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Tuesday
March 1, 2005

The Greatest Operatic Tenor on Record by James Kilbourne

He can float a soft note for what seems eternity, and bring you to beautiful place of his own creation as he does it. Just as you become relaxed and appreciative of this gentle, introspective world, Jussi the hero and conqueror leaves you gasping for air and looking for your horse to join him in battle. (Read more...)
Discuss this Article (48 messages)

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 12:49am

I bet everyone saw the title & thought, another article on Mario Lanza!!

Beautiful tribute to Jussi, James! And I so look forward to the upcoming articles you're promising here.

Knowing what we tenor fanatics are like, I'm sure you'll forgive me if I demur on a couple of points re Jussi. :-)

You say he's the greatest operatic tenor of all, meaning by that tenors who've recorded complete operas, unlike Lanza or Caruso. Yet something stops me listening to Jussi's opera recordings often—his Italian was poor to the point where I sometimes wonder if he really did know, intelligent & all that he was, what he was singing, other than in a general familiar-with-the-plot kind of way. Taking a breath where he does in the ascending last phrase of E Lucevan, for example (in the Tosca with Milanov). This is nit-picking, I know, but it happens sufficiently often for me to come away unconvinced.

Then, too, the sharpness you mention is often not only sharp, but tight, as though the note is having a difficult passage out.

I haven't heard those Swedish recordings you mention, & am looking forward to doing so.

I guess I would rate Gigli above Jussi as an operatic tenor. More authentic. But of course, they're both right up there. If only we had their like around now instead of the note-perfect nothings who abound.

One of my singing teachers heard Jussi at the Albert Hall. Said he (Jussi) was rolling drunk for the whole concert. Said the singing was magnificent!

Of course, there's that story of Jussi visiting Mario in LA & the two of them getting drunk on Chivas Regal while listening to their own records. I hope it's not just apocryphal! :-)

Linz

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 2:30am

Thanks for another beautifully written essay, James. One of the things I love about your writing is that you never equivocate. In a timid world of cautious utterances, you embrace superlatives with all the confidence and passion of a man who genuinely loves life and knows his own mind. We need far more of your kind, Jim.

And like Linz, you've made me curious to seek out more of Bjoerling. If it wasn't for the fact that I *have* listened to the guy, I'd be racing off to the nearest CD store this minute to buy his discs - so compelling is your argument here. But the truth is, I've never been thrilled by Bjoerling's singing. Yes, he has a distinctive plaintive quality, but to my ears he sings everything in the same monochromatic, silvery timbre. Nor do I find his phrasing the greatest on record. If we're going to compare only tenors who've made complete opera recordings, then
Di Stefano and Carreras are far greater vocal poets in my book. *Especially* Carreras, for at his peak in the 1970s he combined the most luscious lyric sound I've ever heard (and a soaring upper register) with a magical sense of phrasing.

But I repeat: you *have* made me curious, and I will definitely be giving old Jussi a second chance :) Thanks again, James.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 2:50am

Here are my current Top Ten Tenors, ranked according to how well they sang opera (& everything else), not whether they recorded complete operas or not:

1) Lanza

2) Carreras - the early stuff

3) Wunderlich

4) Di Stefano - the early stuff

5) Gigli

6) Caruso

7) Bjoerling

8) Oreste (yes!!)

9) Gedda

10) Schmidt

11) Kilbourne (well, he says he has a High C!! :-))

Note - those dreary drones Pavarotti & Domingo don't feature, & never will.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 3:24am

Yes, Oreste (Kirkop) rates in my book, too. Check out his exciting Cielo e Mar - he's like a cross between Lanza and Gigli. It's too bad the guy retired from singing at just 37.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 7:11am

Linz, I agree with you about Pavarotti. But Domingo, no.
(Edited by Robert Bidinotto on 3/01, 7:12am)

(Edited by Robert Bidinotto on 3/01, 7:12am)

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 9:29am

I was once treated to a recording of forty tenors singing Di Quella Pira, that was the entire recording Di Quella Pira by one tenor after another. I made up my mind then that no one could match Caruso. He held the high C for 23 seconds.

I like Bjoerling immensely, but for silver throated clarity I'll take Wunderlich any day.

