All of your choices to demonstrate the high G are outstanding. Due to the limited recording ability of the time, I think that the earlier singers are really impossible to appreciate fully, because the fidelity of the recording is seriously compromised. Nevertheless, the steadiness and nobility of their voices is still very evident. As a now retired operatic baritone, I can evaluate these singers in a professional manor. The aria that opened the Metropolitan Opera to me was "Nulla, silenzio!" which gets a generous display of various voices on this clip. Actually, I found that high G one of the easier ones to feel confident with for some reason. Probably because the notes before it are not difficult, tessitura wise. My great teacher, Casper Vecchione, insisted that I hold that high G as long as possible then portamento slowly down to the C. He was right, of course. I had a contract in 20 minutes with the Met when I sang my audition with that one and covered and sang many leading baritone roles there. If you check me out on You Tube, there are many examples of my singing. Jason Stearns, baritone.
Very interesting to here this note over time, from a variety of singers. And yes, I agree, the high G has the potential to be manly, powerful and exciting.
I saw Giorgio Zancanaro in Andrea Chenier at Covent Garden in the eighties with the title role being sung by Placido Domingo .After " Nemico della patria" which is on You Tube from the actual performance I saw. I let out a BRAVO after one of the finest examples of great baritone I have ever heard. A women sitting in front of me in the stalls turned around and gave me a dirty look. I retorted that she didn't realized what she had just heard. As it happens you can just about hear my bravo !!
As an aspiring baritone in the early 60s, I was a big Fischer-Dieskau fan but Italian just wasn't his fasch. Then I heard the prologue from Pagliacci by MacNeil. I could not believe it, not only the concluding G, but the Ab before. Man! How do you carry that kind of weight up that high? Just amazing. I was privileged to be on stage in a small role with Mac in his on stage debut as Jack Rance with Houston Grand Opera and, yes, he was truly just what you heard on the recordings. Awe inspiring! Thanks for these videos of great baritones. It brought back wonderful memories.
The thing that many baritones struggle with are the notes above the high Eb. Why? Because most teachers don't address the fact that the MALE voice is a duel instrument. We must learn how to sing with an internal HUM at all times. Not a hum on an M, but the internal hum of the NG. NG is actually the HEAD VOICE in a male voice. This doesn't mean FALSETTO. Head voice is the strong, supportive connection of the voice to the body. If you take the word SING for example, say the word and SUSTAIN the NG sound. Not with a vowel, but with your mouth open but the back of the mouth closed with the NG. Play with doing this until you can hold the NG strongly. Don't let a vowel come out....just the buzzing sound of the NG. You can do this on every pitch of your voice. Don't let it have any vibrato. Strong, and buzzing and straight. This is the secret of the support of the voice. Without that NG there will never be a secure high range. The thing to understand is that the NG IS THE HEAD VOICE. It is also THE SUPPORT of the voice. There is only one way to do the NG. The NG is the secret to having power and range and ease. Although the NG is all those things, it is not difficult to do. When you feel you have a good NG going, then open to an AW vowel. There is NO vowel AH. If you sing AH you break your connection to the internal buzzing power of the NG immediately. AH is the spoken A...but doesn't work for singing because it breaks the connection to the NG. Go back and forth from NG to AW.....never allowing the NG to go away. You will discover that the NG is the power and strength of AW, as well as every vowel. Just don't widen your mouth. Open it vertically, not horizontally. Every pitch, every vowel....the NG is the secret power within those notes and vowels. When you sing above the Eb, you will feel a kind of adjustment happening in the palate and throat. I think of it as a "gear shift" in the voice. It is an automatic transmission in the voice....a shift into the high notes. It is somewhat subtle, but certainly noticeable. The vowels become less distinct, more neutral....however they are certainly recognizable to the listener. There is the sense of AW becoming OU as in the word COULD. EE becomes more like IH as in the word WITH. OH becomes more like OU as well. EH is more like IH as well. The high notes you are singing now are starting to be in a female singer's range. There is less clarity of the vowel, but the clarity and power of the voice actually increases. Master the NG, and you are well on your way to discovering your full voice. Check me out on You Tube. Jason Stearns, baritone. You will hear what I am talking about. I also made a series of vocal lessons for You Tube. They might clarify even further what I have written here.
@@jasonstearns2666 I'm looking forward to your TH-cam lessons, I remember you from the Met. Heard your Barone Douphol a few times but unfortunately not the Barnaba.
@@kennethwayne6857 I would be happy to share with you what I believe is the right thing to do to achieve an operatic voice Let me know if you are interested.
As a complete ignoramus about vocal technique, I should just like to say that for me Tibbett was very obviously the most gifted with innate vocal beauty, and Gobbi was the most emotionally persuasive in just a few notes. Thank you for providing us all with such a fascinating and instructive video.
What a fascinating collection! The differences in technique prove what my late teacher Jerome Hines told me. Namely, that there are multiple paths to good singing. As a bass, I have never sung above F# publicly. I guess having the G (and higher) is what most distinguishes a baritone from a bass. Thank you for posting this.
Not exactly, baritones are just a lighter vocal type. Basses usually only sing up to an e4/f4. I'm a tenor, my full range is f#2 to e5 but I wouldn't say my comfortable range are in those highest or lowest ranges. Anyway, voice types are awesome and show vocal uniqueness. Have a good day, from a tenor
You'll not many of the Italian baritones have more squillo in their voices..the general lineage of teaching imo. Btw I met Sang with many decades ago a former student of Hines. A big polish American baritone. I guess he was very prodigious...but had bad vocal trouble and sued Hines. This guy had a chest size of a gorilla and even with his vocal problems his voice rolled out onto the hall like lava. A huge voice.
Long gone, voices of the past, knew how to sing, but the G-spot is something else too sir, cann't help it, the first thing that comes into a man's head!
The balance in some of the earlier voices are stunning. Not overly-dark, not overly covered, very natural, open and pleasant to listen to. Obviously fashions change - but not EVERY voice is built like a George London, Tito Ruffo or Gobbi. Noté and Dragoni in particular are just gorgeous. All the best of these baritones seem to build from the middle outwards - not just focus on high and low notes like conservatoires today seem to push for (which is one of the reasons you get all those gross swallowed baritone sounds).
You get that sounds because that's what sells, and we want to work. Orchestras are incredibly louder than they were 100 years ago as well, with fuller, richer sounds, and the signer is confronted by a literal sound wall that he has to pierce, hence the push to sing always darker and louder. The P we have to sing on today's stages was easily a MP, or even MF 100 ago.
@@captainharlock3998 I agree with you that it's the sound that sells, and it's extremely valid to learn how to do what will make you a living. However, orchestras are not louder now - Puccini was writing Turandot a century ago, and the ensemble was gigantic then as it is now, not to mention Wagner (there is just no way to make 85 players not be a tidal wave of sound). The change is in how singers are taught - asking for the larynx to be depressed and always, ALWAYS sing darker and louder actually ends up creating problems with size and power and gets the "swallowed" sound (I would call it ingolata because I'm just a touch pretentious) mentioned by the OP. Over the last century, there has been a dramatic shift in technique, and I would argue not for the better - the big voices have all but vanished, despite the global population skyrocketing with far more singers studying Classical voice now than there were 80 years ago.
@@martynasmatutis8284 You're right concerning the lacks of vocal technique, but sorry, Captain Harlock is absolutely right when he speaks about the increasing power of the orchestras. It's not specifically a question of number but of instrumental making. The violins family has adopted the steel strings, the brass are incredibly more powerful (the bore is different, the bells are larger...). When you hear the romantic orchestras playing with originals instruments or copies, the sounds is much softer (and, other example, the ophicleide's sound is totally different of the modern tuba (which can produce an earthquake effect 😆), the timpani were smaller, with animal skin.
When I was twelve, my father took me to see Pagliacci at Northrop Auditorium in Minneapolis. At that time, Cornell MacNeil was part of the Met touring company. His voice was so rich and full that I can still hear it now, more than fifty years later.
Of course Gobbi was great but tonal beauty?? Maybe when he was younger but on the majority of his recordings that I've heard, tonal beauty is hardly something I'd attribute to him. Perhaps you've heard Merrill on the 'Tabarro' recording, there's tonal beauty!
@@kennethwayne6857 Gobbi had great panache, but not a ‘gorgeous’ timbre. Since the top was short and lacked a soaring quality, he fell short of the best of the best.
