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Baritone
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Baritone (or barytone; ; ; ) is a type of classical male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek ßa??t????, meaning 'deep (or heavy) sounding', music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C (i.e. F2-F4) in choral music, and to G above middle C (i.e.
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Baritone (or barytone; ; ; ) is a type of classical male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek ßa??t????, meaning 'deep (or heavy) sounding', music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C (i.e. F2-F4) in choral music, and to G above middle C (i.e. F2-G4) in operatic music, though it can be extended at either end. It is one octave below the mezzo-soprano voice range in women.
History
The first use of the term "baritone" emerged as baritonans late in the 15th century, usually in French sacred polyphonic music. At this early stage it was frequently used as the lowest of the voices (including the bass), but in 17th century Italy the term was all-encompassing and used to describe the average male choral voice.
Baritones took roughly the range we know today at the beginning of the 18th century but they were still lumped in with their bass colleagues until well into the 19th century. Indeed, many operatic works of the 18th century have roles marked as bass that in reality are low baritone roles. Examples of this are to be found, for instance, in the operas and oratorios of George Frideric Handel. The greatest and most enduring parts for baritones in 18th-century operatic music were composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. They include Figaro and Count Almaviva in Le nozze di Figaro, Guglielmo in Così fan tutte, Papageno in Die Zauberflöte and Masetto and the Don in Don Giovanni.
19th century
The bel canto style of vocalism which arose in Italy in the early 19th century supplanted the castrato-dominated opera seria of the previous century. It also led to the baritone being viewed as a separate voice category to the bass. Traditionally, basses in operas had been cast as authority figures such as a king or high priest; but with the advent of the more fluid baritone voice, the roles allotted by composers to lower male voices expanded in the direction of trusted companions or even romantic leads - normally the province of tenors. More often than not, however, baritones found themselves portraying villains.
The principal composers of bel canto opera are considered to be:
- Gioacchino Rossini (Il barbiere di Siviglia, Guillaume Tell);
- Gaetano Donizetti (Don Pasquale, L'elisir d'amore, Lucia di Lammermoor, Lucrezia Borgia, La Favorite);
- Vincenzo Bellini (I Puritani, Norma);
- Giacomo Meyerbeer (Les Huguenots);
- Giuseppe Verdi (Nabucco, Ernani, Macbeth, Rigoletto, La traviata, Il trovatore).
The prolific operas of these composers, plus the works of Verdi's maturity, such as Don Carlos, the revised Simon Boccanegra, Aida, Otello and Falstaff, blazed many new and rewarding performance pathways for baritones. Figaro in Il barbiere is often called the first true baritone role and Donizetti and Verdi in their vocal writing went on to emphasise the top fifth of the baritone voice, rather than its lower notes - thus generating a more brilliant sound. Further pathways opened up when the musically complex and physically demanding operas of Richard Wagner also began to enter the mainstream repertory of the world's opera houses during the second half of the 19th century.
The major international baritone of the first half of the 19th century was the Italian Antonio Tamburini (1800-1876). He was a famous Don Giovanni in Mozart's eponymous opera as well as being a Bellini and Donizetti specialist. Commentators praised his voice for its beauty, flexibility and smooth tonal emission - the hallmarks of a bel canto singer. The most important of Tamburini's successors were: Giorgio Ronconi, who created the title role in Verdi's Nabucco; Felice Varesi, who created the title roles in Macbeth and Rigoletto and was the first Germont in La traviata; Francesco Graziani, who created Don Carlo in Verdi's La forza del destino; Leone Giraldoni, who created Renato in Verdi's Un ballo in maschera and was the first Simon Boccanegra; Enrico Delle Sedie, who was London's first Renato; Adriano Pantaleoni, who was renowned for his Verdi performances at La Scala, Milan; and Francesco Pandolfini, whose singing at La Scala during the 1870s was praised by Verdi.
