# Second Round: Salome's Final Scene: Nilsson and Welitsch



## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

4:10 Birgit Nilsson Salome Final Scene Live Metropolitan With Karl Bohm 1965





Luba Welitsch Salome Final Scene Orchestra: Austrian Radio Orchestra Conductor: Lovro von Matacic Composer: Richard Strauss 12:46


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Nilsson is certainly a force to be reckoned with here, but Welitsch makes you think she needs a padded cell, which is what is called for. She channels Salome as Wilde created her.
Incidentally, that photo of Nilsson on the cover of Opera News which is used in the title page of this video was a significant factor in sealing the deal that I was a gay boy.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

I think both are good, but Virginia O'Brien is all I need when it comes to Salome.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

I'm shocked at the conspicuous alteration of an important note in the vocal line by Welitsch. She changes it for no reason I can imagine, and since no other singer does this it can't be an option in the score. In nearly every other respect her performance is ideal. As for Nilsson, her performance is strong and absorbing, and when her voice rises to surmount the orchestra at "Allein was tut's" the power and radiance of it is spine-tingling. A the risk of seeming pedantic, I prefer to hear the score as Strauss wrote it, and I'm going to let my tingling spine vote for Nilsson.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> I'm shocked at the conspicuous alteration of an important note in the vocal line by Welitsch. She changes it for no reason I can imagine, and since no other singer does this it can't be an option in the score. In nearly every other respect her performance is ideal. As for Nilsson, her performance is strong and absorbing, and when her voice rises to surmount the orchestra at "Allein was tut's" the power and radiance of it is spine-tingling. A the risk of seeming pedantic, I prefer to hear the score as Strauss wrote it, and I'm going to let my tingling spine vote for Nilsson.


I'd just add that Strauss might not have minded as he coached Welitsch in the role himself, after choosing her to play it in a production marking his eightieth birthday at the Vienna Volksoper only a couple of years before she made this recording of the final scene.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Tsaraslondon said:


> I'd just add that Strauss might not have minded as he coached Welitsch in the role himself, after choosing her to play it in a production marking his eightieth birthday at the Vienna Volksoper only a couple of years before she made this recording of the final scene.


It's possible that Strauss approved the change, but it's hard to imagine a justification for it. The written notes - on "Jokanaan" - outline one of the score's orchestral motifs, which is prominent in Salome's dance and pervades the final scene. Just baffling.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Nilsson's costume - dress, wig and makeup - makes her look like a komodo dragon in drag. I'm sure Salome looked nothing like that, but I like it anyway. A least she looks, and probably danced, better than Caballe.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> It's possible that Strauss approved the change, but it's hard to imagine a justification for it. The written notes - on "Jokanaan" - outline one of the scores prominent orchestral motifs, which is prominent in Salome's dance and pervades the final scene. Just baffling.


I found a slightly later performance (1948) conducted by Karajan and she sings what is written there, as she does under Reiner at the Met, so I don't know why she sings a wrong note here.

Anyway, wrong note or not, Welitsch just _is _Salome for me, and Nilsson emphatically is not. She doesn't for one minute conjure up any impression of a young girl and I've never liked her in the role. Admittedly, I've never much liked Nilsson's voice, but I do think she's the best Elektra on disc (even if I do dislike the opera). Welitsch also conjures up the horror of the scene more to me. As far as I'm concerned, there's no competition.

Incidentally I suggested this earliest recording of Welitsch in the Final Scene, because the voice is at its freshest. For me it's the ideal Salome sound and I'm sure Strauss thought so too. I hadn't noticed the wrong note until you pointed it out.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> Nilsson's costume - dress, wig and makeup - makes her look like a komodo dragon in drag. I'm sure Salome looked nothing like that, but I like it anyway. A least she looks, and probably danced, better than Caballe.


Another reason she will never be Salome for me.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

I think there are several versions with Welitsch, some more unhinged than others, perhaps.
She was the first singer I’d heard in this scene and I though she was sensational. I don’t think it was this recording, but the Reiner, the cover of which had a decidedly _zaftig _Welitsch, but what singing! I, too, don’t think Nilsson is suited to the role, despite the fantastic high notes, which Welitsch also provides.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

MAS said:


> I think there are several versions with Welitsch, some more unhinged than others, perhaps.
> She was the first singer I’d heard in this scene and I though she was sensational. I don’t think it was this recording, but the Reiner, the cover of which had a decidedly _zaftig _Welitsch, but what singing! I, too, don’t think Nilsson is suited to the role, despite the fantastic high notes, which Welitsch also provides.


Ha! So she did know what the correct note was...


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## ewilkros (8 mo ago)

MAS said:


> I think there are several versions with Welitsch...


This one was a radio recording from 1944, not published until 1972--so no retakes of problem note or notes.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Do we need to do a Welitsch vs. Behrens round? Both were great but I have a strong feeling where the vote will go.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Do we need to do a Welitsch vs. Behrens round? Both were great but I have a strong feeling where the vote will go.


I really like the Karajan recording with Behrens and it is my stereo studio choice for the opera, but you probably know whom I'd vote for.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Tsaraslondon said:


> I really like the Karajan recording with Behrens and it is my stereo studio choice for the opera, but you probably know whom I'd vote for.


I hadn't heard Welitsch do this in about 20 years and my ears are better now. WOW. That is one of the most thrilling performances of any opera that I have heard. Thank you for that link.


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

A proper preparation this time:









Ah! Ich habe deinen Mund geküßt, Jochanaan.


