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Left in the dust

by | 7:09 pm | Dec 7, 2009

waitress_thumbA new production of Verdi’s Macbeth?

At the Wiener Staatsoper?

At a 192 Euro top?

And this is what you get?

“Vieni, t’afretta”

La Cieca thinks there needs to be a word for singing that’s thoroughly crummy but doesn’t rise to the grandeur of filth. “Dust bunny,” perhaps?

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92 Comments
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92 comments

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  • nvshm says:

    That was awful. Who is the singer?

    on December 7, 2009 at 7:27 PM
  • Tamerlano says:

    Oh dear…hmmmm…well…she sounds ANCIENT! There is a voice here, but the technique sounds non existent. The upper middle is a mess and threatens to crack constantly and the lower part of the voice (crucial for Lady Macbeth) isn’t there at all. With proper training she might make a credible Tannhauser Elisabeth, or Elsa, or maybe even Eva. It’s a VERY blonde sound though, and who ever decided she would make a fine Lady Macbeth must have been smoking crack.

    on December 7, 2009 at 7:31 PM
  • wenarto says:

    i am doing the intro….

    on December 7, 2009 at 7:32 PM
  • Verdilover says:

    She is ALMOST as good as Mari Lynn, maybe if she studies a bit, she can get there.

    on December 7, 2009 at 8:10 PM
  • warmke says:

    http://www.erikasunnegardh.com/engagements

    I suppose dropping the Lady from her repertoire won’t do her much good.

    on December 7, 2009 at 8:11 PM
  • Ercole Farnese says:

    After hearing this, I will no longer complain about having to endure Guleghina at the Met.

    on December 7, 2009 at 8:15 PM
    • jatm2063 says:

      Ercole, I say AMEN. I’ll take Guleghina any day over that.

      Sunnegardh sounds like a nice voice for Micaela, trying to push way too far out.

      on December 7, 2009 at 9:35 PM
      • javier says:

        Guleghina’s Lady Macbeth at the Met was awesome so I don’t know why you would complain.

        on December 7, 2009 at 10:18 PM
        • Baritenor says:

          Given that Verdi actually wanted Lady M. to sound slightly Ugly, Guleghina may actually be the best exponent of the role working today.

          on December 7, 2009 at 10:50 PM
        • Nemorinopr says:

          Javier
          That depends on what night you were listening to her Lady. She was UNIVEN to say the least.
          Take care.

          on December 7, 2009 at 10:54 PM
        • rommie says:

          hahahahaha!

          she is hideously exhausting to watch. her voice sounded like it was sucking the air out of the audience’s lungs. flat everywhere.

          Verdi I’m sure was referring to texture. i doubt he had La Ghul’s voice in mind.

          but what do i know?

          on December 7, 2009 at 11:06 PM
        • Lindoro Almaviva says:

          Verdi wanted someone who didn’t have a pretty voice, not someone who couldn’t do the runs and trills he wrote into the role and the Db at the end.

          Guleghina might have the ugly voice, but that is 1 out of 3.

          on December 8, 2009 at 12:26 AM
        • rommie says:

          i wonder how sutherland would have fared as lady m. i could see how macbeth would be her little follower; she would threaten him with her chin!

          i kid i kid.

          on December 8, 2009 at 12:27 AM
        • javier says:

          I actually read that a lot of houses asked Sutherland to sing Lady Macbeth and even Abigale from Nabucco, but Richard didn’t want her to go down that path so they refused.

          on December 8, 2009 at 12:37 AM
        • javier says:

          I actually read that a lot of houses asked Sutherland to sing Lady Macbeth and even Abigale from Nabucco, but Richard didn’t want her to go down that path so they refused.

          Even Deutekom sang Lady Macbeth and Abigale and she was damn good. Sutherland could have easily topped her, but her husband was so narrow minded in the roles he wanted her to sing.

          on December 8, 2009 at 12:39 AM
        • Lindoro Almaviva says:

          Well, I think Richard had a point. Vocally Macbeth would have been OK if a little too low for her (the role sits a lot in the middle and that is not where Sutherland’s voice wanted to stay). The problem would have been temperamentally.

