A Singer’s Life: Fashion and Taste
Readers will be aware, if they have been paying attention over the past months, that I am largely ambivalent to the music of the period usually described as Bel Canto, the era of primarily Italian opera around the beginning of the 19th century, mostly represented by the compositions of Bellini, Donizetti and Rossini. The phrase was not in common use until long after this era had waned and was initially used disparagingly by promoters of the more dramatic vocal arts, encouraged by Verdi and Wagner. Arguments have raged ever since about the merit or otherwise of this period and style of singing and playing, and my conclusion is that it comes down to a matter of taste.
This whole question of taste and fashion reared its head recently in an online discussion about the merits or otherwise of the great German baritone, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (1925-2012). I had ventured to put up on Facebook a post about the splendour of a recording of Mahler’s “Das Lied von der Erde”, featuring DFD singing the songs usually assigned to the mezzo voice. I had never previously heard this version, conducted by Leonard Bernstein, also involving the American tenor James King and had found it deeply moving and wonderfully sung. In the course of this discussion, the question arose of whether DFD was any good, and whether he had gone out of fashion. A long, and to my mind, rather tedious debate ensued, mainly about whether his voice was big or small, but often featuring comments like “I really hate his voice” or “He is like a god to me”. As a proponent of the latter view, I was taken aback by some comments, and couldn’t fathom how anyone could hold the view that he was a bad singer.
I then reflected on another online discussion I had inspired recently, when I drew attention to the rather unimaginative performances, as I heard it, of the singers in the new film of Bernstein’s ‘West Side Story’. Again, this apparently innocuous comment upset some people who, literally, could not hear what I was hearing.
This prompted memories of a debate I had inaugurated a few years ago, about a production of ‘Eugene Onegin’ at the Edinburgh Festival, which I had taken the unusual step of leaving at the interval, as I found the directing terrible. The ensuing discussion on Facebook had revealed to me that I seemed to be in a pretty small minority, and that most people, many of whose opinions I respected, had found the production inspiring and innovatory.
To my mind, this is one of the great advantages of Facebook, inasmuch as friends and colleagues from all over the world can involve themselves in artistic conversations over a wide range of matters. It can descend into unpleasantness, and one has to be careful who one is talking to, but on the whole I feel it is a good thing. However, it did get me thinking about fashion and taste, and whether it is possible to make any objective comment about singing at all. What I hold to be utterly clear cut and factual, suddenly becomes a matter of interpretation. What seems to me to be universal, suddenly becomes subject to discussion.
Where shall we begin? Is it ever possible to be objective about a performance of anything? Let’s go back to my original question about the merits and demerits of the Bel Canto era.
As I have written often in these chapters of ‘A Singer’s Life’, my voice has never really fitted the description of an ideal Italian repertoire bass. It is both too bright and too dark. By that, I mean that for me it lacks the buzziness of the Italian bass, the essential sugary mellowness which an Italian bass brings to the repertoire. It is too direct. Think of the great basses in history, Ezio Pinza and Cesare Siepi. Neither of these singers sounded remotely like me (obviously, because they were so much better, but, bear with me, it’s an essential sound that I’m talking about here). They had an aural halo around their voices, a core sound which gave a homogenous character to their voices throughout the range. You could not really imagine them singing Lieder, or Bach and Handel, but they were perfect for Verdi and Donizetti.
The question arises: do I dislike Bel Canto music because I don’t sound right singing this music, or is it something intrinsic in the style which puts me off? I remember from an early age singing arias by the Bel Canto composers and feeling ill at ease. I would sing something for an audition, knowing full well that I would not be selected. Was this purely the sound of the music, or was it that I couldn’t be bothered singing simply for the sound I was making? The operas of this period were often highly dramatic, and indeed highly melodramatic. My beloved sister in law, Ali, who is hooked on Bel Canto, often tells me of her deep involvement in the plots and characters of these operas, plots and characters which seem to me mere cyphers, repeating basically meaningless phrases simply for the beauty of the sound. I don’t deny that some of this music can be very beautifully sung, but somehow I can’t be bothered waiting for them to finish, especially when the convention holds that after a lovely legato cavatina, there often inexorably follows a fast cabaletta, often with chorus, ending in an inevitable high note for the soloist.
I suppose my problem is with the convention more than anything else. A tradition like the baroque one of the Da Capo aria (literally the “going back to the beginning aria”, where you have an A section, then a B section, and then the A section again, with ornamentation), is so obviously contrived that, somehow, I just accept it for what it is. The plots of many of Handel’s operas, despite the efforts of many modern directors, are usually ludicrous enough not to involve the audience too emotionally, and so, we find that we can enjoy the experience quite comfortably.
The Bel Canto operas, by contrast, are often expressions of quite serious literary creations, adaptations of famous books or important moments in history. This, for me, results in the phrase, “the willing suspension of disbelief”, a concept explained by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1817, defined as a writer infusing enough human interest, and a semblance of truth, into a fantastic tale to allow the reader to suspend judgement concerning the implausibility of the narrative.
I find it interesting that Coleridge wrote these words at the precise moment in musical history when the Bel Canto composers were asking their audiences to do this exact thing. The fact that many, or even most, opera goers are willing to conform to this convention, doesn’t mean that I can! I hope this doesn’t come across as arrogant. I am perfectly happy for others to enjoy these operas, but for me, it is a matter of taste, and I have never acquired it.
