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Richard Wagner In many translations there has neither been a poetic nor a music mind at work. They are simply carried out by people who know nothing about poetry or music [...] and therefore they translate the texts in the same way they would translate an article from the newspaper or a commercial text. Riccardo Muti Mozart – and here I'm only speaking about his Italian works – took his tempi from the natural flow of speech. If one does not understand the manifold meanings of the single words, there will inevitably be faster or slower tempi. [...] The tempo - by the way, this also applies to Verdi, who had the score of Don Giovanni on his piano for his entire life - is dictated by the language. |
Nicolai Gedda A profound knowledge of the language of the opera we sing is very important, not only for us to understand what we are singing, but especially because the music style has much to do with the characteristics of that specific language and by pronouncing the language correctly half of the musical problem is already solved. [...] Whoever does not know the language and therefore sings with a foreign accent does not sound “right” and the result will never be satisfying. [...] To get rid of an accent in singing is easier than when speaking. You have to work on each vowel, on each consonant, on each syllable and try to pronounce everything as perfectly as possible. This type of perfection, this singing "correctly" is an essential stylistic part of each opera. |