Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Opera/Archive 27

Archives Table of Contents

CfR: Operas by Kurt Weill to Musical dramas by Kurt Weill
This is a notification that Category:Operas by Kurt Weill is being considered for renaming to Musical dramas by Kurt Weill at here. Please weigh in if you would like. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 08:24, 7 June 2007 (UTC)


 * In connection with this Cfd Die Dreigroschenoper has been removed from the other opera categories including Category:Ballad operas. How do other people feel about this? Cielomobile has explained his point of view on the talk page. -- Kleinzach 23:42, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Turn of the Screw
The opera synopsis of this article is garbled, and could use some attention from someone familiar with the story. --Pharillon 21:15, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The referencing is also virtually non-existent. I'm surprised that bot thingy hasn't tagged it yet. Best, Voceditenore 21:37, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Opera singer classification
As per discussions higher up, I think we need to agree a preferred classification for opera singers.

The two schemes I can think of are either:

a) Opera singers should be in category:Opera singers or a national subcategory such as Category:American opera singers; at the same time they should be in a voice category such as category:Tenors or a subcategory such as category:American tenors or category:Heldentenors.

b)Alternatively we should classify opera singers in the way that has been started with category:Operatic baritones and its national sub-categories. These will all be direct or indirect sub-cateogries of Category:Opera singers and the basic voice categories should cease to be its sub-categories.

The key thing that I am rejecting is the idea that we have any ownership over the basic voice categories. Other projects have the right to insert non-operatic singers into these categories. If we want Wikipedia to clearly list operatic singers in some sort of category system, then we need the words opera or operatic to appear in their categorisation. --Peter cohen 10:48, 3 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree. However, I have been working for over a year on musical theatre articles on Wikipedia, and I have quite a bit of experience with the scores of musicals.  It is much more difficult to classify voices in contemporary musical theatre than in opera.  Composers of musicals, especially after, say, Rogers, are far less specific about writing roles for particular voice types, and many roles "cross over" from one voice type to another, or require, e.g., some falsetto singing.  Also, productions often change keys for particular performers.  So, while some non-opera roles can clearly be listed in the lists as "tenor" roles or "soprano" roles, etc., it is often not so clear as in opera.  Therefore, I think it is generally OK to cut down the number of references to non-opera roles to the ones where a clear voice category can be shown.  Best regards, -- Ssilvers 14:30, 3 June 2007 (UTC)


 * It isn't so much the roles, but the performers that I'm talking about. --Peter cohen 15:27, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Cleaning up the singer cats would be a huge job - also laborious because of the inflexibility of the WikiMedia software. I have made a page listing the 122 categories that have been identified. The page is here. I have made a summary for this discussion:


 * Category:Opera singers 104 articles (Problem: category little used)
 * Category:Opera singer stubs 425
 * 10 basic voice range categories (Category:Tenors etc.) with a total of 878 articles. Almost all of these are opera singers. (Problem: confusion between altos and contraltos cats.).
 * 5 additional more specific voice cats (Category:Soubrettes etc.): Divas, Sopranistas, Soubrettes, Heldentenors, Lyric sopranos with 138 articles (Problem: random, incomplete series.)
 * 51 opera singers by nationality categories (Category:Albanian opera singers etc.) with 894 articles (Problem: confusion between British and English, Scottish etc.)
 * 22 operatic baritones by nationality (Category:Australian operatic baritones etc.) (Problem: unmatched by other vocal ranges)
 * 22 baritones by nationality (Category:British baritones etc.) (Problem: many of these categories are empty)
 * 2 sopranos by nationality (Category:Italian sopranos etc.)
 * 6 American other vocal ranges cats (Category:American soubrettes etc.) (Problem: not matched by any other nationalities).

IMO opinion the first task is to clear up Category:Altos and Category:Contraltos, then to get all the superfluous baritone categories deleted. I understand that Peter would like to move all the tenors, sopranos into 'operatic tenors', 'operatic sopranos' etc. I am not against this, but I doubt if it is worth the colossal effort. If it ain't broke. . . . -- Kleinzach 03:00, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * If opera singers + opera singers by nationality roughly equals voice categories including more specific voice categories, and the American voice ranges are meant to contain a lot of non-operatic people, then I don't think we are missing too many opera singers by avoiding the voice categories in the mid-term. I gave two options, one of which does not include the extra categories. What I'm not happy with is the automatic tagging of generic voice categories. I get the impression that some categories are purely operatic because you went through moving anyone who isn't an opera singer, but this won't remain the case once people start re-populating them. If you feel they should be purely oepratic, there is always the possibility of proposing that they be renamed so that the name makes it clear that they should be operatic. --Peter cohen 08:30, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I haven't done any kind of check so I don't know how closely the opera singers by nationality items approximate to the voice categories ones. I would guess that they are not so close due to the casual way they've been compiled, so the similarity in numbers may not be significant. (We could check by collating the lists and seeing how many unique names we obtained.)


