RE: Breaking down the eras of Classical Music
The Impressionists belong to the 20th century, but being only able to have 4 choices made it pretty hard to represent everyone! Definitely, they are in my preferred end of the more modern era. I will be going back and doing more detail in each era, this was a whirlwind overview that made it hard to pick out any details.
Opera is completely tired in with this. Although, again I have a preference for the earlier time periods. Monteverdi Orfeo is considered the first real opera. But the secular operas in that period are very very closely linked to the sacred oratorio and other forms.
In addition, there is still a conflict of performance style (the stereotypical screaming giant vibrato version of the Opera singer) that clouds what people think of opera.
As a child & teenager, I certainly thought Dad's opera was a bunch of ghastly caterwauling. But then later, I began to identify specific arias that I liked a lot. I don't have a massive playlist (yet) but have started looking and find I have things from all periods. I was listening to a couple by Handel last night - Dove Sei & Ombra Mai Fu - sung by Andreas Scholl. OMG, that man's voice is such an exquisite instrument.