Introducing: Six Degrees of Plácido Domingo
Connecting the dots on centuries of opera and #MeToo
Six Degrees of Plácido Domingo: The Series
Part 2: Casanova and Da Ponte: The Lives and Afterlives of Don Giovanni
Part 4: The Puzzle about Puccini
Part 6: The Private Lives of the Three Tenors
Earlier this week, Plácido Domingo announced that he would resume his performance schedule after being diagnosed earlier this spring with COVID-19, beginning in August with a performance scheduled to run at the Arena di Verona. Yet Domingo’s performance schedule this season wasn’t solely affected by a global pandemic and social distancing. Last year, at the onset of the 2019-20 season, Domingo’s engagements, especially in the United States, began to drop as more women accused the singer-conductor of sexual harassment. This culminated with Domingo announcing that he would withdraw from his scheduled run of Macbeth at the Metropolitan Opera the night before it was scheduled to open, adding that he didn’t plan on returning to the Met in the future.
Domingo’s story hasn’t been an anomaly in the last few years in the world of classical music, where directors, conductors, singers, and countless other professionals have been accused of sexual misconduct, with independent investigations supporting the credibility of some of these allegations. But his was one of the most high-profile, the most vocal, and, for many, the most upsetting. Many fans, colleagues, and houses have chosen to defend and stand behind Domingo. Others, like one columnist for WQXR, have wondered, point-blank, “How did this happen?”
How this happened — and why many fans choose to support the musicians whose lives and careers have been put on hold due to classical music’s necessary #MeToo reckoning — is actually baked into much of the genre’s history. Just as classical music has spent centuries reinforcing a myth of white, Eurocentric exceptionalism to uphold a canon largely comprised of white male composers, so too has opera spent centuries reinforcing a myth of sex and power to uphold the misconduct of male figures (while simultaneously subjugating their female counterparts), both fictional and real. And it’s a legacy that has led right up to (and past) the years of Plácido Domingo.
Over the next six weeks, we’ll trace that legacy, beginning with the start of opera and the sexual politics of Medici-controlled Florence, and going right up into one of the first public accusations against Domingo that took place nearly 25 years ago. In between, we’ll look at the mythologizing of male seducers in one of history’s most famous operas, and the flip side of this coin: the demonizing of sexually active or awakened women. We’ll also dive deep on one of the composers and one of the singers who preceded Domingo in terms of reputation, and whose legacies have remain largely untarnished for it. Not only will we understand how we got here, but we may also be able to guess as to where we’re going.
All of this will begin next week with Six Degrees of Plácido Domingo, Part 1: Sex, the Medicis, and the Birth of Opera
A prelude from the original run of this post from June 5, 2020:
Writing about classical music in June of 2020 seems to be completely unnecessary. Writing about classical music in June of 2020 without any connection to the centuries’ worth of racism, colonialism, and exploitation of non-European identities (especially Black identities) seems even more so. I considered this in working on this week’s issue of Undone, as many content creators have been doing all week. I even considered pushing back this week’s planned overview of Six Degrees of Plácido Domingo in lieu of writing about something more urgent — such as the story of Paul Robeson’s love of the USSR against Jim Crow America — but any of those stories should be told with time, thoughtfulness, and integrity rather than rushing to push something out this week in order to be timely. Robeson’s is a story that should be told, and I have research on him as well as other Black composers and performers whose stories will take center stage on this Substack in several weeks. But for now, I’ve decided to stick with the plans and research I have for this week, as well as the next six weeks. We will still need to amplify the biographies and work of Black artists and classical musicians then.
In the meantime, here are a few other pieces you can check out:
On Taking Lip (Service) by James Bennett II (WQXR)
When the Opera Acts Like It's Never Seen a Black Person Before by Collier Meyerson (Jezebel)
Black Opera History, Power, Engagement by Naomi Andre (and her interview with Lara Pellegrinelli for National Sawdust Log)
The Complicated History of Marian Anderson’s Met Debut by James Bennett II (WQXR)
Notes on Birdsong, which I wrote for VAN Magazine
Stormy Weather: Lena Horne and Paul Robeson (The Blacklist, Episode 12) from Karina Longworth’s You Must Remember This
Here are more ways you can get informed and take actionable steps to help.
Thanks for subscribing to Undone. See you next week. In the meantime, if you’ve already made donations, please consider demanding that your local arts organizations do more than post black squares and hashtags and actually do the work to include more Black voices on their boards, staffs, rosters, and stages.