De Luca,Protti,Bruscantini,Montefusco,Silveri,Oztoprak,Gualtieri .... i love them all but there are lot more fascinating baritones. Greetings from Istanbul.
Many of the older recordings to my ear seem lighter but also more vibrant than a lot of what we hear today. (Shift to “head voice” instead of trying to do it all “in chest”? It just seems to be more balanced, vibrato seems even, if not slightly faster on top, etc).
It's lighter because the singers then had to move further from the horn in order not to blast the thing to pieces. They all sang in chest voice though.
@@baoanhnguyen9186 Isn't a slight lightening of the fundamental/a shift of energy into the overtones also consistent with the shift into closed/covered timbre while staying in chest (what many would call "full voice in head" or "tenor head voice")? Do we have any evidence that they all reliably moved away from the horn when singing in their top, or is it just a story?
@@thomasgareaubaritone627 There's a clip of Lauritz Melchior doing just that somewhere on TH-cam. It's a movie, sure, but it does show the action. And covering is the exact opposite of "lightening." It's going darker (while trying to maintaining the clarity of the sound.) It's still chest voice, not head voice. To make it easier to understand: covered chest voice is like Beniamino Gigli in the final B of "Pazzo son". Head voice is like Beniamini Gigli in "O dolce incante." You can hear quite a difference. Tl;dr: Yes, old singers (pre-electronic) did step back when they sing a high note. No, covering does not involve lightening.
@@baoanhnguyen9186 we even opera singers today don’t use all chest voice. It might feel and sound like it but it’s a blend. I like to use the term full voice which means the head head voice and chest voice are connected. Head voice is used to hit a high note and the chest voice is used to support it and fill it out.
@@AfroPoli sei troppo gentile mitico Afro ma credo ci sia un equivoco...purtroppo x me che debbo rinunciare ad un Tuo gentile complimento circa la mia voce... che ahimè non possiedo....
Ruffo always sounds like a Ferrari engine idling -not even releasing a fraction of the immrnse power of his voice A wonderful selection of great baritone voices -great listening .
I used to be a operatic baritone for a short period and very knowledgeable about historic baritones. My take is that there is such a plethora of great historic Italian baritones with piercing powerful squillo filled voices. These were not large men(nowadays there is tendency to have large men as lower voices (whose voices are naturally large and can carry EVEN if improperly produced. ) however the reason you had historic Italian baritones usually 57" to 59"....whose voices could cut through any orchestra was in addition to talent.....a heritage of incredible lineage voice instruction. They sang "out there" in front of them ....like oversize speaking. The didn't consciously try to enlarge their throat or envision a pear at back of throat etc.(which I had teachers espouse to me!)The exercises were simple and progressive. When you hear short men like capuccilli, protti, etc with powerful piercing voices it's due to proper training passed down . Macneil and Warren were big men with very big voices. But look at tagliabue,Danise, granforte(they were far smaller than Macneil or warren,(or Milnes for that matter). However their voices carried as far. Besides talent.... it's in the teaching. (Besides Warren and maybe Macneil were freaks of nature). Early on at a major university I briefly had a teacher who simply said milnes had a large voice because he was a large man with a large throat. He supported the size of your voice was permanently limited by your body/throat size. So if you're not at least 6 ft 4 why bother.
Apologies, but could you explain to me exactly what about size limits your projection? It doesn't make sense to me logically because the vocal tract is well above anything that would make you tall. Like, the size of your femurs aren't changing the resonant space in your pharynx, which is what causes large voices. Furthermore, if that's how it works, why are there short wagnerian singers? I don't mean to sound aggressive or anything here, I just don't understand how height would matter.
@@DubiousDubs larger men are going to have larger vocal apparatuses.Larger larynx, vocal cords, cavity space etc. I remember being a freshman voice student over 40 years ago at University of Illinois and my teacher calmly explaining Sherill milnes has a large voice due to his Large size..his face and neck he may have specified. In general this relationship is true. Warren, and Macneil and London, siepi etc. But the Italian baritones of the past were taught properly and had great squillo..no woofy sound. They got the most carrying power out of their voices(talented also of course).
Great but I wish you had taken Zancanaro’s “Il balen” from the film with Bonisolli and Kabaivanska instead! He was a little pushed in the clip you chose... the film version would have been a better example of the clarity he could achieve. (Also, thank you for making some of these vids with comparisons of baritones - why should tenors and sopranos get to have all the exposure?)
There are two turning points in the singing technique. (1) Before and after Ruffo: Singing on the breath vs. singing with maximal extension. (Exceptions: Pavel Lisitsian, Hugo Hasslo and to a certain extent at least: Robert Merrill and Giuseppe Taddei) and (2) born before or after 1920: singing with extension vs. roaring. The decay of singing goes on today it is era of whispering without vibrato and using a mic.
You are quite right - the baritones of the Caruso era sound very similar because they have the correct technique - and their timbre is very similar to that of the middle of Caruso's voice when he was singing "baritonally" - then a certain windiness and forcing element starts to intrude, with some notable exceptions such as Lisitsian, Merrill and MacNeil - until we arrive at Cappuccilli, who was a fine and intelligent singer but whose top notes are really quite poorly produced.
SuperMagren the problem is what Kaufman does is encouraged by the industry. Those in power are the ones who enabled him. Like very sensitive muffled singing, almost like falsetto most of the time with very little projection. No emphasis on big sound even in Wagner. Just everything is all quiet sensitive “artistic” like lieder singing to a very small room of ppl. That’s what they want, so that’s what they get. If the industry rewarded the type of singing we like there would be a whole different set of stars, who are right now just ppl working regular jobs and singing as a hobby, because they cannot get success.
A wonderful array of baritone singing. Titta Ruffo is sublime. Ettore Bastianini singing Largo al factotum is superb, search for it on TH-cam. Apollo Granforte is also magnificent.
Grazie per queste selezioni. Chissà se già c'è una per il do# del finale del "Cujus animam"... E una per le varianti finali dei "verd'anni miei" ? Credo ci possa essere dell'interesse... Grazie 👍
Modern baritones try to make their voice darker than it is like lucas meachum which actually just makes their voice smaller and swallowed. The natural voice is properly opened and placed and invisible without swallowing nor strangling the throat. The male low and middle must come from the chest, and the high notes must come from both the chest and head at the same time. Anyone saying full chest and only chest to the top is an idiot. You keep the root of the chest but increase the head voice activation too. As they said, chest voice in the head. You need both placements working at the same time
Great video! Only Lisitsian’s audio isn’t correct. The G is actually a Gb; I posted the corrected recording on my channel. Of course he HAD fabulous G naturals and Ab’s, as is easily heard on his live recital performance of “O sommo Carlo”!
Really I don't understand missing a "rocket" as Protti. And so Pasquale Amato, Galeffi, Sereni, Silveri, Bruson... Grazie per averci risparmiato Nucci, DFD, Wixell e un "nefando" pseudo-baritono di nome Placido... non-mi-ricordo-più-che. Comunque il finale del Prologo è un la bemolle (di tradizione), poi termina con un sol.
Interestingly Mattia Battistini can be heard on recording singing the Ab (he died in 1928) th-cam.com/video/hc9CkfSZh7g/w-d-xo.html. Battistini also sang Pagliacci during the composer’s lifetime and was the only baritone Leoncavallo allowed to sing the prologue (normally sung by Tonio) despite the fact Battistini was in the cast as Silvio. Battistini remains one of the single greatest baritones of all time, bar none. You can read more on the topic here, page 67: books.google.be/books?id=F5sUdc_816sC&pg=PA67&lpg=PA67&dq=battistini+silvio&source=bl&ots=VMhj9abpTl&sig=ACfU3U0vFiqa1PSOHorQAh1-eNpTyx2qww&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjEscWqrL7tAhUB-6QKHY4KAcoQ6AEwCHoECAcQAg#v=onepage&q=battistini%20silvio&f=false
@@simonschmidt1960 this is an amazing detailed answer, thank you so much (edit): also my god that recording of the prologue is so good vocally and also artistically.
Titta Ruffo n.1 from a vocal point of view. Nevertheless a few top players are missing IMHO: Mattia Battistini, Pasquale Amato, Benvenuto Franci, Carlo Galeffi, Giuseppe De Luca, Armando Borgioli, Aldo Protti, Giangiacomo Guelfi
A documentary on the music life in Berlin, made by German television. They have lots of interesting material in their archives apparently. The Schlusnus footage is from 1944.
