Blühenden Lebens labende Glute
Jane Eaglen (remember her?) reveals a fundamental secret of the art of song. [San Francisco Chronicle]
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Jane at work:
Well, I got to see two performances of “Amelia” in Seattle in May. Although she had a supporting role, she stole the show in the second act. She sang a hymn with a beautiful legato and, in the final scene, her high B’s and Bb’s were perfect.
Eaglen was overrated for a while and that caused quite a bit of backlash. But when she was good, she was good! And she had a genuinely large hochdramatisch soprano voice (except for the bottom of the voice). Her tops could be shrill but when she nailed them, they could be exciting. I saw a Senta with SF Symphony when she was really on and from the opening of the ballade (which she half-hummed and still filled the auditorium) to the final high B at the end, she was fantastic. On the opposite side of the spectrum, I heard a Turandot at the Met that was yawnsville — the Riddle Scene was a non-event (with Margison as Calaf).
The upper middle and top were always the strongest part of her voice.
Say what you will about Eaglen, but she had the goods vocally and technically.
Honestly, I think her weight ultimately got the better of her. It made her uncomfortable onstage – she fidgeted constantly – and generally unhealthy – you could hear huffing and puffing whenever the staging required her to move.
Saw Eaglen last year with the Jalisco Philharmonic in Guadalajara. Which, incidentally, is a terific orchestra. It was a marathon Wagner concert. Make no mistake, the high notes are still there, secure, on pitch and LOUD!. Unfortunately, that´s about all. The color of the voice is now quite uninteresting, and intonation tends to suffer. Oddly enough, she gained strenth as the evening progressed, and her second encore, Elizabeth´s entrance into the Hall of Song, was stunning.
The Jal Phil did this monster concert and followed it the next night accompanying JDF in another marathon. However, he was in the Auditorio Telmex, a huge new hall, as opposed to the Teatro Degollado, so he was miked within an inch of his life.
Yes, sadly, I have to agree that the weight issue seemed to restrict Eaglen even in a concert format. However, members of the orchestra absolutely adored her personally, whereas they though JDF was a bit of a jerk. Chacun a son gout
“Say what you will about Eaglen, but she had the goods vocally and technically.”
Of course. Her VESTALE put Ponselle in the shade, and she was the best Bruennhilde since Anna Green and Marie Hayward-Segal.
Ugh! I went to her Vestale – what a yawn that was!
Egan stayed on pitch during the 2001 Seattle Ring and everything worked (except the conducting!). The Met and Chicago Tristans, however were hard to take as Eaglan’s intonation was all over place.
It will be interesting to see if Jennifer Wilson can sustain a major-league Wagnerian career. Those Ho-jo-to-hos in the Valencia Ring DVD aren’t always spot on.
I wonder who is covering for Ms. Voigt next year in Walkure.
Clarification: I went to the third Seattle 2001 cycle. There were definitely problems in the first cycle because of Alan Woodrow’s injury. Richard Berkeley-Steele sang and acted the role of Siegfried in the last cycle.
Ms. Wilson showed real promise as Gutrune in LA this summer, despite singing from behind a wire-mesh mask the entire evening. The sound was in many ways more interesting than that of the Brunnhilde, Linda Watson.
“Eaglen was overrated for a while…”
Didn’t Tony T. in fact call her “the great dramatic soprano of her generation’?
She was just one of those singers that I just didn’t get. Her Turandot was just awful – no portomento – and the weight made her entrance laughable in the Met production. Fast forward through her Norma and Brunhilde and I just gave up. Still not having learned my lesson I attended her NYC recital debut at Alice Tully. It was a trainwreck. Half of the audience left during intermission and the those of us who stayed only did so out of a morbid fascination of seeing an “A list” singer cash and burn before our very eyes. It was a recital/cd promotion tour where she was still on-book and just murdered the Berg 7 Early songs. It was truly awful and I vowed to NEVER see this woman perform again. Luckily the Met’s obsession with her ended around that time and she has not performed in NYC for quite a while. It’s good to see that she is contributing and fostering young talent. There are just so many used-to-be’s that use master classes to work out their issues rather than impart knowledge. Good for her and good for us that she limits her stage work these days.
