Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Opera/Article styles and formats/Archive 1

Synopsis of operas - Layout: In spite of suggested format in Un ballo in maschera article, is there in fact a "standard format"?
The break down into Acts and scenes is all over the place.

A. The Ballo suggestion produces:

Act 1
Scene 1. Text starts here etc. Using this format, we see Act 1, Act 2 etc as a subtitle of Synopsis is the Contents Box.

Act 2
Scene 1. then the text.

B. A Second Format is:

Act 1

Nothing appears in the Contents Box and text continues beneath.

C. And yet a 3rd format found is simply:

Act 1

Scene 1, The Duke's palace With no period, and text starts right away or sometimes with no period and text is beneath via a line break.


 * ''Is there a consensus as to which format we'd like to see used?
 * And is Un ballo in maschera the best example to use? Viva-Verdi (talk) 23:25, 3 February 2008 (UTC)''


 * As I understand it, Un ballo in maschera is only cited as an example to follow in the matter of "noted arias" (which, we've agreed elsewhere, are better inserted where they occur in the synopsis, rather than appearing as a separate section). There seems to be no standard for the layout of synopses, and I agree that it would be good to have one. --GuillaumeTell (talk) 01:13, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Then I would propose that we do the following as in the I masnadieri article: Viva-Verdi (talk) 18:04, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Act 1
(Appears in bold face as sub-heading in Contents Box for ease of finding. If the Act is named, the name appears on same line as the act)

Scene 1: The Duke's palace

(Appears in italics - with colon after scene number - and with scene location part of the heading)

Line break here

Text of the scene synopsis appear after line break.

Conclusion?
I have just completed the synopsis for La fanciulla del West and removed noted arias section, the same way I did for Aida synopsis, Turandot synopsis, Otello synopsis, La traviata synopsis and Tosca synopsis. We don’t really have standard format, but as agreed before, we will remove “Noted arias” section once we have written complete storyline (synopsis) +adding the arias in it. When I have the time, I will continue with Manon Lescaut’s synopsis. I also created another aria article - Ch'ella mì creda libero article (I translated using machine translation). I believe it is important to have at least 1 or 2 aria articles for any operas. This is just my opinion. As for Giulio Cesare synopsis, I don’t have the DVD to watch and write down the details + the arias by scenes like I did for others; and that is why I leave the “Noted Arias” section as it is. If you guys like to come out with standard heading etc, why not make it official by putting it at the "WikiProject Opera/Article styles and formats" mainpage. It would make easier to all of us. PS- A for La fanciulla del West synopsis, feel free to fix the grammer (as always), I know my english sux! - Jay (talk) 02:17, 6 February 2008 (UTC)


 * WELL, WE JUST NEED AGREEMENT ON A FORMAT AND THEN IT CAN BE PUT ON THE "STYLES AND FORMATS" MAIN PAGE. Viva-Verdi (talk) 05:18, 6 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Hearing no objections, the Fanciulla and I masnadieri article format seem to be best way to proceed, and I shall do so. Viva-Verdi (talk) 19:19, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Review of formalisms
I noticed that there were a number of formal errors in this arrticle and went about correcting them. For example, most section levels within the article proper were wrong and some were wrong in the examples for "Synopsis format". The recommended use and the display of the HTML tag   was wrong and the linking of year numbers and dates is now thoroughly deprecated. At least one date was wrongly formatted. Several opera titles were not italicised.

The wiki code for some features is reasonably complicated, so I added boxes where the wiki code is shown.

The table used as example for "List of operas", List of operas by Mozart, seemed rather specific and not representative for most such lists, so I added one representative list, List of operas by Rossini, and another specialised one, List of operas by Handel, as well as an empty template. This section seems now unduly long. The word "premiere" is still inconsistently spelled (è?). Lastly, I replaced the rather off-topic example for an online reference with a more suitable source.

