Robert Merrill sings "Avant de quitter ces lieux" 

The most beautiful baritone voice ever!!

Arguably the greatest American singer of all time.

...Tibbett is my favorite....but the world would not be complete without Warren and Merrill.....

Voluptuous, round, chiaroscuro! Awesome.

Your remarks about his lack of legato are dead on target. But then again his recording of "In the Gloaming" always makes me cry.

Yeah it was a marvelous voice, remarkable sound, many voices today sound hollow by comparison. And hey his French is not too bad here. Thanks for this post, wonderful!

Voce meravigliosa!!! Bravo !!!!!

I would have KILLED to be at a performance with this cast!

Wonderful, fabulous ! A rare treat to hear Bob's magnificent voice in this life recording. I miss you ! RIP.

THE BEST - nothing more to say.

The young Merrill in his prime. I only wish his vowel shifts between chest and head registers were more subtle. He had ample technical skill for that during this stage of his long career.

First class.

People seem to accuse Merrill of forcing a little on his top notes, but boy, when he had them going - as he does in this clip - they were nearly as good as Warren's.

Very wierd ending of the aria! . the voice is really splendide

that's how you do it! Voice lesson for male singers.. fa sho

This aria is in Eb major!

Bravo

My favorite baritone, but I wonder why he doesn’t close the French E sound, as in “dawn-gee.”

It seems that everyone does this aria in Eb and not the original key which was Db (the original is written in Db but has been since concert practice to transpose it a whole step up).

it's in Eb major!!!

As much as I love Merrill's voice, even my high school French tells me that his French diction is far from idiomatic. Listen to the old EMI HMV mono recording of FAUST with Gedda/De Los Angeles/Christoff, with Cluytens conducting. The magnificent French baritone, Jean Borthayre sings it on that recording with fabulous French style. That said, even given Merrill's faults I would vastly prefer to listen to him than to Warren.

everybody does it in the higher key. I don't know exactly where your information is coming from, but I've never heard a sensible recording that doesn't take advantage of the classic baritone HEROIC G's.

Sorry but it's in the original key. Maybe I am misunderstanding what you wanted to mean but about the piece, it's in Gb dur, nothing is wrong

I loved Dwayne Croft too for about the whole 5 minutes his voice lasted. Unfortunately, he doesn't sing anything like that any more.

Casi nada.

Yes, yes he's got a gorgeous voice, But 2 say it's THE greatest or most beautiful of all american baritones? I totally disagree! For me, THE most gorgeous american baritone voice & maybe of all baritone voices was Lord TIBBETT'S! That's right Lawrence Tibbett:) 'Twas Big, Flexible, Gorgeous color & Has lots of emotion! Not 2 mention the RINGING top notes! And when he sang spirituals, he sometimes sounded like a Bass! Listen 2 how he fools around so easily on the B flats on Largo al factotum! WOW

Terrible rendition - Lawrence Tibbett sang this better.

That optional high note was WAY under pitch.