GMG Classical Music Forum

The Music Room => Opera and Vocal => Topic started by: Maciek on April 22, 2007, 02:50:38 PM

Title: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Maciek on April 22, 2007, 02:50:38 PM
Another call for recommendations. (Last one today, I promise. ;))

Quite an amazing singer, I believe, but I've only heard very little from her. What are your thoughts in general, and specific record recommendations please... ;D

Cheers,
Maciek
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Anne on April 22, 2007, 03:03:38 PM
I have the DVD of Handel's Julius Caesar with Janet Baker and like it.  The set is traditional if that matters to you.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Novi on April 22, 2007, 03:23:16 PM
This one:
(http://www.virginmegastores.co.uk/content/ebiz/virgin/invt/4./r./w./222850/222850_m.jpg)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: AnthonyAthletic on April 22, 2007, 03:30:37 PM
Definately these, Ok the third one Mahler's Resurrection is worth the price of the cd alone just to hear Baker sing "Urlicht", closely miked for sure but what a brilliant display, amazing vocal and devastating power.

The Berlioz & Purcell speak for themselves, classics.

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 22, 2007, 03:31:09 PM
Where to start, probably my favourite singer, she excelled in so many things and rarely strayed into music that was unsuitable. An instance of her self knowledge was that she refused repeated requests by Scottish Opera to sing Carmen. She can be dramatic, tender, spiritual, tragic.

Here is a list of some of her best recordings.....

In Berlioz she was as good as anyone. Her Dido in Troyans was celebrated, but never fully recorded. Here she sings the final section of the opera together with a riveting performance of the early cantata Cleopatra, listen to how she empties her tone out when the moment of death arrives. You also get one of the top Les Nuits d'ete crammed onto the disc.

http://www.cdconnection.com/details/Dame_Janet_Baker__Berlioz:Les_Nuits_DEte/905453

(http://www.conjunction.com/covers/905453.jpg)

The next one is a conflation of several LPs. Bach and Handel singing of the very best. It is a double album.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bach-Handel-Cantatas-Johann-Sebastian/dp/B00005B5NN/ref=sr_1_27/026-2800580-8030813?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1177283977&sr=1-27
(http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/41A31H39EJL._SS500_.jpg)

If you can take Elgar's Dream of Gerontius, then her singing of the Angel is the touchstone for all other singers. The conductor is Barbirolli. I know it ought to be available with her recording of The Sea Pictures coupling it, but I can't find that specific issue just now, though I can find the Gerontius on its own.

She also excelled in Mahler. Her partnership with the elderly Barbirolli brought out his Indian Summer and all the recordings he made with her were special. Here two LP issues make one CD. The three main song cycles in magical performances.

(http://www.conjunction.com/covers/65022.jpg)

In Schubert she was sought for concert engagements all over the world.EMI issued this double disc that includes a double LP from early in her career and a much later recital, it is another must have. She uses an astonishing range of tone colour.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Schubert-Lieder-Franz/dp/B000002SEJ/ref=sr_1_5/026-2800580-8030813?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1177284501&sr=1-5

(http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/41EHTVCMD3L._SS500_.jpg)

I could go on and on, English songs, Mozart, Gluck, Britten.....

Oh, yes, that early Dido and Aneas on Decca is absolutely unforgettable.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Maciek on April 22, 2007, 03:38:52 PM
Mike, what can I say - your enthusiasm is highly contagious! :D You can definitely communicate it very well - I feel like storming a record storm and cleaning it of all Baker recordings this very instant! ;D Thank you so much for the recommendations!

Maciek
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: 71 dB on April 23, 2007, 02:35:02 AM
Quote from: knight on April 22, 2007, 03:31:09 PM
If you can take Elgar's Dream of Gerontius, then her singing of the Angel is the touchstone for all other singers. The conductor is Barbirolli. I know it ought to be available with her recording of The Sea Pictures coupling it, but I can't find that specific issue just now, though I can find the Gerontius on its own.

Sea Pictures can be found on this issue with Cello Concerto and Cockaigne Overture

(http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/4362/413evcz5dvlaa240cp0.jpg) (http://imageshack.us)


Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: val on April 23, 2007, 04:24:02 AM
To me, one of the greatest artists of the century.

The unforgettable Dido, in Purcell's Dido & Aeneas, directed by Anthony Lewis.

The Diana in Cavalli's La Calisto, directed by Leppard.

Vittelia in Mozart's La Clemenza di Tito, directed by Collin Davis.

And the Lieder: Schubert, with an unforgettable Suleika, Brahms, (perhaps her best recordings), Mahler and Elgar (with Barbirolli).

And Bach: in spite of Klemperer, heavy and massive, the most sublime Agnus Dei of the Mass in B minor.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Drasko on April 23, 2007, 05:04:19 AM
http://www.amazon.com/Das-Lied-Erde-Gustav-Mahler/dp/B00006JJ3B (http://www.amazon.com/Das-Lied-Erde-Gustav-Mahler/dp/B00006JJ3B)

Her Das Lied von der Erde with Kubelik is one of the best there is (perhaps even the)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 23, 2007, 05:35:49 AM
Difficult to pick a poor recording of hers. I have all that have so far been mentioned. One I think to avoid would be the Berlioz Childhood of Christ, she was at this point singing sharp and I simply could not endure it...so out it went.

Another fine disc, Mahler Knaben Wunderhorn under Wyn Morris, she has such superb breath control and her voice is at its freshest. Yet another early disc, for Saga this time, is her best recording of Schumman's Frauenliebe und Leben. She makes every emotion believeable and palpable.

She was also a great team player and she makes great effect in many operas and choral works, for instance... Britten's Spring Symphony, (Previn) and in Tippet's Child of our Time. (Colin Davis)

She uses the words so tellingly and colours them so well, you know much of the meaning from her tone.

I was long ago in Chorus when she was singing Jocasta in Oedipus Rex, the BBC recorded it, but it has not surfaced. That was dramatic and hieratic. Also her one aria, Song of the Wood dove from Gurrelieder becomes an overwhelmingly tragic scena.