I am puzzled by the continued mention of Lanza in this august company. Although he did a couple of amazing renditions of popular arias in the late 40s for the film The Great Caruso, his voice was a flash in the pan probably do to bad or incomplete training. His tendency to slide up to the high notes is annoying as well as the hamminess of his performances. I'm sure you are all aware, that he was laughed off the stage in Milano primarily because his Italian was so bad. By the mid fifties, when he sang the score for The Student Prince (he was too fat to appear on screen, the role was lip-synched by Edmund Purdom) his voice was pretty well shot. The beautiful serenade from that work had to be dropped down a third because he could not sing the b flat, and the sliding sloppy obligato he invented for the Drinking Song is a laugh riot.

Back to Caruso, I think he gets short shrift from modern audiences because his recordings are so primitive.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 9:44am

Glad to see that Jussi Bjoerling is getting some attention. I remember being introduced to him at my apartment in New York by a roommate. It was a revelatory experience. (I hadn't liked opera prior to that time.)

Bravo!

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 9:56am

I'll let the rest of you take care of Mr. Davison. It is too early in the morning here for a murder.
1) Bjorling did the best Vittorias from Tosca ever. The BEST.
2) He was not always recorded well, so it make a huge difference when he sang in stereo. Listen to his Butterfly, act one. Unbelievable.
3)He made a recording just before he died where he was singing perfectly and the sound was magnificent. It was arias such as Cielo e Mar! (The best) and Lamento di Federico ( I know it is blasphemy, but it is the best). I'll find out which albums it is currently on.
3) Linz- since you love Albanese, listen to her best recording ever in my opinion- Manon Lescaut. (and Bjorling steals the whole thing).

Gentlemen- give Jussi the love that you give Mario as far as getting the sound right and hearing the greatest renditions. Like Gigli, he has GREAT HEART, and he is one tough son of a bitch, too.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 10:04am

By the way, Bjoerling is spelled Bjorling with those funny little dots above the o. In my case, I am lucky enough just to find the o.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 11:30am

James wrote:

>>I'll let the rest of you take care of Mr. Davison. It is too early in the morning here for a murder.

I am not in the mood to be murdered. Thank you anyway. Is the glotteral Mario a sacred cow, or did I commit some other hanging offense?

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 12:43pm

You mean one of these, James? " ö "
Hold down "alt" and hit 1, 4, 8 on your numberpad.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 2:01pm

Mr. Davison- yes.
Mr. Bissell- are you Swedish?

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 6:49pm

James, while Robert Davison is still alive, why don't you refer him to the various articles written by Solo people about Mario Lanza?

Barbara

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 8:10pm

Barbara- you are too damned civilized! We haven't even had a fight yet!
OKAY! OKAY!
Robert- if you go to Lindsay's, Derek McGovern's and my articles under people at Solo, you can start your long road to spiritual recovery.

Tuesday, March 1, 2005 - 11:20pm

James—before you commit your justified, indeed mandatory, homicide, let me enlighten Mr. Davison as to his egregious errors.

"I am puzzled by the continued mention of Lanza in this august company. Although he did a couple of amazing renditions of popular arias in the late 40s for the film The Great Caruso,"

He did a large number of amazing renditions of popular—and some lesser-known—arias for the early fifties movie The Great Caruso, for several other movies through to the late fifties, and for RCA Victor in the recording studio.

"his voice was a flash in the pan probably do [sic] to bad or incomplete training."

I suspect Mr. Davison hasn't a clue as to the training Mario received, though it's true that aside from Enrico Rosati his best teacher was his own ear & innate musicality. Flash in the pan? Some flash! Some pan!

"His tendency to slide up to the high notes is annoying"

Piffle. All decent singers lean into their notes in a way that stuffed shirts condemn as sliding. If you want sliding, listen to Corelli!

" as well as the hamminess of his performances."

And if you want ham, listen to del Monaco. Or Gigli, for that matter.

"I'm sure you are all aware, that he was laughed off the stage in Milano primarily because his Italian was so bad."

That's rather curious, since he never sang in Milan. And his Italian was excellent. And he was never laughed off anystage. Au contraire, he was mobbed wherever he sang. Mr. Davison might care to check out the Royal Albert Hall concert CD as evidence. Does he have time for that, James?

