Opera Wars Inside the World of Opera and the Battles for Its Future

ByCaitlin Vincent

Blunt, irreverent, and at times wittily subversive,Opera Warsspotlights operas colorful and sometimes warring personalities, increasingly fierce controversies over content, and the battles being waged for its economic future.

Drawing on interviews with dozens of opera insidersas well as her own experience as an award-winning librettist, trained vocalist, opera company director, and arts commentatorCaitlin Vincent deftly unravels clichs and presumptions, exposing such debates as how much fidelity is owed to long-dead opera composers whose plots often stir racial and gender sensitivities, whether theres any cure for typecasting that leaves talented performers out of work and other performers chained to the same roles, and what explains the bizarre kowtowing of opera companies to the demands of traditionalist patrons.

Vincent never shrinks from depicting the industrys top-to-bottom messiness and its stubborn resistance to change. Yet, like a lover who cant quite break away, she always comes back to her veneration for the artform and in these pages stirringly evokes those moments on stage that can be counted on to make ardent fans of the most skeptical.