Carmen or aida??

Question

which is the best opera to take my mum to see? carmen or aida? she is 61 and I am 34. I am an opera philistine but I know I love a good cry!

Answer 1

Carmen is the way to go if you are into opera! In

Aida there were songs written by Elton John which were pretty nice. But strictly opera I would say Carmen.

Answer 2

Both are great operas but Aida is more "epic" whereas "Carmen" is more of a human drama and you will know a lot of the tunes already!

But it would really depend on the quality of the productions!

If you are in England and going to any production at ENO then all are sung in English. Anywhere else check with the box office that there are surtitles.

Both are good old weepies but Carmen would have the edge on it for me!

Answer 3

carmen is not in english, so if you go to see it, (unless you don't mind not knowing what is going on) make sure they have some form of translating- when i went, they had super-titles above the stage. it was cool actually.

carmen is definitely an opera, but i was under the impression that aida is more of a musical.  it has some great music, though, if the singers are good!  

i think you'd both like either of them, though.

Answer 4

aida!!!!!!!!

because this is an Italian opera!!!!

bye bye....

Answer 5

I think Carmen would be better. The music would be more familiar to you and the plot is easier to understand. Most opera companies in the US have supertitles (the words are projected over the stage), while some will sing the opera in English. I've personally always preferred supertitles since sometimes the words are hard to understand even if they are in English. You might also want to read the plot of Carmen before you go so you have a general idea of what's going on in the story. It's not complicated and is easy to understand. If you want to, you could try to find the movie of "Carmen" starring Placido Domingo and Julia Migenes-Johnson. It's not a film of an opera production, but an actual film that was filmed in Spain on location. It's really good. Best wishes and have a great time at the opera. By the way, some other operas that you might also like and are great for beginners because of the catchy music are "La Traviata" by Verdi and "Die Fliedermaus" by Strauss.

Answer 6

Carmen has always been my favourite. The music is wonderful.

Answer 7

Carmen!  Aida is a great opera, don't get me wrong, but Carmen is much easier for first-timers to enjoy.  They will recognize a good deal of the music in the opera, plus it's more "fun," even though it's not exactly a comedy.  Aida is generally for more serious opera fans.

Though I guess I just assumed this was your mother's first time.  If she loves opera, then I'd still say Carmen because of the reasons stated before.

As for what the other person said about it being in a different language...well, yeah, almost all operas are, and they always have supertitles. :P Additionally, Aida was an opera composed by VERDI before it was a musical with songs by Elton John.

Answer 8

Good evening,

Both are beautiful. It main depends of scenographical aspects. The fact is that Carmen might be easier for a first approach, but Aïda is very lyrical and superb.

When I say, it depends, I mean Carmen is not originally an opera, but a specific french kind of piece : an opéra-comique. Not comical but made of sings (not really arias) and spoken times. Halévy, to export this strange thing, composed the recitatives. So, why not, but what you'll see -Carmen, now as an opera is, after Dom Giovanni, the most played -  depends of the quality of the musicians, the singers, etc...

Finally, Carmen is more emotional, more oriental wheras Aïda is more lyrical, european and traditional.

Cordially.

Somedaythere is perfectly true. Aïda is an italian opera. Don't change the language, so that you'll change all the opera. All operas are actually subtitled. How could we know a Russian one ? Let's be serious...