Opera is sexual from start to finish. A century ago, George Bernard Shaw even quipped, Standard opera plot: The tenor and the soprano want to make love, but are prevented by the Baritone. The least that can be said is that the two rarely manage to love each other without one or both of them dying, as well as some collateral damage. And the type of voice does instantly designate the role in the plot of love and desire. The four tessiture (bass, alto, tenor, soprano) engrave the elements of the Oedipus Complex into the scene as clearly as in Father Knows Best: father, mother, son and daughter.
These are the voices of desire and tragedy that Michel Schneider exposes by analyzing over a dozen operas, both very well-known (Orpheus, Carmen, La Traviata, Il Trovatore) and less so (Die Tode Stadt, The Stigmatized and others).

Fifteen operas analyzed by psychoanalyst Michel Schneider, who explores the unconscious plays of desire between the characters.