For the Feast of the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, here is some decidedly non-liturgical music which I always revisit on this date: t...




jesuitjoe.blogspot.com


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

Seattleoperafan said:


> 4:10 Birgit Nilsson Salome Final Scene Live Metropolitan With Karl Bohm 1965
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Nilsson !
Emotional and without pianisssimi - a perfect combination for an exhausted mother of the two to listen to after midnight


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Incidentally, that photo of Nilsson on the cover of Opera News which is used in the title page of this video was a significant factor in sealing the deal that I was a gay boy.


My mother also finds her very unattractive. Should I speculate now, I wouldn't be born if she did ?
  
I think she looks OK.


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

I was acquainted with Nilsson's recording before the contest, had no claims (I never waited for Salome to sound like an overripe teenager) and thought I would vote for her. But Welitsh has made something unimaginable. I've never heard so much sex in a voice. Who was that Jochanaan, who hadn't succumbed to her? 
Nilsson's picture here is a nightmare. Was she auditioned for a villain in B-class spine movie?


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Do we need to do a Welitsch vs. Behrens round? Both were great but I have a strong feeling where the vote will go.


Why not?


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

Woodduck said:


> Nilsson's costume - dress, wig and makeup - makes her look like a komodo dragon in drag. I'm sure Salome looked nothing like that, but I like it anyway. A least she looks, and probably danced, better than Caballe.


I think Caballé had a very sophisticated wardrobe, sometimes it helped.
Dancing ability also doesn't depend on weight. I know several obese people with a ballet school background. Oppositely, I'm 6'2", about 175 pounds last 20 years, but I dance like Pinocchio.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

ColdGenius said:


> Why not?


We can. I just thought Welitsch would smash her in a contest from the reaction I've seen.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Good glory! Never did an orchestra compete so strongly with the singer to the extent that I was dying to vote for Bohm who knocked my socks off along with a pure and straight offering by Nilsson, but when it came down to it, even though the orchestra didn't have the clout that Bohm's did, Welitsch's rendering was the more sexual and interesting. And there lies my vote.
(How alone am I up there?)


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

nina foresti said:


> Good glory! Never did an orchestra compete so strongly with the singer to the extent that I was dying to vote for Bohm who knocked my socks off along with a pure and straight offering by Nilsson, but when it came down to it, even though the orchestra didn't have the clout that Bohm's did, Welitsch's rendering was the more sexual and interesting. And there lies my vote.
> (How alone am I up there?)


Wow! Surprise surprise! I am with the gang for once. Go figure.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

ColdGenius said:


> I think Caballé had a very sophisticated wardrobe, sometimes it helped.
> Dancing ability also doesn't depend on weight. I know several obese people with a ballet school background. Oppositely, I'm 6'2", about 175 pounds last 20 years, but I dance like Pinocchio.


"How do I look, sweetie?"

"Well, you have very sophisticated taste in clothing. Sometimes it helps."


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> "How do I look, sweetie?"
> 
> "Well, you have very sophisticated taste in clothing. Sometimes it helps."


I thought Caballe had some great recital dresses.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Here is Caballe as Salome. This must have been done before she really ballooned in her weight as she doesn't look bad actually.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Seattleoperafan said:


> I thought Caballe had some great recital dresses


Really???


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Here is Caballe as Salome. This must have been done before she really ballooned in her weight as she doesn't look bad actually.
> View attachment 178823


Have you seen her dance?

But really, we have to be more than tolerant when it comes to Salome. Not everyone can look like Teresa Stratas.


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

I think the only opera singer who actually danced in Salome was Catherine Malfitano.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

ColdGenius said:


> I think the only opera singer who actually danced in Salome was Catherine Malfitano.


Maria Ewing, Teresa Stratas, Josephine Barstow. I'm pretty sure Welitsch did too.

Gwyneth Jones did her own dance too, though she was a trifle mature by the time I saw her in the role. She stripped down to a somewhat ill-fitting, nude body stocking. The illusion of youth was not maintained.


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

Well, they all _tried. _I'm agree with Stratas, but it wasn't on stage, during the show. In case of Ewing _dance _is not what I remember first. I'm sure about Welitsh too.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Maria Ewing, Teresa Stratas, Josephine Barstow. I'm pretty sure Welitsch did too.
> 
> Gwyneth Jones did her own dance too, though she was a trifle mature by the time I saw her in the role. She stripped down to a somewhat ill-fitting, nude body stocking. The illusion of youth was not maintained.


Add Karita Mattila


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

ColdGenius said:


> Well, they all _tried. _I'm agree with Stratas, but it wasn't on stage, during the show. *In case of Ewing dance is not what I remember first*. I'm sure about Welitsh too.


What a surprise


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Becca said:


> Really???


You are European and likely have more sophisticated tastes than me. I like Ru Paul's Drag Race on TV🙃


Tsaraslondon said:


> Maria Ewing, Teresa Stratas, Josephine Barstow. I'm pretty sure Welitsch did too.
> 
> Gwyneth Jones did her own dance too, though she was a trifle mature by the time I saw her in the role. She stripped down to a somewhat ill-fitting, nude body stocking. The illusion of youth was not maintained.


