Linda Rondstat -
A Coloratura Soprano Who Sings Real High
&
The Downfall of Opera As We Know It
-A Reflection on the Changing World of Opera and Crossover Singers and its Implications on the Future of Opera as an Art Form-
While listening to an interview with Linda Rondstat on KQED (NPR in the SF Bay Area) http://www.kqed.org/radio/ (See the Archives for 'Forum' on July 19, 2006) my frustrations with all that is wrong with the opera world came to a head.
With assertions that "I'm a coloratura" and "Whenever I hum La Boheme to myself I think of the words in Italian" the ordinary listener may think, "wow, I didn't know that 80's pop singer had such a range of talent. "Indeed, the host of the program even commented on Linda's range of talents as they played excepts from her new 'Cajun' music album.
As I felt my years of classical voice technique, as well as the studying of Mozart's inner struggles with the father figure, the nuances of the difference between open E and closed E in German diction, and exactly what is so special about the Tristan chord, begin to grow into a giant ball of hatred for all that is the modern 'cross-over' singer (Sarah Brightman, anyone?), Linda continued to demonstrate her vast knowledge of classical music through statements like "the 18th century Bel Canto style, that was more an 18th century style, you know, was different from the 19th century style where the tenors just belted out the high notes."
These brilliant statements followed her 'amusing' tale of performing in a pop version of 'La Boheme' because the director of the production thought that it was intended to reach out to the common man by being performed by Bohemian 'street performers.' Would these be the highly trained Italian opera star 'street performers' that Puccini hand chose to perform the premier? Did he just drag some pimps and whores and artists out of the brothels of Florence for that authentic 19th century Parisian feel? (Answer: NO)
But perhaps I was more bothered by the fact that apparently, in the late 1990's, millionaire cross-over pop singers were considered closer to 'common street performers' than the opera singers who got paid pittances to perform 'Norma' in high school gymnasiums in Boise, Idaho after receiving their Masters in opera from the Curtis Institute and studying technique and interpretation from old operatic masters while they wasted away in back alley apartments in Milan and Paris.
Beyond Linda's inexact knowledge of music history (Bel Canto = 19th Century, Bellini anyone? PS Kids - 19th century does not equal 1900s!!!!) what most irritated me was her nonchalant assertion that all of the chorus girls in her first broadway production were trained singers who "knew stage right from stage left." While Linda, the little pop-princess, had to be assigned an emergency voice teacher because the self-proclaimed 'non-trained Coloratura who could sing high,' couldn't get it together for a broadway production. And that was Broadway! While her minimum-wage chorus girls probably had Masters degrees in dance from NYU and voice degrees from Julliard.
But this brings me to a larger point, a more problematic complaint that plagues the future of opera, indeed, the survival of the art form itself.
Crossover singers have always ruffled the feathers of the establishment (Mario Lanza comes to mind), but they have never been as rampant and obnoxiously cheesy as today. I may start carrying around a compilation of Callas as Tosca, Moffo as Mimi, and Corelli as Radamus to hand to the next person who says, 'Oh, you sing opera? I love Charlotte Church.' Instead of politely smiling and backing away to avoid a conversation about what I think of Charlotte Church or Sarah Brightman or Andrea Boccelli (to quote the American Record guide after his La Boheme recording, 'who is this guy? and who let him perform in an opera, let alone, record one?'), I will throw the CD at them. 'Here! Listen! Learn! This is what opera is!'
However, the real problem is not the cross-over singers themselves, merely taking advantage of an available niche and squeezing out as many PBS specials and ensuing record contracts as they can. The real problem is the apparent need for the existence of crossover singers to keep the general public interested in this dying art form.
What is so wrong with the music world today that requires a whole genre of untrained, passaggio-frightened singers belting out arias in the wrong keys to synthesizers? As an optimist, I would hope that Puccini's amazingly melodic and emotional music would strike a chord with any listener, no matter how badly butchered by the singer. The music itself does carry some sort of innate emotional pull, how else would Michael Bolton have gotten anyone to listen to, let alone buy, his monstrous album of butchered Italian opera favorites? Yet, the truth seems to be that the modern opera singers are generally so unpleasant to listen to that the general public flocks to crossover singers as a compromise. Take the following scenario:
Unknowing member of public:
"I'll listen to this opera song and feel really smart and educated."
Queue Beverly Sills or Cathleen Battle for 20 seconds.
"Wow, opera sucks."
1 week later while channel surfing.
Josh Grobin : "O sole miiii-oooo"
"Wow, opera is great! I'm not uncouth! I'm gonna go buy those $120 tickets to Josh Grobin at the Amphitheatre. Then I can tell my friends how I went to see an opera and they'll be super-impressed."