(http://g-ec2.images-amazon.com/images/I/517K16Q9PYL._SS500_.jpg)

On that disc is a daringly slow, hypnotic version of the Berlioz conducted by Guilini. It works and she has the astonishing breath control to cope with the tempi and is daring in the way she will pare down her tone to a thread in a live performance. Nevertheless, she would be heard at the back of the hall. I heard her do this magical projection many times.

Finally for now, her recording of the Bach Cantata 170 Vergnugte ruh is astonishing in its tenderness and she unfurls the enormously long melodies as though she was inventing them, a memorable performace.

Mike



Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Maciek on April 23, 2007, 05:53:29 AM
Mike, stop!!! You're making me SOOOOOO greedy!!! ;D >:D
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Hector on April 23, 2007, 06:17:16 AM
Don't forget the Kempe public performance of Das Lied von der Erde.

An improvement on her commercial recording with Haitink.

However, you have to put up with a poor tenor but does anyone, seriously, buy a recording of this work for the tenor role?
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: SimonGodders on April 23, 2007, 01:54:14 PM
I have the famous Sea Pictures on the Elgar/Du Pre CD and adore it. Have you any opinions on this set? Does it contain key recordings/suggestions thus far or rarities?:

(http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/41BSR7RNMDL._SS500_.jpg)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: SimonGodders on April 23, 2007, 02:03:57 PM
Some more information here:
http://www.deccaclassics.com/music/originalmasters/475161.html
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 23, 2007, 11:27:55 PM
Simon,

I do have that set and it does have quite a bit on it that is not available elsewhere. Baker was an exclusive EMI artist for some years. They fell out over the company refusing to lend her to DGG to enable her and Fischer Dieskau to record the complete Schubert solo songs between them. Seemingly she got quite bitter about it. Gundula Janowitz recorded the female songs instead, but I don't think they have never been issued as an integrated set as had been envisaged.

She took the opportunity to alter her contract at renewal and she started to record for Phillips, also continuing with EMI. This box contains a series of excellent recital discs and on the lists you can see what she recorded. A lot is not available via EMI. Some is from her early Decca days before she went to EMI. Seemingly Decca and EMI did do a deal to enable the La Calisto to be issued as by then she did belong to EMI.

The final disc of mainly 20th cent French music is a very successful disc. There are also nuggets burried there such as Beethoven's Ah perfido.

More from Cosi Fan Tutti would have been welcome. Colin Davis recording was the first complete version and while the women sound terrific, the male singers are a bit of a trial.

The set is well worth getting.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: SimonGodders on April 24, 2007, 03:15:46 AM
Mike,

Many thanks for your most erudite reply! It's probably a bit of a 'no-brainer' as they say, as Amazon UK currently have it for just under £12 for the five discs. So I shall go forth and purchase...

Cheers,
Simon
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 24, 2007, 03:24:48 AM
Simon, A good bargain indeed, do let us know what you think of the discs.

Cheers,

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Susan de Visne on April 24, 2007, 08:13:52 AM
I enjoy Janet Baker's recordings, but the only time I saw her live (a recital of English songs) I was very disappointed. She seemd to have an air of sturdy common sense that somehow missed the poetry, though there was nothing wrong with her actual singing.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 24, 2007, 09:24:41 AM
Well, it is good to read the other side of it, for sure some do not like her. I saw her in recital a number of times, she seemed to fit unobtrusively into the stage and I thought she communicated very strongly. But diferent strokes for different folks. ZB has not been by, but I know she feels Baker lays on the tone painting over what ought to be the basic voice. I don't agree, but it is a point of view. She is not universally admired.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Michel on April 24, 2007, 09:57:22 AM
Although Tony recommended Purcell's Dido, there are better recordings. My understanding and once I bought it, appreciation, of the recording is that the aria is the absolutely wondrous part, with the rest of it much less convincing, particularly the music. It is often cheap, though, so why not get it? Although in saying that there are better CD's to experience her voice, isn't there?
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 24, 2007, 10:05:22 AM
I don't altogether disagree. I have heard probably a dozen recordings and none come close in the final quarter of an hour. There are better performances overall, using orig. instruments. She is not better on other discs, but on many you get more of her.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: zamyrabyrd on April 24, 2007, 10:13:49 AM
Quote from: knight on April 24, 2007, 09:24:41 AM
Well, it is good to read the other side of it, for sure some do not like her. I saw her in recital a number of times, she seemed to fit unobtrusively into the stage and I thought she communicated very strongly. But diferent strokes for different folks. ZB has not been by, but I know she feels Baker lays on the tone painting over what ought to be the basic voice. I don't agree, but it is a point of view. She is not universally admired.

Mike

Hi Knight, I'm a "Newbie" now!!!

Er, that were Hunt-Lieberson who started out as a soprano but decided to concentrate on lower repertoire as far as I know. Janet Baker has shown herself to be a true mezzo, no doubt about that. Of course, singers can be flexible and the dramatic soprano has the advantage of doing Carmen and/or Leonore. I personally don't think it's a good idea to venture beyond one's most comfortable centre MOST OF THE TIME. One CAN hear the seams or the forced colouring.

Recently, this came to mind hearing Victoria de los Angeles on TV.  She presented herself as a soprano (as this was the most accepted and popular type for women back then) but my teacher a long time ago said that she was really a mezzo. Soprano simply doesn't sound or feel like her comfort zone, although she managed to do a beautiful Boheme.  Then, again, Anna Moffo recorded a splendid Carmen. I don't know if in her prime Moffo would have been able to do it night after night.

ZB
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 24, 2007, 10:21:00 AM
Carmen is a strange one, Callas, Leontine Price, Troyanos, Berganza, Horne, de los Angeles, Bumbry, Gheorghiu, Jessye Norman,....just a few of those who have recorded it. What a range of voices rich mezzo to soprano. I cannot think of another major role that attracts such a variety of singers.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: zamyrabyrd on April 24, 2007, 03:09:47 PM
Quote from: knight on April 24, 2007, 10:21:00 AM
Carmen is a strange one, Callas, Leontine Price, Troyanos, Berganza, Horne, de los Angeles, Bumbry, Gheorghiu, Jessye Norman,....just a few of those who have recorded it. What a range of voices rich mezzo to soprano. I cannot think of another major role that attracts such a variety of singers.