Mattila went topless and danced. This was in the early part of this century when she was young and beautiful and it was supposed to be spectacular. She is a fine singer even if her voice as typical of today is a little generic sounding.
Forgive me if I have mentioned it but I have watched Ken Russell's Salome's Last Dance where male and female sex workers at a brothel act out the first performance of Salome in English for Oscar Wilde and Bogey with a blind 15 year old girl giving a truly truly astonishing performance as Salome. It is totally corrupt and quite wonderful. The words of the play are so decadent when said by the gay and straight Cockney sex workers. It is a must see.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Seattleoperafan said:


> You are European and likely have more sophisticated tastes than me. I like Ru Paul's Drag Race on TV🙃
> 
> Mattila went topless and danced. This was in the early part of this century when she was young and beautiful and it was supposed to be spectacular. She is a fine singer even if her voice as typical of today is a little generic sounding.


There was supposed to have been a Salome where Caballe was suspended aloft like a levitating swami and a dancer performed her part onstage.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Seattleoperafan said:


> There was supposed to have been a Salome where Caballe was suspended aloft like a levitating swami and a dancer performed her part onstage.


Probably at the _Liceu_ in Barcelona, where she could do no wrong…


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Actually, I was in the 5th row at the Met with a group of opera friends and Mattila certainly "looked" like she was buck naked, but a friend who worked backstage got the lowdown that it actually was a sheer body suit. Clever.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

nina foresti said:


> Actually, I was in the 5th row at the Met with a group of opera friends and Mattila certainly "looked" like she was buck naked, but a friend who worked backstage got the lowdown that it actually was a sheer body suit. Clever.


There was a photo, at the time, of a full frontal Mattila , where there was a clearly visible bush.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Seattleoperafan said:


> There was supposed to have been a Salome where Caballe was suspended aloft like a levitating swami and a dancer performed her part onstage.


Tonight I will dream about about Caballe suspended aloft. Thanks a ton.


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## ewilkros (8 mo ago)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Maria Ewing, Teresa Stratas, Josephine Barstow. I'm pretty sure Welitsch did too.
> 
> Gwyneth Jones did her own dance too, though she was a trifle mature by the time I saw her in the role. She stripped down to a somewhat ill-fitting, nude body stocking. The illusion of youth was not maintained.


Mary Garden as well, before and about 1910, famously so (she kept getting the show shut down by the guardians of morality). Also bodystocking.


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

MAS said:


> There was a photo, at the time, of a full frontal Mattila , where there was a clearly visible bush.


What? And she too?!


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

Seattleoperafan said:


> You are European and likely have more sophisticated tastes than me. I like Ru Paul's Drag Race on TV🙃
> 
> Mattila went topless and danced. This was in the early part of this century when she was young and beautiful and it was supposed to be spectacular. She is a fine singer even if her voice as typical of today is a little generic sounding.
> Forgive me if I have mentioned it but I have watched Ken Russell's Salome's Last Dance where male and female sex workers at a brothel act out the first performance of Salome in English for Oscar Wilde and Bogey with a blind 15 year old girl giving a truly truly astonishing performance as Salome. It is totally corrupt and quite wonderful. The words of the play are so decadent when said by the gay and straight Cockney sex workers. It is a must see.


I am confused. Are we talking about the complete opera recording ? Or a play ? Where can it be seen ? I know where to look for complete operas, if I have clear identifiers.


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## damianjb1 (Jan 1, 2016)

This was hard. I absolutely love this performance by Nilsson. It's electrifying. So she got my vote.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

BBSVK said:


> I am confused. Are we talking about the complete opera recording ? Or a play ? Where can it be seen ? I know where to look for complete operas, if I have clear identifiers.







__





Loading…






en.wikipedia.org




I am likely in a minority of people that love it but I find it so surreal and the language of Wilde so entertaining and decadent. I can be a bit odd in my tastes. It is such a novel way to see the play the opera is based on.


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## Hoffmann (Jun 10, 2013)

Nilsson.

I saw Nilsson sing the entire final scene of _Salome _in recital at the Kennedy Center right after she returned to the U.S. after her issues with the IRS had been resolved. She would have been in her early 60s at the time - late 1970s - and used the first half of her recital to warm up ("Dich Teure Halle", "Liebestod", etc). When she returned to sing Salome, it was the most riveting singing I had heard in my life.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Hoffmann said:


> Nilsson.
> 
> I saw Nilsson sing the entire final scene of _Salome _in recital at the Kennedy Center right after she returned to the U.S. after her issues with the IRS had been resolved. She would have been in her early 60s at the time - late 1970s - and used the first half of her recital to warm up ("Dich Teure Halle", "Liebestod", etc). When she returned to sing Salome, it was the most riveting singing I had heard in my life.


Both happy for you and envious as hell LOL


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## ewilkros (8 mo ago)

ewilkros said:


> Mary Garden as well, before and about 1910, famously so (she kept getting the show shut down by the guardians of morality). Also bodystocking.


Sorry for the length, sorry for a cultural crudity in the last paragraph (the past is a different planet) but here's a version of the legend for you to enjoy while you wait for the turkey to finish thawing, from Ronald Davis' _Opera in Chicago: A Social and Cultural History, 1850-1965_, Appleton-Century 1966, pp 87-92, and if not all is true at least it's well told. We pick up in 1910, when Mary Garden has joined the new Chicago Opera Company:

