13 Dramatic Sopranos sing Lady Macbeth's Act 1 climax (Or tutti sorgete) 

1952 rome version is even heavier than here...

Stefano, La Divina is on another level. Callas. Then other great !great Opera artist. Callas is the bible of Opera.... She is a true pedogog. She did not have the vice that the public usual knows. But her musicality, interpretation. Drama and wisdom in the theatre is unmatched.

These days, just impossible to hear it on the stage without many mistakes, wrong notes and several groups of notes that just not come out at all!

Yes, Saioa Hernandez! who has yet to reach her prime. Imagine when she does. A protege of Madame Caballé who is doing her proud.

No trouble here. Absolutely agree with you

@@neuberg7315 , indeed. Maria owns three roles for sure: Lady Macbeth, Medea and Norma. It's lonesome on the Olymp.

Callas owns many roles apart from these. Tosca (1951, 1952 ), la traviata (1951,1952 both are much better than anyone else with heroic weight and power along with exquisite coloratura, that no one else has), armida 1952, puritani I 1952, nabucco 1949, aida 1951, il trovatore 1951, I vespri siciliani, la gioconda 1952, rigoletto 1952

@@gr__msk , to be honest: Callas did everything on highest standards. But i think, whenever her personal character meets a role matched with this- then happened opera history. We all know- she wasn't a lovely character and she was on top in these roles.

⁠​⁠@@Sir.Larselotque Callas no era encantadora? Era maravillosa… saludos cordiales ❤❤❤

CALLAS AND VERRETT for me!

A Callas nadie la alcanza, saludos cordiales ❤❤❤

@@laprimmadonna2341 Estoy de acuerdo y mucho menos en este papel

@Walter Monteagudo indeed, in sens of: her voice produce a big strong impression. 👍

Definitely the ultimate interpretation. Aside from her, I also enjoy Verrett, Bumbry (have always thought she was a dramatic soprano acting as a mezzo), Dimitrova and Connell.

@@dramaticsoprano5168 Dimitrova is too throaty and I've never been a fan of Connell. And I prefer Varnay over both Verrett and Bumbry.

@@BaroneVitellioScarpia1 I wouldn’t call it ‘throatiness’ with Dimitrova but I think I understand what you mean. It sounds like she used a less forward placement than other singers, and the sound resonated lower in her body. Connell had average agility but I find her huge voice very thrilling. Having seen her live, I think she could give Nilsson a run for her money in terms of volume.

@@dramaticsoprano5168 Dimitrova and Connell are too veristic for Lady Macbeth and I really, REALLY don’t like Nilsson’s low notes.

Rome version has better low registers and even bigger voice but slower tempo. This one has better coloratura tho.

I agree, interesting how Mödl did not even attempt them but still went for the top note even though she was never really a ‘high note singer’. I think it shows how much harder those ‘quadruplets’ are than the top note. However, technically that top note is supposed to be a B, not a C. So either Callas is slightly sharp or the tape speed is incorrect. I guess that’s the only nitpick one could make.

I played some rehearsals for the Opera Company of Boston’s production BEFORE the Verrett one. Hanne-Lore Kuhse was the Lady Macbeth in that one. It is just as well she didn’t make this list.

@@dramaticsoprano5168 Modl and Hongen make adjustments in the score to suit their dramatic mezzo voices such as an A flat instead of a D flat in the Sleepwalking scene. Hongen adjusts cadenzas to avoid high C. Viardot made several transposition and adjustments as she was really a mezzo.

@@dramaticsoprano5168 the tape sound is faster than what it needs to be. Callas obliterates them all in this repertoire.

Nillson was the worst lol

@@awokwok1029 Poor Nilsson, he suffered a lot there.

And Verret's neck was twisted while doing the agilities. She looked and sounded weird, and I cracked up about it. She seemed to need an exorcism, hahahaha.

You hit the nail on the head here. Putting them all side by side really makes Callas' superiority totally clear.

My God! It's not only live on stage thta we see them all suffer, apart from Callas, sure!. So, for all those people who talk so unkindlly about her voice, technique, etc, they just need to hear this to begin to understand what we've been saying for years now: Callas first. Allways, and the good singers follow her kindly!

Or course Callas slaps Verrett into pieces. Thicker vocal chord, better low middle and high notes, better chest voice, better coloratura, bigger squillo.

I think Bumbry is better than Verrett here. But Callas tops them both--and everyone else--by far.

@@jamesnickoloff6692 I am pleased to agree with you, James: Bumbry really surpasses Verrett here, which had not always happened. Both singers had a large range, but for this part, I think it turned out to be important that Verrett was organically still a mezzo who went to conquer the mainland soprano; Bumbry was just a soprano with good bottoms.

