million),
the Rockefeller Foundation and John D. Rockefeller ($25 million). The rest came from
individuals and corporations. 36
Economically opera was a disaster. America’s economic growth was based on
increasing productivity, and with the coming of television live opera became stagnant. To
produce an opera for television took less then twice the man-hours of live performance,
but it reached an audience of perhaps twenty million. With the production costs rising
opera had a huge financial problem. Opera is very labour-intensive, and this labour was
the crux of the matter. The labour was badly paid and musicians, choristers and
stagehands became members of unions like the American Federation of Labour to force
higher payments. Artists were considered as workers and were treated the same way. To
assure good income artists almost needed to become a union member. Until today this
system is intact and has grown larger. Today the unions control every labour in the
performing arts, including stagehands, technicians and electricians. The unions therewith
also are in charge of working times, salaries, safety, and etcetera. It is the unions that

36
Opera in America – A cultural history, John Dizikes, Yale University, Yale 1993

28


control the working circumstances of the regular employees of a modern opera house in
America.
Today many theatres in the United States are in repertory, like in the United Kingdom and
Germany, and competing with commercial theatre. Repertory theatre with mostly
changing casts and longer running productions are perhaps better classed as "provincial"
or "non-profit" theatre.

Italy

The state support of opera in Italy is not what one could expect in the country
where opera was bourn and where every city has a large opera house, and where streets
and squares are named after famous opera artists. Around 1995 Italy appropriated €300
million of public money for opera, 0,01% of the total state budget.

“With regard to finances, Milan’s Teatro alla Scala – one of the worlds greatest opera houses –
received during a recent fiscal year, for example, approximately €43 million from the state, to which
were added contributions of €4 million from the regional government, €190,090 from donors and
private sources and €9,8 million from ticket sales. With interest, bequests, and money from record,
37
radio, and television rights, Teatro alla Scala’s total budget amounted to €70,6 million.

It was not till after the Second World War that the present organizational structure in Italy
was established. Law 800, passed on 14 August 1967, governs state support of opera. In
the boards of the state supported opera houses are civic politicians seated to remain good
connections between opera houses and the local government. The musical director is not
included on the governing board. Riccardo Muti, music director at La Scala, Milan
between 1986 and 2005, was not really enthusiastic about this system:

“I believe the Italian system is defective in every field. The surgeon is not admitted to the governing
board of the hospital, just as the conductor is not admitted to that of a theatre. The laws exclude the
expert from the control room! It is a serious mistake, because you should hear the opinion of the
person who is to carry out the operation, be it clinical or musical. Under the present system, results
38
are achieved by miracle rather than by normal or rational program.”

There are two types of opera houses in Italy, the ente lirici and the teatro di tradizione.
The ente lirici are self-governing but with financial government support. A national
commission and their own local government govern the teatro di tradizione, or traditional
theatre. With some exceptions, Italian houses follow the stagione system (stagione
literally means ‘season’) rather then the repertory system. In the stagione system, only
one opera is mounted at a time. This production may be repeated three or four to a dozen
times before it closes. There are usually no changes in the cast. The length of the season
and the amount of productions depends of the amount of government money. The ente
lirici offer between six and ten operas a season, and the teatro di tradizione one or two to
five or six. Originally each theatre, particularly the ente lirici produced their own opera’s,
but because the productions costs are increasing and the state support is decreasing they
have started to share productions with other Italian theatres and foreign theatres. In Italy
before the Second World War all operas were translated to Italian, but with the sharing of
productions they are performed in their language of origin.

The Netherlands

In the Netherlands opera is very young, even younger then opera in the United
States of America. Since the seventeenth century travelling opera productions have
visited the Netherlands, but just in 1986 the first national opera house was build in

37
Opera in Italy today, Nick Rossi, chapter 1, - ANELS 1989, tables 1 through 8
38
Jamieson, 1990

29

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