...By now Chicago had learned something of this artistic phenomenon known as Mary Garden. In an era when most singers were still merely automatons on stage, Garden stood out for the depth of her dramatic characterization. She could suggest almost any situation simply by walking across the stage. She could convey more with one intoned word than most prima donnas could in a whole opera. With Garden every movement counted. She could use her arms with more effect than anyone else in the business. Once during a performance of _Thais_, she was having trouble hitting high notes. She came to one she knew better than to attempt, and rather than try it, she simply raised here arm, rattled her bracelets, and literally bewitched her audience into thinking they had heard it. On stage she lost herself in the role she was playing. "I never learned to act," she once said, "acting came naturally." But she did practice poses. At her villa in Monte Carlo she had a room with mirrors covering the walls at one end. Here she would spend hours perfecting her gestures for a new role. She stood only five feet four inches, but she looked much taller on stage. Her command of costuming and make-up was fantastic. And even late in her career she could transform her appearance into that of an adolescent girl with a few skillfully applied touches. She always worked as part of the ensemble, and the operas she sang were consistently well prepared, particularly in staging. She saw to that. Almost everyone agreed that her acting was magnificent, but critics often made a habit of slighting her singing. It was a standard cliché that "Garden's wonderful but she can't sing." Her vocal abilities remained a controversial point all through her career, and opera buffs argue it still. But more than a singer, even more than an actress, Mary Garden was a showman. Her stagemanship was second nature with her, and she gave everything she had to each performance.
She once said she felt _Louise_ more acutely than any other role she sang. "By the time I have finished the opera," she told reporters, "I'm as limp as a rag--and as for my face--well, I just wish you could see that. Oh! no, I don't either! I wouldn't let anyone see my face under those conditions. I'm a sight--quite an old, old woman. I always throw a veil over my face passing from the stage to my dressing room, I'm such an unholy spectacle." She was exhausted after every performance, so deeply did she live whatever role she sang. "Upon finishing my performance," she writes in her autobiography, "I went home, took a hot bath, and drank down a large glass of hot milk, with ten drops of iodine in it."
On November 25, Garden sang her third role in Chicago, _Salome_, setting off a barrage of fireworks that rocked the city to its moral foundation. It had taken the soprano two years to master the role, one of the most difficult in the entire repertoire. She had sung it in Paris and for Hammerstein in New York, and it was one she dearly loved. The Chicago production was carefully prepared under Campanini's direction, receiving twenty-seven orchestra rehearsals before it was deemed ready, a record which the company never equaled. The normal orchestra of 80 members was expanded to 106. The top ticket price was raised to $7.00, "possibly based on the number of veils worn by Mary Garden," mused _Musical Courier_. At the first performance the house was jammed. 
With her great flair for the dramatic, Mary Garden threw herself into the role of Salome with all the realism she could muster. She sang the part in French, using the original Oscar Wilde text virtually intact. Her Salome was young, wild with sensuality, unrestrained in her perversion. "She is a fabulous she-thing," wrote Percy Hammond, drama critic for the _Tribune_, "playing with love and death--loathsome, mysterious, poisonous, slaking her slimy passion in the blood of her victim." Her "Dance of the Seven Veils," which became one of the more controversial aspects of the opera, was designed to further the Strauss drama. "It wasn't a hoochi-koochi dance at all," Garden insists in her autobiography. "Everything was glorious and nude and suggestive, but not coarse. . . I saw them dance the hoochi-koochi once in Algiers, stomachs all bared and rolling. My stomach wasn't bare in _Salome_ and I never rolled it." Her veils were pale pink, and she ran with them flowing through the air. "Then when I finished my dance," the soprano continues, "I put on my dress, a very short dress that went just under my knees, and made of a thick gold mesh covered with jewels, and, oh, those emeralds and diamonds and rubies, how they sparkled and laughed in the light!" When the soldiers brought her the head of John the Baptist, she lifted it over her head and then brought it down quickly and kissed it. "When I was completely _épuisée_, I fell on the head, and Herod, that monster of vice and sensuality, even he couldn't bear the sight of it and he shouted, 'Kill that woman!' " 
The audience left the Auditorium silent and shocked. It was impressed, but there was little indication of either appreciation or approval. According to the _Tribune_, patrons "were oppressed and horrified. But of any real enjoyment there was little or no evidence." The newspaper's music critic found _Salome_, already banned in New York, "the most artistic piece of indecency known to the operatic or any other stage." 
The next morning Chicago awoke to find itself in the throes of a squabble over the nature of art and morals. Even before the performance Arthur Farwell, head of the city's Law and Order League, had received protests about the opera, and he had sent Chicago's police chief, Leroy T. Steward, to see the show to find out just what it was all about. Steward reported, "It was disgusting. Miss Garden wallowed around like a cat in a bed of catnip. There was no art in her dance that I could see. If the same show were produced on Halsted street the people would call it cheap, but over at the Auditorium they say it's art. Black art, if art at all. I would not call it immoral. I would say it is disgusting." What about the music? Said Steward, "There is no music to it. What they call music is simply crash after crash made by the great big orchestra." The chief said he was in the process of seeing to it that the opera was closed. Mary Garden's response to the "catnip" statement was, "I always bow down to the ignorant and try to make them understand, but I ignore the illiterate." 
Arthur Farwell himself denounced the opera, calling Mary Garden "a great degenator [sic] " of public morals, but he never saw it. He was given a ticket, but refused to go. "I am a normal man, but I would not trust myself to see a performance of _Salome_," he said. "I wish Miss Garden would come to see me; I should like to reform her." The singer replied that she didn't think he could do her much good. 
