# SOPRANO TOURNAMENT (By Request): Scotto vs Te Kanawa



## Bonetan (Dec 22, 2016)

Renata Scotto, Italy, 1934-






Kiri Te Kanawa, New Zealand, 1944-






'In quelle trine morbide' from Puccini's _Manon Lescaut_.

Who's singing did you prefer and why?


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## 1846 (Sep 1, 2021)

In general, I prefer Te Kanawa. I think her voice in general is more beautiful and she definitely in this comparison has stronger, more lush high notes than Scotto. Both are very good, but I do think in terms of singing that Te Kanawa wins this one. However, in terms of the acting, Scotto takes it hands down for this particular character. She comes across as an impressionable girl, whereas Te Kanawa comes across like the Marshallin. The old Met production, in which we see Scotto, is quite beautiful and puts Scotto in a proper wig and dress to further add to the "girlishness" of the character, whereas TeKanawa, again, looks like the Marshallin. Those things aren't Kiri's fault, but that wig makes her look about 30 years older than Manon should be and the dress likewise is definitely over-done and pretentious for this particular scene and makes her look like an old woman. Kiri is done no favors by this production, but I do think that her singing is clearly superior.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Miss Scotto is, of course, steeped into the Italian opera tradition much more that Miss Te Kanawa. One could argue that she knows what she’s singing, knows how to impart the feelings of the character, acts with voice and gestures, in a much overt way that Miss Te Kanawa. 

But I literally don’t want to listen to her. All sounds emitted fall unpleasantly in my ears, are effortful and have a sourness to the sound. 

If my choices are to listen to one OR the other, I prefer Miss Te Kanawa, though she is not ideal in the role, either.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Scotto has much more to say in this music than Te Kanawa, who almost always impresses me as a lovely voice and little more. I do think Scotto has a tendency to overdo her effects, which sometimes seem overlaid on the music rather than necessitated by it, but better this than anonymous prettiness. I see no need to belabor the obvious hardening and wobble at the top of Scotto's range; in the context of a total performance, and especially in this comparison, I can tolerate them. I can believe in Scotto as Manon. I don't believe Te Kanawa for an instant.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

So if you're going for a classic sounding beautiful voice without much passion behind it you'd probably vote Te Kanawa.
Me? I prefer my singers to show plenty of depth in their roles even to the detriment of a less than pure high note as in the case of Scotto.
Despite her flaws, Renata's got the guts!


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Scotto is an easy win for me. I understand that there are those who can't get past the sound of her voice, but her artistry is on quite a different level from Te Kanawa's blandly beautiful version. I love the change of colour at _un freddo che m'agghiaccia_ when she talks of a coldness that turns into ice, as well as the magical softening of her tone at _O mio dimora umile_ when she remembers the simple life she enjoyed with Des Grieux. Her basic sound is not beautiful, true, but, apart from at the top of her range, she does have excellent control of it and she has a superb legato.

True, as Woodduck says, art doesn't always conceal art, but I far prefer too much intelligence to too little. Te Kanawa makes a more beautiful sound, but I'm inclined to say, "So what?".


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## Azol (Jan 25, 2015)

Kiri's video seems incomplete and I only now have noticed it... 



 for the full performance. My bad!


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## Azol (Jan 25, 2015)

This round hasn't generated a lot of input - maybe due to the fact there are lots of games and voting on TC going on lately all at the same time so there's less interest in participating.
My vote goes to Scotto - she brings the role to another level so most other competitors look and sound rather bland in comparison. And she manages to sound like a spinto in Act IV, which is an emotional powerhouse so I don't listen to it too frequently just for this reason - you need to be in the right mood to re-live it.
It was a surprising choice for Domingo to include the performance with Te Kanawa in his "My Greatest Roles, Vol 1: Puccini" DVD box (but oh well, same goes with La Fanciulla with Neblett, IMO of course, YMMV).
Other than that, "In quelle trine morbide" stays one of my favorite "tests" for any soprano: very short, looking deceptively easy, one hell of a feat to perform. Callas is my imprint here but Scotto pulls all the right strings and a delight to watch.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Azol said: "This round hasn't generated a lot of input - maybe due to the fact there are lots of games and voting on TC going on lately all at the same time so there's less interest in participating."