Yes, NYCOQ, her Turandot was awful. SO awful that a picture of her as Turandot, pasted on my refrigerator door, I found so mortifying, that it actually helped me to lose 25 lbs. avoirdupois over about an eight month period. I, too sat through the Isoldes–nothing–the bad Norma–the Brunnhilde, especially the awakening scene in Siegfried — oh god let me forget it! It’s too bad, as she did have a quantity of sound, reliably produced, but it was utterly, crashingly boring.
Never heard her sing La Rotonda–think that was Chicago–thank the good Lord.
So, you’re not alone!
Crashingly boring describes it to a tee. It didn’t help that I caught her Turandot after hearing Alessandra Marc & Sharon Sweet sing the role. Not an ugly voice, just a loud, nothing voice. Now just imagine her without sets and costumes and (apparently for the recital I saw) any idea at all what it was she was singing…you get the picture.
Agreed, Eaglen was very boring. I never heard her sing badly in terms of vocal production or intonation, but it was almost always charmless and dull. I left a Turandot before the end once because it might as well have been a train whistle, so lacking in colour and nuance was her singing. All that said however, I did once see her do a Walkure Act III in concert at the Edinburgh festival, and there was one moment of vulnerability and touching femininity so intense I’ve never forgotten it (must have been 12-15 years ago). But it’s an isolated 10 seconds out of the many times I saw her.
She tended to harp on at some considerable length in interviews, back in the day when she was a much lauded soprano in high demand, about always holding something back, never giving 100% under any circumstances because to do so in her repertoire is far too dangerous. I think this was possibly the essence of her lack of enduring appeal, and the upshot is that she had a short performing career in spite of her cautious attitude. At least it might have been short and exciting, leaving us wanting more, if she’d ever just let rip and gone for it.
CK: Very good point. She was quite dull as an artist so she could only make an impact through impressive vocalism. Considering her short-lived prime, it would have been more rewarding had she sung with more abandon during her peak years.
He weight really impacted her singing. One could hear her breathing trouble. When I saw her Senta with SF Symphony, she had lost a lot of weight and the improvement was noticeable.
Wasn’t Eaglen contracted to Sony during Gelb’s time there? Do they still talk?
Oh and did I mention her Isolde? Yeah, I gave her chance after chance and her voice just did not work for me…
I first saw Eaglen in an OONY Norma back in the mid 90s.
She managed the technical aspects of singing the role better than any Norma I’ve seen except for Sutherland at the Met. But she was almost completely uninteresting in the role and to a large degree the performance was stolen
by Sonia Ganassi making her NYC debut as Adalgisa.
I saw Eaglen a few other times during the 90s, before her intonation problems became such as issue. But she was far too tame for me. How could a singer with such a sound , impressive instrument be sooooo uninteresting??? Isn’t it actually really difficult to be boring as turandot?
To be fair to Ms. Eaglen, I must say that while being subjected to the Normas of both Marina Mescheriakova and Maria Guleghina a few years back, I sat there Desperately Yearning that it be Eaglen instead. Their respective performances were both beyond contempt.
I do hope this Angela Meade will continue to develop–and get some gay friends pronto, to help with the coiffure, maquillage and to buy a shawl to hide those arms–as it is not enough to sing Norma, you’ve really got to express something dramatically, and Eaglen could only express her anger on stage and not much else. On Eaglen’s recorded version (I think with Muti conducting) I heard something much better and much different than what she gave in the theatre at the time, but the recording had been at least six or eight years before.
It did seal her doom at the Met as she did sing a series of Rings sometime thereafter and that was it. Recently, I heard her final Goetterdaemmerung, and was grateful for the strength and accuracy of the voice in the Immolation Scene, as I’ve been subjected to so much worse since. That said, I was glad I didn’t have to see it but just listen.
So, in retrospect, she may have had many fine merits but the one overwhelming demerit, i.e., the inability to effectively do anything on stage other than to just stand there, creating a reliable stream of sounds was fatal. I have a dear friend who still goes into gales of laughter at the mention of her at Act I’s end in Tristan, standing there, as he is wont to say, “with her Burger King golden crown on and waiting for the party to begin”.
Now, back to Mawrdew for me.
