Another comment from me about Moll.....he's absolutely having the most fun a human being can have singing this, and it's this joy of his that comes out and just smacks us all in the face! The last time Moll sang Osmin at the MET, the people went CRAZY for him...he got the most huge ovation, and well-deserved, too! High notes, low notes, trills, and every other note in between....killin'em, Kurt Baby!
It is the joy that sets him apart ... there is a video here where a close up catches him almost forgetting not to smile as the Commendatore ... but his eyes just sparkled before he hit the highest true note in that ENTIRE scene like, you know, "Hey tenors -- if you need a night off, I've got high notes covered!" ... knowing all the time that in two minutes he just as easily will be busting out that same low D we hear here ... just two octaves and a bit more of sheer mastery, done with so much joy the character ALMOST cannot contain him. There are some audio-only videos of him singing lieder, and you can FEEL him smiling ... you can HEAR it in his voice ... and there is at least one video of him teaching ... and he passes all that love and light on to his student, who you can hear becoming a better singer minute by minute, drawn to the light!
That is the BEST fricking evil laugh in the history of ever. Epic! And then seeing a somewhat overweight man in a huge black beard and a nightgown *bounching* around the stage, acting and singing out his joy at seeing someone strangled, is just beyond hilarious. And Moll does all that while singing one of the most demanding bass arias there is, and makes it all look and sound so easy. I have seen and heard many good Osmins but no-one even comes close to Moll's performance in my opinion.
+ladylaeriel You are absolutely correct. I like Kurt Moll as the Commendatore in Mozart's Don Giovanni also. The final scene in that opera where the Commendatore comes to dine with Giovanni and asks him to repent of all the evil he has done and Giovanni refuses and descends into perdition is one of the greatest scenes in opera.
In modern tuning, this aria is unbelievably difficult for a low bass. Every phrase crosses the passaggio, and demands a lot of movement in that tricky register. In mozart's tuning this is more reasonable, but that doesn't help us now! This is one of the best renditions on RU-vid - Moll absolutely crushes the piece. Bravo!
This is definitely the hardest piece a low bass can sing. The d4 to d2 is killer and how much middle voice it uses. Don't forget the incredibly hard trill and arpeggios at the end. Moll is such an amazing singer, and it's no wonder he's considered one of the greatest bassos of all time.
Omg was für eine fantastische Interpretation dieser Arie. Kurt Moll unnachahmlich, gesanglich und schauspielerisch. Der pure Genius und Genuss. Vielen Dank für dieses Upload einer kulturellen Kostbarkeit.
I love the audience just cracking up when Moll laughs at the beginning. X'D ...Listening to basses singing is kind of like listening to a tuba player playing. Such a deep and rich sound.
Both his singing voice and speaking voice are equally amazing. Smooth and dark, great balance throughout his range and one of the few basses who trills well.
Watching again! THIS is a clip to come back to time after time! After a fantastically comedic performance, who could NOT love this man! God, he was wonderful!
Oh, this is fantastic. Kurt Moll was one of the greatest bass singers. I liked him when he played The Commendatore in Mozart's Don Giovanni, he was great in that last scene.
C'est tout simplement prodigieux! La voix invraisemblable, le charisme, l'interprétation, l'énergie, l'humour, l'équilibre avec l'orchestre... IMMENSE Kurt Moll! ❤
I suspect some 'purists' might complain of the tempo, but I love it! All to often we don't make tweaks to performances to make a classic piece more relevant to the ears of our modern audiences. For me, I'd love to sing it at this piece -- if I had the bottom register Herr Moll possessed -- as it adds so very much to the dramatic delivery of this awesome aria. Solti was a genius to afford us this rendering.