Before long practically every newspaper, clergyman, and neighborhood philosopher in the city had taken a stand. Poems were written on the subject. Everybody talked about seeing _Salome_; no one mentioned hearing it. "It was like a session with the vivisectionist," wrote one _Tribune_ reporter. Archbishop G. S. Messmer denounced the opera, maintaining that "All the pleas put forth in the name of art cannot overrule the demands of sound morality and Christian principle." One editorial held that "Wilde has written no such drama as Mary Garden plays. . . . His Salome is indeed a princess, who impresses one instantly as haughty and restive, struggling to free herself from the orgies of the tetrarch's court. There is not a suggestion of dignity in Mary Garden's impersonation." The Old Settlers Club took up the debate. How did the dance of Salome compare with the historic Indian dances performed by maidens dressed in scanty costumes? But when the society leaders were asked their opinion of the performance, it was hard to find anyone who was there. Judging from responses, one would have thought the Auditorium had been empty that night. One clergyman whose name had been listed as one of the dignitaries present at the opera, later said, "I would not endanger my standing among my friends by going to such an opera." When Mayor Busse was asked his impression of _Salome_, he replied, "Let's see, _Salome_, oh, yes, that's the name of an opera at the Auditorium theater. I saw something in the newspapers about it, and that is the extent of my knowledge of the matter." 
While talk of closing the opera continued, a second performance was given. The Chicago News said that if "curiosity caused the fall of man, it also led to the progress of the race and it continues a duality of service . . . it also produced the best crowd of the season." The controversy became more intense than ever. What offended most people was the realism with which Garden portrayed Salome's lust for the prophet John and particularly her perverted ecstasy with the head. In an era when Victorian ideals were still much in evidence, this was considered shocking. London had found it so; so had New York. Police Chief Steward finally offered to abandon the idea of closing the opera if Garden would compromise by toning down the business with the head. But Mary held firm. "If there is any more of this twaddle about immorality," she said, "I shall leave Chicago and go to Philadelphia or some place where art is appreciated and viewed as art." 
Then, in the face of growing opposition, the opera company itself suddenly ended the fight, when its board of directors canceled a scheduled third performance. "We want no controversy among the people of Chicago over the merits of grand opera," a company spokesman said. Some claimed that Edith Rockefeller McCormick had ordered the performance canceled, but it seems more probable that the directors were simply trying to shield the young company from unfavorable criticism. After all, a controversy like this one, so early in the company's' career, could easily have jeopardized the whole project. 
A number of the artists were furious at the action. Tenor Charles Dalmorès, who had sung the role of Herod, exclaimed, "It is horrible. Chicago will be the laughingstock of Europe. It puts you back artistically fifty years. . . . Why, in Europe we talk about America as the land of the free. You are not." And to another reporter he said, "Berlin and Vienna will laugh when they hear this. They will say: The great Chicago! What is it? Still a manufacturing city without the true love of art.' " When Oscar Hammerstein heard the news in New York, he laughed and said, "I don't know just what could be done to 'tone down' _Salome_, especially the head scene, unless, maybe they'd give the head a shave and a haircut. . . If they'd put some flannel petticoats and things on Miss Garden that might help tone things, too. Mary really ought to be petticoated, I think, considering Chicago's climate. You know, when she worked for me, she had a deadly fear when singing _Salome_ of getting cold feet." 
_Salome_'s dance may have ended in Chicago, but its vibrations lingered on in Milwaukee, where the company had a performance of the opera scheduled for Friday, December 9, ten days after it was closed in Chicago. Two special trains were chartered to take Chicagoans who had missed the performances at the Auditorium up to the neighboring city. The audience there numbered over five thousand. Chicago's Old Settlers Club was still very much interested in the subject of Garden's dance, and after being taken backstage at the Auditorium to view the costume she wore in the opera, the members decided they could solve nothing until they had seen the veils in action. They would journey to Milwaukee, they said, and then render their verdict. As time for the trip drew near, the oldtimers found that somehow they had unofficially been sanctioned to decide, once and for all, the question of _Salome_'s morality. As the eyes of the city began to focus on them, the Old Settlers grew nervous. 
"You know anything about opera?" one septuagenarian asked another. 
"I got a niece that sings in the school choir." 
On the evening of the performance, one member of the club had to be out of town. Another was not feeling too well. And the rest decided to postpone their visit to Milwaukee until another time. 
There were no dressing rooms in the hall where Salome was given, so makeshift papier-maché, rooms had been built for the principals. Mary Garden arrived early for the performance and was dressed and wigged long before curtain time. She was waiting in her papier-maché dressing room when she thought she heard someone trying to poke his fingers through the wall. She got up, waited a moment, then heard it again. When she opened the door, she found a big, red-faced Irish policeman standing outside. 
"What are you doing, poking your finger in my dressing room?" asked Mary. 
"I'm looking for Mary Garden," said the policeman shyly. 
"I am Mary Garden. What do you want?" 
"But you're dressed, Madame," he said with surprise. 
"Certainly, I'm dressed. What did you expect?" 
"Is that the way you sang _Salome_ in Chicago?" 
"Most decidedly it was!" 
"Well, what are those blankety-blank fellows in Chicago making such a fuss about?" 
Actually Milwaukee took Salome without a whimper. The Milwaukee press was loud in its praise of both the score and the performance, and the public gave the artists a string of curtain calls at the conclusion. Present for the performance were two full-blooded Indians. One of them, Eagle Horse, was asked what he thought of the "Dance of the Seven Veils." He drew himself up proudly, smiled, and replied, "Ugh!" The Milwaukee mayor did not attend. Neither did the police chief, but the chief said he was not worried about _Salome_. Besides, he said, he had never seen a cat wallow around in a bed of catnip, so he could hardly be expected to know whether the opera was immoral or not.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Having just completed round one of this contest, I thought it would be interesting to go straight into round two. Nilsson is very good here (much better than in her studio recording). However, I don't think she is as suited to the role as our first round singers were. She has plenty of expression, but I just can't get past the buzzsaw nature of her sound. It cuts through the orchestra, rather than soaring over the top of it. This is very good, but Welitsch is next.

