# Round One: Mozart- Resta, o cara! Leontyne Price and Kiri te Kanawa



## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

This is one of my favorite Mozart arias with a perpetually fascinating melody. All I will say is Price singing Mozart is an entirely different animal than her singing Verdi.




Resta, o cara! (1993 Remastered) · Leontyne Price · Herman Peter Adler · Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Leontyne Price - Mozart ℗ Originally Recorded 1968. All rights reserved by BMG Music 




Mozart: Bella mia fiamma, addio... Resta, oh cara, K. 528 · Kiri Te Kanawa · Wiener Kammerorchester · György Fischer


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Price completely wins me over here. She completely abandons her Verdian style for a pure Mozart one with great effect and tremendous beauty. She would have to be great to win me over te Kanawa who is top of her game in Mozart.


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## Viardots (Oct 4, 2014)

@SOF: You will need to make a major correction in your thread title. "Bella mia fiamma...Resta o cara" is not a scene from Don Giovanni. It's an independent concert aria Mozart composed for his friend in Prague Josepha Duschek. It has no relation at all to Don Giovanni. It just happened that the aria was dated not long after Don Giovanni made its world premiere in Prague.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Juicy contest!

I've mentioned before that I sometimes find Price sings all composers as if they were Verdi on these recitals discs. However, she sounds very much at home in this music. The melody IS fascinating (especially since there are flashes of the music Mozart wrote for Donna Elvira and Donna Anna). This is more low key and less dramatic though. Price's voice is gorgeous and she sings this well. I think much of her Mozart and Strauss singing are underrated.

Te Kanawa should win this in theory as Mozart was her thing. I've always thought her voice was one of the most purely beautiful and she was perfect for the Nozze Countess' reflective arias, even if she wasn't as convincing as a Schwarzkopf or a Studer in the rest of the part. She sounds more like what we expect in this music and I prefer the conducting on her version.

I'm torn. I find the aria (like much Mozart) rather bland, it's not my favourite cup of tea. So in some ways it comes down to which voice I prefer and that's Price. However, Te Kanawa sounds more Mozartian (whatever that means!)

I adore Price, but Te Kanawa's limited range of musical expression is just right for this music, whereas Price is obviously scaling back, but that results in less being less rather than more. Therefore, with a heavy heart, I vote Te Kanawa.

N.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Price completely wins me over here. She completely abandons her Verdian style for a pure Mozart one with great effect and tremendous beauty. She would have to be great to win me over te Kanawa who is top of her game in Mozart.


Tough contest. Two gorgeous voices, both singing well and both Mozartian, despite being very different artists.

N.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

I've never found Price a particularly convincing Mozartian, and don't here I'm afraid. To my ears, she sounds strained by the high tessitura and a little taxed by the coloratura.

Te Kanawa, on the other hand, though she could be a placid performer, was a superb Mozartian. Indeed I like her more in Mozart than I do in any other composer. The voice is surpassingly beautiful and she sounds quite at home in the high tessitura. Her coloratura is much cleaner as well. Without a moment's hesitation I'm going for Te Kanawa.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Viardots said:


> @SOF: You will need to make a major correction in your thread title. "Bella mia fiamma...Resta o cara" is not a scene from Don Giovanni. It's an independent concert aria Mozart composed for his friend in Prague Josepha Duschek. It has no relation at all to Don Giovanni. It just happened that the aria was dated not long after Don Giovanni made its world premiere in Prague.


Thanks. It didn't say so I looked it up and Google lied to me and said Don Giovanni. Thanks for saving the day. I don't have the program notes in front of me from Youtube.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Leontyne Price has been taken out of all future Mozart contest. Sorry! My ears hear differently from you guys sometimes. I didn't hear all the things you guys complain about with her in her Mozart singing as opposed to Verdi. BTW Price is from my home state 30 miles from where my mother was born so she was a big big deal in my formative operatic youth. Also I am from a time when people loved Price but tastes have changed. Seattle LOVED Price, she sang many concerts to sold out crowds here and she sang one of her very last concerts here at 70 years of age! She was chosen to open the new Met which was an enormous endorsement at the time.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Te Kanawa, on the other hand, though she could be a placid performer, was a superb Mozartian. Indeed I like her more in Mozart than I do in any other composer.


This usually comes to mind when I think of Te Kanawa and Mozart, btw.




Laudate Dominum (K.339)


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Easy peasy! The delicacy, cleanness, and gentility of Te Kanawa's expressiveness crown her the Mozart Queen.
Let us put an "O patria mia" in the hands of the invincible Leontyne Price and rejoice in the gorgeousness of her presentation instead.


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## Viardots (Oct 4, 2014)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Thanks. It didn't say so I looked it up and Google lied to me and said Don Giovanni. Thanks for saving the day. I don't have the program notes in front of me from Youtube.


