I just handed my pinball crown to Jesus Christ, Superstar

Yes, i do. I think Hair qualifies as the first, circa 1968. Jesus Christ Superstar was intentionally written as a "rock opera," or actually, as a "musical." Written by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber in 1970, it was intended for the stage. I don't know that Tommy really qualifies, because it is an elaboration of the song Pinball Wizard released in early 1969, before the album was put together. I don't by that mean to belittle Townsend's and Entwhistle's creative efforts, but i do believe that as a "rock opera," it was an afterthought. Quadraphenia certainly qualifies.

One of the problems that you have with the term "rock opera" is that productions take their creative cues from musical theater, and not opera. In opera, the musical score is at least as important as the song cycle of the story, and long passages of orchestral music without song accompany an opera. By contrast, "rock operas" use music as a vehicle for the song cycle, which tells the story, but the quality of the music is often less virtuosic than the productions of a group such as The Who when intent on producing high quality rock and roll. A good way to see this is to compare the music of the son Pinball Wizard to the music which accompanies the other songs of the production. In fairness to Townsend and Entwhistle, they did produce brief instrumental passages, and made an effort (not entirely successful) to extend a musical theme throughout the work. I think that Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar are straight-foward musical theater works, and were never intended by the composers as anything else.

I doubt that there really has been any such effort since the 1970s, though, and maybe only Evita qualifies--although the "rock opera" character of this other work by Rice and Webber is sufficiently diluted in the motion picture not to be recognizable as in any way related to "Rock" music. Since that time, about the only thing which comes close is Rent, which is acknowledged to be a re-working of La Bohème by Puccini.

It may just be age prejudice on my part, but i have long felt that "Rock and Roll" was irrevocably altered in the 1960s "British Invasion," the musicians of which were more influenced by R & B than by classic American rock and roll. Since that time, The Stray Cats are the only group i have known of who have attempted to recreate 50s style American Rock and Roll. Since the 1980s, things have gotten even worse, and to the point that popular musicians who did not embrace the Hip Hop movement increasingly did covers of 50s and 60s music. For example, Eddie Cochran did Last Kiss, a real potboiler of a song, in 1962, and it was covered in 1964, and that cover (don't remember who did it) went to the top of the charts. It was so cornball, though, that we made fun of it at the time it was popular. Then, about seven or eight years ago, Pearl Jam covered it, for Dog's sake. Can't they do any better than that--if you're going to do a cover, at least do a good song. Tainted Love has been covered twice lately, and including the version by Marilyn Manson. "Tribute" albums have been done for Roy Orbison, Jimi Hendrix, and even The Carpenters (with an hilarious cover of On Top of the Wordl by Shonen Knife). It seems to my jaded eyes as though there is little originality in contempory "Rock" music, and that it may being dying or already dead.

I don't expect that you'll see any more rock operas . . .


I could be wrong . . .



I was once, you know . . .





But that was almost 30 years ago . . .

What about "Rent"?

There is so much blur between the lines it is hard to tell where one format ends and the next begins.

Where does "Rock Opera" end and "Musical" begin? Where does something like Blue Man Group fit in? (They bill themselves as "multimedia theatrics"...)

Quite interesting to follow Wiki's entries for Rock opera and List of rock operas.

I must admit that I like(d) all their 60's entries but never had thought to file them in such a way :wink:

I mentioned that as a re-working of Puccini's La Bohème. As to a category, i'd put it in musical theater. But then, i'd put all of them in the category of musical theater rather than opera.

So you did, sorry.

Our culture, pop or otherwise, still to this day revolves in large part around the "Baby Boomers", if they were to collectively make it a point that a new rock opera....in the vain of "Tommy" was seriously wanted...I'm sure there would be at least three issued by the major studios immediately...one would be excellent, a plethora of oscar nominations....one would be...eh, so so...then the other would go direct to video. Ala, Wyatt Earp/Tombstone/and I don't remember the title of the really cheap one....something like...Guy With Big Gun.