The question of taste and fashion in singers and singing is, to my mind, a trickier concept. I find it hard to accept that a singer who I find categorically excellent can, with the passing of time, be described as inadequate.
I can understand that a certain type of singing could become more or less popular over a period of years. It is not wholly unreasonable to find a big operatic voice, full of vibrato and with a wide range of colours, unsuitable for the performance of music from the Baroque Period. As we have discovered more about performing styles and practices from a period before the Romantic Era, when voices were adapted to suit the orchestration and the size of the auditorium, I am fully prepared to accept that the old adage about horses for courses holds true. Yet, a question of style is different from a question of quality. I still love my old recordings of the Bach Passions sung with much larger and more luscious voices than we hear nowadays. If a singer is fabulous, and with an imagination to go with the sound, why should they be barred from singing anything before Mozart? I admit the problem is more acute with soprano voices, as the whole question of vibrato, yes or no, becomes a problem if the singer has a natural vibrato. I really can’t enjoy, say, Jessye Norman singing Bach or Handel soprano arias, when someone like Nancy Argenta or Lynne Dawson is the comparison. However, when she sang in her mezzo range, for example, ‘Dido’s Lament’, it was wonderful. Listening to Gundula Janowitz or Lucia Popp singing Bach is still wonderful, despite the fact that they were unaware of period practice. Class tells.
As for lower voices, I have come across this apparent anomaly in my own career. In the 1990s, I was fortunate enough to be considered as one of the best baroque basses in the business. I sang on record and in concert with some of the best ensembles and directors, like Trevor Pinnock, Marc Minkowski and René Jacobs at the very highest level all over the world. My voice was considered ideal for this music, as it was bright, forward placed and able to articulate very fast coloratura. Yet, for some Early Music interpreters, my voice was considered too large and too deep. There were certain conductors who would not book me at all, and one or two who only booked me once. I remember a particular conductor of a very famous baroque ensemble, who booked me for an extensive tour of France and Belgium, singing music by Purcell and Pelham Humfrey. I had recently recorded two albums of Purcell’s music on Deutsche Grammophon with the English Concert, to some critical acclaim. However, at the first rehearsal, this conductor, who nearly always used a light baritone for his concerts, demanded that I take a lot of weight off my voice, and sing with only a hint of vibrato. I was able to a certain extent to comply with his wishes but tried to explain that this would remove about half the quality from my voice. He was not remotely bothered by this, but I found the whole experience deeply problematic, and probably didn’t conceal terribly well my disdain for this approach. Basically, he wanted me to sound like his favourite baritone, and, as I was young and unwilling to lose quite a lot of money, I did as I was told, but never worked with him again. No great loss all round! I consider that I was lucky though, to be able to work with some conductors who were willing to give me free rein with my voice, provided I stayed within the bounds of good style and practice, and I enjoyed a decade of pleasure and success, singing this marvellous music in some of the greatest venues in the world. I think this also contributed to the longevity of my career, since, as my voice matured and developed, I was able to take on much bigger and heavier roles because I had taken care of my instrument at an earlier stage. Sometimes, nowadays, I pine for my fast coloratura, which has actually vanished, but at least I have my recordings to remind me, and younger singers, of what I could do!
All this was to show how tastes can change and how one person’s perfection can be anathema to another. I still find it upsetting, mind you, when someone doesn’t like my singing! Or when someone doesn’t like a singer I admire!
It is clear that over the last century tastes have changed about the actual sound of the human voice. Even allowing for the fact that recording quality has improved dramatically from the scratchy 78 rpm of the old wind-up gramophones to the digital clarity we hear nowadays, there does seem to be a preference for a mellow sound in a classical voice, as opposed to the often shriller, more up front buzz of the pre-stereo recordings. This was a particular cause for concern at the beginning of my career, as my fast vibrato and forward placed voice seemed to come from a different era. Now, it often happened that people liked my sound, but it was also true that some people really didn’t like it at all. On the whole, the majority view prevailed, and I was never out of work, but it became a problem in the 1990s, as some managements made it clear to my agent at the time that a change would be necessary, if I was to continue at the level I had become used to.
I, of course, didn’t see a problem, as I was still getting good contracts and making a decent living, and I liked the way I sang, and frankly other people were wrong and they could take a run and jump!
It was only a chance meeting during a BBC Prom with the tenor Tony Roden that brought matters to a head. I have written elsewhere in these chapters how Tony, very politely, told me I was misusing my tongue position and that he could correct this easily. A few sessions with him in his lovely house in Ealing convinced me of the truth of what he had said, and within a year, the fast vibrato was a thing of the past. My voice was still very forward placed, and still clearly not an Italianate sound, but the obvious anomaly, now clear to me, had been removed. This allowed me to contemplate singing roles I had never before envisaged and resulted in a blossoming of my career from my 40’s on, which was remarkable. From being a baroque specialist, I was able to sing Wagner and Strauss, and to learn roles such as Wotan (on a small scale), Ochs, Falstaff, La Roche, Arkel and many others. The basic sound hadn’t changed, but the quality which had been controversial had gone (still a source of regret to some, but undeniably a success financially!).
Can we come to a conclusion about fashion and taste? I’m not sure that we can, but it is a subject that will encourage debate for as long as there is classical singing. Subjectivity is often extremely frustrating, and can promote healthy discussions, but, hey, what’s wrong with that? Life would be very dull if we all liked the same things, so let’s salute difference and variety.
Although anyone who dislikes Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau is an idiot!