Luckily, the gramophone was invented early enough to capture on disc the voices of the top Italian Verdi and Donizetti baritones of the last two decades of the 19th century, whose operatic performances were characterized by re-creative freedom and technical finish. They included Mattia Battistini (known as the "King of Baritones"), Giuseppe Kaschmann (who, atypically for his kind, sang Wagner's Telramund and Amfortas in German at Bayreuth in the 1890s), Giuseppe Campanari, Antonio Magini-Coletti, Mario Ancona (the first Silvio in Pagliacci), Giuseppe Pacini and Antonio Scotti, (who came to the Met from Europe in 1899 and remained on the roster of singers until 1933!). Meanwhile, Antonio Pini-Corsi was the dominant Italian buffo (comic) baritone between the 1880s and WW1. Notable among their contemporaries were the technically adroit French baritones Jean Lassalle (hailed as the most accomplished baritone of his generation), Victor Maurel (the creator of Iago, Falstaff and Tonio in Pagliacci) and Maurice Renaud (a compelling singing-actor) - each of whom enjoyed a career on either side of the Atlantic. They made valuable records, too. Three other significant Francophone baritones who left a legacy of early recordings are Leon Melchissedec and Jean Note of the Paris Opera and Gabriel Soulacroix of the Opera-Comique. The Quaker baritone David Bispham, who sang in London and New York between 1891 and 1903, was the leading American male singer of this period. He, too, recorded for the gramophone.
The oldest-born baritone known for sure to have made solo gramophone discs was the Englishman Sir Charles Santley (1834-1922). Santley made his operatic debut in Italy in 1858 and was still giving critically acclaimed concerts in London in the 1890s. The composer of Faust, Charles Gounod, penned Valentine's aria "Even bravest heart" for him in 1864. A couple of primitive cylinder recordings dating from about 1900 have been attributed by collectors to the French baritone of the 1860s and 1870s, Jean-Baptiste Faure (1830-1914) - the creator of Posa in Verdi's Don Carlos. This attribution is not certain, however.
A contemporary of Faure's, Antonio Cotogni, (1831-1918) - the foremost Italian baritone of his generation - can be heard, briefly and dimly, at the age of 77, on a duet recording with the tenor Francesco Marconi. (Cotogni and Marconi had sung together in the first London performance of Amilcare Ponchielli's La Gioconda in 1883, performing the roles of Barnaba and Enzo respectively.)
There are 19th century references to certain baritone sub-types. They include the tenorish baryton-Martin, named after French singer Jean-Blaise Martin (1768/69-1837), and the deeper, dramatic-voiced Heldenbariton of Wagnerian opera.
Perhaps the most accomplished Heldenbaritons of Wagner's day were August Kindermann, Franz Betz and Theodor Reichmann. Betz created Hans Sachs in Die Meistersinger and undertook Wotan in the first Der Ring des Niebelungen cycle at Bayreuth, while Reichmann created Amfortas in Parsifal, also at Bayreuth. Lyric German baritones sang lighter Wagnerian roles such as Wolfram in Tannhäuser, Kurwenal in Tristan und Isolde or Telramund in Lohengrin. They made large strides, too, in the performance of art song and oratorio, with Franz Schubert favouring several baritones for his music, in particular Johann Michael Vogl.
Nineteenth century operettas became the preserve of lightweight baritone voices. They were given comic parts in the tradition of the previous century's comic bass by Gilbert and Sullivan in many of their productions. This did not prevent the French master of operetta, Jacques Offenbach, from assigning the villain's role in Les Contes d'Hoffmann to a big-voiced baritone for the sake of dramatic effect. Other 19th-century French composers like Meyerbeer, Hector Berlioz, Camille Saint-Saëns, Georges Bizet and Jules Massenet wrote attractive parts for baritones, too. These included Nelusko in L'Africaine (Meyerbeer's last opera), Mephistopheles in La Damnation de Faust (a role also sung by basses), the Priest of Dagon in Samson et Dalila, Escamillo in Carmen, Zurga in Les pêcheurs de perles, Lescaut in Manon, Athanael in Thaïs and Herod in Hérodiade. Russian composers also included substantial baritone parts in their operas. Witness the title roles in Peter Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin (which received its first production in 1879) and Alexander Borodin's Prince Igor (1890).