​@Alexandr Polyakov huh... gotta say i completely disagree with your assessment lol. Bumbry was 100% a dramatic mezzo with a slight top extension which she relied on for her "soprano" career.

@@CASantos There is nothing terrible with the fact that you "completely disagree" with me. You are far from the first and certainly not the last who has no idea what a mezzo-soprano should sound like. Convincing a layman is a thankless task, from which, with your permission, I will refrain. Best regards.

I tried to find Hunter's version of this but was unable to on RU-vid. Do you have a link by any chance?

@@dramaticsoprano5168 I don't have a link. The London performance was released on CD. I think by Opera Rara.

She was flat.

I still maintain that her way of slightly pausing before the attack on her titanic top notes is not idiomatic Italian singing.

@@ransomcoates546 that was telephone bell hour in 1963 I guess. Not her best. But she wasn't always an enigma for Italian approach. She was a stubborn Wagnerian, not an completely italianate soprano. However, I found her Aida (Sweden in 1956) one of her most ltalianate of them all. A glorious perfomance for sure.

@@omarsomehow69 I agree about her ‘Aida’, which showed that she could scale down her enormous voice to a quite idiomatic Italian pp.

@@omarsomehow69 Her Tosca was unbeatable. Metropolitan Guide to recordings states unequivocally that it is the best recorded Tosca.

@@Operafreak9 it likes her performance but as a whole performance the Guide picks Callas 1953

I believe Monastyrska's was a 1/2 step lower too.

she was late for a fraction of a second

@@-giakhanh--kayden-8337 I am not the only one to find all his tempi too fast, even in the sleepwalking scene, it ruins the music. Anyone else than Callas would have fallen down.

@@foropera i agree that the sleepwalking scene tempi were a travesty. imagine the amount of drama she could've pull from that...

@@foropera Well, he kinda hated her, so it might have been on purpose.

Verrett deserves a mention...

she breaks the singing line so no

@@Antonio-qm3bi If I had to give a mention it would be to Elizabeth Connell !

@@Gabriel-hs9mv Hernandez breaks belcanto rules. No agility at all...

she breaks the singing line slightly, very very slightly at 8:26. But then again all but Callas do it so she’s definitely one of the best

She lacks the flexibility in the rising passages of the coloratura. Strong voice, but not swift enough.

Because she is a proper dramatic soprano, who has everything apart from high flexibility. Do you remember Nilson singing Donna Anna? Or do you remember Flagstad singing coloratura? This is the price that dramatic voices pay for their power. Not a very high price, is it not? Btw I think that for this size her voice is very flexible

and kind regards

@@izabelaratusinska842 Yes, Hernández is wonderful--a powerful dramatic. The problem is that once you have Callas's performance (with the power of a dramatic soprano and the flexibility of a coloratura soprano) in your memory, all others fail to thrill in the same way. It's the difference between an excellent steak dinner and a meal for the ages which one never forgets.

Dramatic coloratura wasn't a fach until Ponselle mentioned it.. I don't get why is everybody says Callas isn't true dramatic soprano.. Her vocal weight was darker and heavier than Dimitrova. Her Lady Macbeth rome version are heavier, bigger, darker chest voice than here.. Her Gioconda also have deeper vocal weight than Ponselle herself. People mistaken Callas's voice as a mezzo when she started her career.. It means her vocal weight is very heavy. You can tell her duet with Oralia Dominguez that she almost had quality like a Mezzo..

@@awokwok1029 I think there is a conflation of weight with colour. I think Callas’s colour was dark, but that her vocal weight wasn’t that heavy. This is reflected in how her tessitura was high, and in how her voice was even early on not a great fit for later 19th century rep, compared to earlier rep. One can hear in the Gioconda you mention actually. She compensated at the very bottom with great chest tones, but she couldn’t do the same in the lower-middle, so they come off as weak. (Granted, that partly had to do with technique rather than the basic characteristics of her voice.) Another way to put this is that one can also hear it generally in rep that demand a lot of volume around A/B. Her voice did better in rep that tops out a little bit higher. I think the basic distinction that Ponselle made between a dramatic soprano with coloratura capabilities and a coloratura soprano with dramatic capabilities is basically correct. It explains why Ponselle had to transpose Norma, but also why she was more successful in works like Forza and Aida, vocally speaking.

@@ER1CwC *I was a very heavy voice, that is my nature, a dark voice shall we call it, and I was always kept on the light side. She always trained me to keep my voice limber* - Maria Callas Her voice was definitely heavy. She lighten her voice so most of you think that she is not a real dramatic soprano.