What I love about this is just the joy one can often feel from Herr Moll when he is singing ... that laugh at the beginning that just cracked up the entire audience is what you get when a joyful master of his craft takes a stereotype already worn out and just sends it all the way up to something lovely and expressive. And then there's also the speed here ... REALLY fast, but Herr Moll's attitude seems to be "All right! I can skip, I can dance, AND SO CAN MY HUGE VOICE, and I get to be a grown man and paid to play in public! Ah, another fantastic opportunity!" One forgets Osmin is a villain ... Herr Moll swamps his character's sadism with his joy and love!
Better than Frick, Moll is THE Mozart bass. THE Osmin, THE Sarastro, THE Commendatore! Frick may have him beat at Wagner, but Moll has that great vocal flexibility that he so exercises here. Long live the Molllll!
I have a soft spot for Finnish opera singers - my favorite Osmin is Martti Talvela, while Sarastro is Hannu Forsberg (actually bass-baritone). The Magic Flute was my first ever opera and Forsberg played the role back then, so he left quite an impression on me. Same reason why Tom Nyman is my favorite tenor (he was Tamino in that production).
For me Moll is the best Osmin ever even compared to Frick and others. I hope I'll get this DVD soon, because in this performance Moll shows everybody how to combine great technique, perfect voice and extraordinary acting.
I saw this at the MET in 05(ish?) And Moll was AMAZING! They had to stop for a few minutes cuz people kept clapping so he did this funny look-at-the-audience-and-sort-of-bow-backwards thing. It was FANTASTIC. He's amazing...old, but amazing :)
Moll was the best basso profondo since Emanuel List and Alexander Kipnis emerged in the 1920's. He even did the triplets cleanly and without slowing down, produced fine trills, and was fabulous all the way down.
(Warning bad english , am swedish) I will join in the praising choir. Lord Kurt Moll IS unbeatable when it comes to this aria! Artisticly, bassowise PERIOD! He preforms it musicly to the note and as everybody says he preforms it like it was nothing. My uncle who was a basso said he used to get an anxeity attack when he was asked to sing this. This is NOT a simple song to sing and I morn that so far i haven´t seen a new genartion basso how peforms it as good as Moll did.
Don't get me wrong, I do love the work of the late,great Solti. However, I think he may have needed to run to the bathroom-- THE TEMPO WAS BLISTERINGLY FAST ! I have sung this role 8 times now, and NEVER at such a breakneck speed. Still enjoyable though.
Oh, yessssssssssss . . . that WAS magnificent! Moll was in a class by himself. However . . . I have a CD from a 1949 (yes, nineteen forty-nine) studio recording conducted by Ferenc Fricsay with the RIAS symphony and chorus in which Osmin is sung by Josef Greindl, a fine German bass of an earlier generation. The CD is on the MYTO label; Sari Barabas, Anton Dermota, Helmut Krebs and Rita Streich appear in the other roles. It's worth looking for.
@@brunegilda2453 I bumped into it at a used CD shop and snapped it up, not knowing what a treat lay ahead! There's also a clip from "Don Carlo" on YT of Greindl as Philip II and Marti Talvela as the Grand Inquisitor; it's positively chilling! Talvela's appearance will make the hair on the back of your neck stand up!
Kurt Moll was always excellent when I listened to the MET broadcasts, but my favourite for the triumph aria is Frick in 1956 his first recording. His voice wasn't so good second time around. Henry Webb
Is there anything better than seeing a basso profundo magnifico jumping and prancing around and singing the crap out of a VERY difficult aria? NOOOOOOO
El personaje SELIM que interpreta éste bajo profundo debe tener una voz consistente,amplia y rotunda en los registros graves .los papeles para esta tesitura se hallan básicamente en el reportorio alemán,por bien que en el repertorio italiano también lo han incorporado.(el Inquisidor de don carlos, el Sparafusile de rigoletto sería dos buenos ejemplos.
Oh, you misinterpreted me; i am alluding to the three Operatic Profundi: Wichniakov, Miller & Pasuikov. Also, like i said, the D is not meant to be held for more than 15. In the score it is not marked as a fermata or opzionale sostenere, therefore it must be held for 15.
