The Slipped Disc daily comfort zone (227): Kiri’s glory
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The best aria I ever heard her singing at the ROH! My memory is that it was even better than this performance! Perhaps 1991?
I met Kiri after 1992 San Francisco “Capriccio”. Pure class and sweetness. And that voice of liquid silver, my my, had to be heard live to be believed.
Why do I always get such a warm feeling when I see Dame Kiri? Wonderful artist and exemplary career.
I also like her famous Greenwich concert, especially “Care Selve”
PS on 7th of Nov is Joan’s Sutherland birthday, I hope you, Norman, remember
Beautiful. Google translate comes up with ‘As in this brunette hour’ – can any one do better?
How (or “As”) in this dark (literally “brown”) hour the stars smile at sea…
Bruna es perfectamente aceptable en español, no hay que complicarse la bida
Literally, brown, but more like dusky or crepuscular. (She’s singing about sunrise if I remember correctly.)
It was Kiri’s Countess in Figaro which first lit my opera fuse; and 40 years later I would still say that she had the most beautiful voice I have ever heard live. At times, she made a sound so lovely that I felt that I had forgotten that the human voice could be THAT beautiful until one heard her sing again.
I had never heard of her when I bought her recording of the Strauss 4 Last Songs with Andrew Davis. (Hadn’t heard the songs before, either; at that time, I only knew “Death & Transfiguration.”) I still remember the quote from some critic or other on the back of the album: “Such a Countess as I have never heard, not in Covent Garden, nor Salzburg nor Vienna…” I thought OK, she’s probably good; I’ll risk it. This was about 1979, maybe 1980.
Of course, if she was recording for Sony (or Columbia that was, as Thackeray would put it), she had already “made it;” but in subsequent years it was fun to watch her become a huge star and feel like I’d discovered her for myself.
Those of us fortunate to hear Kiri in the flesh will never forget…the most beautiful soprano voice that ever came out of a human throat. Her recordings capture maybe only 50% of that essence.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard her sing better. She really and truly floats her voice. Amazing. Thanks for putting this on.