Birgit Nilsson with Verdi & Puccini

[knight66]

Yes, I think the Verdi Requiem suits her well, (though there are moments of doubtful intonation), but the movement on YouTube is quite heiratic and this together with the Turandot, a heiratic character, does perhaps mean that she is more successful with the epic as against the intimate. As has been said, she does not really do vulnerability. However, she intelligently chose to concentrate on music where her qualities were vital and her performances were memorable. I saw her as Elektra and she threw herself into the part. Her voice was as fresh at the end as at the begining. I have seen it subsequently with other famous singers and they were not a patch on her, voices in a sorry state by the end.

Mike

[wagnernn]

thank you very much about your replies to discuss on Verdi 's Requiem !
I love Tebaldi very ,very much ,and I know that she is successful in this Requiem,but i don't know that she had a record of this piece .Thanks to you, I will find this CD

[wagnernn]

oh , I'm sorry, I want to say that I would find a record with Schwarzkopf. Are there any parts from Requiem with Tebaldi,please show me

[Tsaraslondon]

oh , I'm sorry, I want to say that I would find a record with Schwarzkopf. Are there any parts from Requiem with Tebaldi,please show me

Tebaldi never recorded the Verdi Requiem commercially, God knows why! However you might be able to find somewhere a live broadcast from 1950, with Toscanini conducting from La Scala. I don't know if you can get the whole thing anywhere, but the recordare and Libera me are included in this set http://www.amazon.co.uk/primi-anni-carriera-Box-Set/dp/B0001ADB8W/ref=sr_1_1/202-7798483-4683869?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1190462398&sr=1-1 As an example of great Verdi singing, it's certainly worth getting hold of. Tebaldi is no less secure than Nilsson, but has the advantage of that warm, golden sound. I am sure this is the sort of voice Verdi had in mind.

Schwarzkopf recorded it twice, once with De Sabata (available from Naxos and other bargain labels)and, most famously with Giulini (available on EMI Great Recordings of the Century). Unlike Tebaldi, Schwarzkopf does not have the natural voice for this music, but she convinces (me, at least), with the intensity and intelligence of her singing.

[Lilas Pastia]

I always thought Callas would have been great in the mezzo part of the Requiem.

    Liber scriptus proferetur,
    in quo totum continetur,
    unde Mundus judicetur

[Tsaraslondon]

I always thought Callas would have been great in the mezzo part of the Requiem.

    Liber scriptus proferetur,
    in quo totum continetur,
    unde Mundus judicetur

She almost sang the soprano part on two or three occasions early in her career, though even then I can't imagine that that ppp top B in the Libera me would ever have come easily to her. I also seem to remember reading that Walter Legge approached her about singing the mezzo role for a recording - possibly the De Sabata - but Callas demurred. She was not about to play seconda donna

[Lilas Pastia]

Yes, that's for sure. And neither would have any other prima donna I suppose. But what a loss...

[wagnernn]

how about this
http://www.amazon.com/Verdi-Requiem-Respighi-Feste-Romane/dp/B00005S24V

[wagnernn]

I want to talk to you and discuss about the voices of Nilsson and other soprano, but my vocabulary is very poor....
So, please enrich my vocabulay by giving me some adjectives which describe the voice,for example :
Nilsson 's voice is....
Tebaldi 's voice is...
Schwarzkopf 's voice is...
(and other sopranos, so I can also enrich my opera knowledge...)
thanks very much

[Lilas Pastia]

I want to talk to you and discuss about the voices of Nilsson and other soprano, but my vocabulary is very poor....
So, please enrich my vocabulary by giving me some adjectives which describe the voice,for example :
Nilsson 's voice is.... like a laser beam
Tebaldi 's voice is... like a yard of velvet
Schwarzkopf 's voice is... like a yard of satin
(and other sopranos, so I can also enrich my opera knowledge...)
thanks very much

[Tsaraslondon]

Very well put. I would add perhaps what I think their best roles

Nilsson: Elektra, Brunnhilde, Isolde

Tebaldi: Leonora (La Forza Del Destino), Desdemona, Adrianna Lecouvreur, Maddalena (Andrea Chenier)

Schwarzkopf: Countess Madeleine (Capriccio), Marschallin, Donna Elvira, Countess (Le Nozze di Figaro), Fiordiligi and Alice Ford in Falstaff, which admirably shows her wonderfully light and deft touch in comedy.

[Lilas Pastia]

And Callas' voice is...like a glass of Burgundy



Best roles: Norma, Lucia, Elvira (I Puritani), Medea

[Tsaraslondon]

And Callas' voice is...like a glass of Burgundy or, on occasion a glass of Greek retsina (a wine one either loves or hates)


Best roles: Norma, Lucia, Elvira (I Puritani), Medea

And Violetta in La Traviata, possibly, in the minds of many, her greatest role. Also the Trovatore Leonora.