I have the impression that there are some modern singers who compare favorably with singers from 100 years ago, but they are not top stars. I suspect it is too important that a star be good looking or sexy these days. Kaufmann definitely has the looks. I don't hate on his voice. I think he's a adequate singer whose voice has deteriorated a bit ahead of schedule. Then there is Stemme, who sings Wagner with her relatively tiny frame. Can you imagine Rita Hunter appearing on a major stage today? Even Nilsson wouldn't easily make it. Another factor about which I have read many times is that orchestras play much louder than they used to. This causes singers to strain. I had an informal coaching session with a student of Sergius Kagen once. My accompanist couldn't make it so I played for myself. This woman explained to me that the piano part needed to be much much softer. Have you ever heard David Garvey accompany Price? He was so self effacing musically you couldn't believe it. But this is what singers need. The human voice is not loud. The piano and most other instruments can outmatch any singer. I believe there are many factors that go against the modem singer who has proper technique. I say without modesty that I had a teacher who knew voice better than most opera singers - - and I was told by a few of them that my training was excellent (I was never pursuing music as a career to be clear). At age 80 and in poor health my teacher sang from low D to high B flat with no visible effort at all. He could sing pianissimo on high A. But no student wanting a career in opera would go to him. He wouldn't rush the development of the voice, nor would he let someone yell or bellow, even if that could have gotten gigs.
Orchestras used to be softer before the 1920's so that is not really an excuse. These days they often actually make orchestras play softer on purpose. They call it a balanced sound. Of course it is very easy to manipulate the loudness of a sound on a recording, even live broadcasted performances are enhanced.
Great compilation but it is impossible to read most of the names,as the writing is tiny,i would love to have known who most of them are,though i have a good idea on some of them
I don't mean this as shade! But Zancanaro strikes me as perhaps not having the "best voice" naturally, but you can hear that his technique was GOLDEN. One of my favorites, a very easy voice to listen to.
@@thomasgareaubaritone627 Heard Zancanaro in Ballo in the 80’s. Reminded one of older great vocalists. Others were doing most of the recordings and people like lightweight Hampson were ruling at the Met. Zancanaro is just a joy to listen to.
Without wishing to compare, I'm really happy you mentioned Zancanaro. I've always admired him highly and feel he's been greatly and unjustly underappreciated.
Черт побери.... Вот это учебник... И зачем консерватория? Ха..ха.. ха ... ! Одно мне непонятно ,- всех обсудили , по всем прошлись более менее. Только одного певца не тронули , обошлись одним словом ИДЕАЛЬНО И это соответствует всем требованиям Изучения старой классической Итальянской школы. ( техника , дикция, фразировка, бельканто и прочее... прочее... прочее..) Так какой тайной владел Великий , Большой, Владеющий ни на кого не похожий голосом и тембром Ettore Bastianini.О красоте , я вообще молчу- это не подлежит обсуждению. И я понимаю , как в прошлом Психолог, Что этот певец - ASSOLUTO😇👌❗️
A very intereting complilation, thank you. Those that want to hear more of Gobbi could start with my video (in which I'm not very flattering about his high range, particularly later in his life, though his G here is marvellous): th-cam.com/video/SXpyyijw7Rs/w-d-xo.html
@@AfroPoli th-cam.com/video/RaTwQcDioXA/w-d-xo.html Giangiacomo Guelfi - O monumento from Ponchielli’s „La Gioconda” If I hear correctly, there is high G at the and of the aria
@@celibidache1000 well, I didn’t have time to go listen to every singer. But for example Forsell and obviously warren but there were a few others. No singer in the video has a bad voice. But some are better produced than others. Everything is a matter of degrees. One can have a very Kermit like sound or only slightly towards it. And you can have vocal faults and still have an overall fine voice. Which is where most inevitably fall as very few were near perfect Obvious standout of greatly produced voice is Ruffo. Probably the best baritone no questions asked.
@@Xerxes89 It was really bad. Those teachers made me sing like that because of my slightly higher pitched speaking voice… I am lucky my voice survived all this abuse.
La buona vecchia scuola vince sempre . Dopo MacNeil, la commedia è finita. Carroli - bellissima voce poca tecnica. Zancanaro - una vocalità poco bella. Cappuccilli - aveva una voce meno pastosa e meno drammatica dai tenori tipo Salazar, Vinay e compagnia. Questa è la mia modesta opinione. il vecchio PS Grazie Daniele ! Bravo !
The crowning achievement of the baritone voice (or any voice for that matter) is not a big high note. It is to sing musically and with artistry - of which there is precious little on display in this compilation. It’s amazing how BAD some of this singing is.
@@labienus9968some of my very favorite singers are showcased here, and they DEFINITELY showed great artistry in their singing. What I said is that it’s not on display in this video. As a baritone and musician myself I detest these kinds of compilations that have the effect of reducing great singing to an act of gymnastics centered around one note. If that were true, Bergonzi and Callas would be failures. But thanks for enriching the musical dialog by posting a personal attack.
@@danielakerman8241 Suggest you re-read your original comment before you construe my remark as an "attack"-(how could it be personal anyway?) If you had begun with much of what you say now I probably would have said,sure notes aren't everything etc. and not even commented. YOu remember what you said-"how BAD some of this singing is" not only was it not true, but we never know what the some is. So you wrote a shallow, inflammatory comment-not at all what you say now-probably knowing someone would react-so you could then react on a high horse no less, please. And then you "detest" these compilation-but why am I left with the feeling you listen to all of them! A guilty pleasure?
@@labienus9968 telling someone “you just can’t grasp it,” is indeed a personal attack calling into question someone’s cognitive or intellectual abilities. Some of the singing on this compilation IS bad!! And not just a little! Even my favorite baritones were guilty of some awful moments. The point is that anyone looking to learn what truly great singing is all about isn’t going to find it in this compilation. The only example here that really stands out for its quality is Zancanaro singing “Il balen” with utter ease and musical taste. Listen to one of the previous examples (don’t remember who right now) and you’ll hear him absolutely butcher the musical phrase. I don’t know you or your background. I don’t know if you’re a musician or not - not that it’s that important either way. But if you want to have an intelligent conversation on the merits and demerits in these musical examples, I’ll happily take part.
@@danielakerman8241 Calm down. The first time you didn't express yourself well. You could try it over? You're probably not a musician, or deeply knowledgeable about baritones, or else why would you make a blanket statement about how bad the singing is, when you rightfully say the measure of a great baritone is not simply having a high note? (more aspiring singers who know it all?-but are on internet comment sections?) But of course some sing quite well and have a lousy high note. You do say-given that most of the great baritones are on display here-there is "precious little" etc. and my response -again- was from that statement you don't seem to grasp much, My god-in this world that is a "personal attack"-it's a comment board-if you can't take different opinions, reactions-maybe it's not a place for you? Interestingly, you don't respond-but you declare disdain for these compilations-but not only listen to them-but comment on them!-mostly I skip them, but I was on a Warren reappraisal so I took the bait. There are others left out-but most of the big guns are here-but I do find that the remarkable Herlea is absent.