Now, I'm picking on Cathleen Battle and Beverly Sills because they are two of the better-known terrible singers whose vibratos are so completely out of control that it is often difficult to tell what note they are on. They epitomize a serious problem that apparently appeals to most of the casting directors at the major companies. At a production of 'Hansel and Gretel' at SF Opera a few years ago, Gretel's vibrato was so out of control that when she approached high notes, she aimed for about a 3 note range and managed to hit the note somewhere within her ridiculously wide vibrato. In an even sadder incident at the same SF Opera House, a haggard Carol Van Ness (who was never that great, but was tolerable), screeched out such a horrendous Tosca that many audience members could have believed that Tosca was dying throughout the entire opera, not just when she jumped off the roof of the opera house. In fact, that production was so terrible, that many of my very open-minded music professors actually left in the middle, unable to handle another 2 hours of proof of why Carol should have retired 10 years ago in a blaze of glory.
What truly concerns me about the whole situation is that these terrible singers are not chosen out of a lack of good singers. Bad tenors I can excuse, with the growing reputation of singing as 'gay' among 12 year old boys, it's no wonder that recruitment for young male singers, particularly the rare tenor voice types, makes finding a tenor who can sing Tristan or Lindoro an unenviable chore. But there are literally thousands of amazing sopranos and mezzos with beautiful, expressive voices who are finding themselves either pursuing pointless 'artists diplomas' after already receiving masters degrees, just to keep studying at conservatories to make connections, or traveling from state to state, singing whatever they can get, just to pay the bills. While the main opera houses are struggling against talentless philistines like Sarah Brightman who sells out 5000-seat arenas, the impresarios are scratching their heads, asking, 'why won't anyone come?' The answer: Get good singers!
If Elizabeth Schwartzkopf or Lily Pons auditioned today, they would be laughed onto the street. And indeed, many of the pleasant modern singers have landed in the world of art songs, take Barbara Bonney and Elly Ameling, where their pleasant voices can be appreciated by the indoctrinated art song aficionados. But what happened to those great singers of old, who sounded like real, individual people, and who put their hearts and souls up on display? I challenge Renee Fleming in all of her technical perfection to reach even a fraction of Maria Callas' raw passion in Tosca. Even as Callas reached the end of her career with her course and hardened voice, the pure emotion was unmistakable. And, apparently, un-reproducible. Lost to history and only available through LPs and old films.
And what of the future of this art form in the twilight of its life?
As the public steers toward the hybrid pop-opera and opera buffs retreat to their LP basements and the masters of old, and impresarios scratch their heads about the lack of public excitement as they cast another Julliard drone who sounds like the last Julliard drone, and the Julliard drone before that, all I have to wonder is...
How did it come to this?
While listening to an interview with Linda Rondstat on KQED (NPR in the SF Bay Area) http://www.kqed.org/radio/ (See the Archives for 'Forum' on July 19, 2006) my frustrations with all that is wrong with the opera world came to a head.
With assertions that "I'm a coloratura" and "Whenever I hum La Boheme to myself I think of the words in Italian" the ordinary listener may think, "wow, I didn't know that 80's pop singer had such a range of talent. "Indeed, the host of the program even commented on Linda's range of talents as they played excepts from her new 'Cajun' music album.
As I felt my years of classical voice technique, as well as the studying of Mozart's inner struggles with the father figure, the nuances of the difference between open E and closed E in German diction, and exactly what is so special about the Tristan chord, begin to grow into a giant ball of hatred for all that is the modern 'cross-over' singer (Sarah Brightman, anyone?), Linda continued to demonstrate her vast knowledge of classical music through statements like "the 18th century Bel Canto style, that was more an 18th century style, you know, was different from the 19th century style where the tenors just belted out the high notes."
These brilliant statements followed her 'amusing' tale of performing in a pop version of 'La Boheme' because the director of the production thought that it was intended to reach out to the common man by being performed by Bohemian 'street performers.' Would these be the highly trained Italian opera star 'street performers' that Puccini hand chose to perform the premier? Did he just drag some pimps and whores and artists out of the brothels of Florence for that authentic 19th century Parisian feel? (Answer: NO)
But perhaps I was more bothered by the fact that apparently, in the late 1990's, millionaire cross-over pop singers were considered closer to 'common street performers' than the opera singers who got paid pittances to perform 'Norma' in high school gymnasiums in Boise, Idaho after receiving their Masters in opera from the Curtis Institute and studying technique and interpretation from old operatic masters while they wasted away in back alley apartments in Milan and Paris.
Beyond Linda's inexact knowledge of music history (Bel Canto = 19th Century, Bellini anyone? PS Kids - 19th century does not equal 1900s!!!!) what most irritated me was her nonchalant assertion that all of the chorus girls in her first broadway production were trained singers who "knew stage right from stage left." While Linda, the little pop-princess, had to be assigned an emergency voice teacher because the self-proclaimed 'non-trained Coloratura who could sing high,' couldn't get it together for a broadway production. And that was Broadway! While her minimum-wage chorus girls probably had Masters degrees in dance from NYU and voice degrees from Julliard.
But this brings me to a larger point, a more problematic complaint that plagues the future of opera, indeed, the survival of the art form itself.