Not to me. I actually look forward to the next vote. I am still hoping more singers of today get rated among themselves rather than with the golden age singers. I know there have been some, but mostly it has been singers of the past.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

I had a chance to see Kiri in concert but passed. Beautiful lady, beautiful voice with a marvelous technique, but so boring. A friend went, though, and loved it. I think she was best suited for Mozart, for which her voice was ideal. I have a feeling Scotto was best seen live as she was more than just a voice.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

I voted for Scotto, although this clip is not a very good example of her art. Her complete presentation of the role, though is why she got my vote.


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## BachIsBest (Feb 17, 2018)

I voted for Te Kanawa. I understand why other members might go for Scotto and partially agree that Te Kanawa interpretation leaves something to be desired. But there are some benefits here to a straightforward, uncomplicated interpretation, and her voice is so much more beautiful especially on the top.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Seattleoperafan said:


> I had a chance to see Kiri in concert but passed. Beautiful lady, beautiful voice with a marvelous technique, but so boring. A friend went, though, and loved it. I think she was best suited for Mozart, for which her voice was ideal. I have a feeling Scotto was best seen live as she was more than just a voice.


We in SF fell in love with her in 1972, on her local début as the Countess in *Le Nozze di Figaro*. As the curtain opened, there sat a most beautiful soprano beautifully costumed with a lovely _poitrine _. A vision. Then she opened her mouth and we heard the most ethereally gorgeous _Porgi Amor qualche ristoro_ we'd ever heard. She didn't put a foot wrong the entire evening and she got ovations during her curtain calls. In subsequent years, she delighted us with her Amelia/Maria in *Simon Boccanegrs*, Pamina in *Die Zauberflöte*, *Arabella,* the Marschallin in *Der Rosenkavalier*, another Countess in Strauss's *Capriccio*, and a repeat of *Nozze, *and *Capriccio* in subsequent seasons. She never disappointed as her voice was always beautifully deployed, she was always scenically and musically apt and always conveyed the emotions of the roles she sang. She was beauty personified in both voice and figure.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Vocal beauty is largely in the ear of the beholder, but it isn't only our ear that finds beauty in voices. Beauty means something very different depending on whether we're talking about a sound as such or a sound capable of conveying meaning. The phenomenon of beauty in the human face is exactly the same: a face that radiates character, personality and emotion will seem more beautiful than a more "perfect" face that expresses nothing (or worse). Certain voices that seem unappealing at first hearing can take on unexpected beauty as we're drawn into the expressiveness with which they're used, and once that happens we may never hear them as unbeautiful again.

There are certainly objective criteria of quality in the way voices function; strain, stridency and wobble are rarely effective in expressing anything music requires, and to the extent that we understand the human voice they're bound to undercut our pleasure. But vocal timbre is infinitely variable, and singers with odd or unconventional tone qualities may bring unusual and even extraordinary qualities of expression to music, qualities we couldn't have imagined otherwise. I think first of Maria Callas, but I've always found Renata Scotto to be this sort of singer as well; it was her very personal expressiveness that I first noticed about her, and aside from the faults which encroached on her vocal production as her career advanced I have never once felt her somewhat reedy tone quality to be unbeautiful. I hear in it a beauty which is a little strange, evocative, and distinctively hers, and I consider her a unique and very special singer.

I enjoy the clear, cool, cosmetically flawless voice of Kiri Te Kanawa as much as most people do (probably), but I'm never left with the desire to hear more of her. Lovely face and figure, lovely voice, but not the kind of fascinating, ambiguous beauty that pierces the heart as well as the eardrum. She was probably just fine in static, aristocratic roles like the Countess Almaviva, and in those Strauss drawing-room operas that interest me just about as much as she does.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> Vocal beauty is largely in the ear of the beholder, but it isn't only our ear that finds beauty in voices. Beauty means something very different depending on whether we're talking about a sound as such or a sound capable of conveying meaning. The phenomenon of beauty in the human face is exactly the same: a face that radiates character, personality and emotion will seem more beautiful than a more "perfect" face that expresses nothing (or worse). Certain voices that seem unappealing at first hearing can take on unexpected beauty as we're drawn into the expressiveness with which they're used, and once that happens we may never hear them as unbeautiful again.
> 
> There are certainly objective criteria of quality in the way voices function; strain, stridency and wobble are rarely effective in expressing anything music requires, and to the extent that we understand the human voice they're bound to undercut our pleasure. But vocal timbre is infinitely variable, and singers with odd or unconventional tone qualities may bring unusual and even extraordinary qualities of expression to music, qualities we couldn't have imagined otherwise. I think first of Maria Callas, but I've always found Renata Scotto to be this sort of singer as well; it was her very personal expressiveness that I first noticed about her, and aside from the faults which encroached on her vocal production as her career advanced I have never once felt her somewhat reedy tone quality to be unbeautiful. I hear in it a beauty which is a little strange, evocative, and distinctively hers, and I consider her a unique and very special singer.
> 
> I enjoy the clear, cool, cosmetically flawless voice of Kiri Te Kanawa as much as most people do (probably), but I'm never left with the desire to hear more of her. Lovely face and figure, lovely voice, but not the kind of fascinating, ambiguous beauty that pierces the heart as well as the eardrum. She was probably just fine in static, aristocratic roles like the Countess Almaviva, and in those Strauss drawing-room operas that interest me just about as much as she does.


