# Single Round: Spiritual. They crucified my Lord. Jessye Norman and Marian Anderson



## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

See if you can choose. I can't. So different. So powerful. You can vote for both like I had to. The low note is a D below middle C in Marian Anderson's song. 




*Jessye Norman sings "Calvary/They Crucified My Lord" at Carnegie Hall




Marian Anderson*They crucified my Lord* USS George Washington Carver (SSBN-656)*


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## Shaughnessy (Dec 31, 2020)

Marian Anderson - sings the lyrics as if they were words that actually meant something...

Jessye Norman - every contest just seems to further affirm the impression that she's singing the notes and not the lyrics - Undeniable vocal acrobatics but I've yet to hear genuine sincerity of expression in anything presented thus far - Kind of like the operatic equivalent of Ella Fitzgerald but with significantly better enunciation.


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## Op.123 (Mar 25, 2013)

Shaughnessy said:


> Marian Anderson - sings the lyrics as if they were words that actually meant something...
> 
> Jessye Norman - every contest just seems to further affirm the impression that she's singing the notes and not the lyrics - Undeniable vocal acrobatics but I've yet to hear genuine sincerity of expression in anything presented thus far - Kind of like the operatic equivalent of Ella Fitzgerald but with significantly better enunciation.


I assume you mean Ella Fitzgerald had the better enunciation?


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## Op.123 (Mar 25, 2013)

Marian Anderson is unsurpassed in this repertory. @Shaughnessy I'm not the biggest fan of Norman but maybe you'd enjoy her Poeme de l'amour et de la mer which is really wonderful. As are her Four Last Songs.


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## Shaughnessy (Dec 31, 2020)

Op.123 said:


> *I assume you mean Ella Fitzgerald had the better enunciation?*


If that's what I had intended to write, that's what I would have written - I may not care for Norman's phrasing - I still hear notes being vocalized as opposed to words that actually mean something - but I can't fault her technique - Her articulation is superb - Every word is clearly and cleanly enunciated in any one of the five languages that she used during the course of her career.

Ella Fitzgerald, despite the Irish surname, is a taste that I have yet to acquire - and I made a genuinely honest effort to do so - but, much like Sutherland, all I hear are notes being vocalized - an apparently endless series of vowels and consonants that are somehow separate from the words that were being used in a lyric to form a particular sentiment..


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Jessye, Ella and Sutherland are three of my favorites but I am not one who is focused on interpretation like many of you more evolved forum members. I think also because I so rarely can relate to the feelings in arias and the lyrics in most popular songs frankly. I think because I don't focus on emotions so much in my life as I try to keep life smooth and without strong feelings given my issues with bipolar disease before I got so well medicated like I am now. I have been stable for decades now and I aim to keep it that way. For me beautiful vocals are more of an emphasis. In videos singers facial expressions like Norman's can influence me more than the details of the singing. I am surprised some of you even bother to communicate with me as our focus is so different


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

It’s like two different pieces -Jessye Norman sings a soprano arrangement with timpani and chorus Interjections, grand and showy, theatrical. Marian Anderson sings a very low lying version, in the most effective range of her voice, mournful, with piano accompaniment, and as showy in its own way, but in a more religious bent?


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

No amount of beautiful background chorales or sumptuous sounding singing from Jessye Norman can save her from the simple, down-to-earth sad beauty of just a piano and the voice of Marian Anderson who meant every single anguishing note she sang.


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

Marian Anderson wins by our unanimous family vote. My 7 year old daughter likes, that she is more understandable and the chorus doesn't make noise, my partner prefers deeper voices and would be OK doing computer programming while listening to this, and I like both the contraalto voice and the emotionality of it.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

BBSVK said:


> Marian Anderson wins by our unanimous family vote. My 7 year old daughter likes, that she is more understandable and the chorus doesn't make noise, my partner prefers deeper voices and would be OK doing computer programming while listening to this, and I like both the contraalto voice and the emotionality of it.


It really really astounded me when I first heard it!!! It is the lowest contralto piece I have ever heard and done so well!


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Anderson sent a chill through me with her very first phrase. She didn't even need the piano. Much better than the Ziegfeld Follies version.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Anderson by a mile. Simple, straightforward and deeply affecting. 

I didn't care for the splashy arrangement for Norman's version (indeed at first I thought I'd wandered into Turandot's realm). Nor did Norman connect with the emotions of the song with anything like Anderson's specificity. @Shaughnessy hit on something I often think about Norman's singing, in that she has almost a one size fits all generosity of emotion. I rarely hear anything specific to the music she is singing.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Anderson by a mile. Simple, straightforward and deeply affecting.
> 
> I didn't care for the splashy arrangement for Norman's version (indeed at first I thought I'd wandered into Turandot's realm). Nor did Norman connect with the emotions of the song with anything like Anderson's specificity. @Shaughnessy hit on something I often think about Norman's singing, in that she has almost a one size fits all generosity of emotion. I rarely hear anything specific to the music she is singing.


With this crowd Norman does well in certain genres. She won big in the soprano part of the Verdi Requiem and did really well against Schwarzkopf in the Four Last Songs. I am not as picky as many of you and am just blown away with the magnificence of her voice ( at least as I hear it). My sister thought her singing in this piece was wonderful with an extraordinary high note at the end. This is not enough for many of you. You want Meryl Streep with a set of pipes I can see why Anderson wins on this, though. It is extraordinary.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

One of the things I love in these contests are unexpected, unusual or unknown (to me) rep.

I love Norman here (and I generally like here in anything that can be considered mezzo-soprano rep. The velveteen quality of her voice can be heard here more fully than in some of her operatic recordings. What a voice. As glorious as the sound is I'm somewhat underwhelmed on an emotional level though.

Anderson is on a whole different level though. The voice is rich and gorgeous, but highly vibrant in addition. However, it's the simple delivery of the text, she says so much with so little means. Wonderful!

N.


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