Wikipedia is more reliable: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bella_mia_fiamma,_addio


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Viardots said:


> Wikipedia is more reliable: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bella_mia_fiamma,_addio


Thanks. Most composers don't compose concert arias but he did a lot. Happy New Year!


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

I find Mozart's concert arias a most interesting part of his oeuvre. For some reason I don't remember this one. It's eccentric - full of unexpected turns, as if Mozart were trying to condense a whole operatic scene into six minutes.

Te Kanawa is Te Kanawa, which means just about perfect in Te Kanawish terms: completely ear-friendly, and even somewhat expressive, here and there. She's probably the epitome of what's been considered good Mozart style in recent decades. My imagination can reach beyond that, but for now I'll just enjoy.

Price is Price, which means she does the right sorts of things with a lovely voice but that there's generally someone else who does them better. In this case it's Kiri.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

I much prefer arias from Mozart’s operas than his concert arias, written, I suppose for certain singers to exploit. For about two years, I had an LP (for those not brought up on vinyl, that means a Long Playing 33rpm record) of Mozart Arias by Margaret Price which I played excessively. 
I also had a Kiri Te Kanawa Mozart Arias LP, which I also played a lot. I don’t recall a Leontyne Price álbum of Mozart arias. She had an annual or at least a periodic albums of arias called “Prima Donna,” in which she sang operatic arias from various composers, mostly of operas she did not sing or record. 

I did not think Leontyne Price was suited to Mozart, though she had a marked preference for that composer, as well as Richard Strauss, though most impresarios wanted to sign her for Verdi or Puccini and would only sign her for other composers at her insistence. I don’t recall ever having heard her in a live performance of a Mozart opera, though I know she sang Fiordiligi at the Metropolitan Opera. 

Seattleoperafan has already professed his disappointment at the direction the voting is going, and I am sorry to contribute to it by voting for Te Kanawa. Now, has it been Margaret Price, it may have gone differently (sorry, John!).


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Leontyne Price has been taken out of all future Mozart contest. Sorry! My ears hear differently from you guys sometimes. I didn't hear all the things you guys complain about with her in her Mozart singing as opposed to Verdi. BTW Price is from my home state 30 miles from where my mother was born so she was a big big deal in my formative operatic youth. Also I am from a time when people loved Price but tastes have changed. Seattle LOVED Price, she sang many concerts to sold out crowds here and she sang one of her very last concerts here at 70 years of age! She was chosen to open the new Met which was an enormous endorsement at the time.


I think one of the things that makes the competitions interesting is sometimes hearing singers in repertoire that they aren't usually associated with (like Schwarzkopf in Verdi). Sometimes it works, sometimes not so well, but it's always interesting.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Tsaraslondon said:


> I think one of the things that makes the competitions interesting is sometimes hearing singers in repertoire that they aren't usually associated with (like Schwarzkopf in Verdi). Sometimes it works, sometimes not so well, but it's always interesting.


That's the best reason for NOT excluding singers merely because they're unlikely to win their matches.

Are you listening, John?


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

MAS said:


> I much prefer arias from Mozart’s operas than his concert arias, written, I suppose for certain singers to exploit. For about two years, I had an LP (for those not brought up on vinyl, that means a Long Playing 33rpm record) of Mozart Arias by Margaret Price which I played excessively.
> I also had a Kiri Te Kanawa Mozart Arias LP, which I also played a lot. I don’t recall a Leontyne Price álbum of Mozart arias. She had an annual or at least a periodic albums of arias called “Prima Donna,” in which she sang operatic arias from various composers, mostly of operas she did not sing or record.
> 
> I did not think Leontyne Price was suited to Mozart, though she had a marked preference for that composer, as well as Richard Strauss, though most impresarios wanted to sign her for Verdi or Puccini and would only sign her for other composers at her insistence. I don’t recall ever having heard her in a live performance of a Mozart opera, though I know she sang Fiordiligi at the Metropolitan Opera.
> ...


Price had a Mozart Arias album I really enjoyed and this is from that. I think Price mainly did Cosi fan Tutti. I've become fine with people hearing things differently from me.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Price had a Mozart Arias album I really enjoyed and this is from that. I think Price mainly did Cosi fan Tutti. I've become fine with people hearing things differently from me.


Fiordiligi is the only Mozart role I associate with her. Were there others?


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> That's the best reason for NOT excluding singers merely because they're unlikely to win their matches.
> 
> Are you listening, John?


Ok, thank you guys for being so nice to me I am putting her back in singing an aria I really like her in... to H*** with whatever you guys think  What I like about her in Mozart is so many singers who sing Mozart are so straight jacketed that you can't hear anything individualistic in their voice. Price alters hers but you can always tell it is her and I love an individual sound.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> Fiordiligi is the only Mozart role I associate with her. Were there others?