Mozart continued to be sung throughout the 19th century although, generally speaking, his operas were not revered to the same extent that they are today by music critics and audiences. Back then, baritones rather than high basses normally sang Don Giovanni - arguably Mozart's greatest male operatic creation. Famous Dons of the late 19th/early 20th centuries included Scotti and Maurel (see the photograph accompanying this article), as well as Portugal's Francisco d'Andrade and Sweden's John Forsell.
20th century
The dawn of the 20th century opened up more opportunities for baritones than ever before as a taste for strenuously exciting vocalism and lurid, "slice-of-life" operatic plots took hold in Italy and spread elsewhere. The most prominent verismo baritones included such major singers in Europe and America as Giuseppe De Luca (the first Sharpless in Madama Butterfly), Mario Sammarco (the first Gerard in Andrea Chénier), Eugenio Giraldoni (the first Scarpia in Tosca), Pasquale Amato (the first Rance in La fanciulla del West), Riccardo Stracciari (noted for his richly attractive timbre) and Domenico Viglione-Borghesi, whose voice was exceeded in size only by that of the lion-voiced Titta Ruffo. Ruffo was the most commanding Italian baritone of his era or, arguably, any other era. He was at his prime from the early 1900s to the early 1920s and enjoyed success in Italy, England and America (in Chicago and later at the Met).
Between them, these baritones established the echt performance style for baritones undertaking roles in verismo operas. The chief verismo composers were Giacomo Puccini, Ruggero Leoncavallo, Pietro Mascagni, Alberto Franchetti, Umberto Giordano and Francesco Cilea. Verdi's works continued to remain popular, however, with audiences in Italy, the Spanish-speaking countries, the United States and the United Kingdom and, interestingly enough, Germany, where there was a major Verdi revival in Berlin between the Wars.
Outside the field of Italian opera, an important addition to the Austro-German repertory occurred in 1905. This was the premiere of Richard Strauss's Salome, with the pivotal part of John the Baptist assigned to a baritone. (The enormous-voiced Dutch baritone Anton van Rooy - a Wagner specialist - sang John when the opera reached the Met in 1907). Then, in 1925, Germany's Leo Schützendorf created the title baritone role in Alban Berg's harrowing Wozzeck.. In a separate development, the French composer Claude Debussy's post-Wagnerian masterpiece Pelleas et Melisande featured not one but two lead baritones at its 1902 premiere. These two baritones, Jean Perier and Hector Dufranne, possessed contrasting voices. (Dufranne had a darker, more powerful instrument than Perier, who was a true baryton-Martin.)
Characteristic of the Wagnerian baritones of the 20th century was a general progression of individual singers from higher-lying baritone parts to lower-pitched ones. This was the case with Germany's Hans Hotter. Hotter made his debut in 1929. As a young singer he appeared in Verdi and created the Commandant in Richard Strauss's Friedenstag and Olivier in Capriccio. By the 1950s, however, he was being hailed as the top Wagnerian bass-baritone in the world. His Wotan was especially praised by critics for its musicianship. Other major Wagnerian baritones have included Hotter's predecessors Leopold Demuth, Anton van Rooy, Hermann Weil, Clarence Whitehill, Friedrich Schorr, Rudolf Bockelmann and Hans Hermann Nissen. Demuth, van Rooy, Weil and Whitehill were at their peak in the late 1800s and early 1900s while Schorr, Bockelmann and Nissen were stars of the 1920s and 1930s.
In addition to their heavyweight Wagnerian cousins, there was a plethora of baritones with more lyrical voices active in Germany and Austria during the period between the outbreak of WW1 in 1914 and the end of WW2 in 1945. Among them were Joseph Schwarz, Heinrich Schlusnus, Herbert Janssen, Willi Domgraf-Fassbaender, Karl Schmidt-Walter and Gerhard Hüsch. Their abundant inter-war Italian counterparts included, among others, Carlo Galeffi, Giuseppe Danise, Enrico Molinari, Umberto Urbano, Cesare Formichi, Luigi Montesanto, Apollo Granforte, Benvenuto Franci, Renato Zanelli (who switched to tenor roles in 1924), Mario Basiola, Giovanni Inghilleri, Carlo Morelli (the Chilean-born younger brother of Renato Zanelli) and Carlo Tagliabue. (The last named baritone retired in 1958.)
