Dame Kiri Te Kanawa sings Aria from Salammbo - Citizen Kane

[tosherification]

The orchestration is MAGNIFICENT! At 3:29 French Horns....YES! Whatever key Dame Kiri sings this in it's still a thing of beauty that was a joke in the movie! As Susan Alexander says in Citizen kane, "I'm the one who gets the raspberries!"

[Saturninus2]

Clap clap clap...(silence) CLAPCLAPCLAPCLAP clap clap clap...(silence)

[elchnase]

Interesting point. Strauss? Massenet? Doesn't matter. It is a good piece never the less. One point about Hermann and his opera: yes ago I conducted a concert in Los Angeles with a youth orchestra(Excellent orchestra) where I shared a podium with Bernard Hermann (we are talking late 1060's here). Part of a festival of concert music by film composerS. I conducted Milkos Rozsa and Korngold, he conducted selections from his opera. Excellent music but what an unpleasant man! Did not like him at all!

[JJRaff18221882]

@elchnase Yes, I've also heard that Herrmann was hard to get along with. However, his main redeeming feature - aside from his genius for composition - was reviving the music of my namesake in 1970 by conducting Raff's Symphony #5 in E Minor (Lenore) with one of the leading London orchestras. That was the beginning of the Raff Revival. Today ALL 11 of Raff's symphonies and ALL of his concerted works have been recorded. It took awhile, but at least ol' Bernie got the ball rolling.

[elchnase]

All of this talk about the last note. Who cares. What IS important is the piece itself. When Wells discussed the original scene with Hermann, he said "...what we need here is a piece of BAD Massenet!" To which Hermann replied: "Bad Massenet? Hmm, that's a redundency!"

It is, in fact a very good piece of Good Massenet! And yes, maybe the D--and that is what it is--is dubbed, but who cares. I have conducted this piece with another singer in Db (Half-step lower) and it is just as good.

[tklogan111809]

@elchnase In fact this is a piece of bad Strauss. I love Herrmann's film music but he wished he could write for the voice like Massenet. Massenet's operas Manon, Werther, Thais are still very relevant and very popular today while Herrmann had to pay out of his own pocket to have his only opera, Wuthering Hights, recorded. It's nowadays completely and deservedly forgotten.

[KathrynARyder]

@tklogan111809 - I agree with you about comparing this aria to Strauss - it has clear echos of Strauss' "Salome".

[Cramnella]

@tklogan111809 "Wuthering Heights" was staged last year in Minnesota, and was given in a concert version in France a couple of years ago. The French performance has been released on CD and the full production was filmed for release on DVD.

So. Not forgotten.

[Cramnella]

@elchnase Eileen Farrell performed it with Herrmann on radio and leaves out the top not altogether.

[adam28xx]

Kiri does indeed sing that top note at the end but the producer revealed in a interview that she told him she'd sing it only once and that was that. So he had just one take of that note to use, whereas he had more than one take of the rest of the piece, so that explains this particular "splice"!

[kachzvi]

One of her earliest recordings, and quite spectacular, from her side and Herrmann's

[3investigators]

Thank you! How marvelous to hear this truly great piece of music as sung by a gifted star who could rise to it! Bravo! Brava!

[yazmillah]

It took me grat pains to look for this Aria - almost a year - not knowing I had it in an old vinyl 12 inch. Imagine 20 something Kiri Te Kanawa belting this rather obscure opera - INCROIABLE!!!

[Dogsledfan]

I don't think that the High D is dubbed; any singer of KTK's calibre should be able to hit it without much effort. No comparison whatsoever to the rendering in the actual movie. I felt sorry for that Italian vocal coach who couldn't convince Kane that his wife's voice was useless for operatic roles such as these. Better to do what you can with what you've got. Of course, then we wouldn't have had that particular part of the movie - along with Herrmann's excellent operatic writing!!!

