Bachtrack: Free Opera & Concert Streaming

Bachtrack are curating a list of performances that can be streamed online from opera houses and concert halls. So check out what Bachtrack has to offer by clicking the link below. During the coronavirus lockdown period you can get free access to many operas from OperaVision via Backtrack.  Concert performances come from 29 partners and 17 countries. 

Click here to access

The Met Opera - Nightly Opera Stream.

The Met Opera, New York. 

Met launches "Nightly Met Opera Streams", a free series of encore Live in HD presentations streamed on the company website during the coronavirus closure. Tuesday the 21st you can see Elektra. Nina Stemme takes on the title role, headlining a gripping production by legendary late director Patrice Chéreau. Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts a powerful cast that also features Adrianne Pieczonka, Waltraud Meier, and Eric Owens.

Click here to access 

Delicious Concerts, Performances, Documentaries and more, from Medici TV

http://www.medici.tv/

We're delighted to say that we now have Medici TV for all of our staff and students, who can

access it at the RCS and at home (click here for instructions)

Medici is a streaming service that covers concerts and archived historical concerts, operas, ballets, documentaries, artist portraits, educational programs and master classes. There is so much to get your teeth into!
 
The events that are broadcast live are from venues such as Carnegie Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall, Concertgebouw, Teatro alla Scala, Berliner Philharmonie, Salle Pleyel, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Verbier Festival and Salzburger Festspiele.

It is the largest on-demand library of classical music, which features over 1,800 programs (3,000 original works), including:-

• concerts and archived historical concerts
• operas
• ballets
• documentaries, artist portraits and educational programs
• master classes

Whitaker Library Trial of Medici TV

We currently have a trial of Medici TV for all of our staff and students.

Medici is a streaming service that covers concerts and archived historical concerts, operas, ballets, documentaries, artist portraits, educational programs and master classes. There is so much to get your teeth into!

The events that are broadcast live are from venues such as Carnegie Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall, Concertgebouw, Teatro alla Scala, Berliner Philharmonie, Salle Pleyel, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Verbier Festival and Salzburger Festspiele.

You can access this resource at the RCS as well as at home and it is available on all digital devices including tablets and smartphones (iOS and Android).

The trial ends on the 6^th of February so please make the most of it and let the Whittaker Library know what you think!

Women in Music: Martinez conducts Ethel Smyth's Opera

We have a new CD in stock - Ethel Smyth's, The Boatswain's Mate.  

The first complete recording is released by Retrospect Opera, and Cuban conductor Odaline de la Martinez conducts the Lontano Ensemble.  

Smyth lived from 1858-1944.  The opera is a comedy in one act and two parts.  As well as a modern recording, there are also excerpts recorded in 1916, and additionally, the overture to The Wreckers, recorded in 1930 and conducted by Ethel Smyth herself.

Don't underestimate the power of those early 20th century ladies! 


*Boatswain is pronounced, and sometimes spelled, Bosun. We made sure you could find it either way in the Whittaker Library Catalogue. Here.

RCS Researcher Rachel Drury at the Two Moors Festival

Opera for Babies?  Why, Yes!

 RCS researcher Rachel Drury has been interviewed for the official Two Moors Festival Blog.  We spotted the blogposting and thought we'd share it with you here!

An Interval with Rachel Drury of BabyO

Rachel's doctoral research was on Kodaly music education, and she has also played saxophone in 'The Farmer's Cheese', a musical work for use with hearing impaired children.  See both her thesis and the music score here in the Whittaker Library (book details).

Think you Know all about Opera and Celebrity?

Then here's a conference you might be interested in!

OBERTO (Oxford Brookes: Exploring Research Trends in Opera) announces:-

OBERTO CONFERENCE 2015: Opera and Celebrity

Oxford Brookes University

Tuesday 8 September 2015

FULL DETAILS HERE

Need Help with Opera Libretto Pronunciation?

Royal Conservatoire of Scotland singers make heavy use of IPA Source - it's the International Phonetic Alphabet website for opera pronunciation, available within the Conservatoire. 

It's great for arias, telling you how to pronounce libretti in different languages.  Not
as comprehensive for recitatives, mind you, but the IPA Source team explain that there are other sources for this information:-
 

"One of the main reasons we decided not to offer this material is that it is already available in book form. Here is what I recommend on the our site:

 "http://www.ipasource.com/opera-libretti "

The Leyerle series are cited - we have those - and two more useful websites are listed:-

	Baroque Libretti   A few early libretti
	Libretti d'opera italiani  Dozens of Italian libretti (no translations)

Ways to Do Opera and Write Plays? Guardian Culture Professionals Address the Issues

The Guardian Culture Professionals Network is a great blog to follow - there's always good material there.  This week:-

• "There is no Traditional Way of Doing Opera", says English Touring Opera's chief. 
• And for the theatrically-minded, "Playwrights in Search of Characters"

These are just two of the subjects raised - there's also tech talk about 3D printers, virtual reality in film, and more.  Take a look!

Discover live theatre online? Digital Theatre Plus.

For staff and students!