One of the best known Italian Verdi baritones of the 1920s and 1930s, Mariano Stabile, sang Iago and Rigoletto and Falstaff (at La Scala) under the baton of Arturo Toscanini. Stabile also appeared in London, Chicago and Salzburg. He was noted more for his histrionic skills than for his voice, however. Stabile was followed by Tito Gobbi - a versatile singing-actor capable of unforgettable comic and tragic performances during the years of his prime in the 1940s, '50s and early '60s. He learned more than 100 roles in his lifetime and was mostly known for his roles in Verdi and Puccini operas, including appearances as Scarpia opposite soprano Maria Callas as Tosca at Covent Garden.
Gobbi's competitors included Gino Bechi, Giuseppe Valdengo, Paolo Silveri, Giuseppe Taddei, Ettore Bastianini and Giangiacomo Guelfi. Another of Gobbi's contemporaries was the Welshman Geraint Evans, who famously sang Falstaff at Glyndebourne and created the roles of Mr. Flint and Mountjoy in works by Benjamin Britten. Some considered his best role to have been Wozzeck. The next significant Welsh baritone was Bryn Terfel, who made his premiere at Glyndebourne in 1990 and has gone on to build an international career as Falstaff and, more generally, in the operas of Mozart and Wagner.
An outstanding group of virile-voiced American baritones appeared in the 1920s. This group were still active down into the 1960s. Outstanding among its members were the Met-based Verdians Lawrence Tibbett (a compelling singing-actor), Richard Bonelli, John Charles Thomas, Leonard Warren and Robert Merrill. They were exponents of French opera, too - as was the Paris-based American baritone of the 1920s and '30s, Arthur Endreze.
Also to be found singing Verdi roles at the Met, Covent Garden and the Vienna Opera during the late 1930s and the 1940s was the large-voiced Hungarian baritone, Sandor (Alexander) Sved.
The leading Italian Verdi baritones of the 1970s and 1980s were Italy's Renato Bruson and Piero Cappuccilli, America's Sherill Milnes and Sweden's Ingvar Wixell. At the same time, Britain's Sir Thomas Allen was considered to be the most versatile baritone of his generation in regards to repertoire, which ranged from Mozart to Verdi, through French and Russian opera, to modern English music. Another British baritone, Norman Bailey, established himself internationally as a memorable Wotan and Hans Sachs. He had, however, a distinguished if lighter-voiced Wagnerian rival during the 1960s and 1970s in the person of Thomas Stewart of America. Other notable post-War Wagnerian baritones have been Canada's George London, Germany's Hermann Uhde and, more recently, America's James Morris.
Among the late 20th century baritones noted throughout the opera world for their Verdi performances was Vladimir Chernov, who emerged from the former USSR to sing at the Met. Chernov followed in the footsteps of such richly endowed East European baritones as Ippolit Pryanishnikov (a favorite of Tchaikovski's), Joachim Tartakov, Oskar Kamionsky (called the "Russian Battistini"), Waclaw Brzezinski (called the "Polish Battistini"), Georgy Baklanov and, during a career lasting from 1935 to 1966, the Bolshoi's Pavel Lisitsian. Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Sergei Leiferkus are two other first-rate Russian baritones of the modern era who appear in the West. They sing Verdi and the works of their native composers, including Tchaikovsky (Eugene Onegin, The Queen of Spades).
