Latest / Q & A, Hosted by Jay Nordlinger / Countertenor

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Countertenor · Q & A, Hosted by Jay Nordlinger

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SPEAKER_01: Hello, everyone, and welcome to Q&A.
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SPEAKER_01: I'm Jay Nordlinger,
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coming to you once more from the Salzburg Festival in the heart
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of Austria,
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SPEAKER_01: which is in the heart of Europe.
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SPEAKER_01: Our guest today is Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen, a singer, a countertenor.
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SPEAKER_01: He's an American performing here at the festival.
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SPEAKER_01: And he tells me about his first name, which is A-R-Y-E-H.
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SPEAKER_01: Think of three letters, R-E-A, R-E-A.
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SPEAKER_01: Aryeh, A-R-Y-E-H, Nussbaum Cohen.
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And his last name is really not Cohen,
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that's his last last name,
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but Nussbaum Cohen.
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SPEAKER_01: So great to see you, Aryeh, and thank you so much for joining us today.
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SPEAKER_02: Thanks so much for having me, Jake.
0:46
SPEAKER_02: Glad to be with you.
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SPEAKER_01: So here is a basic question 101.
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SPEAKER_01: You've probably been asked it a lot, so thank you for bearing with me.
0:56
SPEAKER_01: What's a countertenor?
0:58
SPEAKER_01: In courtroom dramas,
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SPEAKER_01: they say,
1:00
SPEAKER_01: in your own words,
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SPEAKER_01: they say,
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SPEAKER_01: in your own words,
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SPEAKER_01: sir,
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SPEAKER_01: in your own words,
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SPEAKER_01: what is a countertenor?
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SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
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SPEAKER_02: So a countertenor is,
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SPEAKER_02: in classical music,
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SPEAKER_02: still a bit of a rarity,
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SPEAKER_02: but in pop music,
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SPEAKER_02: it's something we're completely used to.
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SPEAKER_02: It's just a man singing...
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SPEAKER_02: in the vocal range we traditionally associate with a woman,
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SPEAKER_02: in a high range,
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SPEAKER_02: in what's sometimes called falsetto.
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SPEAKER_02: That's a term people might be familiar with.
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So in pop music,
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you're used to hearing,
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you know,
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the Bee Gees or Michael Jackson.
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I mean,
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truly,
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you name any male pop star and he's,
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you know,
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he's singing high like that.
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SPEAKER_02: You know, pretty much everyone is.
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But in the opera world,
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in classical music,
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it's still this very sort of jewel.
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SPEAKER_02: It's this unique jewel that folks don't hear every day.
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SPEAKER_02: but that has become more and more refined with the years.
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And we're really in this sort of golden age of the countertenor
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that's on great
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SPEAKER_02: display here this summer in Salzburg.
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SPEAKER_01: Yes.
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And not to get too much into musicology,
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but what is the word counter doing before tenor?
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SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's a fair question.
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SPEAKER_02: I think the idea is that the range is sort of counter to a tenor.
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It would make more sense probably as a counter bass or
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something like that if we're
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SPEAKER_02: thinking about it being in opposition,
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SPEAKER_02: sort of.
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SPEAKER_02: Although we love our bass colleagues, we love our tenor colleagues.
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SPEAKER_02: But I think it probably comes from church music maybe and counterpoint,
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SPEAKER_02: this sort of idea of where the line sits.
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SPEAKER_02: But frankly, I don't know the exact origin of the term.
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SPEAKER_02: The voice type itself only reemerged about 80 years ago.
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SPEAKER_02: So I wonder almost if that first countertenor,
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SPEAKER_02: modern countertenor,
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SPEAKER_02: Alfred Deller,
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SPEAKER_02: who knows,
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SPEAKER_02: maybe he had some part in renaming the voice type.
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SPEAKER_01: You used the word falsetto a minute ago.
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SPEAKER_01: Does that word have a negative connotation?
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SPEAKER_01: Is it pejorative in any way or is it kosher, so to speak?
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SPEAKER_02: I would say it's kosher.
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SPEAKER_02: And as a Nussbaum Cohen, I think I can be a judge of kashrut, of kosher.
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SPEAKER_02: But yeah,
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SPEAKER_02: it's interesting because what it means in Italian,
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SPEAKER_02: it translates literally as false little voice.
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SPEAKER_02: And so originally,
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I would say that's really what you heard when you heard someone
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who was a quote
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SPEAKER_02: unquote countertenor.
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SPEAKER_02: But nowadays, we have, you know, frankly, just with
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SPEAKER_02: more time, more acceptance, better training.
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Now you have all sorts of countertenors who are singing not
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with false little
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SPEAKER_02: voices,
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SPEAKER_02: but also big grand operatic voices that can fill a major opera house.
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SPEAKER_02: So the term falsetto, I would say it doesn't perfectly capture the sound
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uh that a singer like myself today can create but it's
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certainly not pejorative i
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mean it's not a negative uh it's the false bit that sort of
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yeah yeah exactly it's
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not false it's true it's true exactly well and and and you
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might consider it false
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because in most cases right it's not the most quote-unquote
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natural voice right if
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SPEAKER_02: you think about as a you know as a
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biological male singing up in this woman traditional female
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register is not the
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SPEAKER_02: most natural thing.
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SPEAKER_02: But in a case like mine,
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SPEAKER_02: actually,
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it does feel like the most natural thing because it's the only
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voice I've ever sung
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SPEAKER_02: with.
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SPEAKER_01: I was going to ask you if you had another singing voice.
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SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so I really don't.
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SPEAKER_02: Sort of a spare.
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SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
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SPEAKER_02: Plan B, so to speak.
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When I say I'm a world-class countertenor and a truly atrocious
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baritone or tenor,
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SPEAKER_02: because I've never trained that voice,
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SPEAKER_02: most countertenors did sort of study as a baritone.
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SPEAKER_02: It's usually a baritone as the sort of correlation.
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SPEAKER_01: Isn't that interesting?
