Word: countertenors
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...grew up soaked in the brine of the Bible," he says. "As Lutherans, we would go to church and sing as a family." His father was a locally famous countertenor, but in fact the entire family was talented and the house never silent. If it wasn't one of the children playing guitar or piano, it was classical Indian music or the Beatles on the turntable, and the Johnny Cash Show on TV. "I used to watch my brothers and sisters and pick things up," says Ponnudorai. "At 6, I was playing guitar...
Marlowe’s play calls for Cupid to sing two unspecified songs, which composer Laura Jeppensen chose to arrange from Marlowe’s own poetry. Jeppensen’s otherworldly countertenor compositions create some of the most riveting moments of the play and capture its cold cruelty with lines such as: “Love is not full of pity as men say/… Then darkness falls; dark night is Cupid?...
...American Composer by leading the San Francisco Symphony in Aaron Copland's electrifying Symphony No. 3 (Sept. 27-28). Cecilia Bartoli and Bryn Terfel, the hottest tickets of the post-Pavarotti era, join forces for a gala concert at New York City's Metropolitan Opera House (Oct. 29). Ace countertenor David Daniels, opera's freshest star, makes his triumphant return to the New York City Opera in a new production of Handel's Rinaldo (Oct. 31). And Chanticleer, the Grammy-winning 12-man a cappella vocal ensemble, backs up Magnificat (Teldec), its elegant new CD of plainchant and Renaissance motets...
Though Daniels' vibrant voice has made him the first contemporary countertenor with the potential to become an international operatic superstar, many others have had major careers. In the 18th century, falsettists regularly alternated with castrati on the operatic stage, singing the virtuoso coloratura roles of Handel and Gluck. But once the castration of boys was banned, and unaltered male singers started belting out high notes in the manner of the modern tenor, the demand for countertenors began to decline. By the end of the 19th century the voice type had all but vanished; on the rare occasions when baroque operas...
Enter England's Alfred Deller, who, starting in the mid-1940s, singlehandedly revived countertenor singing. Deller inspired Benjamin Britten to write the first countertenor role in a 20th century opera, Oberon in A Midsummer Night's Dream. Other singers began emulating Deller, and as the revival of interest in baroque opera picked up steam in the '70s, countertenors became popular once more...