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Because I have opened up about the research that I am conducting I think it's kind of important for me to give an example that you can use to understand the kind of stories I envision us telling as trans people through the current operatic Canon.
Let's talk about Carmen!
Let's talk about Carmen!
Carmen in the original text is Roma or gypsy, she is referred to as such in the text. She is described as a woman of innate sensuality that man and presumably woman fall in love with easily, she is bold and brash, speaks her mind, and is uncaring for men of rank or prestige.
But what if instead of us seeing this as a surface-level allegory we instead reinterpret Carmen's character as a trans woman. We don't change anything else about her. She is still of a certain heritage of a certain personality of a certain sensuality. But she's also trans.
So how does this change the text? First of all it's significantly alters the relationships Carmen has. Of the key relationships that she has the most significant or between Don Jose, the toreador, and the other women than in the text she interacts with.
Carmen and Don Joses story becomes a trans panic story. Don Jose immediately falls in love with Carmen upon seeing her once finding out that she's a trans woman and battles the demons in his mind over what that means in a repressive society.
Carmen and the toreadors relationship then becomes one of outsider acceptance of performativity recognising performance though not necessarily understanding the reasons why it is necessary for her to employ all the time.
The scene before Carmen sings the habanera features a group of women divided between who they wish to stand behind in an argument, some choosing to side with Carmen and some with another woman as they argue over what is essentially petty squabbles.
But what's really interesting about the way these other woman talked about Carmen is that they demonize her, they say she's a problem they say that she's never going to be like them, never going to fit in, never going to bring good with her, that she's a bad omen.
Carmen's reliance on her personal Faith the use of tarot cards to act as the voice of someone to trust in, because nobody else really understands our listens to her, nobody really gets it, nobody really understands? These are all all trans aligned activities or rituals.
And when that faith reflects back to her and shows her death shows her running out of time shows her dying young shows her not making it, and knowing how many trans people die young these days, it's really hard for me not to see her as having the potential to be read as trans.
And once we have built this narrative, once we have have figured out the line, the trajectory for this character, it becomes very easy to see how we might cast a trans woman in the role of Carmen.
Once we've made that decision as a director, as a company, we have some decisions to make about the original text. Specifically how do we make the musical text accessible to a transfeminine singing voice?
I don't think there is a correct answer here I think there are many different ways one could do this, but I think what's important for us as musicians, is to internalise that the musical notes written on the page are not a gospel and we are allowed to modify them within reason.
If we choose to cast a transfeminine person in the role of Carmen, we have to understand that are transferring invoice is not going to be able to sing in the same register that comment was originally written for. But transposition exists as an orchestration tool.
We have a for over a century now we arranged our music put it on totally different keys to the original composers intentions replaced instruments with other ones that we prefer the sound of changed the makeup of the orchestra at large to be smaller or bigger.
In my mind there is no reason why we cannot reinterpret the score to fit the voice of the person we're hiring to sing this character, and more importantly the story were choosing to tell on stage.
The Habanera will sound just as sensual, just as flirtatious common just as rambunctious, just as feminine in a transfeminine key as it does in the original even if all we do is move the whole song down an octave to fit within a a mid tenor voice instead.
All we have to do is open our minds to the choice and suddenly it becomes the easiest thing in the world.
Anyway if you like that thread and you would like to know more about this, I am writing a master's paper about this, and I'm seeking financial aid.
So here is a link to my gofundme, and thank you for reading. http://gf.me/u/zhsujv
So here is a link to my gofundme, and thank you for reading. http://gf.me/u/zhsujv
