A talk given by Father Stephen Tucker in the Music Room, Burgh House
Father Stephen continued his guided tour of the great and the very good in the world of the opera singer with a fascinating and amusing survey of some of his favourite voices from a third ‘Golden Age on Record’. Now, there are some voices which can undisputedly be labelled as ‘great’, and there were plenty on show at this exalted soirée the pioneering black contralto Marian Anderson’s voluptuous tone singing Dalila (or in this case an American Delilah), laying down the gauntlet to the rest at the beginning of the evening, and the massive, rich-toned bass, Nicola Rossi-Lemeni, whose name has inexplicably escaped the renown his voice surely merited, to mention but two but equally there are those who so divide opinion as to grab the limelight and dominate debate far beyond their more ‘mainstream’ contemporaries.
Our guiding pastor just managed, I think to maintain a dignified impartiality with regard to Mlles. Callas and Sutherland, and even washed his hands of choosing between interpretations of Puccini’s doomed hero Cavaradossi by Corelli, Di Stefano and Bergonzi, throwing the decision to the floor in the style of a sort of blind audition. True to form, the audition panel failed to reach any sort of unanimity, but at least here the decision did not really matter that much.
The description ‘Voices’ can hardly do justice to the artistry on show on such an occasion as a Met first night in this golden era. Imagine being present to hear the wonderful, gravely Mississippian richness of tone in Leontyne Price’s celebrated Aida, or the compassionate, tender lyricism of Bjorling’s Calaf (in what is usually considered to be a heavy role by Puccini standards) to Tebaldi’s heart-wrenching Liu in Turandot.
So Father Stephen’s Desert Island hopefuls had to fulfil stringent criteria to make the cut, and whilst few escaped without small reservations limited acting ability earning Zinka Milanov the nickname la donna immobile, Bjorling virtually refusing to rehearse, and not even the great Tito Gobbi beyond reproach for this ‘intelligent ham acting’ – we were undoubtedly in a hugely privileged position hearing them, only sorry not to have been at the performances themselves. Not to have their spirits dampened by this small consideration however, our sixty-strong jury could not help but join the live audience at the end of Callas’ 1957 La Sonnambula in spontaneous shock horror, early applause…sacrilege nowadays, but why on earth not!
Our shameless gluttony was completed courtesy of Margaret Rodgers and her team’s wonderful spread afterwards to round off a thoroughly enjoyable and enlightening evening.
Jonathan Beatty
Voices from the not-so-distant past
Jonathan Beatty