Crossover singers have always ruffled the feathers of the establishment (Mario Lanza comes to mind), but they have never been as rampant and obnoxiously cheesy as today. I may start carrying around a compilation of Callas as Tosca, Moffo as Mimi, and Corelli as Radamus to hand to the next person who says, 'Oh, you sing opera? I love Charlotte Church.' Instead of politely smiling and backing away to avoid a conversation about what I think of Charlotte Church or Sarah Brightman or Andrea Boccelli (to quote the American Record guide after his La Boheme recording, 'who is this guy? and who let him perform in an opera, let alone, record one?'), I will throw the CD at them. 'Here! Listen! Learn! This is what opera is!'
However, the real problem is not the cross-over singers themselves, merely taking advantage of an available niche and squeezing out as many PBS specials and ensuing record contracts as they can. The real problem is the apparent need for the existence of crossover singers to keep the general public interested in this dying art form.
What is so wrong with the music world today that requires a whole genre of untrained, passaggio-frightened singers belting out arias in the wrong keys to synthesizers? As an optimist, I would hope that Puccini's amazingly melodic and emotional music would strike a chord with any listener, no matter how badly butchered by the singer. The music itself does carry some sort of innate emotional pull, how else would Michael Bolton have gotten anyone to listen to, let alone buy, his monstrous album of butchered Italian opera favorites? Yet, the truth seems to be that the modern opera singers are generally so unpleasant to listen to that the general public flocks to crossover singers as a compromise. Take the following scenario:
Unknowing member of public:
"I'll listen to this opera song and feel really smart and educated."
Queue Beverly Sills or Cathleen Battle for 20 seconds.
"Wow, opera sucks."
1 week later while channel surfing.
Josh Grobin : "O sole miiii-oooo"
"Wow, opera is great! I'm not uncouth! I'm gonna go buy those $120 tickets to Josh Grobin at the Amphitheatre. Then I can tell my friends how I went to see an opera and they'll be super-impressed."
Now, I'm picking on Cathleen Battle and Beverly Sills because they are two of the better-known terrible singers whose vibratos are so completely out of control that it is often difficult to tell what note they are on. They epitomize a serious problem that apparently appeals to most of the casting directors at the major companies. At a production of 'Hansel and Gretel' at SF Opera a few years ago, Gretel's vibrato was so out of control that when she approached high notes, she aimed for about a 3 note range and managed to hit the note somewhere within her ridiculously wide vibrato. In an even sadder incident at the same SF Opera House, a haggard Carol Van Ness (who was never that great, but was tolerable), screeched out such a horrendous Tosca that many audience members could have believed that Tosca was dying throughout the entire opera, not just when she jumped off the roof of the opera house. In fact, that production was so terrible, that many of my very open-minded music professors actually left in the middle, unable to handle another 2 hours of proof of why Carol should have retired 10 years ago in a blaze of glory.
What truly concerns me about the whole situation is that these terrible singers are not chosen out of a lack of good singers. Bad tenors I can excuse, with the growing reputation of singing as 'gay' among 12 year old boys, it's no wonder that recruitment for young male singers, particularly the rare tenor voice types, makes finding a tenor who can sing Tristan or Lindoro an unenviable chore. But there are literally thousands of amazing sopranos and mezzos with beautiful, expressive voices who are finding themselves either pursuing pointless 'artists diplomas' after already receiving masters degrees, just to keep studying at conservatories to make connections, or traveling from state to state, singing whatever they can get, just to pay the bills. While the main opera houses are struggling against talentless philistines like Sarah Brightman who sells out 5000-seat arenas, the impresarios are scratching their heads, asking, 'why won't anyone come?' The answer: Get good singers!
If Elizabeth Schwartzkopf or Lily Pons auditioned today, they would be laughed onto the street. And indeed, many of the pleasant modern singers have landed in the world of art songs, take Barbara Bonney and Elly Ameling, where their pleasant voices can be appreciated by the indoctrinated art song aficionados. But what happened to those great singers of old, who sounded like real, individual people, and who put their hearts and souls up on display? I challenge Renee Fleming in all of her technical perfection to reach even a fraction of Maria Callas' raw passion in Tosca. Even as Callas reached the end of her career with her course and hardened voice, the pure emotion was unmistakable. And, apparently, un-reproducible. Lost to history and only available through LPs and old films.
And what of the future of this art form in the twilight of its life?
As the public steers toward the hybrid pop-opera and opera buffs retreat to their LP basements and the masters of old, and impresarios scratch their heads about the lack of public excitement as they cast another Julliard drone who sounds like the last Julliard drone, and the Julliard drone before that, all I have to wonder is...
How did it come to this?
posted by Unknown at 10:57 PM
1 Comments:
In a momentary defense of Ms. Rondstat (I can't believe I just said that), bel canto was definitely active in the 18th century as well. But the idea that all of 19th century operatic music can be reduced to belting tenors is nothing short of ludicrous. I guess nobody informed her that the height of bel canto was early 19th century with Bellini, as you pointed out.
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