Opera, Passion, and Secrets

My grandfather came here from Roumania when he said he was sixteen years old, got a job in the fabric business, and made and lost a lot of money. Morris was a gambler, as anyone would be, who upped himself and left his country of origin, leaving his siblings and parents behind.

What I remember most about my grandfather were his hands and his stories. Rather than tell us about the old country and the hardships he experienced, my grandfather would tell us the stories of Shakespeare and the operas (no one could talk on Saturday afternoon when he listened to Texaco Performances from the Met Opera live), and as he hummed the arias, he often wept from the depth of feeling these stories and their melodies elicited.

After my grandfather was dead for many years, my father discovered that his father had come to the US under an assumed name, was older than he admitted to, and we suspect that he left another "family" in Europe. My grandfather died with many secrets undiscovered.

Opera is not for the young. I was much too busy trying to experience life myself to be engrossed in a bunch of overweight divas singing in a language I didn't understand.

But Morris did lay the foundation for my learning to appreciate opera as I got older.

In the late 1990s, with my friend Riccarda and our wise and knowledgeable friend Nicky, we occasionally met for "opera breakfast," when I would make some decadent egg dish, we would listen to an opera, and Nicky would explain what we needed to know to appreciate the recording. Then we might actually go see a performance of the opera at the Met or the New York City Opera.

My husband hates opera. My daughter barely tolerates it.

Last night amidst my "Bernie Madoff" obsession, I met Nicky for dim sum at Shun Lee Cafe and a five hour plus performance of Tristan & Isolde by Richard Wagner at the Met.

This is the second year in a row that the principals have become ill and substitutes have been placed. Linda Watson was replacing Katarina Dalayman in the role of Isolde. Tristan was performed by Peter Seiffert.

Daniel Barenboim made his Met debut by conducting the orchestra. He was once married to the British cellist Jacqueline du Pre and not very sympathetically portrayed in the film Hillary and Jackie, 1998.

He was also a very close friend of Edward Said and has insisted on Israeli - Palestinian peace talks, often criticizing the Israeli government.

For anyone who might think that opera crowds are stodgy, forget-about-it. The audience went wild for Barenboim every time he walked to the podium to conduct--the opera is in three acts. The audience went bananas at the close of the opera, the last performance of Tristan & Isolde for the Met season, and kept the performers and Barenboim on stage bowing for almost twenty minutes.

The opera is very long, yes, but it is also extremely beautiful and passionate in that distinguished, classical sense. Wagner wanted to create an opera that was the definitive statement about love. But of course, Wagner was German, and love had to be forbidden, and infused with pain, betrayal, and death. Like most opera, Tristan & Isolde is about love, murder, betrayal, forgiveness, more murder, miscommunication, and a lot of bad timing.

The music is passionate, compelling, and the performances so talented, especially by Linda Watson and Kwangchul Youn, King Marke, that twice I cried. OK, the first time, some tears dripped down my cheek, but the second time, I wanted to openly weep. Only good breeding inhibited me.

As Isolde sang the final Liebestod "Love death" I understood the passion of my grandfather, I understood the depth of despair felt by many in the Met audience, whose own lives are so filled with secrets, with betrayals, love, forgiveness, and more betrayals, that the only safe place to feel all of those feelings was here in the pristine and elegant setting of Lincoln Center on a Saturday night.