30 Amazing Facts About Opera

16-20 Opera Facts

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16. Richard Versalle, an opera singer, died on stage at the Metropolitan Opera right after singing the line “Too bad you can live only so long.” – Source

17. Michael Maniaci is an opera singer whose larynx never matured for an unknown reason, and as a result, he can reach soprano register without using falsetto like most countertenors. He has been compared to a modern-day castrato. – Source

18. The former CEO of Sony only took a Sony job because their low-quality tape recorders were screwing over his opera career. – Source

19. A couple of men created the ‘Most Unwanted Song’ in 1997, incorporating opera singer rapping, bagpipes, cowboy music and a children’s choir urging listeners to shop at Walmart. – Source

20. The President of Turkmenistan banned opera, algebra, physics, P.E., the Internet, the Hippocratic Oath, libraries, free press, recorded music, smoking, beards, chewing tobacco, ballet, the circus, symphonic orchestras. – Source

21-25 Opera Facts

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21. The author of A Clockwork Orange composed his first symphony at 18, translated Eliot’s the Wasteland into Persian, translated Bizet’s Carmen for the English Opera and wrote school textbooks still used today. – Source

22. Weezer made a space rock opera in 1995 but discarded the concept and transformed it into Pinkerton. Only 3 copies of the finished album are known to exist. – Source

23. In 1991 opera singer Placido Domingo received 80 minutes of applause after his performance of Othello in Vienna. – Source

24. Richard Wagner’s “The Ring of the Nibelung” or “Ring Cycle” is an opera that takes about 15 hours to perform and was written over a period of 26 years. – Source

25. Dr. Drew was torn between medicine and being a professional opera singer. – Source

26-30 Opera Facts

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26. Opera composer Gioachino Rossini was forced to write an entire song with just one note (B flat) after he discovered that the woman who needed to perform it was a terrible singer. – Source

27. In the 18th century Italy, 4000 boys were castrated to preserve their pre-pubescent voice ranges for opera singing. Some boys voluntarily requested this. – Source

28. A French man fell in love with someone he *thought* was a female Chinese opera singer, and had a decades-long affair that resulted in a child only to discover that the whole time the singer had actually been (a) male and (b) a spy. – Source

29. When tenor singer Pasquale Brignoli wrote his first opera at 15, he was so disgusted at how the finest aria was being sung, he ran onto the stage and sung it himself. – Source

30. Habitual singing causes the lungs to release leptin, a protein manufactured by the body’s fat cells that is involved in the regulation of appetite. This may partially explain why opera stars tend to lean toward the heavy end of the scale. – Source