I so agree with you and your post reminds me that the majority of voices I love are those which might be considered idiosyncratic.

I remember when I worked at one of the major classical music record shops in London (oh how I miss them) the sales people from EMI would secretly refer to Te Kanawa as dreary Kiri. A little unkind, possibly, but, though the voice was creamily beautiful, she was not a singer who would ever make you sit up and really listen to what she was singing. I have a clipping of John Steane's review of the Te Kanaw/Davis and Schwarzkopf/Szell _Vier letzte Lieder_, in which he talks about the "placid loveliness" of the Te Kanawa version, as compared to Schwarzkopf's caprturing of a deeper meaning in the songs. He also discusses the couplings,



> Te Kanawa gives a beautiful account of "Morgen", but generally her picture stays within its frame, whereas Schwarzkopf comes well forward and out of hers.


I feel much the same about the above performances. Te Kanawa is simply a beautiful voice singing a lovely aria. Scotto is Manon.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Tsaraslondon said:


> I remember when I worked at one of the major classical music record shops in London (oh how I miss them) the sales people from EMI would secretly refer to Te Kanawa as *dreary Kiri. *


Dreary Kiri... Hahaha!

I too miss record shops where you could engage with people who knew classical music and recordings. It was a sad day when Oregon's wonderful little enclave of civilization, the classical department of Music Millennium in Portland, was given over to vinyl LPs, and the classical CDs were squeezed into a small space in the middle of the store where the cashier and customers had to listen to pop garbage instead of classical music (or simply silence, a commodity even rarer in commercial establishments than good music).


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Oh dear, all this Kiri-bashing! She was thought lazy by her teachers, but it’s probably her placid nature. John Steane wrote that she never fulfilled her potential, possibly for the same reason y’all mention above. All I can say that she gave me a lot of pleasure at the opera. She got her Damehood possibly because she sang at the Prince of Wales’s wedding to Diana Spencer. Valerie Masterson, who was asked first, declined and “only” got a CBE. Valerie was Prince Charles’s favorite (favourite) singer at the time.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Woodduck said:


> Dreary Kiri... Hahaha!
> 
> I too miss record shops where you could engage with people who knew classical music and recordings. It was a sad day when Oregon's wonderful little enclave of civilization, the classical department of Music Millennium in Portland, was given over to vinyl LPs, and the classical CDs were squeezed into a small space in the middle of the store where the cashier and customers had to listen to pop garbage instead of classical music (or simply silence, a commodity even rarer in commercial establishments than good music).


Same here. We lost Tower Records and Discount Records where our amateur experts resided. Then there were the "private" issues of pirated performances that they recommended and held in a back room. Operaporn.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

MAS said:


> Oh dear, all this Kiri-bashing! She was thought lazy by her teachers, but it's probably her placid nature. John Steane wrote that she never fulfilled her potential, possibly for the same reason y'all mention above. All I can say that she gave me a lot of pleasure at the opera. She got her Damehood possibly because she sang at the Prince of Wales's wedding to Diana Spencer. Valerie Masterson, who was asked first, declined and "only" got a CBE. Valerie was Prince Charles's favorite (favourite) singer at the time.


I didn't mean to come too down on here. I did see her once in *Cosí fan tutte* and she did sing divinely. She looked gorgeous too and was a great foil to Baltsa's feisty (and very funny) Dorabella.


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