 * The American voice ranges weren't intended for non-operatic people AFAIK but for some reason ended up that way. I made few deletions from the basic voice categories - most of them because they were non-notable as singers, not because they were non-opera. (Many of the pages were non-notable per se.) In the case of two or three genuine, but non-opera, baritones (Sinatra, Crosby etc.) I moved them into the American category, consistent with general practice. (Sopranos and tenors were left with interlopers in situ.)


 * Of course, the basic voice categories should not be exclusively operatic, but I do think they should be for singers who sing within ranges! These categories will attract miscellaneous entries in the future but why is this a particular problem? We are only going to be doing these bot runs very occasionally.


 * Once again I am not against a general reform of singer categories but please consider the complex problems before you start. One final point: category:Operatic sopranos, category:Operatic mezzo-sopranos etc, will be straightforward but national subcategories will present more difficulties - that's always the case on WP!  -- Kleinzach 09:53, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * About (Category:Tenors - Sébastien Izambard is definitely not an opera singer, he is just a "tenor" by his vocal range and that is it. He doesn’t even sound anything like opera or choir singer. He is a pop singer, so happen to be with Il Divo. If we split pop and opera tenor, how do we decide on "Pop opera" singers? Are they in the pop "tenor" category or operatic? - Jay 09:55, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, this is one of the problems. -- Kleinzach 10:22, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Hm I notice the article Operatic pop which might be the basis of a classification. Although that contains people like Andrea Bocelli who has recorded full operas, even if he does not get to perform many on stage and Sarah Brightman who hasn't and who, I have just removed from Category:British opera singers.


 * I agree that people should be classified correctly if they are placed within a voice range. But I notice that you purged Emma Bunton from the Soubrettes as she was non-operatic.--Peter cohen 16:54, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * 'Soubrette' is a specific opera category different from the vocal range cats like Soprano etc. On the category page it reads "The term normally applies to operatic sopranos who sing the comic roles, often of young girls." -- Kleinzach 17:11, 4 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Something else I've noticed - someone recently added Paul Hillier to the Category:English operatic baritones. I took it out, but now I'm not so sure. He's been in some operas, but I definitely don't think of him as an "opera singer". Same with Emma Kirkby (although she's probably been in more operas than Paul). What do we think? Opera cats or not? Mak (talk)  13:10, 5 June 2007 (UTC)


 * There always will be anomalies in any classification system. Having been through all (or almost all) the basic vocal range cats in the last week or so, I found very few (apparently) non-opera classical singers - Alice Swanson Esty, Wilfred Brown, and Gervase Cary Elwes.


 * As noted before there is a huge series of baritone categories unmatched by other voice types. I'm not in favour of using them, especially as using Category:English operatic baritones implies creating Category:English oratorio baritones etc. not to mention all the tedious problems of deciding who is Austrian, Bosnian, Pontevedran or whatever. P.S. Kirkby has done quite a lot of (early) opera with Hogwood etc. -- Kleinzach 01:04, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