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SPEAKER_01: It is interesting.
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SPEAKER_01: It's not tenor to countertenor.
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SPEAKER_02: No, it's baritone to countertenor usually.
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SPEAKER_01: I'll be damned.
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SPEAKER_02: And frankly, I don't even really know what I would be because...
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SPEAKER_02: I sang in children's choir in New York.
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SPEAKER_02: I grew up in Brooklyn,
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SPEAKER_02: and I went to a small Jewish day school,
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and my parents were looking for a choir to put me in after a
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family friend was
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badgering them that they needed to do something with my voice
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after this American
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SPEAKER_02: Idol-themed birthday party.
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And so my parents said,
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okay,
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sure,
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oh,
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it looks like there's a choir right here.
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SPEAKER_02: And so it's this Brooklyn Youth Chorus.
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SPEAKER_02: Great, let's go in, have you audition, and
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SPEAKER_02: It went very well,
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SPEAKER_02: and they immediately promoted me up to the concert division,
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SPEAKER_02: you know,
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SPEAKER_02: skipped the training division,
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SPEAKER_02: so to speak.
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SPEAKER_02: And we were singing all sorts of amazing concerts.
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We were sort of children's choir of choice when concerts or
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operas would happen at
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SPEAKER_02: Lincoln Center,
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SPEAKER_02: Carnegie Hall,
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SPEAKER_02: and they would need a children's choir in,
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SPEAKER_02: you know,
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SPEAKER_02: Carmen or something like that.
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SPEAKER_02: Let's say an orchestra is doing Carmen in concert at Lincoln Center.
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SPEAKER_02: That would be us.
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SPEAKER_01: Now, hang on.
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SPEAKER_01: We can't gloss over this American Idol birthday party.
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SPEAKER_01: We just can't forget about that.
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SPEAKER_01: It's true.
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SPEAKER_01: So tell me about it.
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SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
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SPEAKER_01: Which birthday was it?
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SPEAKER_02: It was a friend's 10th birthday party.
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SPEAKER_01: Oh, it wasn't your birthday party.
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SPEAKER_01: No, it was not even mine.
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And he hosted an American Idol-themed party,
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which American Idol was the big show at the time.
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SPEAKER_02: And this is some 20-plus years ago.
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SPEAKER_02: It was essentially a glorified karaoke party.
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And,
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you know,
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they rented a karaoke machine for the day,
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and it was American Idol.
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SPEAKER_02: And you sang in A Star Was Born?
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SPEAKER_02: And I sang.
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SPEAKER_02: I wouldn't say A Star Was Born necessarily.
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SPEAKER_02: That came a little later.
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SPEAKER_02: But it was my first start.
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SPEAKER_02: I sang R-E-S-P-E-C-T by Aretha Franklin,
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SPEAKER_02: which was a favorite of mine and a chance to really let her rip,
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SPEAKER_02: you know,
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SPEAKER_02: to show off the pipes.
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SPEAKER_02: Great song.
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And it was my friend Elias,
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and his mom Frances was like,
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that's a voice,
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that's a voice.
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SPEAKER_02: And my parents, I don't come from a traditionally musical family.
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SPEAKER_02: And, you know, they were like, oh, yeah, yeah, whatever, whatever.
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And she sort of badgered my parents at school pickups and
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synagogue until they
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SPEAKER_02: said,
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SPEAKER_02: okay,
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SPEAKER_02: okay,
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SPEAKER_02: we'll put them in a choir.
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SPEAKER_02: And that was kind of the beginning.
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SPEAKER_02: But so then I was in this amazing choir, the Brooklyn Youth Chorus.
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We did all that great classical music,
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which I enjoyed reasonably,
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you know,
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enough.
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SPEAKER_02: But what I really loved was we did a lot of pop music backup.
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SPEAKER_02: And that's the music I grew up with.
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SPEAKER_02: And we were singing backup for
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SPEAKER_02: Billy Joel, Sting, James Taylor, Elton John at Madison Square Garden.
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SPEAKER_02: I mean, you know, I joke.
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SPEAKER_01: You guys sign back up for those people in person, correct?
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SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
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SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
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SPEAKER_02: We were like a children's backup choir that they would hire in New York.
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SPEAKER_02: And I joke now,
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SPEAKER_02: my artistic peak was age 13,
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sold out Madison Square Garden behind Elton John for his 60th
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birthday concert,
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SPEAKER_02: and it was his 60th performance at Elton John,
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SPEAKER_02: at the Garden,
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at that time breaking the record for the most performances in
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the history of the
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SPEAKER_02: Garden,
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SPEAKER_02: a night I will never forget.
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SPEAKER_02: And then did Billy break the record?
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SPEAKER_02: Billy then, exactly.
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SPEAKER_02: Billy then retook his record.
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Elton was breaking Billy's record,
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and then Sir William came back with a vengeance.
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SPEAKER_01: So your chorus was hired, and I have to ask this question.
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SPEAKER_01: Did any of the money trickle down to the members?
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SPEAKER_02: No, except for actually the only case was with Elton John.
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SPEAKER_02: That one concert, you know, the chorus got paid.
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We did our jobs and we were getting this extraordinary musical
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education.
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SPEAKER_02: But when we walked off stage at the end of the concert with Elton John,
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SPEAKER_02: he was a very generous man.
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SPEAKER_02: He was really lovely to us.
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SPEAKER_02: And as we walked off,
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SPEAKER_02: one of his people was handing each of us an envelope with,
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SPEAKER_02: I think it might have been $300 cash.
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SPEAKER_02: which to a 12 year old kid is a huge and with inflation, right?
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SPEAKER_02: That's the equivalent of like five,
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SPEAKER_02: 600 today or something that and an iPod shuffle,
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SPEAKER_02: which was the brand new iPod that had just been released.
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SPEAKER_02: So each of us was given this by Elton's people really lovely.
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SPEAKER_02: But so then my voice dropped like any kid when I'm 12,
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SPEAKER_02: 13 years old and,
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SPEAKER_02: or like any boy,
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SPEAKER_02: I should say.