I know the Welitsch and it is a fabulous recording of the final scene and I know that I will choose it before listening because it is possibly the best there is. Yes, this has everything, she sounds deranged in the opening quieter part and manages to combine the elements that made Lawrence and Behrens so impressive in the previous round.

Wellitsch gets an easy win.

N.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

The Conte said:


> Having just completed round one of this contest, I thought it would be interesting to go straight into round two. Nilsson is very good here (much better than in her studio recording). However, I don't think she is as suited to the role as our first round singers were. She has plenty of expression, but I just can't get past the buzzsaw nature of her sound. It cuts through the orchestra, rather than soaring over the top of it. This is very good, but Welitsch is next.
> 
> I know the Welitsch and it is a fabulous recording of the final scene and I know that I will choose it before listening because it is possibly the best there is. Yes, this has everything, she sounds deranged in the opening quieter part and manages to combine the elements that made Lawrence and Behrens so impressive in the previous round.
> 
> ...


Nice to have you play catch up! Your critiques are always so thoughtfully written.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

The Conte said:


> Having just completed round one of this contest, I thought it would be interesting to go straight into round two. Nilsson is very good here (much better than in her studio recording). However, I don't think she is as suited to the role as our first round singers were. She has plenty of expression, but I just can't get past *the buzzsaw nature of her sound. It cuts through the orchestra, rather than soaring over the top of it. *This is very good, but Welitsch is next.


I don't understand this as a description of Nilsson's voice. A buzzsaw must be a pretty harsh sort of instrument, but one of Nilsson's distinctions was that her powerful and brilliant sound was not harsh. I heard her Isolde in 1972 when she was 54 and didn't hear a bit of harshness. Moreover, if her voice doesn't "soar" on "Ich habe deine Mund gekusst" I don't know whose does. Anyway, I doubt that there's a real distinction between cutting through an orchestra and soaring over the top of one. But perhaps we conceive of "cutting" and "soaring" differently. After all, voices don't literally do those things. If a voice is clearly audible against a big orchestra, as Nilsson's was, that's what matters. Whether it comes "over" or "through" seems to me to be mere wordplay.

I certainly do agree that Welitsch sounds more girlish than Nilsson, and that that makes her more of a natural for the role. To me this matters little, perhaps because I think the opera is basically a fanciful, glittering aesthetic object without a soul that barely suggests anything pertaining to life. For some operas you really must have voices "in character"; you wouldn't want NIlsson to sing Mimi or Musetta. But the characters in _Salome_ are amusing monsters, and the main thing the opera needs to do is sound fabulous.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Woodduck said:


> Moreover, if her voice doesn't "soar" on "Ich habe deine Mund gekusst" I don't know whose does. Anyway, I doubt that there's a real distinction between cutting through an orchestra and soaring over the top of one.


Compare Nilsson in the final lines of the role (where Salome sings out over the orchestra) with Welitsch, Behrens and Studer. The latter three are singing on the vowel, have more vibrato (but not too much) and sing on the centre of the notes. Nilsson's voice isn't centred on the vowel, her voice is a little fixed and she's slightly (ever so slightly) just south of the note in places. There's also less legato from her. She's still better than most others who have performed the part, no doubt.

N.


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## ewilkros (8 mo ago)

Woodduck said:


> I doubt that there's a real distinction between cutting through an orchestra and soaring over the top of one.


Sounds like an idea for a thread, beyond Salome, with clips. Volunteers?


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

The Conte said:


> Compare Nilsson in the final lines of the role (where Salome sings out over the orchestra) with Welitsch, Behrens and Studer. The latter three are singing on the vowel, have more vibrato (but not too much) and sing on the centre of the notes. Nilsson's voice isn't centred on the vowel, her voice is a little fixed and she's slightly (ever so slightly) just south of the note in places. There's also less legato from her. She's still better than most others who have performed the part, no doubt.
> 
> N.


What you hear as vibrato from Welitsch I hear as an inability to hold the note. Her whole impersonation of this sounds too much like caricature. I also have to disagree with you with regard to Nilsson singing slightly flat. Not to these old ears she doesn’t and singing below the note is anathema to me.
As regards Seattle’s observation about the demented interpretation by Welitsch, well, I think that comes more from the orchestra than Miss Welitsch. Would I be right in thinking that the Welitsch is not from a live performance, but rather a concert performance given the lack of a Herod!
But all this is of course IMHO,😎


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Woodduck said:


> Tonight I will dream about about Caballe suspended aloft. Thanks a ton.


Which is probably about what she weighed!🤣


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

The Conte said:


> Compare Nilsson in the final lines of the role (where Salome sings out over the orchestra) with Welitsch, Behrens and Studer. The latter three are singing on the vowel, have more vibrato (but not too much) and sing on the centre of the notes. Nilsson's voice isn't centred on the vowel, her voice is a little fixed and she's slightly (ever so slightly) just south of the note in places. There's also less legato from her. She's still better than most others who have performed the part, no doubt.
> 
> N.


Listening again to Nilsson singing those final lines, I remain unconvinced that "cutting through" and "soaring over" is a meaningful distinction. I must also say that I hear her vowels clearly.