My intention was not to make any editorial changes. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 13:25, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Shortcut
I created the shortcut WP:WPOMOS, pointing to this article and added the appropriate template at the top of the article itself. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 04:26, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Voice types
Just to explain the edit I made: our guideline says "voice types specified in the printed score should normally be the ones used in the role table". The table then said The Dutchman is a "bass-baritone". The vocal score says "Baritone" : vocal score  almost - instinct 16:06, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

References, Notes, Cited sources, etc.....
In a recent discussion regarding Aureliano in Palmira the layout of citations under "References" came up. It was also addressed on User talk:Robert.Allen's pages as follows:

How to show referenced material
You present an interesting format, with which I agree and which could become "standard" if agreed up0n by the WikProject Opera:

Other sources
We should get a consensus here, and if agreed to, change the WP:Opera guidelines. Viva-Verdi (talk) 04:00, 23 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Yes, I also think this a good idea. Though I note the formatting is with a semi-colon (presumably to avoid an over-long TOC) rather than ===. -- Klein zach  04:10, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Using the semicolon is an idea I picked up from a featured article that I read. (Don't remember now which specific article, since it was a while ago, but here is an example: Trade dollar (United States coin).) Yes, the idea is to avoid adding so many subheadings to the TOC. There are other ways to create a bold faux subheading than the semicolon, but it's one of the easiest. The guidelines for footnoting seem to allow different approaches to this in Wikipedia articles. I'm not sure whether we really need to standardize it. I added the "Other sources" section to Aureliano in Palmira as a place to list refs we have apparently not yet examined or cited which might be useful for expanding and improving the article. I am hoping to find a source which will explain why Romani is thought to be the librettist versus Romanelli. Personally I am skeptical about the Ricordi vocal score, since it was published much later after the premiere, and putting Romani's name on it, who had become quite famous by then, might have been thought likely to bolster sales rather more than the unknown Gian Francesco Romanelli. The 1816 libretto was published so soon after the premiere, that the librettist was probably still active, and may have been known to the publisher. Anyway, I have no sources which support these ideas, and they are merely my opinions. Unfortunately, Richard Osborne does not cite a source for attributing it to Romani. --Robert.Allen (talk) 05:15, 23 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I am in favour of standardizing the reference format because this has caused problems in the past — and the semi-colon is a good idea. ('Other sources' could be optional.) Let's deal with Aureliano in Palmira on the article page. (My main concern is multiple Romanells.) -- Klein zach  05:51, 23 June 2011 (UTC)''

The format incoporated into the Aureliano article looks like this (note semi colon before each sub-title):

Sources and references
'Sources' are general and 'references' are specific (linked to particular sentences in the text).
 * Books
 * Smith, J. (2005), Dutch Citing Practices, The Hague: Holland Research Foundation.
 * Online references
 * Tommasini, Anthony, "Look What They're Doing to Opera", The New York Times, 22 December 2002. Accessed 7 February 2006.

REVISED FORMAT could incoporate both:

Revised format for the References section
Can I just point out that these guidelines were changed with no discussion on the Project's main talk page or any notice there that they had been proposed here, a page with very few watchers. Even here, there was no discussion of the actual final format. But it was summarily changed two days two after being proposed. As such, the "new" guidelines do not necessarily reflect a wider project consensus at all. Having said that, they are probably an improvement, apart from retaining the extra complication of distinguishing Online sources from Other sources (books) in the uncited sources. I'm quite opposed to it. There's no reason to make that distinction and it's confusing to the reader. An "Other source" is an "Other source", i.e. one not used in the online citations, regardless of the medium, and it's obvious from the live link whether or not it's an "Online source". Voceditenore (talk) 06:03, 12 July 2011 (UTC)


 * As there has been no further discussion of the above, I am going to remove the confusing and unnecessary "online sources" distinction from the guideline. I also fail to see the relevance of distinguishing between Cited sources and Other sources. A source is a source if the material in it corroborates what is in the article, even if it is not currently used in an inline citation. What might be a relevant distinction is that between Sources and Further reading. A Further reading subsection should contain books, articles, etc. which contain additional material which does not appear in the article but currently would not serve as sources for corroborating what is actually in the article. Voceditenore (talk) 07:24, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * These are some of the types of sources I have been adding to the "Other sources" section and why. Sources I have found which could be used for improving an article which are in a language which I find it very difficult to read and/or haven't had time yet to use for an article. Perhaps other editors who are more fluent in that language or have some time can use them for that purpose. Other sources in English which I have found either through citations or bibliographies that I have not seen or read but appear to be useful and may be in a library near another editor who could use them to add information to the article. (I haven't labeled them "Further reading" because I haven't read them myself and am not recommending them to the general reader as a source of further more detailed information.) I have also added some reference works to the Paris Opera article which are useful for adding information to articles related to the Paris Opera, but haven't yet been used to add information specifically to that article. Perhaps these should really be added to the Talk page, but I have the feeling they would just get lost or ignored if I put them there. Personally I have also found these citations useful as text to copy for pasting in the references section of a new article where I have used that source. --Robert.Allen (talk) 20:48, 30 July 2011 (UTC)
 * This section heading has been used by other editors in other subject areas, e.g., Artificial intelligence and Flocking (behavior). I suspect there are more examples of this. --Robert.Allen (talk) 21:13, 30 July 2011 (UTC)