Experience the thrill of live performance brought directly to your teaching space

• Watch high quality films of leading theatre productions
• Discover how plays are brought to the stage in interviews with the creative teams
• Learn about interpretive choice through detailed analysis of play texts
• Teach key plays with stimulating and relevant support 

https://www.digitaltheatreplus.com/

Watch Opera Online with Digital Theatre Plus

Digital Theatre Plus is a resource that the Whittaker Library subscribes to for the benefit of Royal Conservatoire of Scotland staff and students. Find Digital Theatre Plus on the Whittaker Library website, or via our Mahara pages.

Musicians, don't be fooled by the name - there's opera there, too! These were added in August 2014:-

Three new releases from the Royal Opera House
Three more titles have been added to the Royal Opera House Collection:

Hansel and Gretel
Eugene Onegin
Dido and Aeneas

New Opera Titles Added to Digital Theatre Plus

Three more titles have been added to the Royal Opera House Collection:
Hansel and Gretel
Eugene Onegin
Dido and Aeneas

Staff and students of the RCS should ask at the library for username and password to log into Digital Theatre Plus

Singers! Instantly track down that Aria - The Aria Database

The Aria Database

Singers will feel right at home here!  Who wrote that aria? What opera is it in? Who wrote the libretto?  Are there recordings?  The Aria Database is a free resource to help you.

Staff and students at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland will probably be very familiar with IPA Source, which gives you transliterations, phonetic pronunciations and so on.  It's fabulous, but our subscription is only available on campus.  Therefore, The Aria Database might be a useful fallback for those away-days when you need aria information in a hurry.

Save IPA Source (International Phonetic Alphabet) and The Aria Database to your favourites, and you've got arias just about covered!

 

Digital Theatre Plus Goes All Operatic

The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland's Whittaker Library subscribes to this excellent resource for the benefit of our registered students and staff. 

We learn that today, Digital Theatre Plus is launching a selection of content from the Royal Opera House.  So, musicians, don't forget - Digital Theatre Plus is for you too!

New to Digital Theatre Plus:
ROYAL OPERA HOUSE

This Thursday Digital Theatre Plus
launches its first selection of content from this iconic production house.  

Find Digital Theatre Plus on the Whittaker Library website, or via our Mahara pages.

Are you a Student at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland? Read this!

Even if you're technically 'on holiday', you can still access the vast majority of our e-resources via the Whittaker Library website or Mahara pages.

And we have a surprise for you - a much improved offering of streamed music and video via Alexander Street Press Music Online, now the Premium edition.  Find the whole lot here:-  http://muco.alexanderstreet.com

But this isn't just classical music - oh, no!  There's world music, jazz, ballet videos ...

Take a look at these additional resources, which you now have access to:-
 

• African American Music Reference  
• American Song 
• Dance in Video: Volume I 
• The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music
• Jazz Music Library
•  Opera in Video

The German Fach System - Different Voice Types

Has your singing teacher referred to the Fach System?  You didn't like to admit it was unfamiliar?  It's the German way of categorising voice types.

Panic not!  We have a book about it in the Whittaker Library:-

What the Fach?! The definitive guide for opera singers auditioning and working in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, by Philip Shepard.  Catalogue details here.

You can also read a page about it on our IPA Source database - the database which gives the IPA pronunciations of opera and song texts.  The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland has a subscription, which our staff and students can access online, on campus.  Check it out here:- 

http://www.ipasource.com/

Here's the page about the German Fach system.  (You'll need to be on site to access it.)

Or an Opera Conference at home? Oxford Brookes ...

Whittaker was asked to tell you about Oberto, Oxford Brookes University's opera research unit.

There's a conference in September that might interest opera researchers ... in Oxford, UK.

OBERTO

Oxford Brookes: Exploring Research Trends in Opera

Mise en Scene - a new series. First, Madame Butterfly

Mise en Scene is a new series about opera production and direction.  Read more on Bibliolore's latest blogpost.

Series website

Whittaker thinks our Opera School might be interested in this.  Let us know what you think!

Wexford Festival Opera 2012: William Vincent Wallace and Mozart

Wexford Festival

The Magic Flute

William Vincent Wallace bicentenary recital
Here's a review of William Vincent Wallace songs, performed by pianist Una Hunt and mezzo-soprano Rachel Kelly; and a performance of Mozart's Magic Flute.

William Vincent Wallace was born in Wexford - hence the connection with the Festival.  Singers may appreciate an understanding of his context, since his songs do occasionally feature in singers' recital repertoire.  Click here.

Opera for the hearing - hard of hearing - and deaf

A Quiet Life

Whittaker has just seen a tweet about this project, which involves making an opera for people who can’t hear – and people who can:- 

"Annie is an astronomer. She knows all about time and space, but she isn’t so sure about life and death. And she’s just gone deaf. 'A Quiet Life' is a new, multi-sensory opera based on the life of Annie Jump Cannon, exploring ways of hearing and the relationship between the Universe and ourselves. An opera for people who can hear and people who can’t." 

For further details, please visit the website - here.