Opera Singing in Germany and other adventures....

This morning I was confronted with a video on Facebook that was posted by a fellow singer who was fascinated by the vocalism in the video and didn't really know exactly technically what was going on, so I decided to break it down in this blog post, because I think it's worth discussing how much tastes and vocal technical practice has changed in the past 49 years, since Christina Deutekom sang the role and was acclaimed by the New York Times ( according to this Wikipedia biography of her ) as being 'the greatest Queen of the Night of our time'. Here's the video:  So- I sing this piece- and have been studying it and singing it for 4 years now-just so you know where my thoughts are coming from- and from a technical perspective this recording to me is all over the place. In the recitative she changes the text (at "ja schuldlos" and "dies tief" which at the time she was singing was normal- in fact people here in Germany have even sug...

Recently, I had the opportunity to see a YouTube video of Renee Fleming singing this great aria written by Erich Korngold found here , and I remembered that a while ago there was an often-whispered-about Masterclass given by Ms. Fleming (her first ever!) at The Juilliard School.  And, I remember hearing that only Juilliard students were invited to attend this Masterclass. That got me to wondering, why couldn't any old person attend this hugely-touted event?  Apart from the fact that there wouldn't be enough room for everyone who wanted to attend, why didn't they at least sell overpriced tickets?  And then I realized the reason: this was just another manifestation of a phenomenon I have noticed over the years of being "in the biz" of opera singing: the hushed-up mysteriousness and only-for-certain-people attitude that is encouraged among opera teachers/students/professionals, and heck, even the more staunch fans themselves!  It's as if the singe...