The language people use to describe what they hear singers doing can be awfully subjective.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Barbebleu said:


> Which is probably about what she weighed!🤣


Precisely.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Barbebleu said:


> What you hear as vibrato from Welitsch I hear as an inability to hold the note. Her whole impersonation of this sounds too much like caricature. I also have to disagree with you with regard to Nilsson singing slightly flat. Not to these old ears she doesn’t and singing below the note is anathema to me.
> As regards Seattle’s observation about the demented interpretation by Welitsch, well, I think that comes more from the orchestra than Miss Welitsch. Would I be right in thinking that the Welitsch is not from a live performance, but rather a concert performance given the lack of a Herod!
> But all this is of course IMHO,😎



This particular clip was originally a radio broadcast and was later issued by EMI. It was recorded around the time she was singing the role at the Vienna Volksoper for Strauss's 80th birthday. He chose her himself to play the role and coahed her for the performances. It became her most famous role, and the one she was asked to sing most frequently. There are two different live performances from the Met, conducted by Reiner and she also recorded the last scene with Reiner.

I asked for this early performance, because Welitsch's voice was at its freshest. I'm not sure I understand what you mean by caricature. Welitsch just _is _Salome for me, and I'm not sure if I've ever heard anyone who convinces me more in the role. Certainly not Nilsson, who has always struck me as being completely miscast, though I do admire her Elektra. This is of course all just my opinion as well, of course.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Tsaraslondon said:


> This particular clip was originally a radio broadcast and was later issued by EMI. It was recorded around the time she was singing the role at the Vienna Volksoper for Strauss's 80th birthday. He chose her himself to play the role and coahed her for the performances. It became her most famous role, and the one she was asked to sing most frequently. There are two different live performances from the Met, conducted by Reiner and she also recorded the last scene with Reiner.
> 
> I asked for this early performance, because Welitsch's voice was at its freshest. I'm not sure I understand what you mean by caricature. Welitsch just _is _Salome for me, and I'm not sure if I've ever heard anyone who convinces me more in the role. Certainly not Nilsson, who has always struck me as being completely miscast, though I do admire her Elektra. This is of course all just my opinion as well, of course.


Well it wouldn’t do at all if we all liked the same thing. Where you hear girlish, I hear over-emphasised and mannered. I just can’t be doing with the quavery, fluttery vibrato she employs. Maybe that’s why I enjoy singers like Emma Kirkby!😎


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Did Welitsch ever record a complete Salome? That would perhaps allow me to properly evaluate her conception over a complete performance rather than the closing moments.

I see there is a Met with Reiner. I’ll try to source a copy.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Barbebleu said:


> Did Welitsch ever record a complete Salome? That would perhaps allow me to properly evaluate her conception over a complete performance rather than the closing moments.


Not in the studio, but there are the two live Met performances. The second (1950, I think) has better sound, but I actually prefer the earlier one (1949). Both are riveting performances.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

I’m listening to the ‘49 at this very moment. I’ll report back. 😎


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Not in the studio, but there are the two live Met performances. The second (1950, I think) has better sound, but I actually prefer the earlier one (1949). Both are riveting performances.


Ljuba Welitsch & Fritz Reiner • Metropolitan Opera, 1952




Reiner; Welitsch, Janssen, Jagel, Thorborg, Sullivan . Met, 1949


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Not in the studio, but there are the two live Met performances. The second (1950, I think) has better sound, but I actually prefer the earlier one (1949). Both are riveting performances.
> I think the performance you sent me is one of the most electrifying performances I ever heard. But that is as these ears hear it, of course.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Woodduck said:


> Listening again to Nilsson singing those final lines, I remain unconvinced that "cutting through" and "soaring over" is a meaningful distinction. I must also say that I hear her vowels clearly.
> 
> The language people use to describe what they hear singers doing can be awfully subjective.


Absolutely, which is why I described the difference in other words. If you think that purely phonated vowels, legato and vibrato on the one hand and impure vowels and a "voce fissa" on the other aren't meaningful differences then you are welcome to your opinion.

N.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

The Conte said:


> Absolutely, which is why I described the difference in other words. If you think that purely phonated vowels, legato and vibrato on the one hand and impure vowels and a "voce fissa" on the other aren't meaningful differences then you are welcome to your opinion.
> 
> N.


You're speaking in English but I feel all of a sudden dyslexic 😜 😜 😜 😜


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

The Conte said:


> If you think that purely phonated vowels, legato and vibrato on the one hand and impure vowels and a "voce fissa" on the other aren't meaningful differences then you are welcome to your opinion.


Did someone say that those particular things were not meaningful? What I would say about them - and about other things pertaining to singing - is that WHAT they mean, and HOW meaningful they are, depends greatly on who is singing what, as well as on how individual listeners respond to what they hear.

Voices vary dramatically along every parameter, and perhaps in no other area of music is personal taste more essential. Objectively, the classical singing voice funtions more or less well physiologically. This mechanical process can be judged with fairly high accuracy by an experienced ear. Nearly everything - or perhaps everything - else is aesthetics.

A buzzsaw voice that doesn't soar remains for me an inexplicable and disconcerting description of Birgit Nilsson's voice, but I have no other choice than to accept that your ears - or the way you define words - are very different from mine. However, I don't know whether you ever heard her live, where her brilliant tones seemed simply to materialize in the air and soared out over the orchestra, seemingly without weight or muscular constraint, and filled the house. Recordings can give only a partial idea of the effect.