At least, Carmen should be a role that mezzos can call their own without sopranos grabbing it as well.

ZB
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on April 25, 2007, 01:26:18 AM
I would go along with all the recommendations so far. I have almost all of them, and sometimes wonder if she ever made a bad disc. I would also add one from Pentatone

(http://shop.castleclassics.co.uk/acatalog/PTC5186134.jpg)

This is a wonderful disc, which has on it quite the best performance of Sesto's arias from La Clemenza di Tito that I have heard. She tosses of the technical difficulties of Parto! Parto! with an ease that would be the envy of many a mezzo, whilst uncovering an emotional depth outside the range of most of them.

I would also recommend the earlier of her 2 live performances of Maria Stuarda on Ponto

(http://cover6.cduniverse.com/MuzeAudioArt/580/586549.jpg)

Not that the later one on Chandos is bad, but this one finds her in fresher, easier voice.

And from about the same time, an often forgotten set on EMI's Gemini label. Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi, on which she is a fabulous Romeo.

(http://images.bol.de/images-adb/c5/87/c5873704-9800-4284-8fd0-e3402c6788c6.jpg)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 25, 2007, 01:41:59 AM
We can just keep adding!

The complete Clemenza di Tito conducted by Colin Davis still stands up well. She is Vitellia and really shows the implacable side of the character. The cast is utterly first rate.

Britten's Rape of Lucretia has her sounding fresh and innocent, full of joy, then frightened, angry and in numb dispair. She really takes you on a journey and again basically everything about the recording is first rate.

On Ponto there is a live Rosenkavalier from Scottish Opera, she comes up to the Fassbaender quality for the role of Octavian. It is in English and there is a filler of her singing live, again for Scot. Opera, the Composer music from Ariadne.

BBC have recently brought out a superb Brahms song disc, it has about 25 songs and she goes through a good many moods and injects humour where appropriate.

Solti did a recording for RCA of the Verdi Requiem, she is partnered by Leontine Price. Despite enjoying Price immensely, when you listen to Baker, you hear a quantum leap in how to make the words meaningful.

Enough for now, as you might imagine I can go on...and on.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: George on April 25, 2007, 03:49:43 AM

For those who do not have her Purcell/Dido CD, just check out these prices! (http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B00004C8TE/ref=dp_olp_2/104-2949723-2736732?ie=UTF8&qid=1177501442&sr=1-1)  :o

I just got a new copy for .99!!!
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on April 25, 2007, 07:51:37 AM
An absurd amount when you think what little else such an amount can normally buy.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: George on April 25, 2007, 08:09:37 AM
Quote from: knight on April 25, 2007, 07:51:37 AM
An absurd amount when you think what little else such an amount can normally buy.

Mike

Indeed.

But why is it so cheap? I've never seen anything on amazon so cheap, especially new.  :-\
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Maciek on April 25, 2007, 11:03:36 AM
I bought mine on e-bay and I think the price was the same (Amazon marketplace doesn't ship to barbarous countries such as Poland).
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Drasko on April 26, 2007, 03:03:14 AM
Quote from: MrOsa on April 25, 2007, 11:03:36 AM
I bought mine on e-bay and I think the price was the same (Amazon marketplace doesn't ship to barbarous countries such as Poland).

No way, you're merely semi-barbarous at best, I can't even get a paypal account from here  :P
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Maciek on April 26, 2007, 03:13:36 AM
No way! Man, that sucks! We should start a mass protest or something. What do those guys think? Do they even think at all? Do they think Slavic countries are still stuck in the Middle Ages or something? Apparently THEY themselves are! (Ha, that felt good! 0:)) That's just so irritating!

(Another thing that irritates me even more is the amazon.co.uk system, where they have two "categories" of European countries - of course Poland is in category no. 2 and the shipping fees are more or less the same as to America... :o)

How I hate those western imperialist capitalist imbeciles! ;)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on May 05, 2007, 08:47:51 AM
Just found this on youtube. Quite wonderful!



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJzvqX_phcE (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJzvqX_phcE)

Actually, if you follow the links at the side, you'll see that the rest of Nuis d'Ete is on there too.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on May 05, 2007, 11:43:46 AM
Also the final aria from Dido and Aneas. It is amazing what turns up there. This one was added 18th April 07. She was always so concentrated, even in concert.

I am finding a nice clutch of newly posted performances, even some Saint Saens in English. Also some Schubert songs have been added.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on May 05, 2007, 02:15:50 PM
Quote from: knight on May 05, 2007, 11:43:46 AM
Also the final aria from Dido and Aneas. It is amazing what turns up there. This one was added 18th April 07. She was always so concentrated, even in concert.

I am finding a nice clutch of newly posted performances, even some Saint Saens in English. Also some Schubert songs have been added.

Mike

I've been enjoying them too, Mike. The performance of Absence had me in tears. Truly.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: stingo on May 06, 2007, 03:32:32 PM
A bit pricey at amazon, but very fine discs: Mahler 3rd/Ruckert Lieder (Baker) - LSO/Tilson Thomas

(http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/516YGR312NL._AA240_.jpg) (http://www.amazon.com/Mahler-Symphony-No-3-Ruckert-Lieder/dp/B0000026O1/ref=sr_1_2/104-2213491-8154320?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1178494164&sr=8-2)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: jochanaan on May 07, 2007, 01:45:44 PM
Quote from: zamyrabyrd on April 24, 2007, 03:09:47 PM
At least, Carmen should be a role that mezzos can call their own without sopranos grabbing it as well.
I agree.  It really needs a mezzo's resonance and darkness.  And after all, I wouldn't seriously try to play English horn parts on the oboe (although before I had an English horn, I sometimes did since no one else around had one either :-[), so I can't see why sopranos just can't be content with all their juicy heroines! ;D

As for Janet Baker, I simply cannot imagine a greater Mahler singer, or one with greater flexibility in general.  Hmmm...now I'll have to get out that old Barbirolli LP! :D And the Haitink DLvdE too.

