Search - Beverly Sills :: Sillsiana

Sill's Live

Ronald Bembe | 11/17/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This recording brings to life much music that Sill's never recorded commercialy. Of special interest is the music from Semile, Magic Flute, and Lucrezia Borgia. Althrough she disliked the role of the Queen of the Night, she sounds especially vendictive and sings the difficult colortura with great ease and finese. The role of Lucrezia Borga shows Sill's at her dramatic best ( shades of Q E 1 ) but at the same time, you can tell the role was too heavy for her and probably lead to some of her vocal difficulities latter in her career. The only real low point in the recording is the Ernani aria which does not fit her voice at all. The recording ends with an encore arraged by Henri Gagnon, who was her accumpantist and wrote lots of her variations on the bel canto arias. Sillsiana is a hodpoge of many arias Sill's sang, and even Mr Gagnon joins in with her in the Brindizi from Traviata, a nice and fun way to end this tribute to Bubbles. We will miss you ."

Sills the Great Coloratura

William S. Oser | Florida, USA | 04/13/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Ira Siff in Opera News 9/07 wrote an article that was supposed to be a tribute to a great soprano, but instead became a eulogy, as she had passed away a month previously. In the article Mr. Siff discusses that it was easy to get caught up in the bubbly personality, which she used to great advantage to do many important things and forget that before the celebrity came the great singing. These two CDs serve to remind us of the great singer that she was, and was she ever. I was lucky enough to have grown up in Boston, MA, where Sarah Caldwell put on some great opera with great singers. Sills adored Caldwell and sang for her often, even after she had moved from a Boston suburb back to New York. What great performances there were. I remember an Elise Amore with Nicoli Gedda, and she damn near stole the opera out from under him, and he was no slouch when it came to great singing. There was also the infamous Queen of the Night that she hated, a Daughter of the Regiment at Tufts University Gymnasium (the accoustics stunk) and late in the career, Juliet in E Capiletti e I Montecchi with Tatyana Troyanos as Romeo. She was a great artist. What these discs remind me of is that she ornamented like crazy, just for the shear virtuosity of it. Sutherland, who I also heard live several times had a more even and fuller voice, but Sills' coluratura was much more dazzling. Frankly I would not have wanted to miss either one.



On these discs are extensive highlights from an early 60s Semele probably from Atlanta, maybe with Robert Shaw. This was way before anyone really knew how to sing Handel with any sort of proper style, but the singing is gloryous and the emotions of the character are right there for you. the extensive selections from Lucrezia Borgia show that sometimes Sills got through some roles by shear force of will. This one suited her only in the quieter moments. Montserrat Caballe sang it in her American Debut only 10 years earlier and was much more convincing in the role, but Sills artistry is again not to be missed. These two discs along with a disc of selections from her complete opera sets and recital recordings on Angel give a wonderful overview of a great great singer. If you want to explore further, either the 3 Donizetti Queens or Ballad of Baby Doe will do very nicely. Beverly Sills when she was active was in competion with both Joan Sutherland and Montseratt Caballe. If that wasn't a golden age of singing, then there never was one or will be."

A listing for these 2 cds (Live performances)

DodgyUSA | Jamaica Plain, MA United States | 11/27/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"CD 1 (71:49)

1. The Soldier's tir'd of war's alarms (Arne)



Tracks 2-11 Excerpts from Handel's SEMELE. Conducted by Robert Shaw. with Helen Vanni, mezzo soprano



Tracks 12-13 DIE ENTFUHRUNG AUS DEM SERAIL (Mozart)

* Ach Ich Liebte, war so glucklich

* Traurigkeit ward mir zum Lose



Track 14 DIE ZAUBERFLOTE (Mozart)

* O zitter nicht, mein lieber sohn (1966)



Track 15 IL BARBIERE DI SIVIGLIA (Rossini)

*Una Voce Poca Fa



CD 2 (78:27)

1. L'ELISIRE D'AMORE (Donizetti)

*Prendi, per me sei libero



2. ERNANI (Verdi)

*Ernani, Ernani, involami



3. DINORAH (Meyerbeer)

*Ombre legere



4. ROMEO ET JULIETTE (Gounod)

*Je veux vivre dans le reve



Tracks 5-9 LUCREZIA BORGIA (Donizetti)

(with Henry Price and Adib Fazah) cond: Julius Rudel

(NYCO late 1970's I think)



10. Sillsiana (Henry Gagnon and Beverly Sills creation)"