In the realm of French song, the bass-baritone José van Dam and the lighter-voiced Gérard Souzay have been notable. Souzay's repertoire extended from the Baroque works of Jean-Baptiste Lully to 20th century composers such as Francis Poulenc. Pierre Bernac, Souzay's teacher, was an interpreter of Poulenc's songs in the previous generation. Older baritones identified with this style include France's Dinh Gilly and Charles Panzera and Australia's John Brownlee. Another Australian, Peter Dawson, made a small but precious legacy of benchmark Handel recordings during the 1920s and 1930s. (Dawson, incidentally, acquired his outstanding Handelian technique from Sir Charles Santley.) Yet another Australian baritone of distinction between the wars was Harold Williams, who was based in the United Kingdom. Important British-born baritones of the 1930s and 1940s were Dennis Noble, who sang Italian and English operatic roles, and the Mozartian Roy Henderson. Both appeared often at Covent Garden.
Prior to World War 2, Germany's Heinrich Schlusnus, Gerhard Hüsch and Herbert Janssen were celebrated for their beautifully sung lieder recitals as well as for their mellifluous operatic performances in Verdi, Mozart and Wagner respectively. After the war's conclusion, Hermann Prey and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau appeared on the scene to take their place. In addition to his interpretations of lieder and the works of Mozart, Prey sang in Strauss operas and tackled lighter Wagner roles such as Wolfram. Fischer-Dieskau sang parts in 'fringe' operas by the likes of Ferruccio Busoni and Paul Hindemith as well as appearing in standard works by Verdi and Wagner. He earned his principal renown, however, as a lieder singer. Talented German and Austrian lieder singers of a younger generation include Olaf Bär, Matthias Goerne, Wolfgang Holzmair (who also performs regularly in opera), Thomas Quasthoff, Stephan Genz and Christian Gerhaher. Well-known non-Germanic baritones of recent times have included the Italians Giorgio Zancanaro and Leo Nucci, the Frenchman François le Roux, the Canadian Gerald Finley and the versatile American Thomas Hampson, his compatriot Nathan Gunn and the British Simon Keenlyside.
Classification
Bariton/Baryton-Martin
- Common Range: From the low C to the Ab above middle C (C3 to A4)
- Description: The Baryton-Martin lacks the lower G2-B2 range a heavier baritone is capable of. Has a lighter, almost tenor-like quality. Generally seen only in French repertoire, this fach was named after the French singer Jean-Blaise Martin. Associated with the rise of the baritone in the 19th century, Martin was well known for his fondness for falsetto singing, and the designation 'Baryton Martin' has been used (Faure, 1886) to separate his voice from the 'Verdi Baritone', which carried the chest register further into the upper range.
Bel Canto (coloratura) baritone
- Common Range: From the B below low C to the G above middle C (B2 to G4)
- Description: The sound is more or less the same as the lyric baritone voice, but must be considerably agile to sing fioritura and coloratura passages. They are usually the comic relief in Bel Canto operas.
- Roles:
Note: Its ambitus is greater than the lyric baritone's.
Lyric baritone
- Common Range: From the B below low C to the G above middle C (B2 to G4).
- Description: A sweeter, milder sounding baritone voice, lacking in harshness; lighter and perhaps mellower than the dramatic baritone with a higher tessitura. It is typically assigned to comic roles.
The kavalierbariton
- Common Range: From the A below low C to the G above middle C (A2 to G4).
- Description: A metallic voice, that can sing both lyric and dramatic phrases, a manly noble baritonal color, with good looks. Not quite as powerful as the Verdi baritone who is expected to have a powerful appearance on stage, perhaps muscular or physically large.
Verdi baritone
- Common Range: From the A below low C to the G above middle C (A2 to G4).
- Description: A more specialized voice category, Verdi baritone refers to a voice capable of singing consistently and with ease in the highest part of the baritone range, sometimes extend it up to the C above middle C.
- Roles:
- Amonasro, Aida
- Carlo, Ernani
- Conte di Luna, Il trovatore
- Don Carlo di Vargas, La forza del destino
- Falstaff, Falstaff
- Ford Falstaff
- Germont, La traviata
- Macbeth, Macbeth
- Renato, Un ballo in maschera
- Rigoletto, Rigoletto
- Rodrigo, Don Carlos
- Simon Boccanegra, Simon Boccanegra
Dramatic baritone
- Common Range: From the F half an octave below low C to the F above middle C (F2 to F4).