Telling a story with the aid of music, or using music to tell a story, different, but very similar concepts. "The Big Chill" was released in 83, and there was such a buzz about the film and soundtrack, it seems that's all I remember about that year....that damn movie and the music contained within. When I finally made myself watch it, all I got from it was....."It's a bunch of 30somethings setting around talking about themselves...pffft." And to top it off, they made a tv series actually called 30 Something, so the Big Chill fans could get more of the same. I did sort of like the character...Peter?....the one with the long hair, he was cool looking....I think they shot him though.

Anyway, since the "Chill" {and maybe before, just basing this on my personal observations} I think this type of...music heavy movie has filled the niche of the now absent rock opera. I can think of several movies...usually written about a previous decade, where the soundtrack goes far beyond it's intention. Dirty Dancing, being the one I had to suffer thru the most, every single girl in my high school played that ST to death....and knew every single piece of dialog....well, the white ones anyway, the "sistas" were above that nonsense, they were listening to the ST of what I consider to be the far better film, and actually rock operaish....Purple Rain.

As the Boomers...the true children of rock...and the artists of that era grew into adulthood, they left the days of Hair, Tommy, RHPS..etc behind forever. The next batch of teenagers coming up....the Xers....me...just didn't dig it, no market, no more rock opera....but as I stated earlier...what Tommy and Hair did for you guys, Purple Rain and Dirty Dancing did for my g-g-g-generation. So, I don't consider it totally dead, just evolved.


Meatloaf is still around, and no doubt could still pull off a decent one, some of his videos from "Bat Out Of Hell 2" were simply short rock operas.

Randy Rhodes, before he died was experimenting with a classical/metal mix, he had the background and the talent.

Axl Rose, before he caught the "I am A Genius Rock God" bug, was heading in that direction, and just might surprise us someday with a true authentic rock opera...being a Genius Rock God is time consuming though, so don't hold your breath.

After reading Set's comments.....some of the films I mentioned...RHPS and such....would be more accurately described as rock musicals, but in my defense....rock opera sounds better than my usual term....Hippi Crap.


The Habanera, from Carmen is one of the most powerful pieces of music I own. Someone has probably beefed it up with some metal guitar, perhaps Manheim Steamroller has done it and I just haven't heard it...but if Rhodes had lived long enough, I'm sure he would have wrapped his fingers around Carmen, or at least parts of it. It had to be high on his list of classical/opera pieces to rip the **** out of.

I was thinking about this, and the distinction i would make is that opera is a case of a libretto, a story, being the vehicle for orchestral music, whereas musical theater (and by extension, from this definition, "rock opera") is a case of music being a vehicle for a story. It's a matter of whether the emphasis is on the story or the music.

Look at all these lovely answers! I've been laid up the last couple of days with some brain syphoning mighty morphing resperatory nonsense but can almost now give the responses their deserved attention. Bear with me......

Three other "obvious operas" came into my mind:

Arthur, The Kinks
The Wall, Pink Floyd
Joe's Garage, Frank Zappa

Now that I have rejoined the land of the living....

This is all very interesting. I've never really thought of productions like "Jesus Christ, Superstar" as musical theater because it was really all done in song with little dialoge stringing it together. You could listen to the album and get the exact same story as you did from a stage production.

I am not well versed in opera or theater. I've never been to an opera and have only seen two musical stage productions - years ago - "Grease" and "Candide".

If memory serves, "Grease" (which was very different from the movie version) was a play with musical interludes strung together by dialoge which moved the story along.

"Candide" might, I suppose, be called Opera-light because the only speaking was as introduction to song, and accompanied by a score.

"Tommy", for instance, followed the "Candide" pattern.

I don't really know anything about "Rent". Could someone fill me in?

I think I'm getting more confused about the distinctions between musical theater and opera (rock or otherwise)

Walter's link does list Green Day's "American Idiot" as a rock opera so maybe the genre isn't dead yet.