[Dogsledfan]

Benny Herrmann deliberately wrote it to be "unsingable" for the original star in the movie. Herrmann ought to be heard more in the concert hall. He was a fine conductor in addition to his composing for movies.

[sirmercutio99]

It's funny to hear a real opera singer singing it correct. Of course the reason why Susan couldn't sing it was she was a decent singer who could probaly sing pop tunes with her light soubrette voice. Susan would probaly have been equivelent to maybe Britney or Madonna.(not to discount there voices but Madonna made a mockery of Evita!)

[Dogsledfan]

Go ahead and discount Madonna and Britney - neither one of them can sing a note worth listening to.  Madonna's nothing but a whore who wouldn't be anywhere without the Mafia's backing.

[judyanddavid]

Marvellous to hear this again, which I first heard on a record about 35 years and have not heard since, apart from her 50th birthday concert. Do you really think the Top D is spliced? It always seemed to me as though, like many singers with a final difficult note, she paused slightly before reaching for the it.

[domi2020]

This is piece is done to perfection and I don't Te Kanawa sang it too lightly either. This is a fiendishly difficult aria to pull off and she almost got there except the spliced top D. This is a finer version than her live version which was a semitone lower. BTW it is in French! Love it!

[mattskib]

I love this piece - thanks so much for posting damekirilover! To be honest, I think she singers it better at her 50th birthday concert, despite getting the words wrong then! Here, recorded at the beginning of her career, she sounds just a shade too light and pushed and without the drama she gave it when she sang it live. And the top D at the end sounds 'patched' on. What a voice though....

[musicyh]

I don't think it was spliced. Afterall, she hit a top E (quite effortlessly too it sounded) in a recording of Violetta's aria (La Traviata) even though she didn't always sing it on stage.

[mattskib]

It does sound 'patched' if you listen with headphones to the CD. Having worked for a record company I know that this is frequently done - especially with top notes. I'm not saying the top D isn't hers - merely that it doesn't sound like it was recorded all in one 'take' - it may have been in the recording process that one top D was better than another so they patched the better one on to the final version. Note that at her 50th birthday concert she sang the aria down a semitone.

[PecsMaster]

@mattskib I am not sure, but I think she did an interview where she mentioned that she did the last note on a seperate take. If this is so, then she is quite honest.

[JWhittlesey]

I actually do think it's spliced, but still Kiri. The spin and color is still there, but the jump from the A to the D is a bit too quick for a lyrico spinto to make without an engineer. I adore Kiri in any way, shape or form

[mjmacmtenor]

The aria was specifically written by Bernard Herrmann to be somewhat "unsingable". It calls for a lyric/dramatic voice with a very sustained high tessitura. It is perfectly suited to a "Straussian" singer like Te Kanawa, but was completely unsuited to the very light coloratura voice of the character in the film. It is a great "parody" of early 20th century late Romantic music.

[thecelticinme]

First time I heard her sing this aria was at her 50th birthday gala and the last high note made me feel dizzy from such power it emanates.

[damekirilover]

She sang in that concert in a lower key......if you compare.

[thecelticinme]

I'm no pro but yes, I can tell the difference :D

[ClassicPerformances]

@damekirilover Actually having just replayed this LIVE number,,,she sings it on the SAME key as this recording! (F major above middle C) and wonderfully,,,,listen again and you will see.

[ClassicPerformances]

@ClassicPerformances mmm actually, the recitative begins if F,,,,and on this recording, as you uploaded it, she does indeed go down a half tone in the main body of the aria. Interesting!

[ClassicPerformances]

@damekirilover You might try listening to that again,....she sings it in the SAME key as here..(F major)

and quite good, indeed!

[musicyh]

Oh my...that's one tough aria to nail! the extremely high tessitura, and the top D at the end! Sounds like it was written for a coloratura soprano. Are the lyrics in Italian?

[musicyh]

Correction...it sounds like it's in French now.

[damekirilover]

Listen to the high note in the very end! I quite love the picture on the magazine cover.......