(Does anyone have any recommendations for DLvdE recordings with great tenors?  Did Siegfried Jerusalem ever record it?)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on May 07, 2007, 09:44:49 PM
Yes Jerusalem recorded it with Levine and the mezzo songs on the recording are sung by Jessye Norman, I think it is an all round great disc. Though it would have been better for Jerusalem to have recordred it a bit earlier, he is the closest I know to Wunderlich, but he does more with the words.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Sean on May 08, 2007, 09:00:11 AM
Baker is exceptionally sensitive, her Elgar is unsurpassed, but usually approaching the too careful- based on an insecurity and class position she knew was a heap of ****, and which partly explains her early retirement. A self-conscious singer harbouring deep seated tensions (fine in Mahler).
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on May 08, 2007, 09:11:55 AM
Well, I suppose that is an opinion, though I wonder what your evidence is. She seemed very secure in who she was and retired deliberately at the top of her game as she had no intention of doing a Caballe where you go to her concerts and try to remember what the voice was like in its glory days. Also she said she was tired of the tredmill, of having to keep herself trim for stage parts and she wanted more time just to be rather than to serve singing.

Why would she be fine in Elgar and Mahler; but by implication not other composers? Her Bach, Handel, Monteverdi, Britten, Berlioz, Brahms, Gluck, Richard Strauss, Faure, Mozart....etc, etc...all highly regarded in most quarters.

Mike

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Sean on May 08, 2007, 09:22:09 AM
Knight, sure, her BWV 159 & 170 recording is entirely in a class of its own, as is the Four Serious songs and Lucretia: but there is a self-consciousness and uncertainty throughout, no? You obviously know her work well though.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on May 08, 2007, 09:31:23 AM
Some people do find her self conscious and this falls into the same category of argument that Schwartzkopf was arch or too knowing. An opinion and I just happen not to share it. However I am at a loss to discern in what way she evinces uncertainty. She was very willing to take risks in live concerts, but that was a springboard from where she was always very well prepared. So I don't understand where there would be grounds for what you suggest.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Sean on May 08, 2007, 09:43:58 AM
knight

QuoteSome people do find her self conscious and this falls into the same category of argument that Schwartzkopf was arch or too knowing.

I like that. Isn't music complex?!

QuoteAn opinion and I just happen not to share it. However I am at a loss to discern in what way she evinces uncertainty. She was very willing to take risks in live concerts, but that was a springboard from where she was always very well prepared. So I don't understand where there would be grounds for what you suggest.

Okay, I'm just a bit prejudiced perhaps towards people with the dispositions of her social background... I think there's much to be said for blending in while also being yourself, and Baker didn't always achieve that...
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on May 08, 2007, 09:51:40 AM
Well, you have got me interested, in what way did she behave un-naturally? She retained her Lancashire accent. She was not part of the gliterati, rather serious minded in some ways, however she did evince a good sense of humour. So what examples are you thinking about?

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Sean on May 08, 2007, 10:04:39 AM
Well perhaps I wish I were more an expert in this area but her delivery always sounds on shakey ground, not in terms of technique but as though she was intelligent enough to sense that her training and opportunities were her first reference point, and the previleged English social context in which she sang and promoted her was, basically, an absolute pack of lies.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on May 08, 2007, 10:07:34 AM
I don't even begin to 'get' this or grasp how you discern it; but never mind....you are keeping my posting count up.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Sean on May 08, 2007, 10:09:34 AM
No prob, I'm a bit inebriated myself actually. Will try again tomorrow...How about some Margaret Price for some welcome fresh air?
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on May 08, 2007, 10:15:35 AM
Quote from: Sean on May 08, 2007, 10:09:34 AM
No prob, I'm a bit inebriated myself actually. Will try again tomorrow...How about some Margaret Price for some welcome fresh air?

Well, now we have the explanation, it was either that or your inner genius shining through.

Why not start a Margaret Price thread tomorrow!!

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on May 08, 2007, 03:19:53 PM
Quote from: Sean on May 08, 2007, 09:22:09 AM
Knight, sure, her BWV 159 & 170 recording is entirely in a class of its own, as is the Four Serious songs and Lucretia: but there is a self-consciousness and uncertainty throughout, no? You obviously know her work well though.

I am at a loss to understand what you mean by her uncertainty. I heard Dame Janet live on many occasions, and on none of them was there any cause for concern, her grasp of the music being absolutely complete. I only once heard her when she was not in her best voice, and even then, there was no doubt about the intent of her singing and, although her voice wasn't responding as well as she wanted it to, she still took risks. As Mike says, she retired at the top of her game. We never had to witness a sad decline in her powers, as we do with many other singers.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: jochanaan on May 08, 2007, 04:29:22 PM
Sean, what you seem to see as "uncertainty," I see as probing deeply into the music, the lyrics and their underlying psychology.  No singer penetrated a song's musico-dramatic soul more.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Sean on May 09, 2007, 12:39:47 AM
Okay Tsaraslondon & Jochanaan, she's a fine artistic to be sure, with great attention to every detail: the key though, needless to say, is to keep the studiousness at the service of the music's intuitive flow, which she often does.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on August 25, 2009, 02:00:38 AM
I have just finished listening to Baker's recording of Mahler orchestral songs (Kindertotenlieder, Ruckert Lieder and Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen) with Barbirolli, and am now of the firm belief that this is the very greatest of all Baker's recital records, maybe even the greatest of all orchestral lieder recitals. Tomorrow, admittedly, conviction may be a little shakey, but for now, shattered by the emotional intensity of the singing, belief seems unswerving.

