Verdi: Aida

[Marsch MacFiercesome]

I actually agree with you, but, intelligent singer as she is, she copes with it pretty well, better than Harteros on the new Pappano set, who I also think is a little too light for the role. Harteros makes an affecting heroine, without ever quite convincing she has the right size voice for the role. But where are the Ponselles, the Tebaldis, the Prices today? I'm not sure I can think of anyone.

God bless Pappano and Hateros for turning out such a wonderful Aida <mwwwaaaaaaaah!>- but I still feel that we're in a Silver or even a Bronze Age of singers- and not just for 'Aidas.'

When I hear Ponselle's huge column of pristine, dark, port-wine sound- or, say, Callas' psychologically compelling colorations and inflections for something like "D'amor sull'ali rosee"- singing which is so infinitely artistic and spontaneous sounding- I'm just floored beyond compare.

I can listen to these singers incessantly but never too often.

Such poignant and arresting expressivity to me is Eternal- and never goes out of fashion.

[zamyrabyrd]

"O Patria Mia" is nearly 100 years old but has an immediacy about it:
https://www.youtube.com/v/wd98BQRB5MQ

Rosa Ponselle admitted great anxiety before having to sing notes above the staff. Here the pace is sped up to the high C that she manages quite well once she gets there. Probably her voice was one that cannot exactly be categorized, as quite a few really great voices are. In her time it was nicer to admit being a soprano. At any rate the roles were usually much better.

Zb

[Tsaraslondon]

"O Patria Mia" is nearly 100 years old but has an immediacy about it:
https://www.youtube.com/v/wd98BQRB5MQ

Rosa Ponselle admitted great anxiety before having to sing notes above the staff. Here the pace is sped up to the high C that she manages quite well once she gets there. Probably her voice was one that cannot exactly be categorized, as quite a few really great voices are. In her time it was nicer to admit being a soprano. At any rate the roles were usually much better.

Zb

What a magnificent voice, though I suspect these days she might well have been classified as a mezzo. She always transposed down  Sempre libera in La Traviata, but then so did Tebaldi, and nobody would call her a mezzo. That said, Tebaldi, in interview in Luca Rasponi's book The Last of the Prima Donnas bemoans the ever rising pitch of modern orchestras, making top C, for her, more of a hurdle than it needed to be. Nor did she ever sing the Trovatore Leonora on stage, because the general tessitura of the role was just that bit too high. Ponselle did sing the role, though I have no idea whether she made transpositions in the arias.

But, as you say, why is it necessary to categorise singers? Better just to enjoy their work.

[knight66]

I do like the above description of her voice:

' Ponselle's huge column of pristine, dark, port-wine sound'

It was a formidabe voice, quite dark. Philistine that I am however, I can't take much of that vintage of recorded sound.

Mike

[zamyrabyrd]

Acoustic recording until 1925, didn't exactly do justice to a singing voice. So Ponselle should have sounded much better in person. As for the mezzo debate, I can speak from personal experience and from working with women. I have what is called a light soprano voice and high notes are no big deal for me. So it may be a question of what is called heaviness or darkness in the overall sound. These descriptions, though useful, are not scientific terms but might have something to do with relative thickness of the vocal cords.
Maybe Tebaldi was just plain lazy at times, given some of her shmeared coloratura, but she could float a long high C at the end of the first act in La Bohème.

[Marsch MacFiercesome]

"O Patria Mia" is nearly 100 years old but has an immediacy about it:
https://www.youtube.com/v/wd98BQRB5MQ

Rosa Ponselle admitted great anxiety before having to sing notes above the staff. Here the pace is sped up to the high C that she manages quite well once she gets there. Probably her voice was one that cannot exactly be categorized, as quite a few really great voices are. In her time it was nicer to admit being a soprano. At any rate the roles were usually much better.

Zb

Oh absolutely.

Equally true though is that Ponselle had this huge and overwhelmingly pristine tone that I just don't 'hear' anywhere else- except of course in early Callas.