13:50 he is already on a screams, voice is unstable. In some audios we can be tricked in that trap, studios, enchanced sounds can produce unrealistic "clear" sounds, but here we can here the real baritones screams, which can be called a "high notes" but its just a screams
@@arambarsamian6312 Strange leaving Milnes out-given the number of his contemporaries who are included. Many fine examples of the Milnes' top. I heard him live many times-big sound, big high notes
01 GIUSEPPE CAMPANARI : AWFUL. Lacks any legato in this example. Awful phrasing. Doesn't execute the written notes cleanly, and in fact doesn't sing many of them. The high G lacks steady vibrato. I've heard college students do this better. 02 JOHN FORSELL -- doesn't so much sing the high note as squeeze it out. Pitch is suspect (though this could be an artifact of the recording). He may have been great in other things, but he's not great here. 03 JEAN NOTÉ -- AWFUL. Completely butchers the melismas. Lacks any of the elegant phrasing this aria demands. Contrast this to the Zancanaro, which is excellent, or any version by Cappuccilli. 04 MATTEO DRAGONI -- AWFUL. Zero legato. Takes a break every few notes. Pushes the high note so badly he completely loses control of the note, with his vibrato cutting in and out and becoming incredibly uneven. A perfect example of BAD singing. 05 DOMENICO VIGLIONE BORGHESE -- decent, but it doesn't show much other than a high G. 06 TITTA RUFFO -- Never been the biggest fan of Ruffo. Phenomenal instrument, not such phenomenal musical choices. His singing here is pretty good, but the holding of the high G is just a bit excessive. Bad musical choices = bad singing. 07 GAETANO VIVIANI -- Toreador's aria is a terrible vehicle to showcase musicality. That said, this isn't bad, but the last note sounds bottled up a la Sherrill Milnes late in his career. 08 MICHAEL BOHNEN -- Awful. Squeezed, uneven vibrato. Bad singing. 09 GIUSEPPE DANISE: Incredible voice. This is one of the good examples. 10 RICCARDO STRACCIARI: This is ok. He holds the high G an obscene amount of time, though. This is an example of what I call "great voice, bad singing." 11 APOLLO GRANFORTE: One of the great voices, if not the the most tasteful singer. But the example shows only a great high G, not great singing. Had it shown more, maybe it would show what a great singer he was. 12 HANS REINMAR: Pretty good. 13 GIUSEPPE VALDENGO : Interesting recording. Nothing to say about this one. 14 MATHIEU AHLERSMEYER: As evidence of great singing, this is lacking. It's a voice of good quality, but the G is not optimal -- it gets tight and the vibrato slows. One would need to hear more of his singing for examples of how good he was. 15 LAWRENCE TIBBETT -- One of my all-time favorites. Phenomenal voice. Even so, this example doesn't show him off at his best. The high note loses a bit of freedom. His Credo in Otello is phenomenal as was his Rigoletto. As an example of great singing, this isn't ideal. 16 HEINRICH SCHLUSNUS: Phenomenal singing. Good legato, wonderful phrasing, no pushing, the high note is free and perfectly integrated with the rest of the voice. 17 GINO BECHI: Great voice, but what a vulgar, vulgar interpretation. No taste. Just "let me sing this note as long and as loud as possible." Worse than the most excessive moments of Mario del Monaco. A great voice wasted on bad singing. 18 ANTENORE REALI: What an incredible voice. So similar to Warren. Too bad we don't hear more than just this phrase. This example shows you he had a great voice and a great high G, but it doesn't show you much else. 19 TITO GOBBI: What can we say about Gobbi? Completely unique and unparalleled. But if you want to use a high G as the "crowning achievement" of the baritone voice, this isn't great. He huffs and lunges at it. The tonal quality is good, but the really great part of this example is all the other stuff he sings besides the high G. 20 PAVEL LISITSIAN: The pitch is unclear, and he pushes sharp. Not great singing. 21 PIERO CAMPOLONGHI: Huge voice, and great ability. I wish he wouldn't push so much, because he doesn't need to. Suffers a little from covering too much, a la Sherrill Milnes 22 VICTOR DAMIANI: The penultimate note goes way sharp. Bad singing. 23 CARLO TAGLIABUE: another one of my absolute favorites. Nothing bad to say about this one. 24 ROBERT MERRILL: Fantastic -- and he wasn't always. But this is a good one. 25 LEONARD WARREN: Amazing. One of my favorites and he sings every note cleanly and clearly, with legato, phrasing, and phenomenal tone -- UNLIKE Campanari. 26 ETTORE BASTIANINI: Amazing. 27 ROLANDO PANERAI: Underrated because he had to compete with Bastianini. This is decent, but he yells a bit. 28 HUGO HASSLO: nothing to say about this one 29 GIUSEPPE TADDEI: meh. Bastianini did it far better. Beyond that, not much to say about this example. Wish they would have used a different clip of Taddei. 30 CORNELL MACNEIL: perhaps my favorite baritone. Amazing tone. Amazing musicality. He shows all of it here in just a few notes. His "Cortigiani" is my favorite. 31 FRANCO BORDONI: Nothing bad to say about this one. 32 GIORGIO ZANCANARO: Phenomenal. Clean, the melismas are perfect, the tone is even, big and free. One of the few examples on this entire list that showcases phenomenal singing and more than just a high note. 33 SILVANO CARROLI: Pretty good, other than the unnecessary scoop at the end. 34 PIERO CAPPUCCILLI: He was a master, but this example doesn't showcase him well. He's pushing, and runs out of gas at the end, which is amazing considering the amazing breath control he was rightly famous for. Should have used an example of him singing Il balen, or something from Rigoletto, because this isn't great.
Me seeing this title 😏
All of your choices to demonstrate the high G are outstanding. Due to the limited recording ability of the time, I think that the earlier singers are really impossible to appreciate fully, because the fidelity of the recording is seriously compromised. Nevertheless, the steadiness and nobility of their voices is still very evident. As a now retired operatic baritone, I can evaluate these singers in a professional manor. The aria that opened the Metropolitan Opera to me was "Nulla, silenzio!" which gets a generous display of various voices on this clip. Actually, I found that high G one of the easier ones to feel confident with for some reason. Probably because the notes before it are not difficult, tessitura wise. My great teacher, Casper Vecchione, insisted that I hold that high G as long as possible then portamento slowly down to the C. He was right, of course. I had a contract in 20 minutes with the Met when I sang my audition with that one and covered and sang many leading baritone roles there. If you check me out on You Tube, there are many examples of my singing. Jason Stearns, baritone.
Fascinating! Thank you for commenting and sharing!
Very interesting to here this note over time, from a variety of singers. And yes, I agree, the high G has the potential to be manly, powerful and exciting.
I saw Giorgio Zancanaro in Andrea Chenier at Covent Garden in the eighties with the title role being sung
by Placido Domingo .After " Nemico della patria" which is on You Tube from the actual performance I saw. I let out a
BRAVO after one of the finest examples of great baritone I have ever heard. A women sitting in front of me in the stalls
turned around and gave me a dirty look. I retorted that she didn't realized what she had just heard. As it happens you
can just about hear my bravo !!
A wonderful and interesting compilation. Ruffo, Granforte, Tibbett, Merrill , MacNeil, fantastic.
As an aspiring baritone in the early 60s, I was a big Fischer-Dieskau fan but Italian just wasn't his fasch. Then I heard the prologue from Pagliacci by MacNeil. I could not believe it, not only the concluding G, but the Ab before. Man! How do you carry that kind of weight up that high? Just amazing. I was privileged to be on stage in a small role with Mac in his on stage debut as Jack Rance with Houston Grand Opera and, yes, he was truly just what you heard on the recordings. Awe inspiring! Thanks for these videos of great baritones. It brought back wonderful memories.
Thank you for the great comment!
The thing that many baritones struggle with are the notes above the high Eb. Why? Because most teachers don't address the fact that the MALE voice is a duel instrument. We must learn how to sing with an internal HUM at all times. Not a hum on an M, but the internal hum of the NG. NG is actually the HEAD VOICE in a male voice. This doesn't mean FALSETTO. Head voice is the strong, supportive connection of the voice to the body. If you take the word SING for example, say the word and SUSTAIN the NG sound. Not with a vowel, but with your mouth open but the back of the mouth closed with the NG. Play with doing this until you can hold the NG strongly. Don't let a vowel come out....just the buzzing sound of the NG. You can do this on every pitch of your voice. Don't let it have any vibrato. Strong, and buzzing and straight. This is the secret of the support of the voice. Without that NG there will never be a secure high range. The thing to understand is that the NG IS THE HEAD VOICE. It is also THE SUPPORT of the voice. There is only one way to do the NG. The NG is the secret to having power and range and ease. Although the NG is all those things, it is not difficult to do. When you feel you have a good NG going, then open to an AW vowel. There is NO vowel AH. If you sing AH you break your connection to the internal buzzing power of the NG immediately. AH is the spoken A...but doesn't work for singing because it breaks the connection to the NG. Go back and forth from NG to AW.....never allowing the NG to go away. You will discover that the NG is the power and strength of AW, as well as every vowel. Just don't widen your mouth. Open it vertically, not horizontally. Every pitch, every vowel....the NG is the secret power within those notes and vowels. When you sing above the Eb, you will feel a kind of adjustment happening in the palate and throat. I think of it as a "gear shift" in the voice. It is an automatic transmission in the voice....a shift into the high notes. It is somewhat subtle, but certainly noticeable. The vowels become less distinct, more neutral....however they are certainly recognizable to the listener. There is the sense of AW becoming OU as in the word COULD. EE becomes more like IH as in the word WITH. OH becomes more like OU as well. EH is more like IH as well. The high notes you are singing now are starting to be in a female singer's range. There is less clarity of the vowel, but the clarity and power of the voice actually increases. Master the NG, and you are well on your way to discovering your full voice. Check me out on You Tube. Jason Stearns, baritone. You will hear what I am talking about. I also made a series of vocal lessons for You Tube. They might clarify even further what I have written here.