- Description: A voice that is richer and fuller than a lyric baritone and with a darker quality. This category corresponds roughly to the Heldenbariton in the German fach system except the Verdi baritones have been separated. Roles for this voice are also called bass-baritone and are typically dramatic in their tone. Roles such as these tend not to have a slightly lower tessitura than typical Verdi baritone roles, only rising above an F at the moments of greatest intensity. Many of the Puccini roles fall into this category.
Lyric Low Baritone/Lyric Bass-baritone
- Some bass-baritones are baritones, like Friedrich Schorr, George London, James Morris and Bryn Terfel. The following are more often done by lower baritones as opposed to high basses.
- Roles:
- Singer:
Dramatic Bass-baritone/Low Baritone
Baryton-noble
- Description: French for noble baritone and describes a part that requires a noble bearing, smooth vocalisation and forceful declamation, all in perfect balance. This category originated in the Paris Opéra, but it greatly influenced Verdi (Don Carlo in Ernani and La forza del destino; Count Luna in Il trovatore; Simon Boccanegra) and Wagner as well (Wotan; Amfortas).
Baritone roles in opera
- Alfio, Cavalleria rusticana
- Don Alfonso, Così fan tutte
- Dr. Malatesta, Don Pasquale
- Dr. P., The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat
- Enrico Ashton, Lucia di Lammermoor
- Ernesto, Il pirata
- Escamillo, Carmen
- Ford, The Merry Wives of Windsor
- Francisco Goya, Facing Goya
- Gérard, Andrea Chénier
- Guglielmo Tell, Guglielmo Tell
- Horace Tabor, The Ballad of Baby Doe
- Jack Rance, La fanciulla del West
- Lescaut, Manon Lescaut
- Leporello, Don Giovanni
- Scarpia, Tosca
- Sharpless, Madama Butterfly
- Simon, Simon Boccanegra
- Valentin, Faust
- Wolfram von Eschenbach, Tannhäuser
- Wozzeck, Wozzeck
Baritone voices in non-operatic music
In barbershop music, the baritone part sings in a similar but somewhat lower range to the lead (singing the melody), but has a specific and specialized role in the formation of the four-part harmony that characterizes the style. Because barbershop singers can also be female, there is consequently such a singer (at least in barbershop singing) as a female baritone.
The baritone singer is often the one required to support or "fill" the bass sound (typically by singing the fifth above the bass root). On the other hand, the baritone will occasionally find himself harmonizing above the melody, which calls for a tenor-like quality.
In bluegrass music, the melody line is called the lead. Tenor is sung an interval of a third above the lead. Baritone is the fifth of the scale that has the lead as a tonic, and may be sung below the lead, or even above the lead (and the tenor), in which case it is called "high baritone". Conversely, the more "soul" baritones have the more traditional timbre, but sing in a vocal range that is closer to the tenor vocal range. Some of these singers include Tom Jones, Michael McDonald, Rick Astley, Paul Williams from The Temptations, and Levi Stubbs of the Four Tops. There is also a form of alternative rock baritone who combines screaming with full voiced vocals to create a mixed voice sound. This type of baritone includes Corey Taylor, Phil Anselmo, and Charlie Simpson.
Non-operatic baritones include:
Actors/Entertainers Who Are Baritones:
See also
Further sources
- Faure, Jean-Baptiste (1886) La voix et le chant: traité pratique, Heugel, published in English translation as The Voice and Singing (Francis Keeping and Roberta Prada, translators), Vox Mentor, 2005.
- Matheopoulos, H. (1989) Bravo - The World's Great Male Singers Discuss Their Roles, Victor Gollancz Ltd.
- Bruder, Harold, Liner Notes, Maurice Renaud: The Complete Gramophone Recordings 1901-1908, , 1997. (Discusses Renaud and many of his baritone contemporaries as well the stylistic change in operatic singing at the turn of the 20th century.) Retrieved 4 March 2008.
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