Well, admittedly, Ponselle can be slightly firmer in tone at times, but Callas completely 'OWNS' when it comes to color, inflection, and compellingly-dramatic expressivity; the likes of which I've heard nowhere else.
   

[Marsch MacFiercesome]

I do like the above description of her voice:

' Ponselle's huge column of pristine, dark, port-wine sound'

It was a formidabe voice, quite dark. Philistine that I am however, I can't take much of that vintage of recorded sound.

Mike

I know. I'm not exactly the greatest cheerleader for austere monaural and acoustical recordings either- but then: Where else is such singing to be found?

[zamyrabyrd]

Equally true though is that Ponselle had this huge and overwhelmingly pristine tone that I just don't 'hear' anywhere else- except of course in early Callas.
Well, admittedly, Ponselle can be firmer in tone, but Callas completely 'OWNS' when it comes to color, inflection, and compellingly-dramatic expressivity; the likes of which I've heard nowhere else. 

You can try Claudia Muzio, a kind of in between Ponselle and Callas, that I suspect may have influenced the latter by way of recordings:
https://www.youtube.com/v/k0Du4qYfpWk

[Marsch MacFiercesome]

Acoustic recording until 1925, didn't exactly do justice to a singing voice. So Ponselle should have sounded much better in person. As for the mezzo debate, I can speak from personal experience and from working with women. I have what is called a light soprano voice and high notes are no big deal for me. So it may be a question of what is called heaviness or darkness in the overall sound. These descriptions, though useful, are not scientific terms but might have something to do with relative thickness of the vocal cords.
Maybe Tebaldi was just plain lazy at times, given some of her shmeared coloratura, but she could float a long high C at the end of the first act in La Bohème.

I never knew that the girth of the vocal chords had anything to do with the richness of the sound.

Can anyone 'in the know' around here expound on the physiology of why this is so?

[Marsch MacFiercesome]

You can try Claudia Muzio, a kind of in between Ponselle and Callas, that I suspect may have influenced the latter by way of recordings:
https://www.youtube.com/v/k0Du4qYfpWk

Certainly.

- Thumbs up.

Merci.  

[jochanaan]

"O Patria Mia" is nearly 100 years old but has an immediacy about it:
https://www.youtube.com/v/wd98BQRB5MQ

Rosa Ponselle admitted great anxiety before having to sing notes above the staff. Here the pace is sped up to the high C that she manages quite well once she gets there. Probably her voice was one that cannot exactly be categorized, as quite a few really great voices are. In her time it was nicer to admit being a soprano. At any rate the roles were usually much better.

Zb

Indeed a lovely voice!  I noticed that the recording sounds sharp to my ears, which means it was probably played back at a faster speed than when it was recorded, meaning that Ms. Ponselle's voice sounds less dark than it would have in the concert hall or opera house.

[zamyrabyrd]

I never knew that the girth of the vocal chords had anything to do with the richness of the sound.
Can anyone 'in the know' around here expound on the physiology of why this is so?

I don't think anyone has really compared the size or width of mezzo to soprano vocal cords but what happens with men upon maturity can give a clue: "Under the influence of androgens, the voice box, or larynx, grows in both sexes. This growth is far more prominent in boys than in girls and is more easily perceived. It causes the voice to drop and deepen. Along with the larynx, the vocal folds (vocal cords) grow significantly longer and thicker." (Wikipedia)

I often try to match up physiology with voice types. It doesn't always pan out but trilling coloraturas tend to be tiny women (e.g.,Dessay, Pons, Rita Streich, Mado Robin). Chest capacity seems to have something do with dramatic staying power. The famous English alto, Clara Butt, was a formidable woman.

But it is probably not just one of these factors that makes a higher or lower female voice but a combination. In general,  the difference between mezzo and soprano comfort zone is about the interval of a third.

[zamyrabyrd]

Indeed a lovely voice!  I noticed that the recording sounds sharp to my ears, which means it was probably played back at a faster speed than when it was recorded, meaning that Ms. Ponselle's voice sounds less dark than it would have in the concert hall or opera house.

By golly, you're right! It's about a semitone higher. No wonder I felt that some parts were faster than usual.

ZB