The Greatest Bass Ever

This excerpt is from the Paris performance of L'Incoronazione di Poppea.

Nero and Poppea are sung by the big voiced Jon Vickers and Gwenyth Jones. Christa Ludwig and Richard Stilwell also appear. But the show is stolen by Nicolai Ghiaurov as Seneca.

This was before his vocal crisis that required him to lighten his technique. Here he sings with a fullness of tone that no other bass could quite match. Just stupendous

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Monteverdi
• Nicolai
• Ghiaurov
• Seneca
• Bass
• L'Incoronazione
• di
• Poppea

[Trombligliotti]

listen to spoken voice on movies and television from the sixties, compare to today. Totally different vocal techniques. Today actors use whisper-techniques and compression synthesizer.

[Agorante]

@Trombligliotti I'm quite sure that if I were to listen as you suggest to sixties TV I might be able to perceive some differences but the biggest difference which takes no careful study took place in 1928 with Rudy Valee. The biggest recent mic effect has been the use of cardioid mics by gospel quartet basses that started only about twenty years ago. This is a big effect unlike the subtle effects you seem to have noticed.

[Trombligliotti]

modern style of singing is very affected by movies and spoken culture today. Actors whisper, and mobile phones allow a more loose, energy-lethargic style of phonation, which makes it impossible to develop relaxed energy while singing, because it is so different from speech. Fifty years ago, before all the microphones and mobiles, people sang more as they spoke, always using the voice in the same way

[Agorante]

@Trombligliotti Good points but bad chronology. Fifty years ago was 1962. Edison invented the mic in 1877 and recordings went electric in 1926 at about the same time that the talkies came in. I agree about the effect of mics on singing but I think you should say a century not a half century.

[BBozhkilov]

The descendant of Orpheus. GREATEST BASS EVER LIVED!

[bodiloto]

+ 100 !!!! QUESTA SERA a Garnier "IL PUBBLICO " avveva dimenticato che esistevano altri solisti !!!! GHIAUROV era INSUPERABILE !!!!! IMMORTALE !!!! GRAZIE !

[Trombligliotti]

I think we are talking about totally different things. Let's not discuss anymore. Internet is too full of pointless arguments. I think Ghiaurov was an amazing singer and a great artist - full stop.

[Trombligliotti]

Thanks for reply Agorante; You misunderstand. Microphone was indeed invented more than a century ago, but only today does it exist in everyday life, absolutely everywhere, on every person, all through the day, affecting our lives in the same way internet has changed the way we write letters.

[Trombligliotti]

Classic result of singing too muscular in the throat, many men have this crisis around 35-40 when ligaments are not flexible anymore. Many have to stop singing because of too much muscular instability - the cause is bad teachers making the young singers identify the voice with throat-power and not elegance. Big voices can still have amazing flexibility - Birgit for instance, just to name one of the more extreme voices who still was able to make all sorts of emotional lines and vocal effects.

[Halfnerds]

a bass should have also high covered notes babyes: and ghiaurov managed to do notes above MI all in the throat...

so please don't say bull shit and begin to listen to the real basses, siepi, colombara, ramey, lloyd , van dam.

[Jextxadore]

@Agorante Please do; it would be a very interesting lesson.

[Agorante]

@Jextxadore Ghiaurov "carried his chest to high". He did not cover his high notes when he first came up. He sang all the way up to a high F without adjusting. Conversely he had a short bottom at first. He skipped the low Fs in Marcel. Maybe I should make a video demonstrating this change.