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SPEAKER_02: And I didn't want to leave this choir.
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I mean,
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I didn't want to give up these,
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you know,
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opportunities to sing at the garden and,
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SPEAKER_02: And Radio City and The Beacon.
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SPEAKER_02: And so I really became kind of an accidental countertenor.
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SPEAKER_02: I didn't know what a countertenor was.
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SPEAKER_02: I had no intention of this being a career.
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SPEAKER_02: I didn't even know it could be a career.
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SPEAKER_02: But I went back to the choir.
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SPEAKER_02: It was a treble choir, right?
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SPEAKER_02: So mostly girls and then boys whose voices hadn't dropped.
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SPEAKER_02: And I said...
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SPEAKER_02: can I still stay in the choir?
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SPEAKER_02: And they had me come in for a little sort of re-audition,
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SPEAKER_02: and I could still finagle and sing those high notes,
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SPEAKER_02: and so they said,
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SPEAKER_02: and I was a very devout chorister,
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SPEAKER_02: I came to every rehearsal,
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SPEAKER_02: you know,
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SPEAKER_02: I was a studious kid,
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SPEAKER_02: and so they let me stay in the choir,
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SPEAKER_02: and that's how my sort of counter-tenor journey began.
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SPEAKER_02: it was really a happy accident.
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SPEAKER_02: And,
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SPEAKER_02: and my voice,
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I think just strengthened over time because every day since my
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voice dropped,
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SPEAKER_02: I've been singing in this high voice.
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SPEAKER_02: So it is what feels natural to me when I hear a tune or,
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SPEAKER_02: you know,
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SPEAKER_02: think of a,
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SPEAKER_02: yeah,
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SPEAKER_02: like when I,
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SPEAKER_02: when a tune comes to my mind,
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SPEAKER_02: it comes to mind in that register,
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SPEAKER_02: not in my traditional male register.
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And then I pop it up,
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you know,
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it really,
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that's where my imagination lives.
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SPEAKER_01: um,
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SPEAKER_01: someone in the cast of Julius Caesar here in Salzburg was listed as,
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SPEAKER_01: I think,
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SPEAKER_01: a male soprano.
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SPEAKER_01: That's different from a countertenor then.
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SPEAKER_02: Sort of.
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SPEAKER_02: So there's a,
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SPEAKER_02: yeah,
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SPEAKER_02: there's a,
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SPEAKER_02: um,
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SPEAKER_02: with the,
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SPEAKER_02: the,
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this golden age of the countertenor that I would say we're
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really in right now.
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SPEAKER_02: What makes it so special is that,
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so the countertenor voice only reemerged with Alfred Deller in
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the early sixties,
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SPEAKER_02: 1960s,
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SPEAKER_02: I believe.
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SPEAKER_02: And then, um,
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SPEAKER_02: you know,
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SPEAKER_02: slowly the voice type has broadened,
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SPEAKER_02: but for a long time it was really thought of as a monolith.
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SPEAKER_02: So it was,
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SPEAKER_02: you're a countertenor,
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SPEAKER_02: this is the one type of way you can sing,
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SPEAKER_02: this is the one type of music that fits your voice.
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But if you think about a soprano,
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there are so many different types of sopranos.
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SPEAKER_02: You have spinto and dramatic and lyric and coloratura,
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SPEAKER_02: and you have all these mixture varieties of sopranos.
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SPEAKER_02: So you might be a dramatic coloratura,
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SPEAKER_02: and oh,
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SPEAKER_02: okay,
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SPEAKER_02: great,
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SPEAKER_02: that means queen of the night is great for you.
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SPEAKER_02: Oh, if you're a lyric soprano, Pamina is great for you.
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You know,
10:38
just in one opera,
10:39
you can think of all the different sort of specializations.
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And so we're in a moment now where finally that's really being
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acknowledged among countertenors.
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So I have a voice that fits more in the kind of bread and
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butter mezzo soprano range.
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SPEAKER_02: you know, the sort of big handle heroes, Orfeo by Gluck.
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SPEAKER_02: Those sorts of roles fit right in the heart of my voice.
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But there are other countertenors for whom those roles would
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not fit at all.
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SPEAKER_02: And there are roles that were written for soprano castrati.
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SPEAKER_02: So not to make things more complicated, right, but we have countertenors.
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SPEAKER_02: And back in the Baroque era,
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SPEAKER_02: there were countertenors back then as well,
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SPEAKER_02: but there were also castrati.
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SPEAKER_02: And the great bulk of the repertoire that we sing from back then
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SPEAKER_02: was written for castrated men,
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some of whom had voices that sat in this traditional mezzo
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soprano sort of range,
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SPEAKER_02: but some of whom had very high voices.
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So there were soprano castrati,
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and their voices changed over time,
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of course.
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SPEAKER_02: So there were some castrati who started out singing in a soprano range,
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SPEAKER_02: and then by the end of their career,
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SPEAKER_02: they were singing kind of contralto.
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And so there are now countertenors who will identify as a male
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soprano,
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or there's a term
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sopranist or sopranista you know different variations that sort
11:51
of identify that
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there's someone who is also a man singing in falsetto you know
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singing in this high
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range but even higher right in a way where their voice sits
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higher than mine does
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and so we're just we specialize in different roles just as
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different tenors do
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different mezzo-sopranos and it's really a part of this
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evolution of the voice type
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SPEAKER_01: I have to ask or I'd like to ask you was there some teasing
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among your peers and so on was it difficult i'm lucky i mean
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shockingly no uh
12:22
wonderful i i have colleagues for whom that was really the case
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um who went through
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immense bullying and things like that i went to a small jewish
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school in brooklyn
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you know a class of 15 kids and then i went to the big
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performing arts high school
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in new york laguardia high school of music and art performing
12:39
arts also known as
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SPEAKER_01: the fame school it
12:40
SPEAKER_02: It is indeed.
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SPEAKER_01: After the TV series.