@@jasonstearns2666 I'm looking forward to your TH-cam lessons, I remember you from the Met. Heard your Barone Douphol a few times but unfortunately not the Barnaba.
@@kennethwayne6857 I would be happy to share with you what I believe is the right thing to do to achieve an operatic voice Let me know if you are interested.
@@kennethwayne6857 When will I hear from you?
As a complete ignoramus about vocal technique, I should just like to say that for me Tibbett was very obviously the most gifted with innate vocal beauty, and Gobbi was the most emotionally persuasive in just a few notes. Thank you for providing us all with such a fascinating and instructive video.
A lot of variety, but some very impressive, ringing G's anchored in the chest ...a few with real volcanic power. Fantastic. Bravo!
What a fascinating collection! The differences in technique prove what my late teacher Jerome Hines told me. Namely, that there are multiple paths to good singing. As a bass, I have never sung above F# publicly. I guess having the G (and higher) is what most distinguishes a baritone from a bass. Thank you for posting this.
Not exactly, baritones are just a lighter vocal type.
Basses usually only sing up to an e4/f4.
I'm a tenor, my full range is f#2 to e5 but I wouldn't say my comfortable range are in those highest or lowest ranges.
Anyway, voice types are awesome and show vocal uniqueness.
Have a good day, from a tenor
You'll not many of the Italian baritones have more squillo in their voices..the general lineage of teaching imo. Btw I met Sang with many decades ago a former student of Hines. A big polish American baritone. I guess he was very prodigious...but had bad vocal trouble and sued Hines. This guy had a chest size of a gorilla and even with his vocal problems his voice rolled out onto the hall like lava. A huge voice.
Long gone, voices of the past, knew how to sing, but the G-spot is something else too sir, cann't help it, the first thing that comes into a man's head!
Stunning names...grand posting! Bravo,
Wonderful video. All Greats!! MacNeil was just amazing! You should have included his Il Tabarro live from the met 1981, no one touches it! All great!
The balance in some of the earlier voices are stunning. Not overly-dark, not overly covered, very natural, open and pleasant to listen to. Obviously fashions change - but not EVERY voice is built like a George London, Tito Ruffo or Gobbi. Noté and Dragoni in particular are just gorgeous. All the best of these baritones seem to build from the middle outwards - not just focus on high and low notes like conservatoires today seem to push for (which is one of the reasons you get all those gross swallowed baritone sounds).
AMEN!
*Titta Ruffo
**Tito Gobbi
But what you said is interesting, thanks for your comment.
You get that sounds because that's what sells, and we want to work. Orchestras are incredibly louder than they were 100 years ago as well, with fuller, richer sounds, and the signer is confronted by a literal sound wall that he has to pierce, hence the push to sing always darker and louder. The P we have to sing on today's stages was easily a MP, or even MF 100 ago.
@@captainharlock3998 I agree with you that it's the sound that sells, and it's extremely valid to learn how to do what will make you a living. However, orchestras are not louder now - Puccini was writing Turandot a century ago, and the ensemble was gigantic then as it is now, not to mention Wagner (there is just no way to make 85 players not be a tidal wave of sound). The change is in how singers are taught - asking for the larynx to be depressed and always, ALWAYS sing darker and louder actually ends up creating problems with size and power and gets the "swallowed" sound (I would call it ingolata because I'm just a touch pretentious) mentioned by the OP. Over the last century, there has been a dramatic shift in technique, and I would argue not for the better - the big voices have all but vanished, despite the global population skyrocketing with far more singers studying Classical voice now than there were 80 years ago.
@@martynasmatutis8284 You're right concerning the lacks of vocal technique, but sorry, Captain Harlock is absolutely right when he speaks about the increasing power of the orchestras. It's not specifically a question of number but of instrumental making. The violins family has adopted the steel strings, the brass are incredibly more powerful (the bore is different, the bells are larger...). When you hear the romantic orchestras playing with originals instruments or copies, the sounds is much softer (and, other example, the ophicleide's sound is totally different of the modern tuba (which can produce an earthquake effect 😆), the timpani were smaller, with animal skin.
I love them all! Very interesting!
tutti bravissimi....un pelo più su Granforte e Bechi
Bastianini, Zancanaro, stand out here! In all thought old school was ,is and will be the way to sing Opera.
5:57 Tibbett
7:55 Gobbi
10:30 Merrill, Warren, Bastiannini, Panerai
13:06 MacNeil
14:10 Zancanaro
15:02 Cappuccilli
Tibbett is the best
When I was twelve, my father took me to see Pagliacci at Northrop Auditorium in Minneapolis. At that time, Cornell MacNeil was part of the Met touring company. His voice was so rich and full that I can still hear it now, more than fifty years later.
Zancanaro: the best.
Ruffo's magnanimity is unmistakable
, he gave it all
.
3333³3333333³333³³3³³³3³³³³³3³33333³3 se 93333333³31
For sheer tonal beauty:
Merrill, Bastianini, Stracciari, Ruffo, Granforte, Gobbi, and Zancanaro,
Of course Gobbi was great but tonal beauty?? Maybe when he was younger but on the majority of his recordings that I've heard, tonal beauty is hardly something I'd attribute to him. Perhaps you've heard Merrill on the 'Tabarro' recording, there's tonal beauty!
@@kennethwayne6857 Gobbi had great panache, but not a ‘gorgeous’ timbre. Since the top was short and lacked a soaring quality, he fell short of the best of the best.
manca solo uno grande , grande
Nicolae Herlea,
Not that anyone needs to be told, but what a gorgeous sound Schlusnus had.
Indeed. His is my favourite baritone voice.
De Luca,Protti,Bruscantini,Montefusco,Silveri,Oztoprak,Gualtieri .... i love them all but there are lot more fascinating baritones. Greetings from Istanbul.
Many of the older recordings to my ear seem lighter but also more vibrant than a lot of what we hear today. (Shift to “head voice” instead of trying to do it all “in chest”? It just seems to be more balanced, vibrato seems even, if not slightly faster on top, etc).
It's lighter because the singers then had to move further from the horn in order not to blast the thing to pieces. They all sang in chest voice though.
@@baoanhnguyen9186 Isn't a slight lightening of the fundamental/a shift of energy into the overtones also consistent with the shift into closed/covered timbre while staying in chest (what many would call "full voice in head" or "tenor head voice")? Do we have any evidence that they all reliably moved away from the horn when singing in their top, or is it just a story?
@@thomasgareaubaritone627
There's a clip of Lauritz Melchior doing just that somewhere on TH-cam. It's a movie, sure, but it does show the action.
And covering is the exact opposite of "lightening." It's going darker (while trying to maintaining the clarity of the sound.) It's still chest voice, not head voice. To make it easier to understand: covered chest voice is like Beniamino Gigli in the final B of "Pazzo son". Head voice is like Beniamini Gigli in "O dolce incante." You can hear quite a difference.
Tl;dr: Yes, old singers (pre-electronic) did step back when they sing a high note. No, covering does not involve lightening.
@@thomasgareaubaritone627 Watch this: th-cam.com/video/6gGOBlQJaP0/w-d-xo.html
@@baoanhnguyen9186 we even opera singers today don’t use all chest voice. It might feel and sound like it but it’s a blend. I like to use the term full voice which means the head head voice and chest voice are connected. Head voice is used to hit a high note and the chest voice is used to support it and fill it out.
Antenore Reali, the best of all times.
Grazie Afro Poli della bellissima condivisione!!!magari preferirei SOL acuto che high G
Ciao amico mio, come stai tu e la tua bella voce? Tutto a posto?? 🍀
@@AfroPoli sei troppo gentile mitico Afro ma credo ci sia un equivoco...purtroppo x me che debbo rinunciare ad un Tuo gentile complimento circa la mia voce... che ahimè non possiedo....
Ruffo always sounds like a Ferrari engine idling -not even releasing a fraction of the immrnse power of his voice A wonderful selection of great baritone voices -great listening .
Bud powell
Thank you for video!!!
