Joan Sutherland has died

[Guest alanm]

http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/opera/farewell-joan-sutherland-the-grandest-dame-of-australian-opera-20101012-16g8a.html

 

Surprisingly, I never saw Sutherland in person, but enjoyed her singing (records/CDs) for almost my entire life. She may not have been the perfect bel canto singer & there were times when I could not understand her words, but those fault will be forgotten soon. Sutherland was a opera singer for the ages, and will be easily remembered into the next century. I am very sad today.

[Karl-G]

I am very sad to hear of her death. I also never saw her perform on stage, but I watched her many tv performances and listened to her recordings. The concerts, broadcast on tv, which she did with Luciano Pavarotti and Marilyn Horne were some of the most delightful performances I have ever enjoyed.

 

This is the first notice in the NYTimes:

 

October 11, 2010, 10:27 am

Joan Sutherland, ‘Stupendous’ Soprano, Dies at 83

By ANTHONY TOMMASINI

 

Dame Joan Sutherland, one the most acclaimed sopranos of the 20th century, who followed the path of Maria Callas and helped revitalize an entire repertory of early-19th-century Italian opera of the bel canto school, died in Switzerland on Monday morning, according to published reports. She was 83.

 

After Ms. Sutherland’s 1960 Italian debut in Venice, the country’s notoriously picky critics dubbed this Australian-born soprano “La Stupenda” (“The Stupendous One”). For 40 years the name endured with opera-lovers around the world. Even those with reservations about aspects of Ms. Sutherland’s artistry readily agreed that she was a stupendous soprano.

 

Her singing was founded on astonishing technique. Her voice was evenly produced throughout an enormous range, from a low G to effortless flights above high C. She could spin lyrical phrases with elegant legato, subtle colorings and expressive nuances. Her sound was warm, vibrant and resonant, without any forcing. Indeed, her voice was so naturally large that at the start of her career Ms. Sutherland seemed destined to become a Wagnerian dramatic soprano.

 

A complete obituary will follow at nytimes.com.

 

http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~san/sutherland.jpg

[Karl-G]

Among Ms Sutherland's many roles, Marie in Donizetti's "Daughter of the Regiment" was one of my favorites. Here is an excellent video of Ms Sutherland as she first enters on the stage.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icwR8LXov_c

 

Not only was she a superb technician, but she was a delightful comedienne. Here is the singing lesson scene from "Daughter of the Regiment."

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdVAfpeMHFI&feature=related

[leigh.bess.toad]

RIP La Stupenda. You brought a lot of joy and happiness to millions of your fans. You will always be remembered. And you will be missed.

[Guest alanm]

http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/opera/farewell-joan-sutherland-the-grandest-dame-of-australian-opera-20101012-16g8a.html

 

She may not have been the perfect bel canto singer .....

 

I had to leave in a hurry this morning. I should have written that Sutherland may not have been MY favorite bel canto singer. She was so special that my use of the word perfect instead has bothered me all day.

[whipped guy]

Oh my god!

 

I feel such a loss... I was away for a couple of days and have been out of the loop and ironically just learned of this sad news here.

 

I am shocked as I write this. Well, it's been an emotional day for me. I guess I can say that Sutherland is only the second opera singer that has affected me in such a manner... The first was Callas... and I can still remember where I was when I heard her death announced on the radio. I really consider each to be a separate greatness.

 

One of my regrets was never hearing Callas live... it would have been late in her career when she was giving recitals with DiStefano. However, I was fortunate to hear Sutherland in Lucia (1970), La Fille du Regiment, Maria, Stuarda, I Puritani, and Il Trovatore (1987). Her Maria Stuarda really impressed me the most, because it was an unfamiliar piece at the time... I expected fireworks in Lucia and La Fille... but her Stuarda took me by surprise... such breath control... amazing!!!! As for her Marie in La Fille... yes! She was quite the commediane... I saw that standing way up in the family circle at the MET... and her voice was like a laser beam traveling all that way up into the stratosphere... She was unique... and her recordings do not do her justice. She was more involved dramatically in the flesh... and the microphones never really captured the size and power of her voice... she may have not been the most dramatic of coloraturas... but she was certainly a coloratura of heroic proportions.

 

May she rest in peace...

[uwsman2]

I heard Sutherland live at the Met a few times early in my life in NYC, and she always made a big impression. But for me among her greatest achievements was the Turandot recording with Pavarotti and Mehta. That one should stay in the catalogues forever. A long and fruitful career, and important place in opera history with her contributions to the bel canto revival. She will be long remembered.

[+ Italiano]

Definitely one of the greatest singers in Opera world, her technique was exquisite. One can question her diction or her interpretative skills, but indeed she was a fantastic singer.