Camilla Bella, were you there for that horrid Norma at Carnegie Hall with Madame Jane P Eaglen? It was the worst unsupported singing I had ever heard, almost Rita Hunter like, the aspirated Casta Diva was more like expirated, and the attempts at dramatic outbursts simply laughable, the coloratura was beyond contempt. The Trio in Act I a laugh-fest except for the fabulous Ganassi who had a voice about 4 times what the hochdramatisch Eaglen was putting out. It was horrid in every way, and just as I was about to stand up and leave, came the sublime Deh non volerli vittime, and Eaglen was like another singer, the voice full and rich, the legato and the line beautiful, she really acquitted herself very well with those final pages, but the horror it had beeen up to that point!. Then I saw one of the Tristan, I went to see Heppner, who cracked on every note above middle C, and I was surprised how well Eaglen sang, especially the Liebestod. I have often wondered, however, what she must have been possibly like in Act II of Gotterdammerung, following the footsteps of MY girl, and in that production.
Marshie: Which Tristan performance was this? I heard mostly raves about the Heppner/Eaglen T & I pairings at the Met and Seattle. Heppner’s cracking problems didn’t come on till later, around the time of his last Walthers at the Met.
Oh no my dear Kashie, these were the Met Tristans in 1999 (?). As you know I am a Vickers queen through and through, and probably never will hear a Tristan like Chicago 1979, Now that was like the Pavarotti Puritani, one where the gates of heaven open, Vickers was the greatest of the greatest. But I have always liked Heppner, since I first heard him in the Freischuetz rehearsal in 1991. He messed up the actual performance but I knew what glory he was made of from the rehearsal. So of course I wanted to give him the chance as Tristan, plus he was Canadian
. When he could keep the line, he was the closest to Vickers one could get probably, and the sound even sweeter, but the cracks were far far too many for a professional singer. I was disappointed. And shock of shocks, Eaglen gave a very respectable Isolde, once one got past the mountain that descended on Tristan everytime they sang together, not to mention the mostruous entrance in Act III for the Isolde Klage, mein gott, it was the entire Rocky Mountain Chain moving from the back of the stage forward, but the Liebestod was very nicely phrased, she was quite fine. Now Brunnhilde???? MY ROLE???????? that’s another story, right?
Ah, his first Met Tristan. Interesting. I, too, worship Vickers — one of my top five tenors. And yes, the sight of Eaglen entering in Act III in the Met’s production was most unfortunate!
WOW you worship Vickers? Are you available???????
I was a poor graduate student in 1979, but as fate would have it Columbia Univeristy decided to send me to the Fermi National Laboratory to conduct an experiment at precisely the time that Vickers was doing the Tristan. SO I trekked the 50 miles or so from Batavia, IL to Chicago and was able to get a piece a heaven for myself. As long as I live I will carry the memories of that sublem performance. I saw Vickers in everything he did at the Met including the divine pairing with you-know-who as Leonore, all performances with Leinsdorf and the single one with Tennstedt, but that Tristan will always be one of the most glorious moments in my life for that Act III delirium. It’s so weird how Vickers, the ultimate opera queen performer, he was an opera queen’s gift to humanity, and yet he personally was such a homophobe, go figure…..
ERRATA again: sublem = sublime
Do I get a mot juste for that
actually I like “ferocious stinging mad queen bee” better for a mot juste
Mr. MMII — what you say about Eaglrn’s sudden change, in mid-performance, to be very interesting indeed. No, I did not hear that performance, and I am gratified that you and richard mentioned Sonia Ganassi, whom I find to be excellent. Who knows why Eaglen suddenly started to sing well–the end of the work and thus relief/release? A non-florid, but still highly dramatic and more legato kind of singing? It is a very intriguing observation. I’ll give her this, too, she sings Senta’s Ballade in the original key on the Barenboim recording –Telarc, I believe.
My once-in-a-lifetime Jon Vickers moment happened in the fall of 1976, hearing him sing Siegmund. I have never, nor shall I ever have a tenor STOP time and space the way he did whilst “Waelse”in Act I. I don’t even close my eyes to see him, so vividly and indelibly did he etch his memory into my mind’s eye! Extraordinary.
I trust and hope you are doing a little better these days after the loss of your beloved friend last year. It takes a while and one never totally recovers, however, you have many wonderful memories plus there are the recordings and the videos, which is fortunate. I sincerely wish you well in your recovery.
Oh Camille Belle, thank you so much for your good wishes. It has been very hard but I have channeled the energies into soemthing very nice that will soon be made public that has allowed me a bit to overcome and get busy in a positive way.