12:42
SPEAKER_01: Yes, exactly.
12:43
SPEAKER_01: Which I think aired long before you were born.
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SPEAKER_01: It's true.
12:46
SPEAKER_01: Oh, movies?
12:47
SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's right.
12:47
SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's right.
12:47
SPEAKER_01: There was a movie.
12:48
SPEAKER_02: And they just did a remake a couple of years ago, and I was a big fan.
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But so LaGuardia is the kind of environment where having an
12:55
unusual talent is cherished.
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SPEAKER_02: Looking back on it, I realized how fortunate I was to go to this school.
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SPEAKER_02: I went there just because I loved singing.
13:05
I had no intention of pursuing music as a career,
13:07
and I can talk about it.
13:08
I mean,
13:09
when I graduated from LaGuardia,
13:11
I didn't even apply to conservatories.
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SPEAKER_02: I just applied to quote-unquote real universities.
13:16
SPEAKER_02: I wanted to go get a public policy degree,
13:18
SPEAKER_02: and I ended up going to Princeton University where I was a pre-law.
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SPEAKER_02: I was in the public policy school thinking of going to law school,
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SPEAKER_02: and then my life took this sharp turn.
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SPEAKER_02: But LaGuardia was a place where,
13:33
SPEAKER_02: you know,
13:33
people would just walk down the halls playing a trombone and
13:36
singing and scatting
13:37
SPEAKER_02: alongside them.
13:37
SPEAKER_02: And you wouldn't bat an eye.
13:39
SPEAKER_02: That was just a normal Tuesday afternoon to LaGuardia.
13:43
SPEAKER_01: At LaGuardia,
13:44
SPEAKER_01: at the fame school,
13:44
SPEAKER_01: as I think of it,
13:46
SPEAKER_01: did you have classmates whose names are known now?
13:49
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely, yeah.
13:50
SPEAKER_02: During my time,
13:51
SPEAKER_02: a couple of very famous actors who you'll have heard of are Ansel Elgort,
13:55
SPEAKER_02: Timothee Chalamet.
13:56
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean, Timothee was the class below me.
13:59
This is who we were watching in the school talent shows and
14:02
competing against to get a slot.
14:04
SPEAKER_02: Holy moly.
14:05
SPEAKER_02: Now some of Hollywood's biggest actors and performers.
14:08
SPEAKER_02: Can he sing Timothee Chalamet?
14:10
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
14:10
SPEAKER_02: Timothy,
14:11
SPEAKER_02: I don't know if,
14:11
SPEAKER_02: well,
14:12
SPEAKER_02: he did just sing recently in the Bob Dylan movie,
14:15
SPEAKER_02: and he did quite a great job.
14:17
SPEAKER_02: Yeah,
14:17
SPEAKER_02: he was in the drama department at LaGuardia,
14:19
SPEAKER_02: so he wasn't in the,
14:20
SPEAKER_02: you know,
14:20
they were very strict about if you were a drama major or a
14:23
voice major or a dance
14:24
SPEAKER_02: major or a,
14:25
SPEAKER_02: you know.
14:26
visual R major you know you had to specialize in your thing but
14:29
the drummer majors
14:30
got a little bit of vocal training and certainly paid off in
14:34
his case and I loved
14:35
to complete a note I watched it on a flight recently actually
14:38
and I really enjoyed
14:40
it I grew up on Dylan and my dad you know I grew up in a not
14:44
traditionally musical
14:45
SPEAKER_02: household but a very you know my dad loved music and he was a big
14:49
SPEAKER_02: Grateful Deadhead, uh, is how he found his way.
14:52
SPEAKER_02: And then,
14:53
SPEAKER_02: um,
14:53
SPEAKER_02: he dragged me when I was a kid along to all,
14:55
SPEAKER_02: you know,
14:55
SPEAKER_02: it'd be a Wednesday night and he was like,
14:56
SPEAKER_02: Hey,
14:56
SPEAKER_02: we're going to see Dylan at the beacon.
14:58
SPEAKER_02: And, you know, 11 year old me was like, I have homework.
15:01
SPEAKER_02: And he's like, ah, it doesn't matter.
15:03
SPEAKER_02: Come on.
15:03
And I'll never forget actually walking out of the beacon and
15:05
just think of this one
15:06
SPEAKER_02: concert with Dylan at the beacon.
15:08
SPEAKER_02: And, uh,
15:10
SPEAKER_02: I had listened to a lot of Dylan's records, of course, in our house.
15:13
SPEAKER_02: But his voice had already deteriorated quite a bit.
15:16
SPEAKER_02: And I walked in and said, Dad, why do you like this?
15:19
SPEAKER_02: He just mumbles.
15:21
SPEAKER_02: And now I look back and I'm like, I'm so glad I got to see Bob Dylan.
15:25
SPEAKER_02: But I didn't quite appreciate it at the time.
15:26
SPEAKER_01: So I wouldn't have thought to bring up this issue.
15:29
SPEAKER_01: So I live, let's see, five blocks from the Beacon.
15:32
SPEAKER_01: Been there once.
15:34
SPEAKER_01: And...
15:37
SPEAKER_01: Why does everything have to be so loud?
15:40
SPEAKER_01: Why?
15:40
SPEAKER_01: Why all that amplification?
15:42
It was painful,
15:44
physically painful,
15:45
not just psychically,
15:46
but it hurt and so unnecessary.
15:50
SPEAKER_01: Why are you?
15:52
SPEAKER_01: Broadway is just insanely loud.
15:55
SPEAKER_01: Everyone sings with a stick next to his mouth.
15:57
SPEAKER_01: So I'm a harrumphing old man complaining about the state of the world.
16:01
SPEAKER_02: I'll complain about the same thing.
16:02
SPEAKER_02: And for me, it's also in restaurants.
16:04
SPEAKER_02: We're in this age of such volume.
16:07
And the number of restaurants where I love the food,
16:10
I love the atmosphere,
16:11
it's gorgeous.
16:11
SPEAKER_02: They pulverize you.
