# Which singers do you go to when you want something "simple"?



## BalalaikaBoy (Sep 25, 2014)

My meaning of "simple" is essentially
- pleasant timbre
- moves well
- emotional expression is subtle and gentle rather than intense and dramatic
- not overly frilly or ornamented (an occasional trill or run is fine if done tasteful, but no Rossini thank you)
- relaxed sound production (or at least giving that impression)

some of mine would be

soprano
- Kiri te Kanawa
- Annick Massis
- Kirsten Flagstad
- Lucia Popp

mezzo/contralto
- Eula Beal
- Elina Garanca
- Elena Cernei
- Jennifer Larmore
- Maureen Forrester

tenor
- Nicolae Gedda 

baritone
- Nicolai Kondratyuk

bass
- Boris Shtokolov


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## silentio (Nov 10, 2014)

BalalaikaBoy said:


> My meaning of "simple" is essentially
> - pleasant timbre
> - moves well
> - emotional expression is subtle and gentle rather than intense and dramatic
> ...


Victoria de Los Angeles and Ingeborg Hallstein. Two of the sweetest ladies! They are "simple" in the sense that the artlful becomes the artless.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Amelita Galli-Curci comes instantly to mind. The first thing I heard her sing was this, on a 78rpm inherited from my great-grandfather:






As one of the first opera singers I ever heard (with Caruso), she is probably the singer most responsible for my lifelong intolerance of artificially weighted, pushed, vibrato-ridden voices. Such lovely, unforced, thoroughly musical singing, the words floating on the tone with the delicate precision of butterflies on air, embodies Galli-Curci's motto: "Simplicity, Sincerity, Serenity."


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## wkasimer (Jun 5, 2017)

Sopranos:
- Barbara Bonney
- Elisabeth Grummer
- Carolyn Sampson
- Lucia Popp

Mezzos:
- Janet Baker
- Christa Ludwig
- Magdalena Kozena
- Anne Sofie von Otter

Tenors:
- Georgi Vinogradov
- Virgilius Noreika
- Fritz Wunderlich
- Stuart Burrows

Baritones (lots of these!):
- Peter Mattei
- Igor Gorin
- Pavel Lisitsian
- Nathan Gunn
- Robert Merrill
- Andreas Schmidt
- Gerhard Hüsch

Basses:
- Kurt Moll
- Boris Gmyrya
- Mark Reizen
- Wilhelm Strienz
- Robert Lloyd
- John Shirley-Quirk


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## Bellinilover (Jul 24, 2013)

Could one of the criteria be "the impression that the singer seems to delight in the very act of singing"? If so, then Ruth Ann Swenson springs immediately to mind. Also, Robert Merrill.


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## Bellinilover (Jul 24, 2013)

Anna Moffo, Kiri Te Kanawa, Joyce Di Donato, Ramon Vargas


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## BalalaikaBoy (Sep 25, 2014)

Eula Beal: Ave Maria





Richard Fredericks and Anna Moffo: duet from The Desert Song





Boris Shtokolov: I Met You





Natalie Dessay: Vocalise


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Kiri Te Kanawa
Joseph Calleja
Joyce di Donato
Dmitri Hvorostovsky


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## Tuoksu (Sep 3, 2015)

Tito Schipa, Natalie Dessay, Ingeborg Hallstein.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Fritz Wunderlich - especially for the ebullience of the singing in lighter repertoire. His sunny recording (in German) of Lara's _Granada_ quite outclasses that of many Latin tenors.

Victoria De Los Angeles - for the golden tone, the sheer musicality and her natural charm.

But often it can have more to do with repertoire. Schwarzkopf's excursions into operetta never fail to bring a smile to my face.


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## david johnson (Jun 25, 2007)

Custer LaRue. I've always liked her voice.


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## BalalaikaBoy (Sep 25, 2014)

nina foresti said:


> Kiri Te Kanawa
> Joseph Calleja
> Joyce di Donato
> Dmitri Hvorostovsky


some fine singers. only thing I feel differently about is that when I hear Dmitri's voice, I don't think "simple" as much as "swag". he sounds like a sexy vampire about to bite into the flesh of his chosen target.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

BalalaikaBoy said:


> some fine singers. only thing I feel differently about is that when I hear Dmitri's voice, I don't think "simple" as much as "swag". he sounds like a sexy vampire about to bite into the flesh of his chosen target.


Now that he's dead you'd better keep your bedroom door locked.


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## Reichstag aus LICHT (Oct 25, 2010)

Soprano: Arleen Auger
Mezzo: Anne Sophie von Otter
Alto: Sara Mingardo
Countertenor: Robin Blaze
Tenor: Alfredo Kraus
Baritone: Gérard Souzay
Bass: Alastair Miles


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## davidglasgow (Aug 19, 2017)

Really like the subject of this thread. Many times I prefer singers who metaphorically use pastels and delicate shading rather than broad brushstrokes. Here are some favourites 

*Tenors*
Georgi Vinogradov





Leopold Simoneau





Josef Traxel





*Baritones*
Mattia Battistini





Giuseppe De Luca





Hermann Prey





*Basses*
Mark Reizen





Alexander Kipnis





*Sopranos*
Victoria de los Angeles





Anna Moffo





Angela Gheorghiu





*Mezzos/Contraltos*
Frederica von Stade





Marian Anderson





Aafje Heynis


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Some great choices, davidglasgow. I hadn't heard Battistini's "Ideale" for a long time. Singing like that reduces me to a quivering mass of jello.


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## BalalaikaBoy (Sep 25, 2014)

Woodduck said:


> Now that he's dead you'd better keep your bedroom door locked.


Vampires don't feed on their own kind 

in all seriousness though, still a bit upset by that. he was truly cut down in his prime :/


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