CMDFTT Articles
July 4, 2007
Taking Opera to the Heights and Down to Earth
By ANTHONY TOMMASINI
In the mid-1970s, Beverly Sills
was a ubiquitous presence on
American television. I remember
watching her in action on one of
the several occasions when
Johnny Carson asked her to be
the guest host of “The Tonight
Show.” Ms. Sills invited three of
her gal pals as guests: the
comedian Carol Burnett, the
singer and television host Dinah
Shore and the pop chanteuse
Eydie Gorme. The four women
got into a tiff over who was
whose best friend.
Watching Ms. Sills schmoozing
with her friends on television,
hearing her sing comic duets
with Ms. Burnett one moment
and lyrical Donizetti arias the
next, had a major impact on American culture. Millions of viewers
who had assumed that opera was an elitist art form for bloated
divas pretending to be lovesick adolescents experienced little
epiphanies before their television sets. In her day, Ms. Sills was not
just the best-known, best-loved and highest-paid opera singer in
the business. She was the public face of opera, and the performing
arts in general, throughout America.
Yet as we remember Ms. Sills, who died on Monday night at 78, we
must be careful not to dwell too much on Sills the media force. She
would not have had such authority as a proselytizer for the fine arts
had she not been an excellent singer and formidable artist. Sadly,
her time at the top was relatively brief.
Of course, she started in the business early. Look her up on
YouTube and you can find a link showing Bubbles Silverman as a
7-year-old radio darling, singing an Italian song by Luigi Arditi in a
short segment from a movie titled “Uncle Sol Solves It.” Already
present are hints of the coloratura agility and the communicative
energy that later generations of opera buffs associate with Beverly
Sills. Photos and recordings also exist of Bubbles singing a
commercial jingle for Rinso White soap on Major Bowes’s radio
show.
But in her early 20s she struggled, even spending a couple of years
in a touring company where one season she sang 63 consecutive
one-night stands as Micaela in “Carmen.” After finally being invited
to join the New York City Opera in 1955, Ms. Sills spent the next 10
years giving what many company insiders thought were some of
the greatest performances of her career. But only City Opera
loyalists heard her.
Her breakthrough into international stardom did not come until
1966, with her portrayal of Cleopatra in the City Opera’s landmark
production of Handel’s “Giulio Cesare.” Just 14 years later, at only
51, she retired from singing.
I was one of those who did not hear her during that first decade
with the City Opera. But in the 1970s she came every season to
Boston, where I was pursuing doctoral studies in music and later
had a college teaching job. Ms. Sills was a close colleague and
devoted friend of Sarah Caldwell, the founding director of the Opera
Company of Boston, in those days a scrappy, chaotic yet inventive
institution. Perpetually disheveled and disorganized, Ms. Caldwell
both conducted and directed most productions. Still, she and Ms.
Sills inspired each other.
To Ms. Sills’s mind, there were some misfires along the way,
notably her participation in the United States premiere of Luigi
Nono’s 12-tone opera “Intolleranza” in 1965. In her blunt 1987
memoir, “Beverly: An Autobiography,” Ms. Sills explained that she
thought the composer, an avowed communist, was a hypocrite for
making lavish use of the services of the Copley Plaza Hotel during
his Boston stay. “All that might have been overlooked,” she wrote, “if
‘Intolleranza’ hadn’t been such a sophomoric piece of polemical
garbage,” adding, “Luigi and his opera were both Nono’s.”
But I had some unforgettable experiences in Boston thanks to
these two great women of opera. There was a delightful production
of Rossini’s “Barbiere di Siviglia,” with Ms. Sills as a slightly ditsy
Rosina, and also her vivacious yet subtle and superbly sung
Norina in a stylish production of Donizetti’s “Don Pasquale.”
Best of all — a revelation, really — was a 1977 production of Bellini’
s retelling of the Romeo and Juliet story, “I Capuleti e i Montecchi,”
then a little-known and overlooked opera. Ms. Sills brought both
girlish whimsy and tragic stature to her overwhelming portrayal of
Giulietta. Singing Romeo was the plush-toned mezzo- soprano
Tatiana Troyanos, in my first time hearing this remarkable artist.