 

I had the pleasure to meet her once and have a quite lunch with her at some common friends' house in London a dozen years ago. She was a very earthy lady, totally "antidiva" kind of woman, a very nice lady.

[BgMstr4u]

A truly amazing voice and a great human being. When I became an opera lover in high school (early 60's) she was already there. I can hardly imagine the world without her. I am weeping.

[BaronArtz]

I was so saddened by this. Listened to various interpretations of Wagner's Liebestod all day today to commemorate her ...

[adriano46]

My most memorable moments were the duets between Joan Sutherland and Marilyn Horne in Bellini's NORMA where one can hear and see these two amazing artists blending their voices so perfecly they become one.

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4mcD91duYA&feature=related

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWYFZZgs1Cw&feature=related

 

I made references to three renditions of the same duet -- showing how these two voices also developed from the original performance and then as their voices matured and developed. We rarely find such artists, and Joan Sutherland was truly LA STUPENDA with her voice (though, purists can argue about her diction which often was lost with the perfect notes).

[whipped guy]

More Sutherland/Horne

 

May I add the second act duet from Rossini's Semiramide as well... Unfortunately Sutherland's initial statement in this remarkable piece is missing... but enough remains...(1965):

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhp9APMzoCM&feature=related

 

The central section from 1979:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4M4IqjGSqQ

[AdamSmith]

My favorite: Sutherland's performance, again with Horne, in the Schmidt-Isserstedt recording of Beethoven's Ninth. The all-round best Ninth on record, for my money.

[+ Charlie]

Sometime in the early 1960s, an acquaintance took a candid photo of Sutherland and Birgit Nilsson eating at a dinner party in a NYC apartment; they are seated next to one another, smiling and holding their forks over the salad course. Nilsson is wearing a simple black cocktail dress and a single strand of pearls, while Joan has hair piled high on her head, with very long and heavy jeweled earrings, and a scoop-necked dress that looks like it could be made of brocade. Nilsson was not a small woman, but Sutherland looks huge next to her, and her mouth seems almost twice as big. It is a fascinating and, to me, incongruous grouping, because Sutherland looks flamboyant and Nilsson demure, whereas friends of mine who knew both of them characterized them as the exact opposite.

 

The photo was given to a friend of mine, who enlarged and framed it. When he died, he left it to my closest friend, who left it to me when he passed away. Now, all of them are gone, along with a glorious period in opera history.

 

(I suspect some of you would be horrified that it has hung for years in my bathroom.)

[leigh.bess.toad]

(I suspect some of you would be horrified that it has hung for years in my bathroom.)

 

Horrified and horribly jealous that you have such a remarkable memento. God that must have been an amazing dinner. And personality wise, that is exactly what I've heard about both of them -- the exact opposites.

 

But you having it in the bathroom reminds me of the obituary John Feinstein, one of the greatest sports writers of our generation wrote for his father, Martin Feinstein who headed up the Washington Performing Arts Society and the Kennedy Center and so many other landmark DC arts organizations. I'll never forget he said that when he was a kid all he wanted to do was go upstairs and listen to his baseball games, but his parents made him stay down with their guests for some of the entertainment -- guests like Marian Anderson, Anton Rubenstein, Paul Robeson, Vladamir Horowitz, Isaac Stern and on and on. And he so regrets he did not appreciate the chance he had that, even though he became one of the great sports writers, do fully understand the significance of what he was experiencing as a child. Seein that photo everyday would remind me that even though we loved both artists during their time, now, in the hindsight of their absence, we only now truly appreciate what remarkable, remarkable artists they were.

 

Has anyone heard any word from Richard Bonynge. I don't remember seeing any quotes or anything at all. Have I just missed it?

[whipped guy]

Changed forever...

I actually received a "sympathy" card from a friend today who knew of my great love for La Stupenda. Even though it was partially tongue in cheek, it was quite sincere at the same time and made many telling points about the significance of this loss to the operatic firmament.

 

Moreover, it made me realize that the opera world that I grew up with has changed forever. Somehow I feel a void and an emptiness as that world is now a different place. Actually without Maria, Birgit, and now Joan… it is a very different place. Fortunately, I have my memories… and the recordings… so I, along with so many others, will survive the reality that we probably will never see the likes of one so great again.

[whipped guy]

On my trip to and from NYC this past weekend I listened to Sutherland's first recording of Norma with Marilyn Horne. At the time of their MET performances in 1970 it was said that Horne's voice was a lower extension of Sutherland's... and that Sutherland's was the upper extension of Horne's. I found this hard to believe as the two voices are so dissimilar with Horne's being more incisive too boot. Yet on this most recent listening session I found that exactly to be the case in the duets... and especially in the second act duet with them singing in thirds.