Axwell@a... wrote:
> What I don't understand is why is there any need for a man to sound
> like a woman. Aren't there more than enough women to play these parts
> ? What is the advantage of having female sounding men.
Most countertenors (myself included) are not consciously trying to
emulate women. The majority of countertenors approach their first
passagio not like tenors but like mezzos - it is not a categorically
female technique - rather, it is the only way to balance the registers
to allow for notes above E5. It is worth noting that women who
specialize in low notes often balance their registers the way tenors do.
Bach considered the alto voice to be representative of the Holy Spirit.
This is probably because it avoids gender-based irrelevancies, and
therefore transcends the trivialities of corporeal existence. This
notion of artifice is critical in understanding Baroque aesthetics!
Puccini's realism did not yet exist. Baroque and early Classical
composers strove to capture various emotional affects in formalistic
ways. The relative timbral simplicity of higher voices was an asset
rather than a drawback! Handel's portrayal of Caesar is abstract - it
avoids banal distractions.
> Is it so that they can play drag parts, and if so, what are the drag
> parts ? Would baba the turk be considered a drag part because she has
> a beard ?
Practically all of Handel's principal roles were drag roles in the sense
that he did not care so much for the sex of the singer so much as he did
the general competence. Asawa has performed Baba the Turk, but I bet he
did it with his tongue firmly in cheek.
> I don't particularly care for David Daniels. I think that there are
> too many real women that sound better.
I suppose most women sound more like women than Daniels does. And I
suppose if that was his goal, he has failed. I don't believe that this
is his goal. He is trying to approximate for us the experience of seeing
a castrato - a man who sounds, looks, and acts like a man but sings very
high with ferocious coloratura. In this respect, he succeeds with flying
colors.
Similarly, you could say that Kathleen Ferrier failed miserably at
sounding like a man...but she was not trying to sound like a man! She
was trying to sound like herself - one of the world's greatest
contraltos.
-Tako
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| | Replies | Name/Email | Yahoo! ID | Date | Size | | 1944 | Re: American School of Countertenors | Oberon603@a... | | Sun 5/28/2000 | 2 KB | | 1951 | Re: American School of Countertenors | Axwell@a... | | Sun 5/28/2000 | 2 KB | | 1958 | Re: American School of Countertenors | Reg Boyle | | Mon 5/29/2000 | 5 KB | | 1963 | Bach, Baroque and Countertenors, was:Re: [vocalis | John Alexander Blyth | | Mon 5/29/2000 | 4 KB | | 1987 | Re: Bach, Baroque and Countertenors | Reg Boyle | | Tue 5/30/2000 | 5 KB | | 1991 | Some Bach, some vibrato, was: Re: Bach, Baroque a | John Alexander Blyth | | Tue 5/30/2000 | 4 KB | | 1996 | Re: Some Bach, some vibrato, some support | Reg Boyle | | Wed 5/31/2000 | 4 KB | | 2014 | Re: Some Bach, some vibrato, some support | John Alexander Blyth | | Wed 5/31/2000 | 5 KB | | 1997 | Re: Bach, Baroque and Countertenors - and castrat | Joel Figen | | Wed 5/31/2000 | 4 KB |
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