For opera lovers of my generation, there was (and remains) a great admiration for the brilliant Swedish tenor Jussi Björling. He was, like Zinka Milanov, Robert Merrill, Richard Tucker, Maria Callas, Leonard Warren, Jan Peerce, Franco Corelli, and a host of other great singers, an integral part of the golden age of opera that I have referred to previously; a period from approximately the mid 30's to the mid 1970's.
Bjöling was born into a musical family, and received his first instruction from his father. As a child he toured with a family quartet, so that singing in public was an important part of his life from earliest youth. In fact, one of the remarkable things about Björling's career is how early everything happened for him. (This is very fortunate, because he only lived to be 49, a likely victim, tragically, of alcoholism.) He was already on stage in Sweden, doing small parts, by the tender age of 19. This is most unusual in opera. Even more astonishing is that he made his Carnegie Hall debut at age 26 and his Metropolitan Opera debut in the following year (1938), at the age of 27! The role was Rodolfo, in La Bohème, so his youth certainly fit the character, but there are few if any major tenors making a debut at the Met at that age. There may be some, but none come readily to mind.
I clearly remember, as a boy, the first recording of Björling's that I ever heard. It was "Che gelida manina," on an old 78. Here is a wonderful 1938 recording of that aria, made from a live performance. Bear in mind that he all of 27 years old here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_1Ry44K-MM
Does it get any better than this!? It is hardly necessary to call attention to the high notes. He was blessed from earliest youth with a brilliant top. An amusing historical anecdote is that when he auditioned for the Met, earlier that year, one of the reviewers wrote simply: "Good top." Yes, you might say that! :)
Many tenors can sing very high, but often at the expense of a thin or strident sound. It is most unusual to hear a warm, beautifully covered voice like Bjöling's carry its essential quality all the way up to the C with no quality change from the middle on. That is an essential element of the Björling voice that thrilled one and all. Much of the secret for that astonishing vocalism is to be found in the Swedish language itself. Like other Germanic languages, but perhaps even more so, the umlauted vowels of Swedish are quite pronounced. The placement of an umlauted "o," for example, is excellent for tenor singing. It can be approximated in English by taking the "ir" sound of the word "bird" and eliminating the "r." The sound that remains is close to an umlaut. If you are a singer, try vocalizing on that sound, taking care to cover strongly through and past the passagio, and to open the mouth as you go up. It is important to moderate the "r" of "bird" almost out of existence, or you will choke! It really facilitates the high notes, and trims away the rough edges. This, to use the words of a great voice teacher I was once privileged to know, "is the sound that pays the rent." Bingo. For Björling, it was a natural thing to do, thanks to his native language.
One of the glories of Björling's voice was that it blended beautifully with other singers, again owing to the softness of the sound. Here is a rare treat: Björling and Robert Merrill, singing what is generally conceded to be the most beautiful tenor/baritone duet ever written, in a recording that is likewise generally acclaimed to be the very best, still unsurpassed:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PYt2HlBuyI&feature=related
And on that note (those notes?) I am simply going to quit writing, because any attempts at elucidation are silly, unnecessary, and bound to fall short of the mark. That recording says almost everything there is to say about the golden age of opera singing, and especially about the golden voice of Jussi Björling.
Do you prefer Bjoerling/Merrill to Gigli/DeLuca?
ReplyDeletei completely agree with your [generous] assessment here. as you know, i idolized him when i was a boy. you are generous enough to look past his shortcomings, some of which i now see were considerable, and to focus on the best aspects of his admittedly astounding gift.
ReplyDeletei also think he was well served by the advancing technology of the 20th century. just think if we could have had galli-curci -- or the 27-year-old gigli -- on a recording as modern as that jaw-dropping duet with merrill here. or patti! or malibran, or farinelli. if bjoerling had been born even in the generation before caruso, we might not now think so much of him.
Thank you both, gentlemen, particularly for raising questions I did not address in the essay. Mr. Hobbes, you pose an interesting comparison. I know the Gigli/DeLuca recording you refer to, and it is very good indeed. The problem, that Corax immediately perceives, is that we now know these artists only via recordings. I have always wondered how to remedy, or at least chip away at this problem. The only thing I can think of is to look for responses of individuals who actually heard the singers in question. I personally knew two people who heard Caruso in his prime, for example, and they both talked about the power of the voice and also, importantly, the beauty of the voice. That is a valuable hint. I also have read quite a few critics from Gigli's day, and they make the point, fairly consistently, that Gigli's top voice, in the theater, was disappointing. They invariably praise, on the other hand, the beauty of his unique mezza voce. Things like that make me question how well Gigli would have fared in a duet with a big baritone voice such as DeLuca reportedly had. He may have been overshadowed. Caruso, we can be certain, never was.
