# Round One: Contralto: Brahms- Denn es gehet... Forrester, Ferrier, Flagstad



## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

I think my intro below might help you enjoy this offering better


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

INTRODUCTION:I love a great contralto voice but other than Erda there is little for them to sing in opera. Brahms wrote great music for contralto and The Four Serious Songs of Brahms are my favorite. The first of these,Denn es Gehet Dem Mensche, is a song that has the drama and beauty of a Verdi aria. The great thing about songs is men and women can sing them and I will include both. All of these ladies had gloriously beautiful and very very distinctive voices. They are all very involved in the music. I should point out Flagstad is around 65 here and singing contralto with a still incredibly beautiful voice. If you are unfamiliar with this piece, which I predict, you will be astounded at the piano accompaniment. If you really enjoy this perhaps I may at some point include another favorite from this song cycle. I will next feature three men singing this song and it is very different with a low voice.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

My reaction: I love all three. I think Ferrier has the strongest interpretation and the most powerful voice, which is an advantage here. I think the richness of Ferrier's lower notes nail the win for me as they are so perfect. . Forrester also has a wonderful interpretation but blows me away the most by the shear beauty of her voice. It is great to hear Flagstad's still great voice sing this and she makes the piece her own. I LOVE this music so much!!!!!!


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## Shaafee Shameem (Aug 4, 2021)

Ferrier’s voice is such a rich, lush sound, and she sings with fine legato and very sensitive phrasing. I vote for her.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Shaafee Shameem said:


> Ferrier's voice is such a rich, lush sound, and she sings with fine legato and very sensitive phrasing. I vote for her.


She started out as a pianist and came to singing rather late. People who knew her were crazy about her as a person. She died of cancer and sang as long as she was able to before she succumbed to her illness. Her throat was so large you could shoot an apple to the back of her throat by her uvula. No one ever sounded quite like her. Late in her career she was able to sing up to an A5, but starting so late it took a while for her to get that big very dark voice up that high.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

A tidbit about Maureen Forrester: she was a wonderful singer of American popular songs like Cole Porter and Gershwin.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

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## Highwayman (Jul 16, 2018)

Finally, something up my alley! Forrester`s sobriety perfectly fits this and I liked her interpretation a tiny bit better, _but_ Ferrier`s low notes are just irresistible so I ended up voting for her. Flagstad`s interpretation made no sense to me I`m afraid.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

--For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts;
even one thing befalleth them:
as the one dieth, so dieth the other;
yea, they have all one breath;
so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast:
for all is vanity.

--All go unto one place;
all are of the dust,
and all turn to dust again.
--Who knoweth the spirit of man
that goeth upward,
and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward
to the earth?

--Wherefore, I perceive that there is nothing better,
than that a man should rejoice in his own works;
for that is his portion:
for who shall bring him
to see what shall be after him?
--Ecclesiastes 3:19-22

We really need to know what this song is about. Listening to it and reading along is, I would guess, a bit like gazing at the skull of a departed friend. Alas, poor Yorick.

I can't imagine a nobler or more poignant rendering of this song than Ferrier's. Her deep voice and emotional warmth seem made for it. By any lesser standard Forrester is certainly excellent. Flagstad, here in her 60s and transposing the song up a minor third because she isn't a contralto despite the contralto-like richness of her low voice, requires a little charity from me, mainly because of the effortfulness of the high notes, which keep her from singing as expressively as she would no doubt like to.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> --For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts;
> even one thing befalleth them:
> as the one dieth, so dieth the other;
> yea, they have all one breath;
> ...


I really appreciate this. I'll try to remember to post the words if I do lieder again. The genius of Brahms in this is his creating music that perfectly reflects the text. Typically I am not too much into the lyrics in foreign languages, but I first fell in love with these songs when I was taking German so I know what they are singing about.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

As usual, Woodduck says it all. I can’t imagine anyone singing this better than Ferrier. The dark, cavernous beauty of her low voice suits the song perfectly. Forrester is excellent too, but just misses Ferrier’s poignancy. Flagstad transposes upwards and the song loses some of its deep melancholy, plus it’s a bit late in her career. 

Ferrier an easy win for a me.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

I am so glad you all enjoyed this change of pace. I have loved this music for 50 years. You will be amazed at how different it sounds with a male voice. Brahms didn't have the temperament for opera, but wrote gorgeous music for voice. He created powerful moments by voices going down low as other composers create by singing high notes.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Nice choices for this challenge. Ferrier by a whisker from Forrester. Flagstad, alas, does little with this. She is a little too quick for the nature of this song. More of a ‘Vier nicht so ernste Gesänge!’


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Out of my realm and having no idea what I am even supposed to be looking for and not having read any other posts to get some clue, I will have to go with some basic instincts of mine and then see how bad I realy did do.
The basic word is contralto -- a genre that is fairly foreign to me except for Podles and Anderson.
I love Flagstad's voice but do not include her to be as much of a contralto as the other two.
Maureen Forrester's sound is more appealing to me but Ferrier to my ears sounds like the true contralto.


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## ALT (Mar 1, 2021)

Ferrier, w/o hesitation.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

For passionate etymologists, the origin of the term "contralto" is interesting Try this:

"In medieval music, in which the melody was either in a middle voice or passed from one voice to another, and which utilized only male singers, the upper voice was naturally called altus. As music for mixed voices developed, that female voice which was nearest the altus, and thus most contrasted with it, was called contr' alto." [Century Dictionary]

That makes sense. "Alto" actually means high, contrary to its present usage. What makes less sense is the transference of the root "contra" - Latin for "against" - to instruments such as the contrabass and the contrabassoon. These don't play "against" the bass, but typically carry the bass line themselves.


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## ScottK (Dec 23, 2021)

Three great voices! I thought Forrester sounded fantastic and so did Ferrier. But Forresters sound seemed comparatively contained whereas Ferrier's had a buzz on it that made contact. Forrester would have needed to inform with some kind of interpretive insight but again, I thought it was Ferrier who had the alternation between legato and declamation that wakes you up. By comparison Forrester was monochromatic. The higher key did not seem to help Flagstad as she didn't have the advantage of those low sounds the other two commanded and she had to work abit hard on top. I assume she isn't young here? Ferrier!


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## ScottK (Dec 23, 2021)

Didn't know this song but read that Brahms turned to the Lutheran Bible for the text, the same place he got his words, as a young man, for The German Requiem. Fascinating and sad to see the different take between the old and young man. In the Requiem, he says " For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away". Here he says "... the man dieth .....Therefore I perceive that there is nothing better, Than that a man should rejoice in his own works, For that is his portion." Not diametrically opposed but to me the young man's expression rings of compassionate reflection on a truth he is not yet confronting, the second is him facing it, soon, and is not so content with the idea of fading.


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