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| Budapest Opera House |
I joined a tour of the Opera House and afterward, heard a "mini concert" sung by a baritone. The tour took us through all the elaborately decorated rooms accented with gilded carved wood walls. The ceilings were all frescos painted by Hungarian artists. Apparently only Hungarian workmen were allowed to build the hall and all the materials had to be Hungarian as well. However, there are three exceptions to things that were not of Hungarian origin: one a mirror presented by Belgium as a gift, another the German chandelier in the main hall (see below), and the third wood from Austria (I think) that was used because it had no knots and could therefore be carved more easily. As for the Opera House, it is acoustically the second best opera house in the world (next to Milan's La Scala). The gold leaf that is so prominent in the seating area weights only three kilograms in total.
Originally the king offered to pay only 2 million forint to build the hall but it ended up taking 3.5 million. The extra money had to be collected via donations.
Strangely enough, for all the wood in the building, the hall never suffered from fire damage despite the fact that there was a smoking parlor on the second floor of the hall. Apparently many a business deal was made at the opera hall during intermissions, and no self respecting man would be found without a cigar in his hand, thus there was very heavy smoking allowed only in the smoking chamber (the rest of the opera house was a no smoking zone). The smoke got so thick that two people talking couldn't even see each other. Thus, young lovers would sometimes retreat into the smoking room so that they could say/do things that no one else could hear/see. Hence the smoking room became known as the "Lovers Room".
As for the seating area, the hall boasts of being one of the first "air conditioning systems" in the world. Small holes are in the floor just beneath every seat in the hall. Huge blocks of ice are placed below the floor so that cool air will go up through the holes to cool the audience down. The hot air that rises escapes through holes that were drilled in the dome surrounding the chandelier. As for the chandelier, it was designed to be lowered so that it could be easily maintained with gas, a later, light bulb changes. Still it takes many people to do this maintenance. Also, the lights of the chandelier were required to be on for the duration of the performance so that no hanky panky (i.e. touching one's neighbor's hands) could occur.
By agreement with Vienna, the Budapest Opera House was built to fit only 1200 people (whereas the Vienna Opera House is much larger). Although the seating area only accommodates 1200 people, the area behind the stage is larger than the area in the audience area.
The singer of the mini concert performed three pieces, the first an arrangement he accompanied by playing a mandoline. The second piece was an aria from a Pucini opera, and the third was the Toreador Song from Carmen.
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| singer of the mini concert |
By the way, Franz Liszt is one of the prime musicians associated with the opera hall. Although Liszt "only" spoke German, French, English, and Italian, he could not speak Hungarian. However, he is still considered Hungarian because of his devotion to the opera hall. Franz Erkel and Gustav Mahler were also directors and conductors of the music performed there. In fact, Mahler performed his Symphony Number 1 there for its premier.
So, another successful day has been spent doing the touristy things before orientation and then school begin.
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