Singers of the Century

Fülszöveg

Singers of the Century Volume 1
J.B. Steane
'There is probably no one writing in English today who can match Steane's powers of evocation, not only of a voice - the most difiRcult part of all - but of the whole ambience in which it was trained and in which it prospered.' Michael Tanner, Gramophone
In his previous books, the disdnguished cridc John Steane has taken for his subject the art of singing as heard on records and 'in the flesh' in opera houses and concert halls. In Singers of the Century he turns to the singers themselves, seeing how their art develops with the opportunides of their professional lives, with chance and design playing their part and all likely to be at the mercy of some quirk of taste or character.
The singers chosen for this first volume of three are each in some way special, both as artists and as people. From the early years Emma Calvé, the great Carmen, her life an ironically viewed melée of the sublime and the absurd; Géraldine Farrar, vulnerable... Tovább

Fülszöveg

Singers of the Century Volume 1
J.B. Steane
'There is probably no one writing in English today who can match Steane's powers of evocation, not only of a voice - the most difiRcult part of all - but of the whole ambience in which it was trained and in which it prospered.' Michael Tanner, Gramophone
In his previous books, the disdnguished cridc John Steane has taken for his subject the art of singing as heard on records and 'in the flesh' in opera houses and concert halls. In Singers of the Century he turns to the singers themselves, seeing how their art develops with the opportunides of their professional lives, with chance and design playing their part and all likely to be at the mercy of some quirk of taste or character.
The singers chosen for this first volume of three are each in some way special, both as artists and as people. From the early years Emma Calvé, the great Carmen, her life an ironically viewed melée of the sublime and the absurd; Géraldine Farrar, vulnerable of voice, daundess in determination; the tenors Smirnov and Sobinov, alliteratively associated as the Tweedledum and Tweedledee of Russian opera, but in reality very unalike. From the middle years Flagstad and Ferrier, then later Gobbi and Christoff, with Régine Crespin and Carlo Bergonzi up to the sdll missed and lamented Arleen Auger and Lucia Popp.
Each study is a carefully worked vignette, and the book is illustrated throughout with photographs and memorabilia, many never before published. Singers of the Century will appeal to all those with a love of singing and of music wridng at its best.
John Steane writes for Gramophone, Musical Times and Opera Now, and is the author of The Grand Tradition and Voices, Singers and Critics, both published by Duckworth.
Volume 2 of Singers of the Century is available in hardback at L25. Volume 3 will be published in 2000. -----
Cover design by Imagery Marketing. Photographs (clockwise from top left): Elisabeth Rethberg, John McCormack, Régine Crespin, Marian Anderson. Courtesy ofThe Decca Record Company and Nimbus Records. Vissza