Interview: Maestro Carlo Bergonzi

Click here for Full Issue of Fidelio Volume 2, Number 3, Fall 1993 ---.. INTERVIEW _. --------------- Maestro Carlo Bergonzi Return to the Verdi tuning, 'or opera could be finished!' Born at Polisene, near Palma, Italy, no longer have truly Ver Carlo Bergonzi debuted in Italy as a bari dian voices, because of to tone in 1948, and as a tenor in 1951, day's overly high tuning. and in the U.S. at the Metropolitan Opera in 1956 as Radames in "Aida." During Fidelio: Do you think his 45-year world careel� the beloved that the Schiller Institute's tenor has championed bel canto, and new textbook will help to fo ught against the modern rise in pitch. lower the pitch to the Following his fa rewell pelfO/mance Verdi A? of "L'Elisir d'Amore" at the Baltimore Bergonzi: I think so. I can Operain March, 1993, Maestro Belgonzi traveled to New Yo rk to help bring out 'When I debuted, there the Schiller Institute's new textbook, "A Ma nual on Tuning and Registration, " were 100 tenors of the which documents the need to return to first rank and 100 of the or even fo r Donizetti, even Puccini, if Guiseppe Ve rdi's A of 432 Hz. On April the tuning does not come down. This 6, he taped a master class and interview second rank, and those is very important. I admire this initia on the Ve rdi A at WQXR-Radio FM in of the second were better tive ofthe Schiller Institute. In fa ct, ifit New Yo rk (which aired later on June had not been fo r the Schiller Institute than the firstrank tenors 9), and on April 8, he gave a sold-out initiative, just fighting to at least put public master class, "Return to the Verdi of today. What has a damper on this situation, today we'd Tuning!"at Weill Recital Hall at Carne changed? It's the be at A-450, or A-455! gie Hall, sp onsored by the Institute. On April 6, Maestro Bergonzi sp oke tuning! In 1951, there Fidelio: Do you think it would be with Fidelio's Ka thy Wolfe and Nora were 200 great tenors. helpful to use the Schiller Institute's Hamelman. Manual on Tuning in the singing Today, there are two schools or high schools? Fidelio: Maestro, you have stressed and one-half!' Bergonzi: Certainly. The Schiller In that the "Verdi A-432" is the only sci stitute's Music Manual is, without any entific tuning. Can you tell our new only compliment the Schiller Institute doubt, an excellent initiative. It is par readers why it's "scientific?" fo r this initiative, because it is not un ticularly important to raise the ques Bergonzi: Certainly: Because it is the derstood that we are fa cing a very tion of tuning in connection with bel most natural one, because this A is the fr ightening situation. If we don't re ca nto technique, since today's high most natural fo r the human voice. Not turn to the natural lower tuning, we tuning misplaces all register shifts, and only fo r Verdi's operas-but fo r the will no longer have the voices fo r sing makes it very difficult fo r a singer to whole repertoire. The A-432 tuning is ing opera! People have to understand let the sound pass above the breath. ideal fo r voices, because Verdi wrote this. They can insist on A-442, 446, The sound does not have enough fo r the registral passage. If the tuning 448-but remember, that we are los space. When an Pi becomes a G, an is raised higher, this passagio is moved ing a great, enormous cultural heri A, becomes an Aq , a B, becomes a Bq , around. tage, because today in 1993 we already and a C becomes a [)I,, what comes I have a letter fr om Verdi in 1884, can hear that the voices are really start out is a fa lse sound. It is difficult to in which he placed his own A at ing to be missing, absolutely. distribute the sound, and to support it, 432 Hz. He said, "this A must be the Today you can no longer put to because everything is misplaced almost A fo r opera." This is why today we gether a cast as you should, fo r Verdi, half a tone-and the technique fa ils. 86 © 1993 Schiller Institute, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission strictly prohibited. This is why it is correct to raise the When Verdi wrote Aida, he wrote suit anyone today, but to point out: issue of the Verdi tuning in connection it fo r the lower pitch. He respected the What has changed today? It's the tun with bel canto technique. Young voices passagios of the voices, and the human ing! In 1951, there were 200 great ten coming to my Bel Canto Academy in vocal chords. That explains why Giu ors. Today, there are two and one Busseto, fa ce serious problems later, seppe Verdi has written so many half! when they start singing in the public things, which today seem to hover opera theatres. pas agio right around the s -because he Fidelio: Have you tried the Verdi A- I also like the hypothesis in this actually wrote them at the lower pitch. 432 at your Bel Canto Academy in Ma nual that instrumental music is an If he'd been at a tuning of A-442 or Italy? imitation, a derivation, of vocal music. 444, he would never have written so Bergonzi: For the moment, in my Instrumental music, too, sounds fa lse, much in this tessitura. Academy I am using 440. when played at a high tuning. The I explain this because it's our young I cannot use the lower tuning, be sound is as unnatural in instruments, people who are at stake. If you are cause afterward the students will as it is in voices. A violin can play a studying singing at this high tuning, go to sing elsewhere, and they will high tone which is as dull and flat, as you have changed the entire vocal hurt themselves. What can one do? a sung high tone. In the attempt to spectrum. If you sing on the passagio You are giving singing lessons. You sound more brilliant, a violin can pro at F, you are actually singing an F# . use 432-then the poor fe llow goes duce a sound which is too tight, and That shifts the entire technique by a out to sing at 442, and what will he not soft. What is true fo r the voice, is half-tone, from the low notes to the do? I use 440 or even a little lower, also true fo r instruments. middle notes to the high notes. It is but lower than that I cannot use, fo r not the natural position. now. Fidelio: You've said that in the 1950's The great conductor you regularly sang the original duet Tullio Serafinonce said cadenza with the tenor's D above high during the intermission C from Lucia di Lame/moor, which is of Il Trovatore, in a de not sung anymore. Many who sang at bate among friends, the Met in the 1950's remember the "They are starting to pitch at around A-435. They say voices raise the tuning, and were much richer. Do you remember I'm sorry about one the pitch being lower then? thing: the day will ar Bergonzi: Yes, yes it was lower in the rive, when true singers 1950's. Yes, I think it was around A- will no longer be heard. 435 or A-438. We are saying that the I nstead of tenors, they composers are wrong-but we're the will hear castratif" I ones making the mistake! think that Maestro Ser afin was a prophet. Fidelio: Now, in Europe how high The Verdi tuning is does it go? You said that in Vienna the one we need to de they were at A-450 a fe w years ago. velop young voices, and Bergonzi: Yes, yes! There are opera if we return to it, we houses which even have A-452. La will hear the great Scala is at A-442. Florence is very high, voices which existed at 'If we don't return to the natural A-448. Because in Italian concert halls one time. If not, it could they don't have separate orchestras, the be that opera will be lower tuning, we will no longer orchestra that plays symphonies also finished. have the voices fo r singing opera ! plays fo r the opera. So they tune their When debuted, You can no longer put together a instruments up fo r the symphonies, to there were I 00 tenors of make the violin "vibrant." the first category, and cast for Verdi, or Donizetti, or even For example, "Celeste Aida." This I 00 of second rank, and Puccini, if the tuning does not come aria at the beginning of Aida is fr ight those of the second ful fo r the tenor because it is one of the rank at that time were down. And if it had not been fo r most beautiful arias, yet so difficult.At better than the first the Schiller Institutue initiative, the Verdi A, you can still sing this aria rank tenors of today, we'd be at A-450 Hz or A-455 Hz at age seventy.

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