16:13
Exactly where there's just no thought of the acoustic design of
16:16
the space and
16:16
SPEAKER_02: they'll create an all marble and...
16:18
glass space and then blast music and i'm literally screaming to
16:22
have a conversation
16:23
which for many people doesn't really matter but in our field
16:27
where we're singing
16:28
unamplified in very large spaces uh we have to take care of our
16:32
voices so i uh i
16:34
have to be mindful actually i mean it's one of the sacrifices
16:36
you make is not going
16:38
to those spaces where you have to scream to have a conversation
16:40
um so i lament it
16:42
SPEAKER_02: as well
16:43
SPEAKER_01: So let's go back to college.
16:45
I'm guessing that they didn't admit you to Princeton because
16:48
you could sing.
16:49
SPEAKER_01: They admitted you because you were a brainy kid.
16:51
SPEAKER_01: Correct.
16:52
SPEAKER_01: A bookish kid, brainy kid, and a good scholar.
16:57
SPEAKER_01: You majored in history.
16:59
SPEAKER_01: Did you think about becoming, you said lawyer.
17:01
I was going to ask if you ever thought about becoming an
17:04
academic,
17:05
a prof.
17:05
No,
17:06
so I started as a public policy major,
17:08
and I wanted to go into politics.
17:10
SPEAKER_02: I came of age in the sort of Obama era of hope in American politics,
17:16
and it was really a kind of revolution in American politics
17:18
that inspired me
17:19
SPEAKER_02: profoundly.
17:21
SPEAKER_02: And starting when I was – yes, his campaign started.
17:24
SPEAKER_02: His first campaign was when I was –
17:27
SPEAKER_02: Started when I was 12, 12, 13.
17:28
SPEAKER_02: And yeah, 11, 12.
17:29
And I started volunteering on his campaign and started
17:33
volunteering for local
17:35
SPEAKER_02: candidates for city council whose values aligned with mine.
17:37
SPEAKER_02: And I was really inspired.
17:40
SPEAKER_02: And so I went off to Princeton exactly as a brainy kid.
17:43
SPEAKER_02: And then the end of my freshman year,
17:46
SPEAKER_02: I had this experience that truly changed my life.
17:49
I joined the choir when I went to Princeton because I had
17:52
always enjoyed singing in choirs.
17:53
SPEAKER_02: I had gone to LaGuardia singing in choirs, enjoying it.
17:57
SPEAKER_02: And so I was in the music building for choir rehearsal three days a week,
18:01
SPEAKER_02: you know,
18:02
SPEAKER_02: or two days a week,
18:02
SPEAKER_02: whatever it was,
18:03
SPEAKER_02: Tuesdays and Thursdays,
18:04
SPEAKER_02: let's say at 4.30.
18:06
SPEAKER_02: And every other Thursday or something like that,
18:08
SPEAKER_02: they had a raffle for free tickets to see an opera.
18:13
And someone had generously donated a subscription sitting on
18:16
the grand tier,
18:17
SPEAKER_02: front of the grand tier.
18:18
SPEAKER_02: Great seats.
18:19
SPEAKER_02: Really the best, you know, almost the best seats in the house at the Met.
18:22
SPEAKER_02: And they had a subscription for 12 or 14 operas over the year.
18:26
SPEAKER_02: And you could,
18:27
SPEAKER_02: in the lobby of the music building,
18:28
SPEAKER_02: whatever,
18:28
SPEAKER_02: you put your name in a little bowl and they draw who wins.
18:31
SPEAKER_02: And so I just started entering.
18:32
SPEAKER_02: I thought, oh, it'd be fun to go to an opera.
18:34
I went to high school directly behind the Metropolitan Opera
18:36
and I never stepped
18:37
SPEAKER_02: foot inside there.
18:38
SPEAKER_02: It'd be interesting to go.
18:40
SPEAKER_02: And so I had just started entering and finally I won,
18:42
SPEAKER_02: I think it must have been the last draw of my freshman year,
18:45
SPEAKER_02: very end of the year.
18:47
SPEAKER_02: And it was for this opera called La Boheme, something like that.
18:50
SPEAKER_02: Oh, yes.
18:50
SPEAKER_02: La Boheme.
18:51
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
18:52
SPEAKER_02: And, you know, I knew nothing of opera.
18:54
SPEAKER_02: I was entering also for,
18:56
SPEAKER_02: you know,
18:57
SPEAKER_02: Arabella and all sorts of other pieces that might be less good,
19:01
SPEAKER_02: but not as great a first opera,
19:03
SPEAKER_01: not a story.
19:03
SPEAKER_01: That was a great first.
19:04
SPEAKER_01: You're right.
19:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
19:05
And especially the Met production,
19:07
which is this,
19:08
you know,
19:08
very famous Zeffirelli production.
19:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's.
19:11
SPEAKER_01: Of course, I've said that for the last 20 years, and it's still going.
19:13
SPEAKER_01: It's still there.
19:14
SPEAKER_01: Thank God.
19:14
SPEAKER_02: And I've now taken— And the Turandot is still there.
19:16
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
19:17
SPEAKER_01: They'll both come eventually.
19:19
SPEAKER_02: Oh, I hope not.
19:19
SPEAKER_02: Don't say it.
19:20
SPEAKER_02: It's a sad thought.
19:22
And I've now taken probably 20 friends and family to the Boat
19:25
at the Met as their first opera.
19:26
SPEAKER_01: A colleague of mine once said about the Turandot,
19:28
SPEAKER_01: and he said this with some bitterness or at least resentment—
19:31
SPEAKER_01: It's critic proof.
19:32
SPEAKER_01: I'm so glad it's critic proof.
19:35
SPEAKER_02: It's a great production.
19:35
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
19:37
SPEAKER_02: But so I went to the opera and I really had an aha moment.
19:40
SPEAKER_02: I say no.
19:41
SPEAKER_02: I was a performer in search of his audience.
19:43
SPEAKER_02: I had loved singing in choirs.