"By the mid fifties, when he sang the score for The Student Prince (he was too fat to appear on screen, the role was lip-synched by Edmund Purdom)"

He wasn't too fat. He had an argument with the German director who told him his singing was too passionate. Mr. Davison would no doubt have sided with the director.

" his voice was pretty well shot. The beautiful serenade from that work had to be dropped down a third because he could not sing the b flat,"

Not only was the Serenade not transposed down—it's in the same key every other tenor records it in: E-Flat—but also Mario pinged out not one but three glorious B-Flats at its conclusion. His performance of this classic remains definitive. The voice "shot"??!! Such a moronic observation is yet another reason you're about to be, Mr. Davison.

"and the sliding sloppy obligato he invented for the Drinking Song is a laugh riot."

Well, Mr. Davison, if you could pour out "sloppy" obligati like that one, you'd be very rich & adored & have better things to do with your time than ejaculate stunningly ignorant posts on SOLOHQ.

Proceed, James! :-)

Linz

Wednesday, March 2, 2005 - 12:05am

I'll happily lead Mr. Davison to the scaffold, Linz. The notion that Lanza needed to transpose anything down is an abominable slur - in fact, if anything, his arrangers regularly transposed many of his songs up. Take his Granada, for example, which is sung a whole tone and a half higher than usual. If the egregious Mr. Davison had taken the trouble to listen to the disc of live performances that accompanies Armando Cesari's biography of Lanza, he'd have discovered an abundance of effortless B-flats, Bs and high Cs from the beginning of Mario's career to the end.

The more I think about it, though, Mr. Davison has to be winding us up. No one could be as much a musical moron as he pretends to be here.

Wednesday, March 2, 2005 - 2:12am

I doubt it's a wind-up, Derek. No moron could be somoronic as to want to pose as such a moron! :-)

Wednesday, March 2, 2005 - 4:46am

" The more I think about it, though, Mr. Davison has to be winding us up. No one could be as much a musical moron as he pretends to be here."

Maybe he read a review of a review...

Wednesday, March 2, 2005 - 9:38am

Joe Maurone wrote:

<< No one could be as much a musical moron as he pretends to be here."

I am not a musical moron.

-----

On First Hearing Mario Lanza
by James Kilbourne

The world through Mario Lanza is serious, important and most of all, joyful! Your life and your feelings are meaningful; and so very, very important. Don’t speak to me of his flaws; I know them better than you do.
-----

I am speaking of his flaws, and because I recognize them as you do, I will not put Mario Lanza in the same company with Bjorling, Wunderlich or Caruso, unless we can agree to restrict his career to the years between 1948 and 1951.

I recognize his incredible potential, and the quality, beauty and discipline of his early recordings. Without question they are wonderful or as I have already said, amazing. But to insist he had the same voice by the mid-50s is silly.

Discipline was unnatural to Lanza. He relinquished an opera career for the money Hollywood offered. He was a big spender with a prodigious appetite for food, sex and booze. These pursuits are not conducive to vocal longevity. This lack of discipline allowed him to abandon restraint and precision for a wonderful, yet sloppy sentimentality (which could be considered more creative, I suppose).

I am a serious romantic. I spent many hours in my youth reveling in the lush romanticism that comprised the bulk of his repertoire. I listened to Liberace as well. His truncated versions of the classics like the b-flat Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto are what turned me on the classical music in the first place, but I would not compare his performance to Van Cliburn’s.

I stake a claim as the last of the American Operetta fans (my favorite is Romberg), but I don’t confuse Operetta with Opera, joi de vivre with virtuosity or quote Rand, "confuse the potential with the actual".

I apologize for and retract the remark about his appearing in Milan.

Hero worship is all well and good as long as it is recognized as such, but only a sycophant consciously chooses to not look at the feet. It is important to be a hero, but more important not to be a villain.

(Edited by Robert Davison on 3/02, 9:51am)

Wednesday, March 2, 2005 - 9:51am

Right on, Joe. That was funny as hell.

I have been tempted to jump into this discussion, but I have learned the hard way to stay away from discussions of religion, politics and tenors.

Michael