Word: coloratura
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Indeed, the opera Welcome to the Voice, which premiered Nov. 20, doesn't demand feats of coloratura of the pair. Rather, they lend their rock timbres to improbable duets with such brilliant sopranos as Sylvia Schwartz to "hopefully make harmony," as Sting says...
...elaborate series of acronyms that, put together, suggest that this really is somebody: HIR, HPT, IOP, PBHA. You may not be UC President. But who else is the Business Secretary of Women and Youth Supporting Each Other and the Vice President of the Harvard Romanian Association and the only coloratura soprano in the Harvard Krokodiloes? Each additional acronym carves out a niche in which you can predominate. And with each acronym comes another bracketed e-mail list.True Love Revolution—yet another of Harvard’s cornucopia of organizations—periodically hosts forums for those who feel...
...expected to train, then seek the attention of the major opera houses. Beverly Sills, the redheaded child radio star whose mother dreamed she'd be the "Jewish Shirley Temple," stayed home, loyally working her way up through New York's "second" City Opera and drawing raves as a brilliant coloratura soprano in shows from Manon to Cleopatra. Though she guested around the globe, the Met's Rudolf Bing, who scoffed at U.S.-trained artists, refused her a major role. (Sills' belated 1975 Met premiere, following Bing's retirement, earned a 20-minute standing ovation.) Her rise seemed inevitable. Witty, smart...
...Ziegfeld revues, and glamour at Encores! is not skin but star quality. The star here is Kristen Chenoweth, that petite package of pyrotechnics who has wowed Broadway in Wicked and, this season, in The Apple Tree (a production that originated at Encores! two years ago). Whether flaunting her coloratura or radiating that elfin sensuousness, she's sensaysh...
...ever a role is going to expose a rising soprano's skills and flaws, it's that of Alcina. Running over four hours, the Baroque opera presents its leading lady with aria upon aria of fiendishly difficult coloratura singing (Ah! Mio cor! alone is a 12-minute, seven-stages-of-grieving emotional roller-coaster) with minimal orchestral backing. With typical understatement, Durkin calls it musical "Ping Pong." Only the finest sopranos can survive such exercise. Handel's original Alcina, Anna Strada, was unkindly described by a contemporary as having "so little of Venus in her appearance, that she was usually...