19:45
SPEAKER_02: I was a very theatrical kid.
19:47
SPEAKER_02: I mean, in our house, I was putting on little shows all the time.
19:50
SPEAKER_02: Unshy.
19:51
SPEAKER_02: Unshy to say the absolute very least.
19:54
SPEAKER_01: You proved at the karaoke party.
19:58
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
19:58
SPEAKER_02: True to form.
19:59
SPEAKER_02: And I had also done a little bit of singing in synagogue.
20:02
SPEAKER_02: So I started a couple of years after I started in the children's choir,
20:05
SPEAKER_02: I started singing as a cantor.
20:07
SPEAKER_02: And that was my first real solo singing.
20:09
SPEAKER_02: And so that's where I
20:10
SPEAKER_02: started to find my voice.
20:11
SPEAKER_02: But again, I had no intention.
20:14
SPEAKER_02: I didn't know it could be a career.
20:16
SPEAKER_02: Here I was at Princeton,
20:18
SPEAKER_02: making every Jewish parent proud,
20:20
SPEAKER_02: first in my family to go to an Ivy League school.
20:22
I don't come from a college-y family,
20:25
you know,
20:25
the way many kids at a school like Princeton do.
20:28
SPEAKER_02: You know, I was the furthest thing from a legacy.
20:30
My dad didn't go to college and my mom went to three schools in
20:33
four years.
20:34
SPEAKER_02: And then I went and saw this opera and I just,
20:39
It was the sort of larger-than-life emotions that were being
20:42
portrayed in such a
20:43
SPEAKER_02: powerful way on stage,
20:44
SPEAKER_02: and I just knew that was what I was meant to do.
20:47
SPEAKER_02: That was what my life was leading towards, in a way.
20:54
SPEAKER_02: And so I went back to Princeton,
20:56
SPEAKER_02: and I changed from public policy to history,
20:59
SPEAKER_02: thinking,
20:59
SPEAKER_02: you know,
20:59
SPEAKER_02: I could major in music here,
21:01
SPEAKER_02: but you can't major in voice,
21:03
SPEAKER_02: so it would be a very different kind of music degree,
21:06
SPEAKER_02: and I just decided...
21:08
SPEAKER_02: To use the resources of this great university,
21:10
history is an amazing department where I can study the history
21:13
behind the music
21:14
SPEAKER_02: that I want to sing.
21:16
SPEAKER_02: And so that's what I did.
21:17
SPEAKER_02: So I studied 17th and 18th century European musical history, essentially.
21:22
SPEAKER_02: And at Princeton, they're very proud to...
21:27
really encourage independent research among students to sort of
21:30
help you think
21:31
SPEAKER_02: about whether you would ever want to be a professor or not,
21:33
SPEAKER_02: whether you would want to go into academia.
21:35
SPEAKER_02: So you do,
21:36
SPEAKER_02: in addition to your coursework,
21:37
SPEAKER_02: you do two large junior papers,
21:39
SPEAKER_02: which are like big independent research papers.
21:42
SPEAKER_02: And then everyone has to write a senior thesis.
21:44
And so I started doing sort of music related things for my
21:47
junior papers and my thesis.
21:49
And one of my junior papers was the history of the castrati as
21:53
I started to get
21:53
SPEAKER_02: interested in,
21:54
SPEAKER_02: oh,
21:54
SPEAKER_02: what's a countertenor?
21:55
SPEAKER_02: What is this whole thing?
21:56
SPEAKER_02: And my senior thesis was about,
21:59
it started sort of diving deeper into the castrati and it ended
22:01
up evolving into a
22:04
SPEAKER_02: study of musical tradition in the Catholic church.
22:06
SPEAKER_02: So looking at Gregorian chant,
22:08
SPEAKER_02: the castrati,
22:09
SPEAKER_02: looking at these sort of invented musical traditions and
22:12
SPEAKER_02: Um,
22:13
the jumping off point was just being shocked that actually the
22:15
last castrato died
22:16
SPEAKER_02: in the 1920s,
22:18
SPEAKER_02: long after you might have thought.
22:20
SPEAKER_01: We have a recording, don't we?
22:21
SPEAKER_01: We do.
22:22
SPEAKER_02: We have this one very scratchy recording.
22:23
SPEAKER_01: From the Vatican?
22:24
SPEAKER_02: From the Vatican of Alessandro Moreschi.
22:26
SPEAKER_02: And part of why I chose my topics as well,
22:29
SPEAKER_02: I shaped my research projects,
22:31
SPEAKER_02: this is how I knew I was meant to be in this career,
22:33
SPEAKER_02: around the cities I wanted to travel to.
22:36
SPEAKER_02: So I figured,
22:36
SPEAKER_02: oh,
22:37
SPEAKER_02: if I do this,
22:38
SPEAKER_02: oh,
22:38
SPEAKER_02: if I do this for my thesis,
22:39
SPEAKER_02: I can get funding to spend three weeks in Rome.
22:42
SPEAKER_02: oh, that's what I want to do.
22:43
SPEAKER_02: And so that's what I did.
22:44
SPEAKER_02: So I had an ID to get backstage,
22:47
SPEAKER_02: you know,
22:47
SPEAKER_02: behind backstage,
22:49
SPEAKER_02: you know,
22:50
SPEAKER_02: whatever,
22:50
SPEAKER_02: sort of behind the gates of the Vatican.
22:52
And I did research in the private libraries and archives of the
22:55
Vatican for a few
22:56
weeks and wrote a Vespa around Rome and just kind of had the
22:59
time of my life.
23:01
To get kind of down and dirty and icky,
23:05
were these men,
23:05
were they castrated against their will?
23:08
SPEAKER_02: It's hard to say because they were castrated at such a young age.
23:10
SPEAKER_02: So can a seven or eight or nine-year-old boy really give consent?
23:15
SPEAKER_02: No.
23:15
SPEAKER_02: I would say no.
23:15
SPEAKER_02: So in that sense, yeah, they were being castrated against their will.