I used to be a operatic baritone for a short period and very knowledgeable about historic baritones. My take is that there is such a plethora of great historic Italian baritones with piercing powerful squillo filled voices. These were not large men(nowadays there is tendency to have large men as lower voices (whose voices are naturally large and can carry EVEN if improperly produced. ) however the reason you had historic Italian baritones usually 57" to 59"....whose voices could cut through any orchestra was in addition to talent.....a heritage of incredible lineage voice instruction. They sang "out there" in front of them ....like oversize speaking. The didn't consciously try to enlarge their throat or envision a pear at back of throat etc.(which I had teachers espouse to me!)The exercises were simple and progressive. When you hear short men like capuccilli, protti, etc with powerful piercing voices it's due to proper training passed down . Macneil and Warren were big men with very big voices. But look at tagliabue,Danise, granforte(they were far smaller than Macneil or warren,(or Milnes for that matter). However their voices carried as far. Besides talent.... it's in the teaching. (Besides Warren and maybe Macneil were freaks of nature).
Early on at a major university I briefly had a teacher who simply said milnes had a large voice because he was a large man with a large throat. He supported the size of your voice was permanently limited by your body/throat size. So if you're not at least 6 ft 4 why bother.
Apologies, but could you explain to me exactly what about size limits your projection? It doesn't make sense to me logically because the vocal tract is well above anything that would make you tall. Like, the size of your femurs aren't changing the resonant space in your pharynx, which is what causes large voices. Furthermore, if that's how it works, why are there short wagnerian singers? I don't mean to sound aggressive or anything here, I just don't understand how height would matter.
@@DubiousDubs larger men are going to have larger vocal apparatuses.Larger larynx, vocal cords, cavity space etc. I remember being a freshman voice student over 40 years ago at University of Illinois and my teacher calmly explaining Sherill milnes has a large voice due to his Large size..his face and neck he may have specified. In general this relationship is true. Warren, and Macneil and London, siepi etc. But the Italian baritones of the past were taught properly and had great squillo..no woofy sound. They got the most carrying power out of their voices(talented also of course).
Grandi voci👏👏👏
Also, can I just say that Ruffo sound like a lion?
On the underrated side, Carolli and Bordoni sound gorgeous.
Hence his actual honorific, the Lion of Pisa.
can you tell me the time stamp? I wanna hear that lion too hahag
Great but I wish you had taken Zancanaro’s “Il balen” from the film with Bonisolli and Kabaivanska instead! He was a little pushed in the clip you chose... the film version would have been a better example of the clarity he could achieve. (Also, thank you for making some of these vids with comparisons of baritones - why should tenors and sopranos get to have all the exposure?)
There are two turning points in the singing technique. (1) Before and after Ruffo: Singing on the breath vs. singing with maximal extension. (Exceptions: Pavel Lisitsian, Hugo Hasslo and to a certain extent at least: Robert Merrill and Giuseppe Taddei) and (2) born before or after 1920: singing with extension vs. roaring. The decay of singing goes on today it is era of whispering without vibrato and using a mic.
You are quite right - the baritones of the Caruso era sound very similar because they have the correct technique - and their timbre is very similar to that of the middle of Caruso's voice when he was singing "baritonally" - then a certain windiness and forcing element starts to intrude, with some notable exceptions such as Lisitsian, Merrill and MacNeil - until we arrive at Cappuccilli, who was a fine and intelligent singer but whose top notes are really quite poorly produced.
SuperMagren the problem is what Kaufman does is encouraged by the industry. Those in power are the ones who enabled him. Like very sensitive muffled singing, almost like falsetto most of the time with very little projection. No emphasis on big sound even in Wagner. Just everything is all quiet sensitive “artistic” like lieder singing to a very small room of ppl. That’s what they want, so that’s what they get. If the industry rewarded the type of singing we like there would be a whole different set of stars, who are right now just ppl working regular jobs and singing as a hobby, because they cannot get success.
Gino Bechi number 1.
A wonderful array of baritone singing. Titta Ruffo is sublime. Ettore Bastianini singing Largo al factotum is superb, search for it on TH-cam. Apollo Granforte is also magnificent.
Antenore Reali nel Tabarro è strepitoso! Un baritono che meritava più visibilità.
Grazie per queste selezioni.
Chissà se già c'è una per il do# del finale del "Cujus animam"...
E una per le varianti finali dei "verd'anni miei" ?
Credo ci possa essere dell'interesse...
Grazie 👍
I would hope that Dramatic and/or Helden Tenors can deliver that thrill as well----and b'Ezrat HaShem, we go beyond!
E.T.T.O.R.E. B A. S. T. I. A. N. I. N. I
Zancanaro e Cappuccili...che finale! Grazie per questo momento di estrema bellezza!
Cappuccili ????
Fabio Sampaolo
I peggiori…
🤣🤣🤣🤣
Modern baritones try to make their voice darker than it is like lucas meachum which actually just makes their voice smaller and swallowed. The natural voice is properly opened and placed and invisible without swallowing nor strangling the throat.
The male low and middle must come from the chest, and the high notes must come from both the chest and head at the same time. Anyone saying full chest and only chest to the top is an idiot. You keep the root of the chest but increase the head voice activation too. As they said, chest voice in the head. You need both placements working at the same time
Cornell Macneal!!
Bravo great Video
Great video! Only Lisitsian’s audio isn’t correct. The G is actually a Gb; I posted the corrected recording on my channel. Of course he HAD fabulous G naturals and Ab’s, as is easily heard on his live recital performance of “O sommo Carlo”!
Thank you very much for clarifying and correcting!
No doubt! Giuseppe Danise is the King!
Really I don't understand missing a "rocket" as Protti.
And so Pasquale Amato, Galeffi, Sereni, Silveri, Bruson...
Grazie per averci risparmiato Nucci, DFD, Wixell e un "nefando" pseudo-baritono di nome Placido... non-mi-ricordo-più-che.
Comunque il finale del Prologo è un la bemolle (di tradizione), poi termina con un sol.
you are right: there should be an extended second edition also including josef schwarz, josef metternich, nicola herlea...
out of curiosity how many of the old recordings take the high Ab on the Pagliacci aria?
Most of the ones here do, even Forsell (from 1907).
Interestingly Mattia Battistini can be heard on recording singing the Ab (he died in 1928) th-cam.com/video/hc9CkfSZh7g/w-d-xo.html.
Battistini also sang Pagliacci during the composer’s lifetime and was the only baritone Leoncavallo allowed to sing the prologue (normally sung by Tonio) despite the fact Battistini was in the cast as Silvio.
Battistini remains one of the single greatest baritones of all time, bar none.
You can read more on the topic here, page 67: books.google.be/books?id=F5sUdc_816sC&pg=PA67&lpg=PA67&dq=battistini+silvio&source=bl&ots=VMhj9abpTl&sig=ACfU3U0vFiqa1PSOHorQAh1-eNpTyx2qww&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjEscWqrL7tAhUB-6QKHY4KAcoQ6AEwCHoECAcQAg#v=onepage&q=battistini%20silvio&f=false
@@simonschmidt1960 this is an amazing detailed answer, thank you so much (edit): also my god that recording of the prologue is so good vocally and also artistically.
Many great baritones, but Ruffo and Granforte stand out for me.
Thanks for sharing! Who is the baritone to follows Robert Merrill at about 10:58?
Leonard Warren
@@AfroPoli Thanks very much. I think he's magnificent!
Some others missing from this:
Renato Bruson
Matteo Manuguerra
Mattia Battistini
Thomas Allen
George London*
Battestini's g im Prologo or Domgraf-Fassbaender... pre old school?
Titta Ruffo n.1 from a vocal point of view. Nevertheless a few top players are missing IMHO: Mattia Battistini, Pasquale Amato, Benvenuto Franci, Carlo Galeffi, Giuseppe De Luca, Armando Borgioli, Aldo Protti, Giangiacomo Guelfi
Grande Cappuccilli!!!
What a shame that people have begun to forget Pablo Elvira. He definitely should have been recorded more.
Elvira was wonderful! He had a Warren like voice but much smaller in scope. Sang so well and with a gorgeous timbre.
YES Pablo Elvira fantastic!!!
I remember him well. He had a great top, and very low extension too. I would have liked to hear his G...and Matteo Manuguerra's as well.
One of my absolute favorite baritone voices. I could not agree more!
@@joshuamcpherson007 th-cam.com/video/x1mMmg7zfg0/w-d-xo.htmlsi=IWzWo-bjzAhwMz-k
Hây quá👍👍❤❤❤
I know you can't have everyone but Pasquale Amato in his recordings before 1920 were generally excellent.
@AfroPoli could you write which arias or pieces are sung by these wonderful singers? Thank you very much.
Where is the Schlusnus video from? I hadnt seen it before.
A documentary on the music life in Berlin, made by German television. They have lots of interesting material in their archives apparently. The Schlusnus footage is from 1944.