It may be possible to piggyback on the work undertaken by WP:MUSCAT which gives a full category structure, conceived I think originally for pop music but applicable to opera singers. At the heart of this is the ranking: 1. nationality 2. Genre 3. Instrument. For opera singers, the 'genre' would be 'operatic' which could be left as understood if we use traditional names for the voices, the 'instrument' would be voice (in the plural). Thus "Fooian sopranos" which would itself be a subcategory of "Fooian female singers" (except for castrati :-) ), and also of "Sopranos". Caveat: Kleinzach] I know, and perhaps some others, are nervous about nationality. I don't see why this should be so, as virtually all other categories I am aware of discriminate by nationality. They do, as noted, involve tedious edit-work, but 'fiat justitia, ruat coelem', and all that............[[User:Smerus|Smerus 13:21, 13 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The nationality problem is a major one for us because our work spans so much time and so many territories. We have the general problem of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (previous edit wars about Liszt, Gluck etc.), the large number of East European singers who ended up in Vienna, and the equally large number of European singers who went to America during the 1930s and 1940s (acquiring US passports on the way). That's why I am not in favour of the system that prioritizes nationality in the ranking. Fine for pop, just a headache for us. On the other hand simply creating new Category:Operatic sopranos, Category:Operatic basses is relatively simple although the transfer numbers involved are large. -- Kleinzach 13:52, 13 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Comments on some points above - to keep the pot boiling. Transfer numbers: if there are enough of us around, we could divide up the task. Once it's done, it's there for ever(ish) and makes the future easier. Also stops people being 'lost' in 'Male/Female singers' categories. On 'nationality', it's possible to use 'from or based in' for the country in the category head text. 'British' - shouldn't actually exist except as a head category for 'English', 'Irish', Welsh', 'Scottish'. (I was trying to clean this out when caught in the act by Kleinzach but have desisted until some consensus is reached).--Smerus 20:21, 13 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Perhaps we could make nationality optional? You are interested in using it for British artists which is fine and uncomplicated given hstory etc. (I don't think 'from or based in' is practical for historic singers, or contemporary ones for that matter. Nor do I think aggressive nationality edit warrers will accept it. ) I agree about 'British' as a head category for 'English', 'Irish', Welsh', 'Scottish' - I've always done it that way for the opera singers. I was just concerned about avoiding changes while the bot run was in process. (Yes to dividing up the work.) -- Kleinzach 07:15, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Project logo?
Our current symbol is the Sydney Opera House. This appears on the project banner. (Userboxes have the same image, or the fat lady graphic, or the Leipzig operahouse picture.) One problem with the Sydney Opera House is that the shape of the image doesn't fit the banner well - it needs to be squarer - see Template:WikiProject Opera. The fat lady graphic (above) on the other hand is too fine and doesn't reduce well to a small size, see Template:Opera1. (now deleted, see other topic)

I've been looking though WikiCommons for alternatives and found the image on the right. It's a logo for the Opera station of the Madrid subway. It was designed by Javitomad see who has (apparently) designed at least one logo for a WP project (and is a user here under the same name).

I am wondering whether we might ask Javitomad to design either a version of the above, or a new one, for our logo. Is this a good idea? What do other people think? (Incidentally this would not hold up the bot run as the re-design could be done after that). -- Kleinzach 02:48, 7 June 2007 (UTC)


 * If he's willing. But the sign isn't as iconic as Sydney. --Peter cohen 21:44, 7 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Any ideas for an iconic image are welcome. It doesn't have to be based on this image here. -- Kleinzach 23:46, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Iconic-ness aside, that sure is an unattractive graphic, while the Sydney graphic is graceful and elegant. -- Ssilvers 14:59, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Opera banners now ready for bot run
SatyrTN has now prepared the banners for the bot run. They are here. The code is in bold above the boxes.

The first example is the plain banner, the second is the banner with auto (i.e. bot) stub assessment, and the third is the banner with hand stub assessment. (The code also allows us to add other assessments later - see the fourth banner - although, as agreed, we are not implementing this now.)

Any comments/problems? Can we go ahead with the run tomorrow? Thanks. -- Kleinzach 02:08, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to see the run happen asap. --Peter cohen 09:25, 8 June 2007 (UTC)


 * So is User:Peter cohen/opera categories the list to use (minus the "NOT to be tagged by robot")? If so, I can set it up to run tonight and over the next several nights.  Since you have ~750 categories, I think I'll start with 100 cats - this may take a few days :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs)  13:34, 8 June 2007 (UTC)


 * No, there is a new list at WikiProject_Opera/Catlist. It's just one list - no exemptions - for simplicity. Can we hold off for another 12 hours to allow the others to see this? If there are no more comments here by then I suggest we start. There is no hurry, and we all want this to be a success. Thanks. -- Kleinzach 14:02, 8 June 2007 (UTC)