Donna Anna.


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## ScottK (Dec 23, 2021)

It was so refreshing to hear Mozart sung without that Mozart "halo of sound" hovering over the phrases in the way that pretty much inevitably happens when career Mozartians like TeKanawa sing this rep. In her opening phrases I thought Kiri sounded beautifully off-the-shelf. But as time went on I thought She became more spontaneous and Leontyne less even.


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## ScottK (Dec 23, 2021)

Seattleoperafan said:


> What I like about her in Mozart is so many singers who sing Mozart are so straight jacketed that you can't hear anything individualistic in their voice. Price alters hers but you can always tell it is her and I love an individual sound.


Excellent point John. A lot of talk from people who's careers say they should know a thing or two- Will Crutchfield, I believe Maria Callas - indicate that their thinking is along the same track as yours!


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Donna Anna.


Yes, for Karajan with Schwarzkopf as Elvira.


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## Viardots (Oct 4, 2014)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Thanks. Most composers don't compose concert arias but he did a lot. Happy New Year!


Same to you 

Kiri Te Kanawa by default. This concert aria and the Countess in the Solti _Figaro_ are among the best things she ever did on recordings.

Price is for me less suited to this music, which requires more nuanced and delicate expression and phrasing than she could handle. I heard her Donna Anna at Salzburg conducted by Karajan in 1963 [in a stellar cast that also includes Waechter, Schwarzkopf, Wunderlich, Rolando Panerai (singing Masetto), no less] in a live recording - vocally opulent with a generalised kind of dramatic-ness that becomes less interesting on repeated hearings.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Viardots said:


> Same to you
> 
> Kiri Te Kanawa by default. This concert aria and the Countess in the Solti _Figaro_ are among the best things she ever did on recordings.
> 
> Price is for me less suited to this music, which requires more nuanced and delicate expression and phrasing than she could handle. I heard her Donna Anna at Salzburg conducted by Karajan in 1963 [in a stellar cast that also includes Waechter, Schwarzkopf, Wunderlich, Rolando Panerai (singing Masetto), no less] in a live recording - vocally opulent with a generalised kind of dramatic-ness that becomes less interesting on repeated hearings.


I love gorgeous voices and especially when she was young she had that in my book, but she was always very wrapped up in herself, which worked better for concerts which is where I saw her and she could be a diva, than in an opera where she had to identify with the character. I think she was able to get into Aida as a character better than other parts.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Seattleoperafan said:


> I love gorgeous voices and especially when she was young she had that in my book, but she was always very wrapped up in herself, which worked better for concerts which is where I saw her and she could be a diva, than in an opera where she had to identify with the character. I think she was able to get into Aida as a character better than other parts.


I love some of Price's early recordings. She recorded a lot of Samuel Barber, some with him at the piano, and hers has always been my favorite recording of his wonderful _Knoxville, Summer of 1915._ Her southern black heritage tinges her singing, totally apt in that piece. You can feel the humidity and smell the lilacs.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> I love some of Price's early recordings. She recorded a lot of Samuel Barber, some with him at the piano, and hers has always been my favorite recording of his wonderful _Knoxville, Summer of 1915._ Her southern black heritage tinges her singing, totally apt in that piece. You can feel the humidity and smell the lilacs.


I have heard great things about that recording. I admire the fact that she has never tried to change her native dialect one bit. She shows you can sound intelligent and cultured while speaking in a South Mississippi Black dialect.It is a very beautiful and rich dialect.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Seattleoperafan said:


> I love gorgeous voices and especially when she was young she had that in my book, but she was always very wrapped up in herself, which worked better for concerts which is where I saw her and she could be a diva, than in an opera where she had to identify with the character. I think she was able to get into Aida as a character better than other parts.


She once said in interview, "It’s terrible but you know I just love the sound of my own voice. Sometimes I simply move myself to tears. I suppose I must be my own best fan. I don’t care if that sounds immodest – l feel that all singers must enjoy the sound they make if they’re to have others enjoy it too."

Well it's one view, I suppose, but in some ways that comes across in her singing. She seems quite content to pour out the glorious sound and then just leave it at that. I rarely hear anything specific to the music she is singing. In her _Prima Donna _series of recitals, though the range of music and composers tackled is wide, the interpretive range is not and she sings Handel in much the same way as she does Verdi or Barber.