There was something wonderfully American about Ms. Sills’s no-
nonsense approach to singing. Her passagework was accurate
and honestly executed; words came through clearly. Yet, while
honoring the score, she sang with intensity and rich, though never
maudlin, expressivity.
She was a total product of American training and proud of it. When
she made her debut in 1969 at the most scared of all Italian opera
houses, La Scala in Milan, in Rossini’s “Siege of Corinth,” it was
practically an all-American affair. The other leads were Marilyn
Horne and Justino Diaz (a Puerto Rico-born American); Thomas
Schippers conducted. The critic at La Stampa commented that
“American interpreters of Rossini brought bel canto again to La
Scala.”
Ms. Sills’s Metropolitan Opera debut came shockingly late in her
career. For years the company had been headed by the Austrian-
born Rudolf Bing — later Sir Rudolf Bing — who barely disguised
his patronizing attitude toward American singers. So it was sweet
justice that she ended her influential career in arts administration
as the chairwoman of the Met’s board.
When she announced her retirement in 2005 from administration
and even from fund-raising, except for some charity work, I met with
her at her elegant apartment overlooking Central Park for an
interview. After my questions were answered and the tape recorder
was turned off, she said that during her career she had tried to be
careful about not fraternizing with critics. But now she was out of the
business, she said. “So why don’t you and I just have lunch
sometime, just for fun?” she asked.
A few months later we did. We met at Fiorello’s, across from
Lincoln Center, where a table had a special plaque reading
“Reserved for Beverly Sills,” for whenever she wanted it. Over lunch,
we talked not as critic and diva but as two veteran opera buffs,
sharing enthusiasms and gossip.
During the lunch, two middle-aged women stopped by our table.
One asked Ms. Sills, “Are you who I think you are?”
Ms. Sills smiled at her warmly and said, “I hope so.”
Taking Opera to the Heights and Down to Earth
By ANTHONY TOMMASINI
In the mid-1970s, Beverly Sills
was a ubiquitous presence on
American television. I remember
watching her in action on one of
the several occasions when
Johnny Carson asked her to be
the guest host of “The Tonight
Show.” Ms. Sills invited three of
her gal pals as guests: the
comedian Carol Burnett, the
singer and television host Dinah
Shore and the pop chanteuse
Eydie Gorme. The four women
got into a tiff over who was
whose best friend.
Watching Ms. Sills schmoozing
with her friends on television,
hearing her sing comic duets
with Ms. Burnett one moment
and lyrical Donizetti arias the
next, had a major impact on American culture. Millions of viewers
who had assumed that opera was an elitist art form for bloated
divas pretending to be lovesick adolescents experienced little
epiphanies before their television sets. In her day, Ms. Sills was not
just the best-known, best-loved and highest-paid opera singer in
the business. She was the public face of opera, and the performing
arts in general, throughout America.
Yet as we remember Ms. Sills, who died on Monday night at 78, we
must be careful not to dwell too much on Sills the media force. She
would not have had such authority as a proselytizer for the fine arts
had she not been an excellent singer and formidable artist. Sadly,
her time at the top was relatively brief.
Of course, she started in the business early. Look her up on
YouTube and you can find a link showing Bubbles Silverman as a
7-year-old radio darling, singing an Italian song by Luigi Arditi in a
short segment from a movie titled “Uncle Sol Solves It.” Already
present are hints of the coloratura agility and the communicative
energy that later generations of opera buffs associate with Beverly
Sills. Photos and recordings also exist of Bubbles singing a
commercial jingle for Rinso White soap on Major Bowes’s radio
show.
But in her early 20s she struggled, even spending a couple of years
in a touring company where one season she sang 63 consecutive
one-night stands as Micaela in “Carmen.” After finally being invited
to join the New York City Opera in 1955, Ms. Sills spent the next 10
years giving what many company insiders thought were some of
the greatest performances of her career. But only City Opera
loyalists heard her.
