Operetta "P.S. Who Are You?" (UPDATED!)

I've brought this thread from the archives to add a new bit I've just finished and expose the other ones I had already uploaded more than a year ago.

The audio files

EDIT: Why are the excerpts posted in the reverse order when I put them in the right one?... o.O

FIRST EXCERPT:

I'll start with this silly little virtuoso tune for soprano. The aria "Look but Don't Touch".

Basically, this character, the baroness, is at a ball (which started with the Masquerade and Fireworks), jolly drunk, and starts teasing all the men. But she's still reserved enough to keep them at distance, claiming to be searching for a man that pleases her.

I tried to give it a silly/drunk look while still retaining simplicity (after all, the tenor falls in love with her, hence the Love Scene)

I don't have the full score available because it's HORRIBLY DIRTY since I had to transpose from A to Ab (to use an infamous high Eb, MUAHAHAHAHAH!).

I do, however (for the sake of context and general interest), have the soprano line with the libretto for those of you kind enough to follow the piece with it (piano = soprano).

SECOND EXCERPT:

"Here is a letter"

Anyway, here's a shorter excerpt. An arietta in which Basil (the main tenor) is writing the baroness a letter explaining how she will proceed to answer him secretly, and at the end going into how much he misses the bliss of the previous night (a.k.a. my Love Scene).

There's a score for the vocal line (piano sound = tenor).

THIRD EXCERPT:

"Never seen a woman who was fairer"

This is a duet between Basil and Father Prudence. Prudence is a drunkard priest who will assist Basil in passing his letters to the baroness. The problem is that both the baroness and Basil's neighbor whom he hates have the same name, and since at the ball they were acquainted only by first name, confusion will ensue later on.

Basil is trying to explain vaguely what the baroness looks like, from what he can remember from the agitated night.

I might lower this half a tone to make it easy on the tenor because of all the unnecessary high As.

As usual, the score has only the vocal lines and the piano is the sound of the tenor and bass's voices.

UPDATED!

New excerpt: Arietta "Secret Admirer"

Just a little snippet from the 5th scene, where Sarah gets a letter from Basil that was supposed to have been delivered to the baroness.

that was fantastic!

The music is definitely very nice. It has a light sound that works well with voices, for the most part. The text setting isn't awkward, which is actually rare to find. There might have been a little to points where the music stopped entirely while a character said something, and then resumed - it got a little repetitive and lost it's conversational-ness after time. Particularly the first one, which actually got kind of awkward when you just continually force whatever lyric into that motive. It's ok to change so the text fits better.

Also, the thing about the gargoyles mouth is a little over-emphasized, "don't forgot the gargoyle's mouth". The only way I feel this is justified, is if there is actually some significance to gargoyle's mouth beyond being the spot where they exchange letters. And if it is just that, why a gargoyle's mouth? Seems a little arbitrary to me.

I think my main problem is the openly misogynist characterization of the baroness (mainly in "look but don't touch"). I suppose that it's common in operas, written for the most part over a hundred years ago - before most of feminism as we know it, are commonly pretty sexist. But it's 2010, and I don't think this kind of portrayal of women is okay any more (if it ever was...).

Despite that, I really liked the music to "look but don't touch", particularly the melody and harmony on "...we can go up the stairs/don't really mind if someone cares". Some how, that kind of progression is really appealing for me. And generally I found the music very nice, definitely antiquated, but that's obviously what you want.

Hehe. The gargoyle's mouth is rather important, yes, and the stops only happen twice in the duet, they're on purpose.

About the baroness, sexism is a word people invented so they wouldn't have to put up with being offended.

It's an operetta bordering the 19th century style. It's a stereotypical character. I will obviously make her a drunk hoe if I want her to be a drunk hoe. I would be "sexist" if I said all women were drunk hoes. I don't.

I am in fact all in favor of eradicating political correctness, since it inspires precisely the opposite kind of attitude. It's annoying, it's hypocritical, and it's even more far-fetched to try and apply it to a stereotypical comedy based on the 19th century.

Just so you know, I'm not reacting angrily at you :P, since I don't care about the way I portray whatever it is I portray, exclude whatever it is I exclude, include whatever it is I include, etc. I just do. This was just a rant about what I think is probably the stupidest and most hypocritical thing mankind has ever invented to attempt "retroactive peacemaking," if you know what I mean.

Other than that, thanks for the comments. :) I also really like the progression I found for that bit you said you liked in the aria. It was what made me do it in the first place.

Ok, that's okay. You can have absolutely no analysis of gender relations if you want. "During the 2004-05 concert season, works by women accounted for only one percent of all pieces performed by the 300 or so member orchestras who responded to the repertory survey of the American Symphony Orchestra League (now the League of American Orchestras, or LAO). The following year, with a boost from Joan Tower's widely-performed Made in America, the number rose to two percent." Obviously mainstream classical music values do wonderful things for women.

Source: http://www.newmusicbox.org/article.nmbx?id=5576

The last thing my music is supposed to do is influencing a third party in any serious "political" way. If people take a representation like this one seriously it is obviously their problem. They can't separate fiction from reality. They should go to a shrink.

The baroness isn't the only case, I find it funny that you went directly towards that one.

Father Prudence is a fat alcoholic priest who will have a monologue with Christ on the cross about how he should go buy a coat because the church is freezing.

Basil is an overly-naive romantic poet with little to no money who survives with connections to rich aristocrats.

Sarah is Basil's neighbor, who reprimands him for hours on end every time he gets to the condominium and makes noise, or for any other reason as long as she can nag him.

Mrs. Gray is the landlady. Alternating between sitting on her donkey all day and cleaning the buidling (since she's too stingy or poor to pay for a maid), and yelling for silence every time Basil and Sarah have an argument.

The baron is a rich aristocrat who wants to go to the ball alone to have fun with other women while his wife is at home (or so he thinks).

Stefan is the baron's assistant. Very young, short, inconsequential, almost always quiet. The typical "tangential" character.

See? They're all stereotypes. xD

For a stage comedy focused on situations instead of character development, how else would you expect it to be done?

New excerpt!

Just a little snippet from the 5th scene, where Sarah gets a letter from Basil that was supposed to have been delivered to the baroness.

I didn't make the tremolo part followed by the unaccompanied line to annoy you, last life, but I thought of you and laughed a bit. :P

You're right about the politics thing, it really isn't that big of a deal. Also it's hard to comment on something like that without knowing the whole story, so I was premature--and would be if I commented before it's finished.

As for all the stopping to talk: it's your opera, you can put a stop in every song if you want.

Scores would be really helpful, even if they're a bit messy, as long as their readable it would be nice to see them, and I don't think it would be that hard to make them readable.

The new excerpt sounds nice :).

Yes, I know about the scores. I'll try when I can.

About the stopping to talk, I didn't mean that. I meant what she said. :P

She's basically saying she doesn't care if she's married to a rich guy or if she's raped by a weirdo, as long as she has a man. xD

Well I gave up on the political issue, because it's impossible to convince people to change those views.

I liked it.

I liked it.