23:19
SPEAKER_01: Back to something nicer.
23:20
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
23:21
SPEAKER_01: Cantor singing.
23:22
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
23:24
SPEAKER_01: You follow a tradition of Richard Tucker.
23:29
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
23:29
SPEAKER_02: Jan Pierce.
23:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
23:32
SPEAKER_01: Let me quiz you.
23:32
SPEAKER_01: What was Richard Tucker's original name?
23:35
SPEAKER_02: Oh, that's a great question.
23:37
SPEAKER_02: I don't remember.
23:38
SPEAKER_01: Ruben Ticker.
23:39
SPEAKER_02: Ruben Ticker.
23:39
SPEAKER_01: I love it.
23:40
SPEAKER_01: Can you do Jan Pierce?
23:41
SPEAKER_02: I know.
23:41
SPEAKER_02: I used to know Jan Pierce's name.
23:43
SPEAKER_02: I used to know his... Pincus Perlman.
23:45
SPEAKER_02: Yes, Pincus Perlman.
23:45
SPEAKER_02: There it is.
23:46
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
23:47
SPEAKER_01: Wonderful cantors, tenors, brothers-in-law.
23:51
SPEAKER_01: Hated each other, of course.
23:52
SPEAKER_01: Despised each other.
23:53
SPEAKER_01: Unfortunately, that'd be an opera itself.
23:55
SPEAKER_01: Yes, exactly.
23:56
SPEAKER_01: But what did your...
23:59
I shouldn't say cantor training,
24:01
because I don't imagine you were trained.
24:02
SPEAKER_01: You probably showed up and did it.
24:04
SPEAKER_01: What did your cantor experience do for you?
24:06
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
24:06
SPEAKER_02: So I was working at this very beautiful,
24:10
old kind of traditional synagogue in Brooklyn called the East
24:12
Midwood Jewish
24:13
SPEAKER_02: Center,
24:14
SPEAKER_02: which if anyone has watched the TV show The Marvelous Mrs.
24:16
SPEAKER_02: Maisel,
24:17
SPEAKER_02: it's the TV show that they film all the synagogue scenes in.
24:20
SPEAKER_02: So when they go to high holidays...
24:22
SPEAKER_02: Excuse me.
24:23
SPEAKER_02: That's where they're going.
24:24
SPEAKER_02: So it's this beautiful kind of grand old space.
24:28
SPEAKER_02: And it was different.
24:28
The synagogue that I grew up in was very much based on communal
24:31
singing and a lot
24:32
SPEAKER_02: less of the cantor chanting.
24:34
SPEAKER_02: But this synagogue was a little more traditional.
24:36
SPEAKER_02: And so I was taught by a cantor, Sam Levine, the musical modes.
24:42
And the Jewish tradition holds these musical modes were sung by
24:45
God at Mount Sinai to Moses.
24:48
SPEAKER_02: Maybe I don't necessarily believe that, but they have...
24:51
SPEAKER_02: You know,
24:52
they've stood the test of time and traveled the world through
24:54
various persecutions
24:55
SPEAKER_02: and through the Holocaust.
24:56
SPEAKER_02: These same exact musical scales have survived.
24:59
And they're musical scales that as soon as you hear them,
25:01
it sounds Jewish to you.
25:03
And so I was taught those scales and which parts of the service
25:06
you apply which ones.
25:07
SPEAKER_02: There's different, it's called Nussach.
25:09
And there's different Nussach for different holidays,
25:11
for different portions.
25:13
SPEAKER_01: That sounded really well pronounced, by the way.
25:15
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
25:17
SPEAKER_02: A few years of practice.
25:19
But it was my task,
25:20
starting when I was 13 years old,
25:21
the first year I did it.
25:22
SPEAKER_02: And I did it for seven years in a row then.
25:24
SPEAKER_02: to take those musical modes,
25:26
take those scales and shape the text to bring out the meaning
25:30
as I best saw fit.
25:32
SPEAKER_02: And I look back now and realize how much I was developing as an artist.
25:36
SPEAKER_02: I had no idea at the time.
25:38
I was just a 13-year-old kid trying to make a couple hundred
25:40
bucks,
25:41
you know.
25:42
But I was really learning how to use my voice to bring meaning
25:44
to the audience.
25:46
SPEAKER_02: And the first year that I did it, I said, okay, I'm a cantor.
25:50
SPEAKER_02: I have to sing like a man.
25:51
SPEAKER_02: So I sang the whole service in my low voice,
25:53
SPEAKER_02: except my one favorite prayer I sang up in my high voice.
25:58
SPEAKER_02: And I had no low voice training, so the low voice was nothing special.
26:01
SPEAKER_02: But I sang one prayer up in that high voice,
26:03
SPEAKER_02: and as soon as the service ended,
26:04
SPEAKER_02: all of the old ladies came up to me.
26:06
SPEAKER_02: Oh, my goodness, what did you do on that one prayer?
26:10
SPEAKER_02: You've got to do more of that.
26:11
SPEAKER_02: And I said, okay.
26:12
SPEAKER_02: And so then I sang the whole rest of the service up high,
26:15
SPEAKER_02: and I became a kind of countertenor cantor.
26:18
SPEAKER_02: Again, just sort of by mistake, no intent behind any of it.
26:22
And who would have thought it would later lead me to the
26:24
Metropolitan Opera and the
26:25
SPEAKER_02: Bayerische Staatsoper München and here at the Salzburg Festival.
26:29
SPEAKER_02: I could have never imagined.
26:31
SPEAKER_01: At Princeton, you won the concerto competition.
26:33
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
26:34
SPEAKER_01: but you don't have a concert or two play.
26:35
SPEAKER_02: Correct.
26:36
SPEAKER_02: What was your music?
26:38
SPEAKER_02: I am a bit of a renegade.
26:42
SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
26:42
So there had been in the past singers who had presented a few
26:45
arias together or a
26:47
SPEAKER_02: vocal major work that you would perform at the symphony orchestra.