ReplyDeleteI also knew a singer who had heard Bjoerling in person, and knew his records in detail. He told me once that Bjoerling never sounded as good in the opera house as he did on record. I believe this is the kind of information that directly applies to some of the questions you both raise. Bjoerling's voice recorded extremely well. My eyebrow also goes up a bit when I look at the repertoire he undertook on the stages of the world's great opera houses: Trovatore, Rigoletto, Aida, Ballo in Maschera, Cavalleria Rusticana, Pagliacci, La Boheme, Tosca, Manon Lescaut, Romeo and Juliet: these are some of the biggest and most demanding roles in opera, and Bjoerling's was a lyric gift, essentially. This fact alone, had he lived longer, would soon have become a problem. Also, he was, as we all know, a two-fisted drinker, and that can be artistic death for a tenor. The cords thicken and grow husky. Many problems there.
Still, he had a mighty following, and very many admirers. When he was on form, he was wonderful, and the top was one of the best ever. That's the Bjoerling I chose to celebrate. That's the one we all love.
I understand the difficulties of comparing these artists in person vs. via recording. I heard Richard Tucker in person. I was in the back row of a large hall, and his voice rang brightly. I don't know how else to describe it, but it certainly carried througout the auditorium and resonated from his "mask," even above a large orchestra. I can hear that in his recordings, but it isn't the same. Similarly, I heard Bocelli in person, and while his voice was quite good, it was not like that of Tucker. Bocelli's forte is the cross-over kinds of songs that he sings, and he couldn't be compared with the tenors you have mentioned. It is very hard to compare and contrast these people. One almost would have to hear them side-by-side at the peak of their careers. Nevertheless, we can still appreciate them and be thankful for their contributions.
ReplyDeleteAs a side note, I knew a woman who heard Caruso sing. Her comment was simply "a little man with a big voice."
Very interesting comment. Yes, I agree. Recording well was a big deal in the 20th century. I knew someone who had learned to admire Melchior on record, and finally had a chance to hear him in concert. He was bitterly disappointed. He was a snitty little man, and I don't particularly respect his observation, becaue it is more typical of him than descriptive of Melchior, but he called him "a constipated baritone." Ha. To paraphrase Churchill, "some baritone, some case of constipation:)" Giacomini had the opposite problem. He apparently sounded great in the hall, but did not record well. Thick, heavy sounds do not record nearly as well as bright and vibrant sounds.
ReplyDeleteBjoprling is brilliant , I totally agree. Perhaps 10 years ago I watched a documentary about three tenors: Caruso, Bjorling and Lanza. It was difficult for me to hear the difference between operatic voices then , but I remembered Bjorling and I liked his voice more than those of Caruso and Lanza. It was because of melancholic sound of his timbre and intonations, which was very distinctive. To my taste, it was the main charm of his voice. Someone said that timbre reflects the singer’s personal qualities. Callas had an intonation of tragedy in her voice; Bjorling was melancholic and poetic. Actually, he is one of my favorites.
ReplyDeleten.a.
Yes, exactly! It was that covered sound, realated, I am sure, to his native language, that gave a soft and melancholy sound to the voice. It was extremely attractive. I cannot think of another like it. If sound suggests colors to you, as it does to many people, Bjoerling's voice was more nearly a "brown" voice than a "black" voice. People always struggle to define those qualites, but I think you have put your finger on the essential thing that made his voice stand out so.
ReplyDeleteI never heard Bjoerling on stage. But already in my teenage years, I admired him for his outstanding studiorecordings, especially the 1952-Trovatore and the 1956-Bohème.
ReplyDeleteI have collected almost all his liverecordings, most of them taken from broadcasts of Metropolitan-performances. I think that these recordings present to us the very best of the art of Bjoerling. His 1940-Ballo with Milanov is one of the best ever issued on CD, and his performance of Rigoletto (1945) as well as the Bohème-performance on Christmas Day 1948 has higher qualities than the studioversions from 1956.
The jewel in my Bjoerling-collection happens to be a liverecording too. He never sang better than he did in the Hilversum Radio-recital on June 8th 1939. Bjoerling recorded the Bohème-aria "Che gelida manina" 12 times, but never so exellent as in this Holland-recital.
