BAD BEGINNING

OPERA is an acquired taste – even for opera singers. French soprano Natalie Dessay , star of the Met’s lavish new “Lucia di Lammermoor,” told The Post’s Barbara Hoffman: “I was 15 when I saw a dress rehearsal of ‘Tristan and Isolde’ in Bordeaux, France, and it was horrible. I thought, What is this crap? . . . Some productions are so dull, I can understand people don’t want to see it.”