 * BTW, Kleinzach made a list of singers in the voice categories who are not opera people. The voices are the last 15 or so categories in the list. So, if you are able to synchronise with him on when they are processed so that he is able to remove the unwanted tags fairly quickly, that would avoid annoying too many people.
 * Also remember that the robot should ignore WP:G&S tagged articles. Thanks --Peter cohen 14:06, 8 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Gotcha - it'll ignore G&S-tagged pages. The bot starts running at 5amUTC (that's midnight Eastern US).  I'll check back here before then to see if there are any objections to starting. Note that if the possibly "offending" categories are at the end of the list, we wont get to them until Thursday or Friday. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs)  18:08, 8 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I look forward to finding out how many articles we have to rate. --Peter cohen 18:58, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) I've set up the bot's instruction page with tonight's categories. If one or more people from the project are willing, please watchlist the bot's comment page, as the edit summary for each article that is tagged points there. If a random passerby wants to question the banner, they usually do it there. Thanks! -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 01:14, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Okay. I'm watching it. Tast night's list doesn't look as if it ought to generate any complaints. But let's see. --Peter cohen 08:46, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry I've been offline for a while. Two small problems I can see - if I'm looking in the right place! - first the main text is centred instead of ranged left, and second the stub box symbol that goes in the bottom left corner seems to be missing. Any ideas? I can correct the text alignment in the template if you like. -- Kleinzach 10:28, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for fixing those problems (above). Unfortunately it seems the bot is missing at least some of the stubs. Here are two examples: La rencontre imprévue, Orlando finto pazzo. -- Kleinzach 15:00, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Yep. Due to a bug in the code &lt;shudder&gt;, the bot was detecting stubs, but not marking them.  I'm running it through last night's articles and tagging the stubs now. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs)  15:04, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

The Bot is not working properly. It added the automatic STUB assessment today to Ein Walzertraum and Les brigands, but these are not stubs and have no stub tag. If it did this to these articles, it must be incorrectly tagging other articles. Thanks! -- Ssilvers 15:07, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't see a stub assessment on either of those? The bot added to both of them, with no assessment.  If you see any that are incorrectly assessed, let me know? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs)  15:42, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

These have been fixed now. Whatever you (or someone) did worked. -- Ssilvers 15:47, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I think the template was incorrectly coded to have everything in Category:Stub-Class Opera articles - that got fixed when I updated the template. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs)  15:51, 9 June 2007 (UTC)


 * This is probably a minor point but I see that creates  (in red). Should we bring this out of limbo and create it? -- Kleinzach 03:07, 10 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I think in the mid-term we'll need not just this but categories for each of the rating levels. --Peter cohen 10:01, 10 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Someone made the category. What is the situation now? Is the bot run continuing? -- Kleinzach 23:17, 12 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes - the bot's running. I neglected to set up for last night's run, but I'll set it up for tonight.  You can see progress on the project list, which includes links to log pages. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs)  01:48, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Comment on multiple project banners and assessments
If you all believe that your assessments might run roughly equivalent to those of other projects, you might want to run User:PockBot to see what if any existing assessments have been done, and maybe save some time that way. I wish I knew exactly where the project's banner was, but alternately, if you believe that your project might have different criteria than other projects, you might want to copy the banners at Template:WPMILHIST and Template:WPGR and substitute in any parameters that you think might be unusual or unique to your project. If you wanted any help doing either of these, I would be more than willing to lend what help I could. Just let me know. John Carter 14:56, 8 June 2007 (UTC)


