Dame Margaret Price

I was completely sadden to hear that Margaret Price, the incomparable Welsh Soprano, passed away recently at age 69.  When I think of all of the beautiful soprano voices I have heard,  the two Prices are at the top of my list (Leontyne being the other).

Margaret Price had a gleaming,  pure tone that always reminded me of an other worldly sound that couldn’t possibly emanate from a mere human. I first encountered her,  by chance, in Paris around 1982, when I happened upon an afternoon recital of lieder she was presenting. I was completely hooked and for years envied those in San Francisco who heard her regularly in her greatest operatic roles.

I finally heard Price at the Met where she made her debut, I believe, as Desdemona opposite Placido Domingo in Verdi’s  Otello in 1985.   I treasure, beyond all my recordings,  a radio tape I made a week later of that performance.  The Act 3 confrontation with Otello showed her, not only as a legendary voice but also a vocal actress,  who left one drained after such a performance.

I was pleased to watch,  yesterday,  an interview with her from Wigmore Hall (after she retired at the height of her career in 1999).  It further confirmed what an intelligent, dedicated singer she was to her art.

There is a You Tube of an Otello she sang with Domingo in 1976,  when both were just taking on these roles.  The sound isn’t great, but that doesn’t keep one from recognizing the she was and still is the greatest Desdemona of her era and to date.

But first listen to what she has to say about opera and the art of singing in  her interview and then watch the clip.

Interview video of interview with Margaret Price ( please copy and paste):

http://www.classicaltv.com/v943/dame-margaret-price-in-conversation

You Tube:  Dio ti giocondi, o sposo.  Otello Act 3, 1976

Jonas Kaufmann in Concert

Jonas Kaufmann sings German Arias.  43 minutes of elegance and beauty!!

Sibyl Sanderson

The Sibyl Sanderson Story is not a particularly fetching title for a book.  Perhaps it was the subtitle: Requiem for a Diva that made me reach for it in a pile at a used book store on Gough St. in San Francisco.  Somewhere in the recesses of my mind,  far too cluttered with opera trivia, Sibyl Sanderson lurked as a name….a soprano who seemed to blitz on the opera scene in the early days of Puccini…a name  I recall as one of some importance in opera…but more than that …a blank.

Over the next couple of weeks I became absorbed with a world that begins in 1864 with Sibyl’s birth in Sacramento and  ends in Paris in 1903 with her death,  just shy of age 40.  In between,  I am in Paris and the great opera centers of a gilded age,  caught in a story of intrigue, obsession, rapture and tragedy as great as any Opera of its day.  Sanderson was a fascinating woman and artist of attractive appeal, perhaps falling short in any one category,  but inhabiting a package that was irresistible.  Her story made  me relish every page.

I imagine the author,  Jack Winsor Hansen, is as interesting as his subject. He is a man who has seemingly devoted a good deal of his life collecting minutiae on a woman for whom he is obviously obsessed.  Sanderson’s story is as compelling as she must have been in real life.

This is the best opera biography I have read in years.  It makes me yearn for a similar account of the life of  Claudia Muzio,  one of the greatest sopranos ever, whose life remains shrouded in mystery and tears and awaits unfolding.

Sondra Radvanovsky and Tosca

Last night I settled in to listen on Sirius to the first Tosca of 2011 at the MET featuring the wonderful American soprano,  Sondra Radvanovsky in her debut in the role of the iconic DIVA at least at the MET.  There was a bonus to the performance  with the announcement that Roberto Alagna, tenor had been intercepted in a taxi on his way to Little Italy.  He was rushed back to the Met a couple of hours before the performance started  to step in for Marcelo Alvarez, who had decided late in the game that he was to ill to sing  Cavaradossi. All of this, of course,  just adds to the drama of opera;  but it is strange how fate sometimes plays its hand.

The Met has not yet lived down nor done much about their ridiculous  and inappropriate new staging of Tosca by Luc Bondy, so any singer is going to have to adjust to a fair amount of absurdity from the start.  The passion of the story must play through, however, no matter the staging.

I have been very impressed by Radvanovsky in the past.  As Leonora at San Francisco Opera in Trovatore in 2009,  she proved that she is a real Verdi soprano with a beautiful rich voice and a distinct sound.  Verdi is not Puccini, however,  and Bel Canto/Romantic opera is not Verismo opera;  yet Radvanovsky sang Puccini last evening….as Verdi.   There was little passion in an otherwise beautifully sung performance,  and what emotion was there was monochromatic.  That does not a Tosca make.  Perhaps, Radvanovsky  should shelve Verismo for a while and focus on the numerous Verdi roles for which she is in demand all over the world.

Tosca’s  wonderful aria of self pity,  Vissi d’arte,  is on You Tube with Radvanovsky;  it is a stunning piece of singing but lacks interpretation.   It tells us little about Tosca’s state of mind at this moment which must be swirling with  fear, anger, desperation, humiliation, love & loathing.    Would I  go to hear Radvanovsky live in this role?  In a hearbeat!!  She is an incredible artist making, in this instance, an inadequate stab at a role that all sopranos long to sing.  I will follow her progress and hope that  she improves with every try.  She may very well.

The triumph of the evening went to Alagna, who sang  with impassioned outpourings. He sounded as wonderful  as I’ve ever heard him.  The adrenalin rush that must accompany  stepping into a Met performance with no rehearsal was clearly evident last night,  and I and the Met audience gobbled it up.

Check in with Sirius,  for there are 7 more performances of Tosca at the Met with Radvanovsky and  Alvarez as scheduled;  meanwhile,  Alagna opens as Don Jose in Carmen this Thursday,  1/20,  which you can also hear broadcast  on Sirius.

Sondra Radvanovsky,  Vissi d’arte…2009

Maria Callas, Vissi d’arte 1958

SABBATICAL !

After 12 straight years of teaching A Passion for Opera at SRJC,  I have granted myself a one year sabbatical with full pay, travel and wonderful benefits!!  I announced this at the end of the 2010 Fall Class to my students,  some of whom  have been in every class I have taught!  The support, encouragement and appreciation that so many have expressed over the years  has been absolutely wonderful.

There is nothing more gratifying to me than to have 200 students in the auditorium, listening to an opera selection of my choice and falling completely silent while breathing with the music.  I’ll never be a singer or a performer, but I think I know what opera singers mean when the speak of  connecting with an audience. It’s the magic of Opera.

It is always wonderful that  wherever there is opera  (San Francisco Opera, New York, the Met in HD, Berkeley recitals)  I run in to many of you,  who stop and tell me they are now hooked on opera,  and it is my fault!  What a  compliment!  That has been my intention all along!

For those of you who attend my classes,  fear not.  I shall return and am determined in 2012 to offer   something that is very different and exciting!  In the meantime,  don’t be shy! Send me ideas of what you’d like to hear, or what kind of opera event you’d jump at the chance to be a part of.

For now,  I’ll continue to see you wherever there is opera and certainly  let you know via this blog what I hear,  see and recommend.  Stay tuned!  There are fascinating times ahead!