Tyler Cowen weighs in on the question of why opera singing has declined (you'd noticed?) (link). I'd go with some combination of Tyler's #5 and #6--the suits don't like individuality, because they think it doesn't sell. It's the same reason every Broadway show is miked at full volume--the suits think that loud sells, even though the theatre people think it loses all individuality that way. Or the reason every Toll Brothers home has Everything you could Want in a Home and nonetheless lacks charm.
I'd offer another reason, at least for my own taste: nostalgia. I like to listen to mouldy opera disks for the same reason I read Alan Furst novels, or a lot of people watch Edwardian soapers on Mawsterpiece Theatre: a yearning for a past we never experienced (segue to Snoopy on "when this cruel war is over").
Ms. Buce suggests another possibility: it is not the moderns but the ancients that are less well trained. Nobody ever listened to Callas for technique. Less polished voices are more likely to jump off the shelf at you. I think of Bruno Walter doing Beethoven's Fifth with the Philadelphia Symphony: they sound like they are about to fall off a cliff, as if they are all saying "my God, we're playing Beethoven!" Gives the performance an urgency that you just wouldn't get in a more disciplined age (I think I got this last point from Jim Svejda (link))
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