I have the impression that there are some modern singers who compare favorably with singers from 100 years ago, but they are not top stars. I suspect it is too important that a star be good looking or sexy these days. Kaufmann definitely has the looks. I don't hate on his voice. I think he's a adequate singer whose voice has deteriorated a bit ahead of schedule. Then there is Stemme, who sings Wagner with her relatively tiny frame. Can you imagine Rita Hunter appearing on a major stage today? Even Nilsson wouldn't easily make it.
Another factor about which I have read many times is that orchestras play much louder than they used to. This causes singers to strain. I had an informal coaching session with a student of Sergius Kagen once. My accompanist couldn't make it so I played for myself. This woman explained to me that the piano part needed to be much much softer. Have you ever heard David Garvey accompany Price? He was so self effacing musically you couldn't believe it. But this is what singers need. The human voice is not loud. The piano and most other instruments can outmatch any singer.
I believe there are many factors that go against the modem singer who has proper technique. I say without modesty that I had a teacher who knew voice better than most opera singers - - and I was told by a few of them that my training was excellent (I was never pursuing music as a career to be clear). At age 80 and in poor health my teacher sang from low D to high B flat with no visible effort at all. He could sing pianissimo on high A. But no student wanting a career in opera would go to him. He wouldn't rush the development of the voice, nor would he let someone yell or bellow, even if that could have gotten gigs.
Orchestras used to be softer before the 1920's so that is not really an excuse. These days they often actually make orchestras play softer on purpose. They call it a balanced sound. Of course it is very easy to manipulate the loudness of a sound on a recording, even live broadcasted performances are enhanced.
What is the song that Gino Bechi is singing?
"Torna" by Valente
Great compilation but it is impossible to read most of the names,as the writing is tiny,i would love to have known who most of them are,though i have a good idea on some of them
Please look at the description, all the names are there! Thanks!
I think they are all great, but Zancanaro is the one with the most beautiful voice. Taddei and (a young) MacNeil are also fantastic.
I don't mean this as shade! But Zancanaro strikes me as perhaps not having the "best voice" naturally, but you can hear that his technique was GOLDEN. One of my favorites, a very easy voice to listen to.
@@thomasgareaubaritone627 Heard Zancanaro in Ballo in the 80’s. Reminded one of older great vocalists. Others were doing most of the recordings and people like lightweight Hampson were ruling at the Met. Zancanaro is just a joy to listen to.
Zancanaro had one of the most beautiful natural voices and productions. He may not have had the largest voice
But large enough.
Without wishing to compare, I'm really happy you mentioned Zancanaro. I've always admired him highly and feel he's been greatly and unjustly underappreciated.
A reminder that the baritone vocal type is much closer to tenor than bass
You should include Ivan Petroff
2:16
Лучшие-Руффо, Беки, Гранфорте
Черт побери.... Вот это учебник... И зачем консерватория? Ха..ха.. ха ... ! Одно мне непонятно ,- всех обсудили , по всем прошлись более менее. Только одного певца не тронули , обошлись одним словом ИДЕАЛЬНО И это соответствует всем требованиям Изучения старой классической Итальянской школы. ( техника , дикция, фразировка, бельканто и прочее... прочее... прочее..) Так какой тайной владел Великий , Большой, Владеющий ни на кого не похожий голосом и тембром Ettore Bastianini.О красоте , я вообще молчу- это не подлежит обсуждению. И я понимаю , как в прошлом Психолог, Что этот певец - ASSOLUTO😇👌❗️
Ruffo ... absolutely spectacular. Transcends time and space, even through primitive technology, still the greatest BY FAR
Listen to John Forsell and Domenico Viglione Borghese, that is how we should hear opera singing.
There is a great description of Viglione Borghese singing in Aida in Rome in Vocal Truth by Edgar Herbert-Caesari.
A very intereting complilation, thank you. Those that want to hear more of Gobbi could start with my video (in which I'm not very flattering about his high range, particularly later in his life, though his G here is marvellous): th-cam.com/video/SXpyyijw7Rs/w-d-xo.html
Silvano!!!!
Bastianini and Robert Merril the best baritones ever.
Senza dubbio !!!!
perdonate... il brano al min. 12:51 quello con Giuseppe Taddei come si intitola? ( si sente anche a 14:40 da quale opera e tratto? grazie mille
ok ce l'ho fatta! l'ho trovato!!! lo scrivo subito nel caso qualcuno/a lo cerchi come me: Il Tabarro opera di Puccini
What? No Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau?
The G4 is infinitely harder to hit well then F#4 or even G#4.
Actually, C#6 is more harder to hit
It doesn't really make sense but ok
There is NO WAY you titled this that and got away with it
Cappuccilli, Merrill, manca Urbano, Basiola, Ruffo😊
You forgot JUAN PONS ?!?!?!
What, no Giangiacomo Guelfi?
Which recording would you suggest...?
@@AfroPoli I was waiting Basiola also
@@AfroPoli th-cam.com/video/RaTwQcDioXA/w-d-xo.html
Giangiacomo Guelfi - O monumento from Ponchielli’s „La Gioconda”
If I hear correctly, there is high G at the and of the aria
@@davidroy6371 That's true. Thanks!
All fine voices. Some slightly on the knodel side but still good. Always loved the note at 14:50
What a voice!!!! At 14:50
Knodel? I don’t think so.
@@xxsaruman82xx87 some bro. Some.
Which voice/s have knödel's according to you?
@@celibidache1000 well, I didn’t have time to go listen to every singer. But for example Forsell and obviously warren but there were a few others. No singer in the video has a bad voice. But some are better produced than others. Everything is a matter of degrees. One can have a very Kermit like sound or only slightly towards it. And you can have vocal faults and still have an overall fine voice. Which is where most inevitably fall as very few were near perfect
Obvious standout of greatly produced voice is Ruffo. Probably the best baritone no questions asked.
Great video! Is it just me or has there been a massive decline from beautiful singing to screaming?
manca giangiacomo guelfi
No Afro Poli?
You're quite right. I have him in the aria from La Favorita. It is nice, but not as spectacular as many others here.
@@AfroPoli Ok. Thank you.
@@AfroPoli He has a spectacular high G# in the Arlesiana recording that you posted several years ago though. :D
@@michelez3710 Definitely. I am saving that for the G# / Ab episode...! :)
Maffei gh'é no?
Who is the singer at 03:12?
Danise.
@@AfroPoli Thanks for answering!!!
Haha, I remember the days when I thought I was a baritone! Im smarter now.
Good for you. When I was younger, they told me I was a tenor. I believed them...
@@AfroPoli thats a bit more rare I think to be wrongly told your a tenor. You definitely had a high range though, I heard some tenor clips of you
@@Xerxes89 ugh… those are awful!
@@AfroPoli who cares when you sing like a lion as a baritone right! Anyway I wouldnt say awful ✌️
@@Xerxes89 It was really bad. Those teachers made me sing like that because of my slightly higher pitched speaking voice… I am lucky my voice survived all this abuse.
La buona vecchia scuola vince sempre .
Dopo MacNeil, la commedia è finita.
Carroli - bellissima voce poca tecnica.
Zancanaro - una vocalità poco bella.
Cappuccilli - aveva una voce meno pastosa e meno drammatica dai tenori tipo Salazar, Vinay e compagnia.
Questa è la mia modesta opinione.
il vecchio
PS
Grazie Daniele !
Bravo !
Manca Umberto Urbano e Fernando Texeira
The crowning achievement of the baritone voice (or any voice for that matter) is not a big high note. It is to sing musically and with artistry - of which there is precious little on display in this compilation. It’s amazing how BAD some of this singing is.
Most of these voices had more than just high notes, you just can't grasp it.
@@labienus9968some of my very favorite singers are showcased here, and they DEFINITELY showed great artistry in their singing. What I said is that it’s not on display in this video. As a baritone and musician myself I detest these kinds of compilations that have the effect of reducing great singing to an act of gymnastics centered around one note. If that were true, Bergonzi and Callas would be failures. But thanks for enriching the musical dialog by posting a personal attack.
@@danielakerman8241 Suggest you re-read your original comment before you construe my remark as an "attack"-(how could it be personal anyway?) If you had begun with much of what you say now I probably would have said,sure notes aren't everything etc. and not even commented. YOu remember what you said-"how BAD some of this singing is" not only was it not true, but we never know what the some is. So you wrote a shallow, inflammatory comment-not at all what you say now-probably knowing someone would react-so you could then react on a high horse no less, please. And then you "detest" these compilation-but why am I left with the feeling you listen to all of them! A guilty pleasure?
