This means that the action should move the audience to pity and fear, to purge them of these emotions. According to Aristotle, the purpose of tragedy is to bring about catharsis in the spectators. The earliest antecedent of opera is the Greek tragedy. Robert Greenberg, in: How To Listen and Understand Great Opera. “(…) a drama which combines soliloquy, dialogue, scenery and action and continuous or nearly continuous music-the whole always greater than the parts.”
In his class, How to Listen to and Understand Great Opera, Professor Robert Greenberg defines opera as: The world stops breathing for a brief moment before music fills the whole room. The conductor steps onto his platform to an ovation, raises the baton. You are dressed in your finest, sitting in your theater seat and the stage lights come on. Pierre Auguste Renoir, La Logue, 1874, Courtauld Gallery, London, England, UK. However, when we consider that opera has been continuously performed since the 1600s, we have to stop and ask, what makes opera so successful? What is it about opera that still moves audiences and performers, even today? Opera simply means “work” and it can sometimes seem over-the-top and old-fashioned to our modern tastes. When we think of opera, art is not the first thing that comes to mind.
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