# The intrusive aitches



## Herkku (Apr 18, 2010)

I was going to continue the reviewing Rossini's operas on DVD and watched Il Maometto secondo from La Fenice, but I just got tired of the singing. Rossini seems to have liked to compose a lot of rapid scales on one vowel and as I understand it, they shouldn't sound like "ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, hi-hi-hi-hi-hi-hi, ho-ho-ho-ho-ho"!, which they almost invariably do in this recording. The only singer who can avoid this here is Calbo, Anna Rita Gemmabella, a mezzosoprano. And the same happens in many other recordings. To listen something where this might not happen, I tried Rossini's Armida with Renée Fleming. Armida must be one of the most fiendish roles for a soprano, Rossini playing with endless scales up and down until the singer must take a breath, and Renée can manage it with almost clean papers! I tried Caballé and even she couldn't achieve the same. So, where is the bel canto singing going? I mean, so many obscure operas are being performed, but do we have singers to sing them properly? Does anyone care?


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

You see, most of great singers, despite all their outstanding talents, are bitches without a sense of vocation.

Not many are devoted to the music, most are commited to themselves, their money and fame - so they don't care about performing obscure operas, they don't care if other (inferior) singers are ruining music that would sound great with performers like them.

But why bother? They are paid for singing and recording Figaro, Boheme and other famous and popular highlights over and over again - so why bother with giving justice to other great but obscured operas? It equals risk, less money for more work... for what, artistic ideals and music itself? Nah, that's not good deal.

So the answer is:



> Does anyone care?


Unfortunately - no.


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## Herkku (Apr 18, 2010)

Yeah. I remember an interview with Kiri te Kanawa where she openly admitted that she is just too lazy to learn new roles...

One singer that could have chosen the same way is Placido Domingo. Instead he has sung well over 100 roles and I admire him for that as much as I like his voice - even if his interpretations may have sometimes been "generalized" as someone wrote recently in this forum.


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## Almaviva (Aug 13, 2010)

Herkku said:


> Yeah. I remember an interview with Kiri te Kanawa where she openly admitted that she is just too lazy to learn new roles...
> 
> One singer that could have chosen the same way is Placido Domingo. Instead he has sung well over 100 roles and I admire him for that as much as I like his voice - even if his interpretations may have sometimes been "generalized" as someone wrote recently in this forum.


I think Placido is in the 150s already.
Yes, admirable.
On the other hand, this phenomenon you and Aramis have correctly identified leaves the door open for young new singers to launch their careers with more obscure operas (they don't suffer with the competition of more seasoned stars), like you noticed yourself when you reviewed the M22 box set - you were impressed with many young and unknown singers who did a good job in Mozart's more obscure works.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

> On the other hand, this phenomenon you and Aramis have correctly identified leaves the door open for young new singers to launch their careers with more obscure operas


I don't think that one is enough. If some great soprano would devote herself to sing obscure operas she would perhaps get noticed but to step out of the shadow she would have to accept offers of singing in popular operas.

Just think: important impresarios/conductors see her potential and what they do? Say "you're awesome, we take you and your repertoire!" or "you're awesome, but you have to sing something diffrent than so far, I want you to be my Traviata, number 2323203497323941!".

If there could be such person, someone to gather whole cast at good level to perform these operas - I think it would be conductor. Someone like Karajan, kind of guy who calls you and you think "uhm, it's Karajan, can't go wrong with him". Someone with prestige and position could convice even those talented but lazy "stars" to work with him on unusual repertoire.

So we have to depend on conductors.


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## Almaviva (Aug 13, 2010)

Aramis said:


> I don't think that one is enough. If some great soprano would devote herself to sing obscure operas she would perhaps get noticed but to step out of the shadow she would have to accept offers of singing in popular operas.
> 
> Just think: important impresarios/conductors see her potential and what they do? Say "you're awesome, we take you and your repertoire!" or "you're awesome, but you have to sing something diffrent than so far, I want you to be my Traviata, number 2323203497323941!".
> 
> ...


I meant it more like job market for young singers than as an opportunity to pull these more obscure operas from oblivion.

But now that I'm thinking of it, it does happen. Think of Danielle De Niese, for example. She is partially responsible for the baroque revival. And now we have someone like Patricia Petibon singing Rameau, and Cecilia Bartoli singing lesser known Handel. I got a CD of Placido Domingo singing an obscure opera by a Brazilian composer, Il Guarany by Carlos Gomes (quite good). And he's also into bringing zarzuelas into the main stream (I have a DVD of a zarzuela with him - Maria Fernanda - also quite good). So, it happens.

And some conductors do this as well - case in point, Christie and again, the baroque revival.


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

Juan Diego Flórez is a Rossini specialist and he seems to take this role seriously. I don't think he's done any really obscure ones which is a shame.


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## Herkku (Apr 18, 2010)

We are getting beside my point here. I mean, the singers and their teachers must know that all those aitches are wrong! Why and how did things come to this?


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