Sonia Ganassi was simply sensational at that Norma. I was chided here last year for saying that I was shocked how her career didn’t take off as I had expected. People mentioned great outings in Europe and even some engagements at the Met, but my point remains that she should be FAMOUS, like Rene Fleming-famous because she is a grand singer. Don’t know why that happened……
Vickers, ach mein gott, would not know where to begin describing his glory, other than the Tristan delirium, I’d have to say the Canio in 1985 was breathtaking! the madness was Tristan-like. An opera queen’s wet dream. And I also saw an Act II of Tristan with Brigit Nilsson where you completely forgot about her!, yes Birgit herself was overshadowed by his magnificence. To me there is no Melchior, no one that comes near his Tristan, I only saw it once complete, but it’s enough to know I have lived. His Fidelios with Hildegard were heaven, the two of them like a pair from Ellysium. But what comes closest to your “time becoming still” were of course the Act III of Parsifal. In 1979 with Christa Ludwig, I saw all of them, and then in 1985 with the divine Leonie who recovered from her hepatitis for the last performance which was the broadcast. Saw all four performances. Again that pair was also direclty from heaven. In Parsifal he was at his most spiritual elegiac, at one with the music and the text and his own beliefs, the stuff of dreams…….
Oh and Camille Belle, it is just MMII but if you must, then it’s Ms MMII
In the Parsifal, despite my having to mention the divas, in true opera queen fashion, who are only in Act II, I really meant Act III because that is where Jon Vickers transcended space and time. At the consecration, you really felt like Verweile Doch Du Bist so Schoen! That music and THAT voice……… it is still travelling through space and time.
You have seen and heard such rare and surpassingly wondrous things; hold on tightly to it all and do work to bring your project to fruition as it will do good, for yourself and to others as well.
What a young fool I was in 1979 not to have seen Parsifal with Ludwig, when I had the opportunity! At the time, however, I wouldn’t have known Parsifal from a parsnip, truthfully.
Sonia Ganassi is the genuine article, in my feeling. Perhaps she prefers to remain remain in her home country?? Too bad for us.
Verweile, doch du bist so schoen!! Pass it on to the young ones so they don’t make an ignorant mistake as I once did in spring 1979.
Stay strong.
To be fair to Ms. Eaglen, I must say that while being subjected to the Normas of both Marina Mescheriakova and Maria Guleghina a few years back, I sat there Desperately Yearning that it be Eaglen instead.
“Once I contracted bubonic plague, I felt pangs of nostalgia for cholera.”
Naughty, naughty Cieca!
Exactly, my fair Doyenne.
I cannot read the PDF download of the McCourt interview, tarnation!
C
LOL. Can La Cieca give her self the “mot juste” designation?
Just to give a sense of perspective on Eaglen: at the beginning it was a big healthy voice that could hit the notes, she was fairly young and she seemed to have a good vocal technique that would last (it didn’t). In the early 1970′s the Wagnerian standard was Nilsson with singers like Rita Hunter to back her up. By the 1980′s and beyond it was “singing actresses” like Gwyneth Jones (with full tremolo), Hildegard Behrens and Gabriele Schnaut. Renate Behle and the like backing them up. After over fifteen years of (admittedly theatrically exciting) paint-peeling vocalism, people were hungry for a clean, healthy, steady, big, fresh sound. For a few years up to about 1996, Eaglen seemed to have that.
It was hoped that she would lose weight, learn to act and move onstage and develop some insight into her parts. She didn’t and then the voice turned unsteady and sour. Her weight caused movement and breathing problems. Like many of us, she woke up one day and was no longer a young thing. The opera world moved on. I moved on.
I wouldn’t be upset if I heard she had a stunning comeback – but I wouldn’t beat myself up if I never heard her sing again. She just wasn’t that interesting outside of the basic qualities of the voice which have eroded.
All the personal encounters I have had with Eaglen (including her participation in a Met Guild Seminar on “Norma” with Zajick) have shown her to be a down-to-earth, direct, smart, unpretentious, grounded, likeable, friendly and positive person. I wish her nothing but the best in all her future endeavors.
I am curious to know, has anyone out there, anyone at all, heard her recently in a staged opera. I have read that she sang an Isolde in Spain as recently as 2007. Did any of you international travelers hear that or anything else? One commenter above states that he heard her in concert and that it was still pretty good in some ways.
I never heard her live myself. I don’t really want to travel all the way to Denver (or rather Boulder, CO) to hear one aria, although I am mighty curious. On recordings and television it seemed a large, relatively even voice (until the end), with a rather short top. But as many commenters point out, it lacked charisma and communicative power. She just sort of stood there and sang.