"Did you get her innuendo?"
"Ms. Fleming's soprano has gotten bigger and richer since her Dallas debut 15 years ago. 'I was replacing Carol Vaness in a lot of Mozart repertoire she couldn't sing anymore,' Ms. Fleming says of her early years."You can read more of The Tactful Voice's audition for the remake of The Women in an interview with Scott Cantrell in The Dallas Morning News.
Labels: camp, fleming, la cieca ci guarda la cieca ci vede
POSTED at
4:02 PM
15 Comments:
Power of suggestion of course but when I read the low carb part all I could think was "no gluten!" "Have you ever known such a housewife?!"
I was sort of surprised about all that nonsense she uttered about not even trying to create a public persona.
Who does she think she's kidding?
I wonder who will someday soon say "I really got my start singing all that opera that renee fleming really couldn't sing anymore."
We need more catty comments like this. It makes opera more interesting. Nowadays, so many divas try to make themselves seem nice to their colleagues and rival divas. We all know most would stab each other's back for a coveted role without blinking an eye. As for Ms. Vaness, she herself has admitted to leaving the Mozart roles behind when she started pursuing the heavier roles. She even said in an interview once that she hated Donna Anna, a role that she owned for a number of years. Ms. Vaness said it was not high enough or low enough and sits too much in the middle of her range.
She was replacing Vaness in Mozart in the 90's?
Mozart performances at the Met since 1990/91 (Fleming's First):
Vaness: 61
Fleming: 23
Covering, maybe - replacing, obviously not - aside from her Countess in Miller's Figaro and Vaness had already racked up 20 of those by then(including the previous new production). Vaness even has her beat in the current century.
Maybe La Fleming's lack of carbs has affected her memory... As steveac10 has noted, it's possible that she was covering Vaness but her most major break was stepping in as Desdemona. Vaness had injured her back in rehearsals, causing the Met to replace her with her cover - Fleming.
How can anyone read this interview and not puke???
Yes, but by the late nineties Renee was outstripping Vaness all over the world. And Vaness knew it from this interview with Brian Kellow in the June 1999 issue of Opera News: (discussing the younger generation and their lack of extensive and lengthy preparation for a role)
"Now even singers in mid-career run from here to there. RENÉE FLEMING -- gorgeous voice, but running all over the place. She cancelled the Met's Traviata, and regardless now if she ever sings it, she's going to bear that with her, because she got too tired and busy. Everyone is going to say she can't sing it. And I doubt that. I bet she can sing it. But I bet she can't find a minute to work it the way it should be worked."
Renee is obviously getting Vaness back for a snarky comment Vaness made in a printed interview, commenting on Renee's then recent cancellation of her very first planned Violetta at the Met a number of years ago. This was several years before her actual debut in the role. I can't remember Vaness's exact words (or where I read them - quite possibly Opera News) but I do remember being rather shocked by them. Perhaps one of you more web-savvy youngsters could dredge it up???
As usual Gualtier Malde has beaten me to the punch line!
Back in 1995 when a heavily pregnant Renee Fleming was singing Amelia in SIMON BOCCANEGRA and the newly slimline Carol Vaness was singing Violetta in LA TRAVIATA at the Covent Garden Verdi Festival the two divas got along very well. In fact Carol had offered Renee all her old 'fat dresses' to wear whilst she was pregnant. Maybe Renee was remembering that kind gesture when she was interviewed.
It was a time when America ruled the Verdian soprano wave at the Royal Opeera House. As well as Fleming and Vaness we had June Anderson singing in I DUE FOSCARI and Catherine Malfitano in STIFFELIO. There was no love lost between the those ladies who refused to acknowledge each other's existence.
Renee was just at that point before she became a big star and was wonderful to work with and sang beautifully. She was following Dame Kiri who sang Amelia when the production premiered and because of the similarity in their voices at that time Renee was nicknamed the 'intelligent Kiri' by those backstage.
I remember during a break in a stage rehearsal where Renee said to Maria Cleva (the Italian coach) that she wished she was Italian, because if she was she would be famous by now. Maria responed that she would indeed be very famous and that it would be better for her career that she had to wait.
La Cieca, you should have a tag for stuff like this here. Like "ain't it a pretty voice" or "I'm beautiful...dammit!"
I for one can only hope for a dressing room rapprochment after one or the other opens a met season (but not Adriana, maybe ...?) Brittle smiles as they stand cheek to cheek for the camerass as a fresh bouquet of flowers wilts just a little bit harder. It doesn't get any better than that.
But this can only happen after lots of mutual bitching and sniping and coming to blows onstage when cast together in the same opera.
The days of Vaness being cast in anything at the Met are long gone. I hope she's settled in nicely at her teaching job in Indiana.
Lola, what's your point? Vaness is in her mid-fifties, after a twenty-five year plua of the greatest integrity in virtually every major theater, minus any of the controversy that has dogged Fleming's career. There isn't a competition to be won here, as there are hardly enough first-class sopranos to fill the stages as it is.
As to her teaching at Indiana, it's a gift to the next generation of operagoers that she teaches, as her work is on the highest level. This kind of snarkiness directed at Vaness is pointless, no matter what thinks of the inevitable decline of her instrument after much hard use in recent years.
My point, Keikobad, was a response to the Farris post, although I'm sure he wasn't serious.
If you're a fan of Vaness, fine, but don't get so sanctimonious. Snarkiness is what people do best here.
Post a Comment
<< Home