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## Op.123 (Mar 25, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> Did someone say that those particular things were not meaningful? What I would say about them - and about other things pertaining to singing - is that WHAT they mean, and HOW meaningful they are, depends greatly on who is singing what, as well as on how individual listeners respond to what they hear.
> 
> Voices vary dramatically along every parameter, and perhaps in no other area of music is personal taste more essential. Objectively, the classical singing voice funtions more or less well physiologically. This mechanical process can be judged with fairly high accuracy by an experienced ear. Nearly everything - or perhaps everything - else is aesthetics.
> 
> A buzzsaw voice that doesn't soar remains for me an inexplicable and disconcerting description of Birgit Nilsson's voice, but I have no other choice than to accept that your ears - or the way you define words - are very different from mine. However, I don't know whether you ever heard her live, where her brilliant tones seemed simply to materialize in the air and soared out over the orchestra, seemingly without weight or muscular constraint, and filled the house. Recordings can give only a partial idea of the effect.


The best place to hear that effect is maybe the Liebestod in her 1966 Tristan. I was listening to it earlier and thought I’d never heard her sound so huge and with a slightly darker timbre than many of her other recordings. Very involved too.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Op.123 said:


> The best place to hear that effect is maybe the Liebestod in her 1966 Tristan. I was listening to it earlier and thought I’d never heard her sound so huge and with a slightly darker timbre than many of her other recordings. Very involved too.


That's one of the better examples of the effect she could make, as are some other live recordings. I have a _Turandot (_with Corelli under Gavazzeni) that puts my jaw on the floor; the endless stream of soaring brilliance is mind-blowing (her "vacation role," she called it). That Isolde also illustrates a phenomenon I heard in the house: her voice seemed to grow lighter - not less powerful, but less weighty - as the evening progressed. All voices warm up, but apparently hers continued to do so over the course of four hours. A really anomalous voice, the proverbial "freak of nature." One can dislike it in one respect or another, but there's no denying the phenom of it.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> Did someone say that those particular things were not meaningful? What I would say about them - and about other things pertaining to singing - is that WHAT they mean, and HOW meaningful they are, depends greatly on who is singing what, as well as on how individual listeners respond to what they hear.
> 
> Voices vary dramatically along every parameter, and perhaps in no other area of music is personal taste more essential. Objectively, the classical singing voice funtions more or less well physiologically. This mechanical process can be judged with fairly high accuracy by an experienced ear. Nearly everything - or perhaps everything - else is aesthetics.
> 
> A buzzsaw voice that doesn't soar remains for me an inexplicable and disconcerting description of Birgit Nilsson's voice, but I have no other choice than to accept that your ears - or the way you define words - are very different from mine. However, I don't know whether you ever heard her live, where her brilliant tones seemed simply to materialize in the air and soared out over the orchestra, seemingly without weight or muscular constraint, and filled the house. Recordings can give only a partial idea of the effect.


As you know, I don't much like Nilsson's voice, even in *Turandot *which has led me to believe I have some sort of tonal deafness when it comes to her, especially as I tend to prefer cutting, slim voices to fat, rich ones. (Does that make sense?) However I have been told by many who heard her live that records don't really represent what she sounded like in the house and I'm willing to believe it. Unfortunately that privilege is now for ever denied me. I do keep trying to like her more, but she's still something of a blind spot for me.

I was once the same way about Jessye Norman, whom I did hear live a few times, but recently I've started to enjoy her work a lot more. Maybe the same thing will eventually happen with Nilsson.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Woodduck said:


> Did someone say that those particular things were not meaningful? What I would say about them - and about other things pertaining to singing - is that WHAT they mean, and HOW meaningful they are, depends greatly on who is singing what, as well as on how individual listeners respond to what they hear.
> 
> Voices vary dramatically along every parameter, and perhaps in no other area of music is personal taste more essential. Objectively, the classical singing voice funtions more or less well physiologically. This mechanical process can be judged with fairly high accuracy by an experienced ear. Nearly everything - or perhaps everything - else is aesthetics.
> 
> A buzzsaw voice that doesn't soar remains for me an inexplicable and disconcerting description of Birgit Nilsson's voice, but I have no other choice than to accept that your ears - or the way you define words - are very different from mine. However, I don't know whether you ever heard her live, where her brilliant tones seemed simply to materialize in the air and soared out over the orchestra, seemingly without weight or muscular constraint, and filled the house. Recordings can give only a partial idea of the effect.


I think we can both agree that my definition of 'soaring' and yours are different. Therefore, I suggest we move away from discussing what 'buzzsaw' and 'soar' mean. I'm more than happy to go with your definitions.

To be clear, at no point have I said that Nilsson couldn't be heard above an orchestra (in fact, I described her voice as 'cutting through' the orchestra). As I have said in the past, Nilsson's live recordings of Turandot reveal that the voice was huge (especially the Mehta one from the Met). Her voice rides out over the orchestra there. The other role that I consider hers is Elektra (not one for a lyric soprano either!)

I wonder if I can explain what I mean using _your _words! (Humour me and just go with it, you never know it might be fun!)

Strauss' music for soprano is extremely varied and it's impossible to choose one moment from his works that sums up the total of his writing for soprano. However, I think most of his soprano roles have key lyric moments (Elektra is interestingly an exception there). Perhaps the most telling example of that lyricism appears in the soprano line after the violin solo in Beim Schlafengehen and for all his modernity Strauss never totally turned his back on the italianate legato line.

Getting back to Salome, she is not the force that is Elektra, nor is her music as expressionistic and singers that have good legato and lyrical abilities often do better than singers with bigger voices and less flexibility. My point is simply that Nilsson sings with _less _legato than Studer or Behrens in those final moments in the role. That's not to say that Nilsson sings _without _legato or that she is totally unsuited to the role.

N.


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