I have had this disc in my collection for over 20 years now, and have listened to it many times, but, for some reason, hadn't taken it off the shelves for a while. I was prompted to do so after listening to Karajan's recording of Mahler's 6th, for which the couplings are Christa Ludwig's recordings of Kindertotenlieder and the Ruckert Lieder. Now Ludwig has her rich and beautiful voice, is by no means a placid interpreter, and sings with rare dignity and poise, but somewhere in my mind's ear, I could hear a greater dramatic truth, a more personal way with the songs, and so Baker came down off the shelves. From the very first note of Nun will die Sonn' so hell aufgehn, there is an intensity of utterance missing from Ludwig's more generalised approach. Not everything goes Baker's way, admittedly. I prefer Karajan's more propulsive tempo for In diesem Wetter, in diesem Braus, and Ferrier and Walter are more sheerly dramatic in Um Mitternacht, but in Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen, Baker and Barbirolli are unrivalled, her singing here so tender so self communing. I once heard Baker sing the Ruckert Lieder at a concert at the RFH, and then, as now, she had me in tears, so moving is her response to the poetry. She had this remarkable gift of being able to sing the quietest of pianissimi, that somehow seemed to reach the furthest recesses of a large hall.

The Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen too are classics. One thinks of the lovely, smiling tone she uses for Ging heut morgen ubers Feld and the intense pain of the repeated cries of oh Weh in Ich hab' ein gluhend Messer. So, yes, without doubt a great recording, It certainly deserves to be included in EMI's Great Recordings of the Century series, and I urge all lovers of Mahler and/or Baker to acquire it.

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on July 31, 2011, 01:43:21 PM
I have just found this on Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7uAxFcmexU&playnext=1&list=PL612D40A0A3B9D432

Baker as Cassandra in Trojans in English. What sweep she achieves and boy does she dig into those words.

In this month's Gramophone there is a big article on the Abbey Rd studios. Amongst the many people who they quote; Baker explains that her favourite recording made there was the Wagner Wesendonk Lieder. Despite being outside of her normal repertoire she felt the sessions achieved something special.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6exIFuxbv-s

Mike

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on August 01, 2011, 03:25:18 AM
Quote from: knight66 on July 31, 2011, 01:43:21 PM
I have just found this on Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7uAxFcmexU&playnext=1&list=PL612D40A0A3B9D432

Baker as Cassandra in Trojans in English. What sweep she achieves and boy does she dig into those words.

In this month's Gramophone there is a big article on the Abbey Rd studios. Amongst the many people who they quote; Baker explains that her favourite recording made there was the Wagner Wesendonk Lieder. Despite being outside of her normal repertoire she felt the sessions achieved something special.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6exIFuxbv-s

Mike

The Wagner I have known many years ago. I would agree with her that the sessions did achieve something special, but then so many of her recordings do.

The Cassandra is a revelation - and I think, despite it being in English, the fullest realisation of this scene I have heard.

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: zamyrabyrd on August 01, 2011, 10:35:54 AM
Strophic music is notoriously difficult to register differences between stanzas as the music doesn't always reflect or even follow the words. I find Régine Crespin more convincing in Villanelle than many singers because I believe she is feeling the words and not just marking time from one stanza to the other:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOoDzJPrNPg&feature=related

In this recording of Villanelle with Janet Baker I don't find a lot of nuances and word coloring. That is what I was getting at in my other post. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-bu2OeHYkY&feature=related

But as our learned friend, knight66, already has remarked, people do hear differently...

ZB

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on August 01, 2011, 01:18:51 PM
I always thought Villanelle, the least successful of the songs in all Dame Janet's versions of Les Nuits d'Ete, and here it is taken at a much faster tempo than on any of her other recordings. In this song, she doesn't altogether avoid the trap of sounding a little arch.

The Crespin version you detail is not available in the UK, so the only one I have for comparison is the commercial recording with Ansermet. This version of the cycle has been widely praised over the years, and is still commonly held to be the best version available. However I don't find it so. I don't find that much sense of Crespin feeling the words, as you put it, in the version with Ansermet, and in much of the rest of the cycle I find her laboured and earth bound, particularly in Le Spectre De La Rose, which is heavily sung with no sense of mounting rapture whatsoever.

But as you say, we all hear differently...

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Mandryka on August 14, 2011, 09:29:52 AM
I've been enjoying Dawn Upshaw's recording of Fauré's Chanson d'Eve and I want to explore what other singers have made of this music – which I like a lot. What  do you think of Janet Baker's Hyperion CD?

Other suggestions for this cycle gratefully appreciated!
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on October 08, 2011, 01:07:38 PM
Dame Janet has been awarded Gramophone's Lifetime Achievement award.

Here is the link to a short article about her by pianist Graham Johnson http://www.gramophone.co.uk/awards/2011/lifetime-achievement (http://www.gramophone.co.uk/awards/2011/lifetime-achievement)

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Daverz on October 08, 2011, 02:24:02 PM
[Damon Runyon voice]
What a dame!
[/Damon Runyon voice]


Quote from: Hector on April 23, 2007, 06:17:16 AM
Don't forget the Kempe public performance of Das Lied von der Erde.

An improvement on her commercial recording with Haitink.

However, you have to put up with a poor tenor but does anyone, seriously, buy a recording of this work for the tenor role?

There is one recording that I would recommend for the tenor alone (and the conductor), the Sanderling recording with Peter Schreier and a completely forgettable alto.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on October 08, 2011, 10:18:14 PM
Good to see Janet Baker being given the award; mind you, it would have been more timely over 10 years ago as now as for many years she has confined herself to teaching and sitting in juries in competitions.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: zamyrabyrd on October 11, 2011, 03:35:02 AM
I'll stay out of this one...
...from another Janet
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Guido on December 02, 2011, 03:11:15 PM
This is amazing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_x0zPRT3iwE&feature=channel_video_title

Didn't know she really did Bel Canto rep. Truly wonderful though.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on December 03, 2011, 04:33:08 AM
Quote from: Guido on December 02, 2011, 03:11:15 PM
This is amazing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_x0zPRT3iwE&feature=channel_video_title

Didn't know she really did Bel Canto rep. Truly wonderful though.

Her New York debut was, I believe, in a concert performance of Anna Bolena as Smeton. She also recorded a superb Romeo in I Capuleti e i Montecchi with Sills (now available on EMI Gemini).

Her Maria Stuarda at ENO had been a huge success when she first sang it there, with Pauline Tinsley as Elizabeth, in 1973, and it was one of the three roles she chose to sing in the year of her final farewell to opera. The others were Alceste at Covent Garden, and Orfeo ed Euridice at Glyndebourne. She did of course continue to sing as a concert artist for quite a few years after that.



Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on December 11, 2012, 02:59:27 PM
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51vG72MfbpL._SL500_AA300_.jpg)

This is a great set. 5 very well filled discs of great music making.

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: zamyrabyrd on December 12, 2012, 01:35:41 AM
Quote from: Guido on December 02, 2011, 03:11:15 PM
This is amazing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_x0zPRT3iwE&feature=channel_video_title
Didn't know she really did Bel Canto rep. Truly wonderful though.

Apparently, the vid was taken down on the above link. However, there was another that may or may not have been the same performance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOjx9ixYrmU

Done in English for the ENO, in my opinion, is more verismo than Bel Canto and I would say the same of Sills. Also it seems to be a full tone lower than usual for sopranos. The problem in doing such music other than the original, and a non-Romance one to boot, is the reduced possibility for tone coloring via pure vowels. It actually sounds like another piece in another key and language.

Joan Sutherland, the true Queen of this opera:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMau-hBYhVU

ZB
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on December 12, 2012, 06:32:42 AM
Quote from: zamyrabyrd on December 12, 2012, 01:35:41 AM
Apparently, the vid was taken down on the above link. However, there was another that may or may not have been the same performance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOjx9ixYrmU

Done in English for the ENO, in my opinion, is more verismo than Bel Canto and I would say the same of Sills. Also it seems to be a full tone lower than usual for sopranos. The problem in doing such music other than the original, and a non-Romance one to boot, is the reduced possibility for tone coloring via pure vowels. It actually sounds like another piece in another key and language.

Joan Sutherland, the true Queen of this opera:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMau-hBYhVU



ZB

Actually Dame Janet was performing the mezzo version, prepared by Donizetti himself for Maria Malibran, and in which the part of Elizabeth is taken by a soprano, as it was in the ENO prodcuction (Pauline Tinsley in the first production, Rosalind Plowright in the revival). ENO perform all operas in the vernacular, whether they were written in German, French, Italian or any other language, so we should hardly criticise her for that.

As usual, Sutherland is, well, Sutherland, and it doesn't really make much difference what language she is singing in. She doesn't make any use of the words at all.  Her response to the music is the same as it would be for any of the other bel canto roles she sang. We have had this discussion before a propos of Callas's more dramatic way with bel canto music, but, if contemporary reports of Guiditta Pasta, who created many of these roles, are to be believed, she too put drama at the forefront of her interpretations.

I really don't understand your criticism of Baker's singing being versimo (she never sang a verismo role in her life, by the way). She introduces no glottal stops, no aspirates, no sudden bulges in the line, tricks so beloved of the verismo singer. She sings what is written in the score, her legato is excellent (like Sutherland she was once a mainstay of the Handel Opera Society), but makes far more of it dramatically than Sutherland, which is precisely what these composers wanted. Again I refer you to contemporary reports of the singing of Pasta, Malibran and Viardot, who were all commended as much for their dramatic ability as for their voices.

It's all down to personal choice of course, but I find Baker's version more involving and more exciting. Sutherland does some amazing vocal tricks, but leaves me, as usual, totally unmoved.


Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on December 12, 2012, 11:51:14 AM
I echo that, but ZB always sits on the other side of this argument.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: zamyrabyrd on December 12, 2012, 09:12:10 PM
Why did I get the feeling that anything I write about Baker would be construed as criticism? Oh well.
I mentioned Sills because her approach is very similar in my opinion. By the time she gets to the end of the opera the voice is tired and sometimes flat after all that emoting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K9ts--gDKY

The seeming detachment that Sutherland has in this opera paradoxically enhances the drama, and doesn't take away from it at all - makes it more regal, as it were. I used the word verismo for lack of a better term. What Sills hasn't done here (and as a rule this was her approach) she doesn't mine the MUSIC for the last drop of expression possible to squeeze out of it like Callas did.

A certain amount of detachment is necessary for a performer to project the emotion and not get swallowed up in it.  In this clip of Sills, I don't hear the structured sentiments written into the score by the composer, instead, wave after wave of emotion. In instrumental music, perhaps, this is a bit clearer to comprehend, that expression is embedded in structure and style. Sutherland and Callas were superb musicians so understood how to project through the music and not outside its frame. I found that Dessay's approach to coloratura was frequently mistaken verismo (for lack of a better term again), screaming out high notes as bursts of emotion rather than the culmination of musical phrases that actually didn't require extra melodrama.

ZB
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on December 15, 2012, 06:43:29 AM
Quote from: zamyrabyrd on December 12, 2012, 09:12:10 PM
Why did I get the feeling that anything I write about Baker would be construed as criticism? Oh well.
I mentioned Sills because her approach is very similar in my opinion. By the time she gets to the end of the opera the voice is tired and sometimes flat after all that emoting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K9ts--gDKY

The seeming detachment that Sutherland has in this opera paradoxically enhances the drama, and doesn't take away from it at all - makes it more regal, as it were. I used the word verismo for lack of a better term. What Sills hasn't done here (and as a rule this was her approach) she doesn't mine the MUSIC for the last drop of expression possible to squeeze out of it like Callas did.

A certain amount of detachment is necessary for a performer to project the emotion and not get swallowed up in it.  In this clip of Sills, I don't hear the structured sentiments written into the score by the composer, instead, wave after wave of emotion. In instrumental music, perhaps, this is a bit clearer to comprehend, that expression is embedded in structure and style. Sutherland and Callas were superb musicians so understood how to project through the music and not outside its frame. I found that Dessay's approach to coloratura was frequently mistaken verismo (for lack of a better term again), screaming out high notes as bursts of emotion rather than the culmination of musical phrases that actually didn't require extra melodrama.

ZB

You won't get much argument out of me regarding Sills, though I always thought the reason for this over expressiveness (for want of a better expression), was the fact that she was forcing what was really a rather soubrettish voice beyond its natural means. For me, her most successful bel canto role was Giulietta, which she sings on a studio recording of I Capuleti e i Montecchi with, paradoxically, a superb Janet Baker as Romeo. Sills can still be a bit shrill on top, but, in this gentler role, she doesn't resort to the sort of explosive singing heard on the Maria Stuarda recording you highlighted.