 * OK, first of all, Artificial intelligence does not use the sub-headings in the same way you and the "new" OP guidelines are using them. All of their "Sources" appear in the shortened inline citations in the "Notes" section. They are simply divided between those which are general textbooks and those which are more specialised. (I personally think that's superfluous too, but that article may have special requirements.) Works which are not in cited sources have their own section called "Further reading". Flocking (behavior) is inconsistent and confusing and should definitely not be used as a model because it uses a mixed format. It uses full citation in each footnote rather than shortened citation and it is unclear to the reader whether or not "Other sources" are actually sources for the article but do not have inline cites attached for them or if they are simply potential sources for information not currently in the article. If you want to use a model, it is far better to look at the references sections in Featured Articles (FAs), and especially at ones that are opera-related. If you haven't personally read a work and don't know whether it is can be a source for what is actually in the article, then it should not be listed as a "source" ("other" or otherwise). The word "sources", regardless of what extra label you attach to it implies that the works under that heading are sources for, i.e. corroborate, what is currently in the article. They may also contain further material, but that is true of all cited sources. Works which do not fit that criteria belong in "Further reading". Labelling them as any kind of source is confusing and misleading to the reader. The "new guidelines" were also inflexibly worded (I've added a premable to the current guidelines section to remedy that) and are still potentially confusing to apply. Some articles at FA level distinguish between "Notes" (which simply add extra information) and "References" which are for inline cites (Nixon in China). The guidelines at WP:CITE makes it clear that articles may differ in their requirements and in how they title and subdivide the References/Sources/Notes sections. The Guidelines there require only that the article referencing format be internally consistent. It also specifically lists things to avoid when editing existing articles, e.g. Changing the section heading to or from ==References==, ==Notes==, etc.". – Voceditenore (talk) 07:39, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I see now what you are objecting to. You are reserving the word "sources" to exclusively mean sources used for information added to the article, while I was thinking that is what "Cited sources" meant, and was seeing "Other sources" as other sources of information on the subject. Many of the books added to the "Other sources" section are not really ideal for further reading but are more useful as reference works (I'm thinking, for instance, of Gourret, Lajarte, and Chouquet in the Paris Opera article). I suppose a somewhat longer heading might be less ambiguous, such as "Other sources of information on this topic". It seems to me that these are significant sources of information on the Paris Opera, and they need to be included in the article under some kind of heading without necessarily creating a new TOC heading. "References" seemed like a good TOC heading, since it can be fairly broad, like what is meant by the phrase "works of reference", or when it is used for the name of the "Reference desk" at the library. --Robert.Allen (talk) 04:47, 1 August 2011 (UTC)


 * This is a bit off topic, but in our guideline we currently use parentheses for the year in the Notes section, whereas WP:CITESHORT does not. I had been following the latter, i.e., no parentheses in the short notes. --Robert.Allen (talk) 05:16, 1 August 2011 (UTC)


 * A source that has been used to contribute to the article should be cited. --Robert.Allen (talk) 18:15, 1 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I'm off to to Italy for a month with very poor internet access, alas, Perhaps we can continue the discussion when I get back. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 19:02, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that "Other sources" is a useful place to put stanard ref. works such as Holden or Warrack & West where they are not specifically cited in the "Notes". Typically, they will contain a general overview of the topic and may be more easily accessible to the general reader.

Re: Dates in Notes section: if the full details of the publication are listed below the Notes under "Sources", including the date seems to me to be redundant, unless there are more sources by the same author with different titles.

Overall, the new format seems to provide a much cleaner layout than before. Viva-Verdi (talk) 05:11, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * That's exactly what happened. I added a cite to a different article by Andrew Lamb in Jacques Offenbach and now that is the only short citation for Lamb with the year. I think this will be potentially confusing and onerous for the first editor who must add the year. Does that mean I should go through and add the year for all the other citations, so they will be consistent? If we always add the year as suggested in the Wikipedia guideline, this won't happen. I like the way it is done at WP:CITESHORT because the short citations are easily distinguishable at a glance from the long ones.  --Robert.Allen (talk) 22:59, 2 August 2011 (UTC)