A History of Rigoletto at Opera North
Unpacking Opera North’s various approaches to Verdi’s opera and its depiction of disability.
Dramaturgical Prosthesis: Disability Imagery in David Pountney and Dan Potra’s The Portrait
Canes, wheelchairs, and symbolic blindness for dramatic effect?
The Paradis Files: Opera like Never Before?
This new opera is breaking ground in terms of accessibility, inclusion and disability representation in the genre.
Music and Disability Studies: Exploring the Literature
A dive into the existing literature on music and disability studies.
Disability Mimicry: Exhibition and Erasure
A first look at ‘disability mimicry’ and how it enables the simultaneous exhibition and erasure of disability on the operatic stage.
Normality and Abnormality in Zemlinsky’s Der Zwerg
Juxtaposing disabled characters alongside aesthetically normative counterparts in the operatic canon.
Kill or Cure? The Fates of Disabled Characters in the Operatic Canon
What happens to disabled characters in opera?
Lucia’s ‘Madness’: Femininity and Freedom
What does Lucia Di Lammermoor reveal about 19th-century attitudes to ‘madness’?
Auerbach’s The Blind and Disability Simulation
Considering the use of disability simulation in the 2013 production of Lera Auerbach’s ‘The Blind’.
Opera’s Narrative Prosthesis
A brief look at what is meant by Narrative Prosthesis, and how it applies to opera.
Disability in Opera – The Numbers
A closer look at the prevalence of disability in opera narratives, with the help of Blake Howe’s database of Musical Representations of Disability.