          Sutherland just didn’t have the temperament to sing Lady Macbeth. Look at her, she could barely get through Norma! Vocally we all know she was superb, but tell me you don’t feel sorry for her every time she skips backward while thrusting her head back and pretending that she was enraged. ,

          Or who could forget the look of dissapointed mother she gave Polione during In mia man al fin tu sei. Where was the look of rage and victory (your ass is mine…)?

          If she had learned the arias, she would have been able to show the amazing bel canto requirements the roles have, she might’ve been able to dazzle us; but she would have left the stage still wondering what was the fuzz about a perfectly innocent letter.

          on December 8, 2009 at 1:16 AM
        • javier says:

          No! :) I don’t think Sutherland was such a bad actress. Have you seen her Lucrezia Borgia first Lucrezia Borgia video (there are 3!). The kind of sining and acting ability she displays in that role makes me believe she would have been excellent in these roles.l

          on December 8, 2009 at 1:24 AM
        • Lindoro Almaviva says:

          I am not saying she was a bad actress (she was not the best, but she was respectable)

          What i am saying is that she didn’t have the temperament to portray cunning, rage, scheeming and emotions like that. In the roles she did, when she was asked to portray those emotions, she was reduced to the same gestures and the skip back (or forward) and the head tilt and that was it.

          The evidence is all in the videos. Vocally she would have been a dazzling Lady Macbeth, but Lady Macbeth does not need to dazzle, she needs to make us believe that she is a witch who can have the powers of hell at her disposal, who is capable of killing herself if necessary. Those kinds of emotions and the depth of acting ability were just foreign to her temperament.

          on December 8, 2009 at 1:34 AM
        • javier says:

          I still don’t agree. The proof is not in the videos. We don’t have many video of Sutherland’s really good performances. She sang Elettra from Idomeneo in the late 1970s. There is no video from what I know, but you can hear cunning, rage, scheming…madness in her voice. I’m sure she acted to part well too. She just didn’t get to sing roles like this very often so you really don’t know what she would have been like.

          on December 8, 2009 at 1:56 AM
        • Lindoro Almaviva says:

          And I disagree. Norma was all about the rage, from the moment Polione comes in. She is enraged because of what she does and spends pretty much the whole opera trying to trap him and when she finally does, she tortures him.

          Of all the roles she Sang, Norma was closes to Lade Macbeth in terms of rage and cunning. We do have videos of her as Norma and what we wee on them is the same: She is vocally dazzling, a decent, if not great actress, who goes off the deep end when it comes to the moments when a tragedienne would have us in ecstasy. She uses the same tricks to express extreme rage and she does not have the temperament to seize those moments and blow them out of the water.

          on December 8, 2009 at 1:23 PM
        • Tamerlano says:

          Is it wrong that I only find myself paying attention to Troyanos in that clip?

          on December 8, 2009 at 3:10 PM
  • brett says:

    Was she coached by Miranda?

    on December 7, 2009 at 8:28 PM
  • Quanto Painy Fakor says:

    This has got to be Ion Holender’s WORST piece of casting ever. Why would that Erika chickie even want to sing THAT Lady in public or think she could do it justice?
    Sounds like the lovely la Scapucci could not even led a hand to improve things. Ascendi Via Regnar indeed. Where is the Via Regnar? Who got lost looking for it?

    on December 7, 2009 at 8:40 PM
  • jumping clapping man says:

    she sounds MUCH better in the german excerpts on her website.:
    http://www.erikasunnegardh.com/video

    this verdi is clearly some VERY bad miscasting…accentuating all the wrong qualities in her voice, and it’s difficiencies.

    on December 7, 2009 at 9:10 PM
    • Cassandra says:

      Really? She sounds MUCH better?

      I hear exactly the same tragically flawed sound that is able to hide in Strauss’ eager over-orchestration of Salome.

      This is not a voice even worthy of discussion.

      on December 9, 2009 at 12:32 AM
  • midispiace molto says:

    oh gawd, put her out of her misery!

    surprising because her salome here is, while not a classic, nowhere near as bad:

    on December 7, 2009 at 9:53 PM
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