@@labienus9968 telling someone “you just can’t grasp it,” is indeed a personal attack calling into question someone’s cognitive or intellectual abilities.
Some of the singing on this compilation IS bad!! And not just a little! Even my favorite baritones were guilty of some awful moments. The point is that anyone looking to learn what truly great singing is all about isn’t going to find it in this compilation. The only example here that really stands out for its quality is Zancanaro singing “Il balen” with utter ease and musical taste. Listen to one of the previous examples (don’t remember who right now) and you’ll hear him absolutely butcher the musical phrase.
I don’t know you or your background. I don’t know if you’re a musician or not - not that it’s that important either way. But if you want to have an intelligent conversation on the merits and demerits in these musical examples, I’ll happily take part.
@@danielakerman8241 Calm down. The first time you didn't express yourself well. You could try it over? You're probably not a musician, or deeply knowledgeable about baritones, or else why would you make a blanket statement about how bad the singing is, when you rightfully say the measure of a great baritone is not simply having a high note? (more aspiring singers who know it all?-but are on internet comment sections?) But of course some sing quite well and have a lousy high note. You do say-given that most of the great baritones are on display here-there is "precious little" etc. and my response -again- was from that statement you don't seem to grasp much, My god-in this world that is a "personal attack"-it's a comment board-if you can't take different opinions, reactions-maybe it's not a place for you?
Interestingly, you don't respond-but you declare disdain for these compilations-but not only listen to them-but comment on them!-mostly I skip them, but I was on a Warren reappraisal so I took the bait.
There are others left out-but most of the big guns are here-but I do find that the remarkable Herlea is absent.
Screams 0:25, baritones can scream on a 1 octave
2:20 bass ruffo is worser
13:50 he is already on a screams, voice is unstable.
In some audios we can be tricked in that trap, studios, enchanced sounds can produce unrealistic "clear" sounds, but here we can here the real baritones screams, which can be called a "high notes" but its just a screams
Isn't this G4 aka G-natural?
Es fehlt noch Mattia Battistini.
Amazing that Herlea is not on this list. The finest A-flat you'll ever hear. th-cam.com/video/cyprLeJb5dQ/w-d-xo.html
Very nice indeed. Free, spinning, gorgeous sound.
Jorge Negrete gana
It’s a misconception that baritones don’t have good high notes. Some baritones can even go up to D5.
My favorite subtype among the others :
Baritono Contraltino
Baritono Leggero
Barìtono Ligero
Barítono Ligero
Baritone Altino
Baryton Martin
Like A Teenage
Like A Young
Like A Youth
Like A Teen
Like A Cool
Like A Boy
Like A Son
Like A Guy
Like A Gay
And also to the like a pop singer and a pop star ☺
TITO GODBI N1 UNIVERSO. +500 rigolettos, +100 falstaf +300 toscas etc... nothing is compared with him.
Wish all these singers were clearly identified. Some are, some are not.
Y milnes?
His high G at the end of the “Puritani” aria in the Met 1986 broadcast was truly sensational!
@@arambarsamian6312 Strange leaving Milnes out-given the number of his contemporaries who are included. Many fine examples of the Milnes' top. I heard him live many times-big sound, big high notes
Dude, seriously?
01 GIUSEPPE CAMPANARI : AWFUL. Lacks any legato in this example. Awful phrasing. Doesn't execute the written notes cleanly, and in fact doesn't sing many of them. The high G lacks steady vibrato. I've heard college students do this better.
02 JOHN FORSELL -- doesn't so much sing the high note as squeeze it out. Pitch is suspect (though this could be an artifact of the recording). He may have been great in other things, but he's not great here.
03 JEAN NOTÉ -- AWFUL. Completely butchers the melismas. Lacks any of the elegant phrasing this aria demands. Contrast this to the Zancanaro, which is excellent, or any version by Cappuccilli.
04 MATTEO DRAGONI -- AWFUL. Zero legato. Takes a break every few notes. Pushes the high note so badly he completely loses control of the note, with his vibrato cutting in and out and becoming incredibly uneven. A perfect example of BAD singing.
05 DOMENICO VIGLIONE BORGHESE -- decent, but it doesn't show much other than a high G.
06 TITTA RUFFO -- Never been the biggest fan of Ruffo. Phenomenal instrument, not such phenomenal musical choices. His singing here is pretty good, but the holding of the high G is just a bit excessive. Bad musical choices = bad singing.
07 GAETANO VIVIANI -- Toreador's aria is a terrible vehicle to showcase musicality. That said, this isn't bad, but the last note sounds bottled up a la Sherrill Milnes late in his career.
08 MICHAEL BOHNEN -- Awful. Squeezed, uneven vibrato. Bad singing.
09 GIUSEPPE DANISE: Incredible voice. This is one of the good examples.
10 RICCARDO STRACCIARI: This is ok. He holds the high G an obscene amount of time, though. This is an example of what I call "great voice, bad singing."
11 APOLLO GRANFORTE: One of the great voices, if not the the most tasteful singer. But the example shows only a great high G, not great singing. Had it shown more, maybe it would show what a great singer he was.
12 HANS REINMAR: Pretty good.
13 GIUSEPPE VALDENGO : Interesting recording. Nothing to say about this one.
14 MATHIEU AHLERSMEYER: As evidence of great singing, this is lacking. It's a voice of good quality, but the G is not optimal -- it gets tight and the vibrato slows. One would need to hear more of his singing for examples of how good he was.
15 LAWRENCE TIBBETT -- One of my all-time favorites. Phenomenal voice. Even so, this example doesn't show him off at his best. The high note loses a bit of freedom. His Credo in Otello is phenomenal as was his Rigoletto. As an example of great singing, this isn't ideal.
16 HEINRICH SCHLUSNUS: Phenomenal singing. Good legato, wonderful phrasing, no pushing, the high note is free and perfectly integrated with the rest of the voice.
17 GINO BECHI: Great voice, but what a vulgar, vulgar interpretation. No taste. Just "let me sing this note as long and as loud as possible." Worse than the most excessive moments of Mario del Monaco. A great voice wasted on bad singing.
18 ANTENORE REALI: What an incredible voice. So similar to Warren. Too bad we don't hear more than just this phrase. This example shows you he had a great voice and a great high G, but it doesn't show you much else.
19 TITO GOBBI: What can we say about Gobbi? Completely unique and unparalleled. But if you want to use a high G as the "crowning achievement" of the baritone voice, this isn't great. He huffs and lunges at it. The tonal quality is good, but the really great part of this example is all the other stuff he sings besides the high G.
20 PAVEL LISITSIAN: The pitch is unclear, and he pushes sharp. Not great singing.
21 PIERO CAMPOLONGHI: Huge voice, and great ability. I wish he wouldn't push so much, because he doesn't need to. Suffers a little from covering too much, a la Sherrill Milnes
22 VICTOR DAMIANI: The penultimate note goes way sharp. Bad singing.
23 CARLO TAGLIABUE: another one of my absolute favorites. Nothing bad to say about this one.
24 ROBERT MERRILL: Fantastic -- and he wasn't always. But this is a good one.
25 LEONARD WARREN: Amazing. One of my favorites and he sings every note cleanly and clearly, with legato, phrasing, and phenomenal tone -- UNLIKE Campanari.
26 ETTORE BASTIANINI: Amazing.
27 ROLANDO PANERAI: Underrated because he had to compete with Bastianini. This is decent, but he yells a bit.
28 HUGO HASSLO: nothing to say about this one
29 GIUSEPPE TADDEI: meh. Bastianini did it far better. Beyond that, not much to say about this example. Wish they would have used a different clip of Taddei.
30 CORNELL MACNEIL: perhaps my favorite baritone. Amazing tone. Amazing musicality. He shows all of it here in just a few notes. His "Cortigiani" is my favorite.
31 FRANCO BORDONI: Nothing bad to say about this one.
32 GIORGIO ZANCANARO: Phenomenal. Clean, the melismas are perfect, the tone is even, big and free. One of the few examples on this entire list that showcases phenomenal singing and more than just a high note.
33 SILVANO CARROLI: Pretty good, other than the unnecessary scoop at the end.
34 PIERO CAPPUCCILLI: He was a master, but this example doesn't showcase him well. He's pushing, and runs out of gas at the end, which is amazing considering the amazing breath control he was rightly famous for. Should have used an example of him singing Il balen, or something from Rigoletto, because this isn't great.