@@ER1CwC ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-s37itqU9L-U.html also another version of her Lady Macbeth, still her voice wasn't that heavy? 😂😂

@@awokwok1029 I’m not saying that her voice wasn’t heavy. I’m saying that it wasn’t in the same weight category as those whom I consider real dramatic sopranos. Again, I base my assessment on her tessitura, and on the fact that her voice came under pressure in heavy lower rep, even in the early days. It’s not a knock on her at all. She is my favourite. (I don’t take that self-evaluation of hers seriously though. I have considered it over the years and rejected it.) Lady Macbeth was a great fit for her. But I think it was a great fit precisely because it has more in common with roles like Norma than late Verdi, let alone the big Wagner roles.

Deutekom, given her lack of Bel Canto training, sounded as a a turkey in every vocalize, scale, whatever. Given that the repertoire she chosed, was full of these, she always sounded as a turkey, an aspirated, sloppy, horrible turkey singing. That big range of hers was useless, given this.

She's horrible

@@luisdavidalvarezcorrales8882 Ah, another uneducated youtube expert full of shit! 🙂

Grandi had a great voice but she was a lyric soprano.

@@BaroneVitellioScarpia1 Thanks for your reply! And I wonder what you think of the other Margherita, Margherita Roberti. I find her Odabella and Abigaille fascinating.

@@beatriceyoung161 Not a fan of Roberti.

Y hasta el fin de los tiempos... Callas.

@@LeanrossoAsí es! Bien dicho, saludos cordiales ❤❤❤

One that is not listed here but that I enjoyed too is gilda cruz romo

@@luanllluan I find her voice very beautiful but not dramatic or dark enough for the Lady. She was definitely a spinto and on the more lyric side there too. I enjoy her Butterfly and Violetta however.

@@dramaticsoprano5168 i agree with you. I've only listened to her singing this piece on a concert more later on her career, when the voice has aged a bit, and found it interesting. Perhaps the full opera would be too much to her, although she also sang Turandot

One soprano from the past that was a great Lady Macbeth was Sylvia Sass. She was almost on the level of Callas. One that I'm really glad was NOT represented here was Netrebko! Her Lady Macbeth is atrocious, as are ALL of her supposed "Dramatic Soprano" roles. It is such a fake sound for her, and ruined the beautiful voice she once had.

@@artdanks4846 I know that Sass is not everyone's choice, but I quite like her. But it seems that it put her voice to shreds, as for Netrebko, I dunno, she was very promising with a beautiful voice for some good years, but then she thought to be Callas reborn and we all know what this has led her to. But in the La Scalla most recent performance I don't believe she was awful, although I agree she was bad. there was some moments I almost liked, but it is definetely not suited for her voice. she should keep the Lady as a concert piece.

Well she was clearly not a dramatic soprano based on density and tessitura, but I find it hard to believe her voice was small.

She was not as big as a true wagnerian,something like Varnay,Nilsson or Prandl. But she was penetrating. Every Callas 'Norma has a ....different size. The difference between Mexico- CG.-Trieste is enormous

She's not disastrously flat as it seems. The main problem with old tapes was pitch. This one simply lower by few degrees than original.

@@omarsomehow69 Then it still sounds good because she’s in tune with the instruments.

@@draganvidic2039 4:34 was flat tho

@@omarsomehow69 I noticed this right off and was surprised. Jones did not normally sing flat, but she certainly does here.

@@ransomcoates546 yes, because she often sang sharp due to her wild oscilations. An erratic night or just an accident I guess. She is human after all, not a robot.

Yes, it is from here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-CtPcbUbxmEA.html Might sound a little strange because of a tape-speed error, I didn’t manually check any of the pitches.

@@dramaticsoprano5168 Thanks. I stand corrected. I needed to hear more. The beginning of the aria was much better than the end. But hey, it is Macbeth!

Not a dramatic soprano.

By a country mile? With that weak chest voice?

Ha! The most uniformed comment of the week. Anyone lucky enough to have heard La Verrett in her prime would laugh at a comment daring to suggest she possessed "a weak chest voice." In fact, her chest voice was more audible and stronger than the top voice, or, at the least, it was the equal of the top in volume and carrying power. Her middle register became weaker, later in her career, than it had been previously, as it does with nearly all sopranos. Yes indeed, "by a country mile" and much more, to tell the truth.

@@jackhamm1745 awwww yes, her chest voice is VERY WEAK in this ARIA. Are you deaf?

@@awokwok1029 No. Are you deaf and dumb?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. STUPID OPINION.