Some of his operaticparts remains only in liveperformances. Un Ballo in Maschera is one of them, but they include too the Gounod Faust and the tittle role in Verdis Don Carlo. Two performances of Faust is recorded: that of 1950 and a 1959-version.
Some say that Bjoerling was a weak actor. But he was able to act with the voice. His liverecordings proves this just as good as his studiorecordings.
For me, Bjoerling was the best frensh/italian tenor of 20th Century.
Mr. Bjoerling was not a high skilled actor. But especially in his many liverecordings, often based on performances at the Metropolitan Opera, you can hear, that he was able to act with his voice i a way, that made it possible for him to draw psycograms of his karacters on the stage.
ReplyDeleteI prefer generally his stage-popraits, compared to his studiorecordings, although especially the 1952 Trovatore with Milanov, Barbieri and Warren and the 1956 Bohème with de los Angeles and Robert Merrill are operarecordings at a very high level.
There are no studiorecordings with Bjoerling as Faust, as Riccardo (Un Ballo in Maschera) or as Don Carlo. But I don´t miss them. The 1940-Ballo as well as the Faust (with Kirsten) and Don Carlo, both from 1950, shows Bjoerling at his peak in those favoriteparts. All three recordings are among the best Bjoerling-documents ever realised. Another Faust from 1959 (with Soederstroem) reveils a darkened and heavy voice.
Allthough he was no brillant actor, the stage was his element. If you compare his studio-Rigoletto (1956) with the 1945 performance at the Met or the 1957 performance at the Stockholm-opera, you will find Bjoerling uninspired in the studio but thrilling on both stages. And that goes for La Bohème too. The 1956 recording with Sir Thomas Beecham belongs to the best operarecordings of the fifties, but it can´t match the performance on the Metropolitan Opera, Christmas Day 1948 in which Mr. Bjoerling is a very romantic, lyrical and passionate lover and poet.
Concerning his Cavaradossi i Tosca, none of the liverecordings has the high level of the studiorecording, made in Rome i the summer of 1957. Here Mr. Bjoerling is at his very peak as a lirico-spinto tenor. His legato phrasing is of outstanding beauty, his 3 top-Cs in "Vittoria" in act 2 are splendid and his diminuendi in "E lucevan le stella" as well as in the "O dolci mani"-arioso, are indeed outstanding even compared to those of Giuseppe di Stefano in the legendary 1953-production with Callas and Gobbi.
Jussi Bjoerling is my favorite tenor in the french / italian repetoire, the very best lirico-spinto in 20th Century.
In the 1959
There are no high C's for the tenor in Tosca!
DeleteThank you very much for a well-considered and thoroughly detailed analysis. I agree absolutely. It is hard to imagine a finer tenor!
ReplyDeleteYes, very well reasoned, and very accurate! I knew someone who went to hear Bjorling at every opportunity, and he told me that Bjorling never sounded as good in the opera house as he did on record. You say it well when you say that squillo can only do so much. He sang with a lot of cover, which sounds great up close, but it doesn't carry. I remember Lily Pons once said to a colleague, "Do not worry if you cannot hear me very well on stage...they will hear perfectly well out there in the house." And she was right. That tiny little woman, with a small voice (in a way similar to Galli Curci and Roberta Peters) carried exceptionally well, because she sang on the very thinnest edges of the vocal cords, and sound at that frequency cuts in the same way or flute or piccolo does.
ReplyDeleteThat's a very interesting thought. I'll have to ponder that one a while! I think at least part of the picture is the problem that has always been with us, and that is the desperate desire of many singers to be famous and sing the big roles: Chenier, Rhadames, Manrico, Otello, etc., and they destroy perfectly good voices in the process. Even poor Ferruccio Tagliavini, who started his career with one of the lovliest, most gracious, lyric voices ever; even he, who could have continued to sing that way for his entire life, was seduced and tried to do bigger roles and pretty nearly ruined that beautiful instrument. It was never the same again. It's so sad because it was totally delusional--he was very short, very heavy (for his height), and was, shall we say, not exactly a Marcello Mastroianni look-alike. Further, he had a very lyric voice. That was just plain sad! And many, many have made that mistake.
ReplyDeleteWonderful assessment Edmund.
