Words

I've been spending a lot of time listening to music recently. Mostly vocal music of genres other than opera: blues, folk, rock, popular, and jazz. When I listen closely (which I find it hard not to do), I'm struck by most singers attention to words. They all concentrate not in producing a sound, but in conveying the meaning of a song through the text. And even though I sometimes can't take long doses of their vocal quality despite other compensating talents (I'm sorry, I just can't listen to too much Bob Dylan at one time, despite his genius), I'm almost always (in a good musician) moved by their approach to the text.


It's something that some opera singers forget. One who didn't was Giuseppe DiStefano, which is probably why, among the great tenors of the second part of the last century, he moved me the most. Despite his vocal defects (which increased dramatically in the later part of his short career), he always threw himself into what he was singing and always spent most of his capital trying to put across the text. Of course his career was essentially over before I was born, but the recordings, live and in the studio, all speak to a talent that was natural, unaffected, and joyously exploited. Exploited to the point were it was all gone in just about ten years, but when it was there, it was glorious.

Many people try to analyze his defects: his lack of cover through the passaggio, taking on roles far too heavy for his basic lyric instrument. The truth is that none of it really matters. To take away any of it would have changed the person. A man who obviously loved life, who had an innate natural musicality, and who was born with a glorious instrument, that in its prime could do just about anything.

I'm sure he had no regrets. RIP, Pippo.