In conrast, Callas famously hated the sound of her own voice when she first heard it on a recording and never quite got used to it afterwards. She actually hated listening to her own records. Robert Sutherland recalls an incident during rehearsals for her final concert tour, when the voice was pretty much gone. Somebody had sent her the recording of her famous Lucia in Berlin in 1955, which she hadn't heard before. They sat and listened to it and at the end she turned to him and said, "Well what did you think?" He was a bit flustered, but managed to blurt out, "It's marvellous singing, Madame Callas," to which she replied. "Marvellous? It's bloody miraculous!" Then she quietly added, "And to think that I went back to my dressing room that night and cried because I didn't think I'd sung as well as I could have." She was never satisfied and always striving for the impossible.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Somebody had sent her the recording of her famous Lucia in Berlin in 1955, which she hadn't heard before. They sat and listened to it and at the end she turned to him and said, "Well what did you think?" He was a bit flustered, but managed to blurt out, "It's marvellous singing, Madame Callas," to which she replied. "Marvellous? It's bloody miraculous!" Then she quietly added, "And to think that I went back to my dressing room that night and cried because I didn't think I'd sung as well as I could have." She was never satisfied and always striving for the impossible.


I've known about this anecdote for some time, but I had no idea that she made that remark to Sutherland or that she hadn't heard the recording until that time.

N.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Seattleoperafan said:


> I have heard great things about that recording. I admire the fact that she has never tried to change her native dialect one bit. She shows you can sound intelligent and cultured while speaking in a South Mississippi Black dialect.It is a very beautiful and rich dialect.


I had always thought that she was putting on a voice (a sort of Amercian version of RP), but now I realise that she didn't change her accent or dialect, it's all in the delivery of her speech which is very refined.

You know I love Price's voice. I told my housemate about this contest and he was quite annoyed that Te Kanawa won. I think put Price in a Mozart contest again, but put her up against someone other than Te Kanawa or Schwarzkopf or other Mozart naturals.

N.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Price had a third Mozart role in addition to the above two (at least in the studio). She's Donna Elvira in the Leinsdorf studio recording. John, this is one for you to look into as Nilsson is Donna Anna. (Siepi is the Don.)

N.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

The Conte said:


> I've known about this anecdote for some time, but I had no idea that she made that remark to Sutherland or that she hadn't heard the recording until that time.
> 
> N.


The live recordings weren't as readily available in those days, and she hated the whole idea of pirated recordings, chiefly because she didn't make any money from them.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

The Conte said:


> Price had a third Mozart role in addition to the above two (at least in the studio). She's Donna Elvira in the Leinsdorf studio recording. John, this is one for you to look into as Nilsson is Donna Anna. (Siepi is the Don.)
> 
> N.


Nilsson is fine as Donna Anna but even she knew it was not her forte. She bargained with Bing that if they had her in her big Wagner and Strauss roles she had to be regularly given Mozart and Verdi because she felt it was great discipline for her to keep her voice from getting too heavy singing Wagner all the time. As a repertoire choice it was not the most ideal for her but you can just listen how great she was still singing in her 60's and it paid off. Remember how impressed many of you were with her Tomb Scene in Aida with all that ppp singing? This method paid off in it's madness. She even sang Hojotoho at 76 for Levine's Gala! Jones was one of the best Verdi singers of the 20th century and perhaps if she had mixed up her Wagner and Strauss with the more Bel Canto singing of Verdi she could have prolonged the wobble getting in her voice. Gertrude Grob Prandl, who had ginormous voice like Nilsson also kept Mozart in her repertoire and when she retired at top of her game at 50 she was still singing with a very healthy voice after years of brutal roles. Jane Eaglen started out as what Carol Vaness said was the best Donna Anna soprano in the business and sang both Wagner and Bellini with great skill but when the world demanded her sing mostly Wagner she wasn't as good of a singer. Still good, but by the time she sang Norma at the Met after a lot of Wagner it was not as great as she was in her debut in 1994, 6 years before. When you look back at Flagstad and Traubel one marvels that they they remained so wonderful vocally singing only Wagner. Same for Melchoir. Sorry I get wordy sometimes 😊


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Tsaraslondon said:


> The live recordings weren't as readily available in those days, and she hated the whole idea of pirated recordings, chiefly because she didn't make any money from them.


I know she had some of her live recordings on tape when she died and I thought she had had them in the sixties in Paris (I know she listened to her Mexico Lucia). However, maybe that wasn't until the seventies.

N.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> I find Mozart's concert arias a most interesting part of his oeuvre. For some reason I don't remember this one. It's eccentric - full of unexpected turns, as if Mozart were trying to condense a whole operatic scene into six minutes.
> 
> Te Kanawa is Te Kanawa, which means just about perfect in Te Kanawish terms: completely ear-friendly, and even somewhat expressive, here and there. She's probably the epitome of what's been considered good Mozart style in recent decades. My imagination can reach beyond that, but for now I'll just enjoy.
> 
> Price is Price, which means she does the right sorts of things with a lovely voice but that there's generally someone else who does them better. In this case it's Kiri.


 It is precisely those unexpected turns, especially when the voice dips down low, that really bring this aria alive for me.


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