Her breakthrough into international stardom did not come until
1966, with her portrayal of Cleopatra in the City Opera’s landmark
production of Handel’s “Giulio Cesare.” Just 14 years later, at only
51, she retired from singing.
I was one of those who did not hear her during that first decade
with the City Opera. But in the 1970s she came every season to
Boston, where I was pursuing doctoral studies in music and later
had a college teaching job. Ms. Sills was a close colleague and
devoted friend of Sarah Caldwell, the founding director of the Opera
Company of Boston, in those days a scrappy, chaotic yet inventive
institution. Perpetually disheveled and disorganized, Ms. Caldwell
both conducted and directed most productions. Still, she and Ms.
Sills inspired each other.
To Ms. Sills’s mind, there were some misfires along the way,
notably her participation in the United States premiere of Luigi
Nono’s 12-tone opera “Intolleranza” in 1965. In her blunt 1987
memoir, “Beverly: An Autobiography,” Ms. Sills explained that she
thought the composer, an avowed communist, was a hypocrite for
making lavish use of the services of the Copley Plaza Hotel during
his Boston stay. “All that might have been overlooked,” she wrote, “if
‘Intolleranza’ hadn’t been such a sophomoric piece of polemical
garbage,” adding, “Luigi and his opera were both Nono’s.”
But I had some unforgettable experiences in Boston thanks to
these two great women of opera. There was a delightful production
of Rossini’s “Barbiere di Siviglia,” with Ms. Sills as a slightly ditsy
Rosina, and also her vivacious yet subtle and superbly sung
Norina in a stylish production of Donizetti’s “Don Pasquale.”
Best of all — a revelation, really — was a 1977 production of Bellini’
s retelling of the Romeo and Juliet story, “I Capuleti e i Montecchi,”
then a little-known and overlooked opera. Ms. Sills brought both
girlish whimsy and tragic stature to her overwhelming portrayal of
Giulietta. Singing Romeo was the plush-toned mezzo- soprano
Tatiana Troyanos, in my first time hearing this remarkable artist.
There was something wonderfully American about Ms. Sills’s no-
nonsense approach to singing. Her passagework was accurate
and honestly executed; words came through clearly. Yet, while
honoring the score, she sang with intensity and rich, though never
maudlin, expressivity.
She was a total product of American training and proud of it. When
she made her debut in 1969 at the most scared of all Italian opera
houses, La Scala in Milan, in Rossini’s “Siege of Corinth,” it was
practically an all-American affair. The other leads were Marilyn
Horne and Justino Diaz (a Puerto Rico-born American); Thomas
Schippers conducted. The critic at La Stampa commented that
“American interpreters of Rossini brought bel canto again to La
Scala.”
Ms. Sills’s Metropolitan Opera debut came shockingly late in her
career. For years the company had been headed by the Austrian-
born Rudolf Bing — later Sir Rudolf Bing — who barely disguised
his patronizing attitude toward American singers. So it was sweet
justice that she ended her influential career in arts administration
as the chairwoman of the Met’s board.
When she announced her retirement in 2005 from administration
and even from fund-raising, except for some charity work, I met with
her at her elegant apartment overlooking Central Park for an
interview. After my questions were answered and the tape recorder
was turned off, she said that during her career she had tried to be
careful about not fraternizing with critics. But now she was out of the
business, she said. “So why don’t you and I just have lunch
sometime, just for fun?” she asked.
A few months later we did. We met at Fiorello’s, across from
Lincoln Center, where a table had a special plaque reading
“Reserved for Beverly Sills,” for whenever she wanted it. Over lunch,
we talked not as critic and diva but as two veteran opera buffs,
sharing enthusiasms and gossip.
During the lunch, two middle-aged women stopped by our table.
One asked Ms. Sills, “Are you who I think you are?”
Ms. Sills smiled at her warmly and said, “I hope so.”
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