Maria Calla as Norma in 1954 |
Pierre Lacotte's reconstruction of La Sylphide photo Christian Leiber |
In such circumstances teachers become highly important, repositories for knowledge which is then passed on to pupils. The 19th century in particular can be traced through families of teachers so-and-so was a pupil of Tausig who was a pupil of Liszt. And whilst Liszt's pupils were a diverse bunch (there are recordings from 21 of them), the pupils of a teacher like Clara Schumann form quite a coherent group (we have recordings from five of them including Fanny Davies's recording of the Schumann piano concerto).
Manual Garcia the Younger by John Singer Sargent |
But such lineages would have been important not only for pedagogy, but for information about other performers both past and present. An example of this is the soprano Adelina Patti. Born 1843, she came out of retirement in 1905 to make recordings, so that we can hear for ourselves what a late 19th century diva sounded like. Patti was managed from a young age by her sister's husband, Maurice Strakosch who was a pupil of Giuditta Pasta and also her accompanist. Strakosch trained Patti the way he had learned from Pasta. And Patti had created roles for Donizetti and Bellini, and had sung Zerlina in London within 25 years of Mozart's death. Now, we can make too much of such links, especially as Patti's recordings are of a style and freedom which is alien to today's performers. But it is well worth bearing in mind. (You can hear hear slightly alarming Casta Diva from Norma on YouTube, and her performance of Voi che sapete from Mozart Le nozze di Figaro is below).
I got much of the above information from John Potter and Neil Sorrell's invaluable book, A History of Singing, and they also illuminate another point. The way recordings themselves have changed the way we sing. For much of the 19th century, despite the rise in the amount of control composers had, performers retained a rather flexible attitude to the notes themselves. In a society without a fixed record, aural transmission was important which brings us back to the chains of information through teachers. Only in the 20th century was it possible to put on a recording and hear how so-and-so performed the music. This has had the effect of rather fixing the music. Notes have become settled and singers less inclined to sing with a freedom.
But whilst notes have become fixed, performing styles have I suspect rather widened. If a performer can hear a wide variety of other performers, then there is greater freedom to choose. Perhaps this isn't a big point but it seems one which might benefit from further research, are the performers of today more or less diverse in style than those 150 years ago?
Elsewhere on this blog:
- Summer Listening: Craig Ogden's Summer Guitar - CD review
- Prom 47: Britten's War Requiem - concert review
- Chamber intensity: Werther at Grimeborn - opera reveiw
- Princely splendour: Sacred music from 18th century Rome - CD review
- The Rite as you've never heard it: Rite of Spring from Les Siecles - CD review
- Don't you know who I am: Preventing attacks of Grumpy Critic - feature article
- My beloved's voice: Sacred songs of Love from Jesus College - CD review
- Prom 37: Steve Reich - concert review
- Home
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