I have two purposes in this posting. I would like to introduce Apollo Granforte, who was a great Verdi baritone, with marvelous placement, during the early and middle parts of...
Read MoreClaudia Muzio was one of the great singers of the 20th century, and she had a profound influence on Maria Callas. She died quite young, too young to have made...
Read MoreGigli was a marvelous lyric tenor. He was sometimes accused of being overly sentimental, and you may hear some of that when he is singing, but I don't mind it. ...
Read MoreElisabeth Grümmer was a wonderful soprano who sang at around the same time as Elisabeth Scwarzkopf, Lisa della Casa, Hilde Güden, Irmgard Seefriend, and Sena Jurinac. There seemed to be...
Read MoreWhat was unique about Hofmann, besides that he was a musical genius, was the quality of the sound that he could get from the piano. The piano is a percussive...
Read MoreWhat is Verismo and who was Magda Olivero? First, let me say that no one can really agree what verismo is. Below is a "median" definition. I am going...
Read MoreAuch Kleine Dinge Before moving on from Wolf, there is one more Lied that I wanted to play for you. It is called "Auch kleine Dinge". It is the first...
Read MoreMy purpose here is to introduce Irmgard Seefried, who was an absolutely wonderful soprano. Here she is singing three Strauss songs to poetic texts. The first song, "Morgen" was written...
Read MoreLemishev was a very famous lyric tenor from a very poor area of Russia. He spent a good deal of time in Harbin, which was a Russian colony (really a...
Read MoreThis first link is to the love duet from Madame Butterfly. Just by coincidence, I have this recording somewhere. One thing to notice is that Tebaldi is nearly always in...
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