 * It will be useful to see the other assessments anyway. There's scepticism about the assessment process of a certain project in particular. So we may want to vet other people's assessments instead of accepting them automatically. --Peter cohen 15:18, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Understood. If you wish to run the PockBot, go to the User:PockBot page and enter the name of the category whose assessments you want to see displayed. And, remember, if you do disagree with anyone else's assessments, there is always the option to request that they do a reassessment. I would, however, note that other projects may well have at least slightly different bases for their assessments, and possibly different criteria, so there may be quite a bit of variation between the assessments you make and they make, based on those different criteria. And, depending which project you are referring to, there is often, particularly with Biography and some of the other really large projects, like Military history, potentially a lot of people doing assessments, and some of them might be much less than really good at it. I know I have recently had to upgrade a few of my own assessments of Saints articles based on my now having more defined internal "parameters" for the various grades, and think that the same thing happens to probably every project and person involved in assessments. So I can understand not necessarily accepting anyone else's assessments on face value. Actually, I would even encourage that, as the assessment may well have been done before several subsequent revisions to the article. But they can often serve as at least of what others have earlier seen as being an article's strengths or weaknesses. Not wanting to scare anyone here, but there are hopes that articles be assessed regularly, to reflect changes which may have been made since the last assessment. So, at least potentially, the project might want to ask someone to maybe once or twice a year go through a given subcat to see if the content of the article has changed recently. That is a bit down the line, but something I thought you might want to know in advance anyway. John Carter 15:27, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Hi, John Carter! Would it be possible te remove the Biography Project (auto) assessments from opera articles as our project develops? The banners clutter up the Talk pages and since they are all automatic assessments (of whether or not there is a stub tag) they don't add anything. (AFAIK there aren't any human assessments by the Biography Project here.) -- Kleinzach 10:51, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
 * If you agree with the auto assessments, then just remove the "|auto=yes" from the banner tag. Regarding whether you want to remove the banners in general, that tends to be a rather more sticky issue. Lots of people have argued on both sides whether banners should be removed. The primary subject of the page WikiProject reform is substantively that subject. In general, I guess I would say, that generally, most operas will be eligible for the opera banner and probably at least the banner of the country of origin of the opera. Whether these articles actually have been so tagged is another matter. Most of the articles relating to biographies have probably also been tagged with the bio banner, I imagine. It is generally considered bad form, as per the WikiProject reform page above, to try to remove banners of projects which are clearly and specifically relevant at least potentially to an article. However, if a banner has clearly been placed there in error (if, for instance WikiProject Dogs tagged The Magic Flute), then the banner can generally be removed without difficulty, although you might consider dropping a note to the project about removing the banner, as it might actually be relevant for less than immediately obvious reasons. The alternate approach, which actually has been at least more or less provisionally agreed to, is to place the banners of all projects which are at best peripherally related to an article within the templateWikiProjectBannerShell. Regarding specifically the Biography project, it is clearly harder to argue from generalities, like the above, to specifics. In general, I can say that I don't think Biography would object their banner being placed in the shell, with the provision of keeping the blp visible in cases of articles clearly relating to living people, and, maybe, keeping the banner individually visible if it has the "core" biography tab activated, like on Johann Sebastian Bach and Giuseppe Verdi. There is a specific (if currently more or less dormant) work group specifically designed to work on those 200 or so articles, and with luck it will reactive shortly, hopefully to improve the articles. In those specific cases, it might be a good idea to keep it visible separately. Sorry for being so verbose, but I think this way would probably be the best way to avoid any possible conflicts with either Biography or any of the other projects which might tag such articles. John Carter 16:55, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Attribution/Permission question
I want to add this external link in my sandbox to the Spinto page, but I first want to doublecheck if it's properly attributed, or if I need any kind of special permission to add this paragraph to Wikipedia. Operalala 20:25, 10 June 2007 (UTC)


 * A possible qualm is that what you are doing appears to be original synthesis? Please correct me if not. Cheers, Moreschi Talk 20:29, 10 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks, It's actually a illustration of spinto and lyric voices, which happened to be juxtaposed in this soundclip so that listeners can hear the differences between them, rather than advancing any kind of position. Am I understanding this right? Operalala 20:51, 10 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, I'm being a little silly. I'd cut the bit in brackets, though, just looks a little strange. Moreschi Talk 20:55, 10 June 2007 (UTC)


 * You mean take the highlighting part out? I guess I was trying to be as true to the source as possible, but I think you're right, it doesn't really belong on this site. Operalala 21:04, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

September Composer of the Month
Here are some ideas for the September composer(s) of the month:


 * Bedřich Smetana (1824-1884) and Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904)
 * Hungarian operetta: Jenő Huszka (1875-1960), Emmerich Kálmán (1882-1953), Victor Jacobi (1883-1921)
 * Gaspare Spontini (1774-1851) and Luigi Cherubini (1760-1842),
 * Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
 * Paul Hindemith (1895-1963)

Any other suggestions as always welcome! -- Kleinzach 02:18, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The Czechs would suit me. I have several of their operas in my to-do list on my user page. If I know they're going to happen, I can focus on other articles before then. --Peter cohen 10:42, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Rossini still needs some concentrated attention; Kurt Weill, too.  I'd also be happy with the Czechs, but could we add Janacek - the operas are all there, but some (e.g. From the House of the Dead) need expanding. --GuillaumeTell 11:08, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Silbersee is on my list too, so I wouldn't mind Weill. Three major Czech operatic composers might be abit of a handful. --Peter cohen 11:13, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The three Czechs would only need 7 completely new articles, compared with over 20 for the three 18th century Italians above, so I think they would be practicable. They would also make a good contrast with the other composers we have been doing recently. (I had a feeling no one would go for the Hungarians!) -- Kleinzach 11:25, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The Czechs sound like good fun. They're a nice contrast with what we're doing currently and also my suggestion for October (I think this was Folantin's idea originally), which is Cavalli. Moreschi Talk 14:07, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd second that. Czechs in September, then Cavalli. --Folantin 19:40, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I have set up the Czechs. Incidentally is there any reason not to move Počátek Románu to the English title Beginning of a Romance? -- Kleinzach 00:18, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
 * No reason, but it should be "The Beginning of a Romance" (see Grove, s.v. Janacek). --GuillaumeTell 00:44, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Glad I asked! I've made the change now. -- Kleinzach 02:44, 12 June 2007 (UTC)