[knight66]

Gundula Janowitz: Her voice is like a ribbon thrown up into the air. Best roles, Elsa in Lohengrin, Countess in Figaro, Pamina, Countess in Capriccio.

Mike

[Lilas Pastia]

Leontyne Price's voice is like a great Lapsang Souchong: alluring and smokey.

[knight66]

Yes, That is a good one.

Victoria de los Angeles: Like fine and beautiful porcelain, but with warmth as well as beauty.

Mike

[wagnernn]

I 've seen the list of top 20 sopranos fo 20th century.
I have some questions:
1.Top 5 is OK (Callas,Sutherland,Angeles,L.Price,Nilsson) but where is Sills in the list?I usually compare her to Sutherland ,and I love both of them...
2.then from 6 to 20 ... I 'm very disappointed because of the positions of Tebaldi, Schwarzkopf (my two favorite sopranos). Why? I think Tebaldi is very important,her voice is very beautiful...

[zamyrabyrd]

I 've seen the list of top 20 sopranos fo 20th century.
I have some questions:
1.Top 5 is OK (Callas,Sutherland,Angeles,L.Price,Nilsson) but where is Sills in the list?I usually compare her to Sutherland ,and I love both of them...
2.then from 6 to 20 ... I 'm very disappointed because of the positions of Tebaldi, Schwarzkopf (my two favorite sopranos). Why? I think Tebaldi is very important,her voice is very beautiful...

Whose list is this anyway? But for the sake of argument, take out Angeles and replace Schwartzkopf in the leading 5. So much of the former's singing on closer inspection doesn't really pass, particularly when she sang Lied transposed up to soprano key. She was a mezzo who at times successfully did some roles like Mimi that lies a lot in the middle range anyway. Tebaldi and Caballe, artistic sisters I believe, deserve high rating.

Sills, however, does not belong even in the list 6 to 20. The kind of meticulous artistry that characterized the first group doesn't apply to her at all. She had a lot of youthful enthusiasm that endeared her to the public but her phrasing and diction were amateurish. Yes, she had a certain amount of technique, but that, like a beautiful voice is only raw material and not "enough".

ZB

[Tsaraslondon]

Whose list is this anyway? But for the sake of argument, take out Angeles and replace Schwartzkopf in the leading 5. So much of the former's singing on closer inspection doesn't really pass, particularly when she sang Lied transposed up to soprano key. She was a mezzo who at times successfully did some roles like Mimi that lies a lot in the middle range anyway.

ZB

ZB, you have made this observation regarding De Los Angeles before, but I am still not convinced by your arguments. Apart from Mimi, she successfully sang other soprano roles such as Manon, which lies quite high, Violetta, singing Sempre libera in the correct key, Butterfly, and Desdemona. Tebaldi, on the other hand, would transpose Sempre libera down a whole tone. I have a live recording, of her doing this. It doesn't bother me unduly, though her sketchy singing of the scales and coloratura does. Ponselle used to do it too, as, like Tebaldi, she was a soprano with a short top. In Lanfranco Rasponi's book The Last Prima Donnas, Tebaldi constantly bemoans the upwardly rising pitch of modern orchestras. For a soprano such as her, it must have been a persistant problem. Interestingly Tebaldi never sang Leonora in Il Trovatore on stage, and in the studio recording, you can hear that it puts quite a strain on her. On the other hand, the Forza Leonora, which lies much lower, suits her perfectly, as it did Ponselle. I also have an early disc of De Los Angeles singing arias from Ernani, La Wally, and Faust, among others. Her voice is seamless from top to bottom, with absolutely no strain at the top. Admittedly, its greatest beauty is in the middle and lower registers, but then so was Ponselle's. Do you think she was a mezzo too?
People have often erroneously come to the conclusion that Callas was a mezzo because of the problems she had at the top of her voice towards the end of her career. But with Callas, it was more a question of support. She could still hit those top notes on pitch, but she just didn't have the physical strength to support them, and they would flap about alarmingly.
And in the end, does it really matter that much? They are all great singers, who have given enormous amounts of pleasure over the years. In the nineteenth century, when much of the repertoire they performed was written, there was not the delineation of voices there is now. Singers were just singers, and composers were quite happy to make transpositions to suit the voice of a great singer if need be. One thinks of the special versions of Maria Stuarda and La Sonnambula, made for Maria Malibran, who today would probably be called a mezzo.

[knight66]

ZB, you have made this observation regarding De Los Angeles before, but I am still not convinced by your arguments.

Ditto.....ZB, your opinion on de los Angeles is just that; not fact. Mind you, we are at one over Sills.

Mike