It's interesting that you should group Sutherland and Callas together as singers who understood how to express through the music and not outside its frame, when they are almost at opposite ends of the scale with regards to their approach. Callas was once supposed to have said about Sutherland, "That woman has put my work back fifty years." It may be apocryphal, and some say she was actually talking about Bonynge, but it's an interesting point. Callas's idea was to be as true to the composer as possible, coloratura was used only for dramatic expression, not just for dazzling display. There are plenty of instances where, when listening to Sutherland, all we are listening to is her fabulous voice and prodigious technique. I remember a review by Rodney Milnes, of the Sutherland/Pavarotti/Bonynge Lucia di Lammermoor, in which he said, and I paraphrase from memory, "I strongly believe that somewhere amongst all this vocal showing off, high notes interpolated and held long past their natural use, their is a supremely dramatic Romantic opera trying to get out, in vain on this occasion." Callas actually saw Caballe, not Sutherland as her natural successor. If you see any of the excerpts from Caballe's Norma at Orange on youtube, you can see why.

Coming back to Baker, I have always thought of her too as a singer who mines the MUSIC for every drop of expression, as you put it. The only piece of music both Baker and Callas sang was Marguerite's beautiful air D'amour l'ardente flamme from Berlioz's la Danmation de Faust. Though voice and method are so markedly different, it is amazing how similar their versions are, as if both had individually come to the same conclusions about the music. I heard Baker live many times, though unfortunately never in opera, only in concert, but even here she had a quiet intensity that would draw an audience in. One felt she achieved her effects through a deep understanding of the music she was singing, never imposing on it anything extraneous.





Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: zamyrabyrd on December 16, 2012, 10:12:33 PM
Sills' singing for me is like scratching a nail across a blackboard. Somehow her effervescent enthusiasm for everything she did (her nickname was "Bubbles") made fiercely protective fans, mainly Americans, who to this day will not countenance even a vote of dislike on any of her youtube vids.

Now that I got that out of the way, indeed, Baker's D'amour l'ardente flamme has a palpable warmth in the voice that doesn't come through as much with Callas who seems strangely detached in this aria.

It is a pity that Callas did not record Maria Stuarda, so there would be yet another possibility to consider for that opera. Comparing her Mad Scene from Hamlet by Thomas with Sutherland shows the fascinating differences between two fine musicians. What strikes me about Sutherland's approach all around is that her concepts have a musical wholeness about them that the pianist Jorge Bolet described as every detail fitting perfectly. Of course artists can agree to disagree where the peaks of the music occur, how they relate to one another, etc. That is why interpretation among artists can be so widely divergent.

I submit that Sutherland's performance in this aria (1960) is a peerless work of art (likewise Maria Stuarda for the same reasons) and in no way does she extend a note for the sake of showing off her technique. (Galli-Curci and some other artists from the first half of the 20th century had a habit of trailing out high notes that actually distorted the musical line.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7NIW088w7I&list=HL1355726749&index=3

Callas is also convincing in a different way. Sutherland sounds to me a more vulnerable Ophelia. Callas has a few outbursts of high notes that would be consistent with the character gone out of control.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7_7wHsZtFU&list=HL1355726749&index=5

If Callas doesn't go outside the frame of the music, she sure can stretch it at times that can almost defy belief. At least one recording of Ah non giunge from Sonnambula sounds more like a battle cry but still can be defensible as a person in an altered state.

ZB
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on December 17, 2012, 01:04:31 AM
Quote from: zamyrabyrd on December 16, 2012, 10:12:33 PM

If Callas doesn't go outside the frame of the music, she sure can stretch it at times that can almost defy belief. At least one recording of Ah non giunge from Sonnambula sounds more like a battle cry but still can be defensible as a person in an altered state.

ZB

This might well be explained by the stage production that Callas appeared in, a production by Visconti at La Scala, which also toured to Cologne and Edinburgh. She only ever sang the role live in this production and it was recorded at its premiere (with Bernstein in the pit), at the performance in Cologne (with Votto, the conductor of the studio recording), where she is in prodigious voice, and in Edinburgh, when she was in ill health (also with Votto).

Visconti's picture book production was an attempt to hark back to a previous era, Callas costumed to look like the ballerina Taglioni and a reincarnation of some nineteenth century prima donna playing the role of Amina. Callas being Callas, though, there is never any sense of her playing the role of Amina. As is her wont, she enters entirely into the spirit of the poor misunderstood village girl. However when Amina is awoken and expresses her joy in the cabaletta Ah non giunge, Visconti turned on all the lights in the auditorium and had Callas sing straight out to the audience, no longer Amina, but the prima donna exuberantly singing out to her public. Bernstein gave her ever more difficult and elaborate ornaments to sing, which, in later revivals, and for the studio recording, she tempered down, though she interpolated a cadenza between the two verses of the cabaletta, which took her up to a fortissimo Eb in alt, on which she performs an incredible diminuedo before cascading down the scale to lead into the second verse. This is not a one off trick, as she does it both live in Cologne and on the studio recording, though in Cologne she has to take a breath a split second earlier. As usual with Callas, her singing is so musical one hardly notices the difference.

This might explain your idea of Ah non giunge sounding more like a battle cry.


Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on September 05, 2013, 01:09:06 AM
Joyce Di Donato speaks to Dame Janet Baker

http://www.gramophone.co.uk/features/focus/dame-janet-baker-speaks-to-joyce-didonato-full-30-minute-video-interview (http://www.gramophone.co.uk/features/focus/dame-janet-baker-speaks-to-joyce-didonato-full-30-minute-video-interview)

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: jochanaan on September 05, 2013, 07:17:40 PM
zamyrabyrd, somehow I cannot imagine Dame Baker doing bel canto any real justice.  For me, she is a master of lieder and unusual repertoire.  To this day I cannot listen to her singing Der Abschied from Das Lied von der Erde without moist eyes...

