Reflection 8

I was really looking forward to the Salome show, as I had never been to an opera before. It made me even more excited to learn that it was in German, as I am learning the language and am very interested in it. Getting there was a different story though. First of all, I had forgotten my glasses and could not see the supertitles very well. So, from that point on, I just had to go by what little German I know, and it did not go well overall. I understood "Give me the head of Johannen" pretty well though. But that wasn't really the important part to me. What I found interesting was how such a raw and grotesque scene as Salome holding the head of Johannen was surrounded by an audience of mostly older upper class men and women, which isn't exactly the kind of audience you would expect to find watching a show like that. But even so, it is the Opera; I feel as if the very fact that they are going to the opera would entice them to go, because it has always been an upper class activity. It really shows you that a good portion of society functions upon the stereotypes with which it identify's itself with.

At any rate, I wouldn't go back. There was just a general pretentiousness to the atmosphere that didn't really sit well with me; it just made me feel uncomfortable, or like I didn't belong. And in all honesty, I didn't find the acting all that good. I found the scenes, especially the final one with Salome gripping the head of Johannen, to be unnecessarily long and drawn out. The music and singing were pretty good, I will give them that. But in all honesty I would rather go see Wicked on broadway, and I honestly feel like it would have been more entertaining generally.