ReplyDeleteI have been holding off commenting because I was searching for the right word to describe what I hear in Bjorling's singing. Anonymous had the words - a melancholic timbre. And also for me one of the instantly recognizable voices. While "Nessun dorma" has been ruined for me by Pavarotti and the World Cup, I can still listen to the Pearl fishers duet with Bjorling and Merrill over and over.
There must have been something special in the food in Sweden in the 20th century - they certainly punched above their weight in terms of producing fine opera singers didn't they?
Thank you for another great comment. I do believe the Swedish language has something to do with it. The many umlauted sounds, which round the sound off to something like the "ir" of the English word "bird," are absolute balm for the tenor voice. It conduces naturally to the kind of Italianate "squillo" that is so popular.
ReplyDeleteI heard him in opera but never in recital which I believe would have been quite an experience. The basic color of the voice was a lyric tenor but he sang some some Spinto roles also. His voice was not a large one but I had no problem hearing him. A great artist. He had it all.
ReplyDeleteThe difference as said here in an earlier comment is Bocelli in opera has to be amplified too be well heard. He did sing Boheme in Sardinia but in a small room (I have the tape of it) but in Detroit when he sang with no amplification in the big house he was not well heard. Tucker had a very powerful voice of course and was heard with power that on his High B's would bounce off the back wall and come back at you when he came off the note. Tucker didn't need a mic. he had it in his throat and in those days like with Jussi, if you could not project you just did not last in opera! They did not amplify opera in those days.
ReplyDeleteBjoerling was very smart and never sang roles like Luisa Miller, Boccanegra,Forza,Chenier,Gioconda and even less Spinto roles that he felt where not for him. His voice recorded very well and he hated to rehearse so he did more concert work later then opera. His drinking later mmayn have been part of it. His voice was more a lyric then Spinto, not big but amazingly even. His singing in Swedish was more emotional then in Italian generally.
ReplyDeleteGood comment! You obviously know a lot about Bjorling and how he handled his career and voice. A valuable addition to the discussion. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteLike a number of your commentators I discovered Jussi Bjorling as a teenager in the 50s It truly was a golden age and Bjorling despite the presence of a number of exceptional tenors e.g Di Stefano, Tagliavini and the aging Gigli, who I saw in concert, was the primo tenore. We all have our favorite recordings and I accept that his Ghe Gelida was magnificent ( but less warm than Gigli's 1938 version) and the Au fond du temple saint a fine example of the collaboration.between him and Merrill. My personal favorite recordings, however, would be his spirited version of Tosti's L'alba separa and the Carlos/Rodrigo duet perhaps the finest rendition ever.
ReplyDeleteThe collaboration between Bjorling and Merrill is worthy successor those between Caruso and Scotti and Gigli and De Luca.
Very good comment indeed! Thank you!
ReplyDeleteThere was no one like Jussi. The musicianship was superb; the blending of voice with other voices, regardless whether the other performer was baritone, bass, soprano, mezzop soprano. the full length recordings of Aida and Turandot, even after half a century, are still the best. The La boheme is matchless and the Tosca unequalled A lesson for singers in every note that emanated from Jussi' throat. His rendition of, of all things, Jeannie With the Light Brown HAir is a converter for anyone who hears it into his corner and, L'alba separa is better even than Caruso's. Finally, who ever did O helge natt better, or as well?
ReplyDeleteIvan Hametz, the Operaphile
My father grew up during this golden age, he heard Jussi sing at the met live and became a fan. He had thousands of records and tapes from just about every singer on this blog.
ReplyDeleteAs a boy growing up in the 90s I had no clue why he had this obsession, it was so different from what I knew to be music. He was persistent about it though, seeking to educate me and share his passion. Over time I grew to appreciate the beauty of the voices and four years after he passed I still find myself drawn back to listening to Jussi's version of Nessun Dorma.
Thank you for these wonderful words and this blog as a whole, I'm sure my father would have truly enjoyed reading this.
I am from South Africa. I had the previlidge to hear Jussi Bjorling in person when he toured South Africa in 1953.THIS IS A NIGHT i WILL NEVER FORGET. When the program was done, (Bjorling did not stick to the prgram), he sang no less than five encores if I remember correctly,he just would not stop singing. It was outstanding.
ReplyDeleteI am from South Africa. I had the previlidge to hear Jussi Bjorling in person when he toured South Africa in 1953.THIS IS A NIGHT i WILL NEVER FORGET. When the program was done, (Bjorling did not stick to the prgram), he sang no less than five encores if I remember correctly,he just would not stop singing. It was outstanding.
ReplyDelete