Who would be worth hearing as Brunnhilde who is still singing?

I should repeat that I’m looking forward to hearing Stemme in this role in 2010.

Lindoro Almaviva: I also agree that Nina Stemme is being too ambitious, too quick. This fast track ‘great -hope anticipation’ when a singer gets on the operatic ‘grid’ today, is a big killer of voices. This ‘Brunnhilde ‘ fascination is like a singer is daring to go for ‘Gold’ at some Olympic marathon voice – race. From just some simple announcement ‘of the possibility’, the casting machine and the fans start pushing and shoving as they all go into media overdrive. They all want to ‘be there’-to get the ‘first look in’.

Most times the ability of a singer to actually ‘endure’, is the last consideration. For many, they fall over with a mouthful of gravel rash in their mouth…..and burnt vocal cords, as their prize. And off they then go, in relative oblivion or quick retirement.

Turandot’s one big riddle for operatic women: role of ‘Brunnhilde’!

Puccini’s riddle for operatic women: the role of Turandot! The Calaf may lose his head. She can lose her voice.

Furthermore, if you look at the Hollander final scene, you can see how the body tenses up as she punches out the high notes like she was batting at a baseball practice. Do you think true Hoch dramatisch have that much touble with that?

I do not hear a Brunnhilde in her voice, I hear a Marschallin, a Desdemona, maybe Amelia, Donna Anna, Manon Lescaut, Lina, Seglinde, Alceste (maybe); but the Brunnhilde of the Immolation scene?, no way.

Don’t ignore the legendary Kenneth Woollam, ENO’s one and only Rienzi and Opera Coach to the Stars.

There is no fach beyond Gwyneth’s voice. (Have you heard her live?) The only sound louder than Gwyneth is the sound of the engine of a Space Shuttle at take-off.

I also love Behrens and Jones.

At the time that Dalayman first sang Brangäne to Eaglen’s isolde, I thought to myself that she would have been a much better Isolde.

It didn’t quite work out that way, I am afraid.

Last night at Zankel Brewer gave one of the best recitals I have ever heard. The voice is stupendous. I hope last spring’s setback doesn’t keep her from further exploring the big Wagner roles.

She acquired a farm in Norway and retreated there for much of the regular opera season to prepare roles and work on instructions from Cosima while running the farm.

I have not heard her recordings, so cannot comment on the voice, but she had some very good names among her early teachers (including the Marchesi family). Cosima’s influence over singers is controversial, and she’s credited with instituting the “Bayreuth Bark.”.

In Gwyneth’s case, it was partly the fact that her womb prolapsed on the birth of her second child, partly her unfettered approach which caused her to take its voice to its limits at practically every performance, and perhaps also the fact that, experiencing success so young, she didn’t ever quite lay a solid enough technical foundation in the first place. Maybe her schedule was too full on as well.

In any case, holding up J Meier as the exemplar, when the best you can say of her is ‘very respectable, at times memorable’, against the singers you mention who people rave about, avidly collect the every utterance of, and who managed to create interpretations against which others are still measured, seems a bit perverse.

As we also know, Wagnerian singers in particular (or maybe not in particular) are seduced/pushed into roles they aren’t ready to take on. Europeans especially wax over Anja Kampfe. I’ve only heard her live three times (as Sieglinde) and been less impressed each time. Waltraud Meier, Eva Marton, Behrens, even the redoubtable Gwyneth, have or are encountering serious difficulties because they pushed their voices outside their fach. Johanna Meier on the other hand was aware of her vocal capabilities and had a very respectable, at times memorable, career. Johanna grew up in Spearfish, SD. Maybe there is something to be said for growing up in a rural environment and long-term vocal health and longevity.

With Berkeley-Steele and Mitchinson, he is the premium choice today.

I’ve only seen her live once, as Amelia in Ballo, and although I was very impressed with the actual singing, particularly some very large, gleaming top notes, she didn’t seem to be at all musical, the phrasing was so mechanical. But having heard her Isolde on disc and DVD, I don’t think one can level the same charge at it.

It baffles me that some have reservations over her suitability for Brunnhilde, when people like Dalayman are having a go at the role in very important theatres. Stemme, if nothing else, is at least a natural soprano with a singing style healthy enough to preserve her instrument whatever she essays. I think the voice is very large, and has enough cut and thrust to convince in the moments where such qualities are called for, even if they aren’t the overriding qualities of her instrument.

Theorin was incredibly impressive as Turandot at the ROH in, I think, January of this year. I was disappointed by what I heard of her broadcast Brunnhildes from the Met, but heartened to hear she was better in Washington. I hope she achieves some level of consistency, because if so, she’ll probably reign supreme in her repertoire.

Urmana has a Sieglinde coming up, and repreises her Isolde with Rattle in Vienna in December. She’s recorded snippets of Brunnhilde. I wouldn’t be terribly surprised if she ended up taking on the role, given her ambition and apparent refusal to settle for anything but the most glamorous title roles in the repertoire whatever her natural fach, although I’m not sure it would be the best ever idea for her.

I agree with whoever said the Nilsson comparison is unhelpful, because vocal phenomena like that should be appreciated as the unique wonders that they are, they shouldn’t set an impossible standard for everybody else. I don’t think invoking Varnay (the best, in my opinion too) or Behrens helps either, because none of these 3 ladies could be described as having a voice that was at all ‘normal’ even for a Wagnerian soprano.

In terms of timbre, vocality etc, Stemme, Theorin, Dalayman all seem to line up on an axis that includes the likes, at whichever point along it you like, of Anne Evans and Deborah Voigt. Their voices work(ed) in readily understanable, conventional ways, and to greater or lesser extents, they all have some metal and heft that makes them contenders for Isolde et al. These are the terms in which we need to understand dramatic sopranos these days, with no extraordinary one-offs around to amaze us.

Siegfried is prob Ian Storey.