(I love your new tag "Selig sind..." ;D May Ein Deutsches Requiem be ever resurrected!)
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on September 07, 2013, 01:45:37 AM
Quote from: jochanaan on September 05, 2013, 07:17:40 PM
zamyrabyrd, somehow I cannot imagine Dame Baker doing bel canto any real justice.  For me, she is a master of lieder and unusual repertoire.  To this day I cannot listen to her singing Der Abschied from Das Lied von der Erde without moist eyes...

(I love your new tag "Selig sind..." ;D May Ein Deutsches Requiem be ever resurrected!)

Well she was a great Handel singer and many of the qualities needed to sing Handel well are those required of a bel canto specialist. She had a small operatic repertoire, but it covered Montverdi, Cavalli, Purcell, Handel, Gluck, Mozart, Berlioz, Bellini, Donizetti, Massenet, Britten and, if I recall rightly, even Von Einem.

Her Maria Stuarda (or Mary Stuart, because she only sang it at the ENO, who perform all operas in the vernacular), was undoubtedly one of the highlights of her career, and the success she had in it led her to choose it as one of the three roles she would sing in her final year before retiring, at the top of her game, from the operatic stage (though she did continue to perform on the concert platform for a few more years). Choosing one role in each of the opera houses that had meant so much to her, she also sang Gluck's Alceste at Covent Garden, and his Orfeo at Glyndebourne.

The commitment and intensity you hear in her singing of Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde is something she brought to everything she sang. Di Donato talks a lot about integrity in the interview I posted, and there is no doubting that Baker was a singer of great integrity, whose sought first to serve the music, not herself.



Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on September 16, 2013, 01:41:26 PM
Tsaras, Thanks very much for posting the interview. It was good to here her being intelligently interviewed and they clearly meet on a number of the issues they discussed. I have been listening to Janet Baker for well over 40 years and performed with her quite a bit. No performance was ordinary, they were all special occasions. Listening to her recordings and analysing what she was doing with the words was a marvelous learning experience. Almost no one uses and colours words so powerfully and appropriately.

Her interpretation and revelation of the great art that she was a channel for taught me a lot about life, in just the way that reading Shakespeare or Tolstoy teaches us, it was like someone shining a light into the work of poets authors and composers. It very much annoys me when, mainly Americans, denigrate her as just another hooty English singer and over rated. If so, then we can line up a very distinguished crowd of conductors who repeatedly worked with her; Kubelik to Klemperer, Colin Davis to Szell, Britten, Barbirolli, Haitink and so on. Her recordings are a great legacy and her collaborates were top notch.

I return to her Bach, Mahler, Handel, Berlioz and many others as the touchstone of quality for both pleasure and for learning.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on September 16, 2013, 11:40:39 PM
Quote from: knight66 on September 16, 2013, 01:41:26 PM

It very much annoys me when, mainly Americans, denigrate her as just another hooty English singer and over rated. If so, then we can line up a very distinguished crowd of conductors who repeatedly worked with her; Kubelik to Klemperer, Colin Davis to Szell, Britten, Barbirolli, Haitink and so on. Her recordings are a great legacy and her collaborates were top notch.


Mike

Of course she only once appeared in opera in the USA, and then only in a concert performance of "Anna Bolena" (as Smeton), but she did return regularly to Carnegie Hall for recitals, events that were always eagerly anticipated and sold out weeks in advance. Judging by some of the reviews of these events, clearly there were quite a few Americans who valued her very highly indeed.

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: knight66 on September 18, 2013, 08:49:32 AM
Yes, she was very successful within her own terms in the US, but I do read, here included, dismissive posts that suggest it is only the English who can see the point of her as though we liked her out of chauvanism. That was the point I was making. Of course she does not appeal to one and all, that is only normal.

Mike
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Pohjolas Daughter on June 21, 2021, 03:32:14 AM
Quote from: Irons on June 21, 2021, 12:51:50 AM
You are right! It does say "Debut Series NO.4". You are much more observant then me! I see that the Shirley-Quirk is XID 5211 and Baker XID 5213. So released at same or similar time?

Do you have "A Pageant of English Song" with Janet Baker and Gerald Moore?

You mention "Youth and Love" being a favourite. It is one of mine too. :)
No, I don't have that album.  As far as LPs go, I only have a few with her singing on them (operas).   I have about a half-dozen CDs (or boxed sets).  It appears (after doing a bit of googling) that I have Side 1 (or most of it?  Trying to find a listing of all of the songs on it) of Pageant as part of my EMI Icon set.  According to a Gramophone except here:  https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/7945443--janet-baker-haydn-beethoven-scottish-folk-song-arrangements  Pageant was her first solo album for EMI.

PD


Note:  The above is from the Vaughan Williams Veranda thread which I also copied here.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: LKB on March 10, 2024, 07:12:59 PM
I just now came across this fairly recent documentary:

https://youtu.be/KLURaAic4mE?si=4v1dqbAX51ZR03Uk

I'm guessing she was 89 when she was taped for the program, and she's sharp as a tack.
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Pohjolas Daughter on March 11, 2024, 05:00:18 AM
Quote from: LKB on March 10, 2024, 07:12:59 PMI just now came across this fairly recent documentary:

https://youtu.be/KLURaAic4mE?si=4v1dqbAX51ZR03Uk

I'm guessing she was 89 when she was taped for the program, and she's sharp as a tack.
Thank you so much for sharing this!  I'll watch it soon.  :)

PD
Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Tsaraslondon on March 11, 2024, 07:31:59 AM
Quote from: LKB on March 10, 2024, 07:12:59 PMI just now came across this fairly recent documentary:

https://youtu.be/KLURaAic4mE?si=4v1dqbAX51ZR03Uk

I'm guessing she was 89 when she was taped for the program, and she's sharp as a tack.

One of the best singer documentaries I have ever seen, and incredibly moving. Highly recommended.

Title: Re: Dame Janet Baker
Post by: Papy Oli on March 11, 2024, 09:51:10 AM
Great documentary, the end sequence with her husband brought me to tears the 3 or 4 times I have seen it.