26:52
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
26:52
SPEAKER_02: But it hadn't been done in like 17 years or something like that.
26:56
SPEAKER_02: No singers had even entered the competition.
26:57
SPEAKER_02: And I said, well, I'm going to enter the competition.
27:00
SPEAKER_02: And so I,
27:01
put together a couple of arias that had been written for the
27:03
same castrato,
27:05
SPEAKER_02: one of which I knew was Carasposa from Ronaldo,
27:08
which is a role that I'm now going to debut this coming season
27:11
around Europe and
27:12
SPEAKER_02: Asia with the English concert.
27:13
SPEAKER_02: So a long time coming, right?
27:15
SPEAKER_02: I'm very excited for that one.
27:17
SPEAKER_02: But yeah,
27:18
SPEAKER_02: I put together a couple of arias and presented it as a sort of concerto,
27:23
SPEAKER_02: and I won the competition.
27:25
SPEAKER_02: Wonderful.
27:25
SPEAKER_02: And now I'm proud to see every year,
27:28
I think they have now created a sort of vocal division of the
27:30
concerto competition
27:31
SPEAKER_02: at Princeton.
27:32
SPEAKER_02: So every year a singer gets to win and perform with orchestra.
27:36
SPEAKER_02: And I'm sort of proud to see that continuing.
27:38
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but it's better that you won it without a special division.
27:41
SPEAKER_02: It's true.
27:42
SPEAKER_02: I made my own way.
27:43
SPEAKER_02: And that's kind of my story, really, is making my own way.
27:46
SPEAKER_02: So even then, I'll talk a little bit about after Princeton.
27:49
SPEAKER_02: I graduated with my history degree, but aspirations in voice to sing.
27:55
And I applied to a bunch of master's programs thinking I'd get
27:58
a vocal degree,
28:01
SPEAKER_02: a proper music degree.
28:03
SPEAKER_02: And I got into the finals of pretty much everywhere I applied.
28:06
SPEAKER_02: And then I got rejected from everything I had applied to.
28:09
SPEAKER_02: And I was devastated.
28:10
SPEAKER_02: And my parents certainly were devastated.
28:13
SPEAKER_02: How could I have thrown away my Princeton degree?
28:15
SPEAKER_01: Let me interject before.
28:17
SPEAKER_01: I just want to guess, like trying to guess the ending of a show.
28:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
28:21
SPEAKER_01: Was it all to the good?
28:22
SPEAKER_01: Was it for the better that you were rejected?
28:24
SPEAKER_01: Is that going to be the end of the story?
28:26
SPEAKER_02: Shockingly, yes.
28:28
SPEAKER_02: I made my own way.
28:29
SPEAKER_02: So I assembled my own program, really.
28:32
SPEAKER_02: I found a voice teacher who would work with me and different coaches who
28:35
SPEAKER_02: specialized in different repertoire,
28:37
SPEAKER_02: an Alexander technique teacher,
28:38
SPEAKER_02: a music theory teacher who I worked with privately,
28:41
SPEAKER_02: a breath technique teacher.
28:43
So I moved back to New York and I assembled my own master's
28:45
program,
28:45
basically.
28:46
And my plan was to do that sort of intensive work for a couple
28:49
of years and then go
28:50
SPEAKER_02: get a voice degree once I was ready.
28:52
SPEAKER_02: And then the second year of my little internal program,
28:56
SPEAKER_02: I entered the Metropolitan Opera Competition sort of on a whim.
28:58
SPEAKER_02: I said to my teacher, I don't think I'm ready.
29:00
SPEAKER_02: And he said, you know, I think you are.
29:02
SPEAKER_02: And if not, okay, you pay the $20 application fee.
29:05
SPEAKER_02: You get some feedback from some industry professionals.
29:08
SPEAKER_02: Just enter.
29:09
SPEAKER_02: I said, okay.
29:09
So right before the deadline I entered and I was shocked to
29:13
advance through each
29:13
SPEAKER_02: round and then ultimately to win the competition.
29:16
SPEAKER_02: And then the day after the Met Finals, the Met Competition Finals,
29:23
SPEAKER_02: The New York Times prints out the review of the finals by Zachary Wolfe,
29:27
SPEAKER_02: who's classical music editor of the Times.
29:29
SPEAKER_02: And the headline was, Met Opera Discovers a Young Star, colon, R.E.A.
29:35
SPEAKER_02: Nussbaum Cohen.
29:36
SPEAKER_01: Holy mackerel.
29:37
SPEAKER_02: Literally.
29:38
SPEAKER_02: It was beyond anything anyone could ever dream of.
29:41
SPEAKER_02: And the whole review, basically, was about me.
29:44
SPEAKER_02: And I brought tears to his eyes.
29:46
SPEAKER_02: And...
29:47
SPEAKER_02: This, you know, whatever.
29:48
SPEAKER_02: It was all these amazing.
29:49
SPEAKER_02: To hell with graduate school.
29:51
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
29:51
So all of a sudden it did not matter that those programs had
29:54
all rejected me.
29:55
SPEAKER_02: Screw them.
29:56
SPEAKER_02: 15 months earlier.
29:57
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
29:57
SPEAKER_02: Screw them.
29:58
SPEAKER_02: And it was off to the races.
30:01
SPEAKER_02: So that review is framed on my wall, on my mom's wall, my dad's wall.
30:04
SPEAKER_02: Everyone has their review framed.
30:06
SPEAKER_01: And by the way, to be praised by Zachary Wolfe.
30:09
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
30:09
SPEAKER_02: He's a tough critic.
30:11
SPEAKER_01: And a great critic.
30:12
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
30:13
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
30:14
SPEAKER_01: What do I got for you?
30:17
SPEAKER_01: Let's talk some Julius Caesar, the Handel Opera.
30:21
SPEAKER_01: You've done a lot of roles in it, including the title role.
30:25
SPEAKER_02: I say a lot.
30:26
SPEAKER_01: Three, maybe?
30:27
SPEAKER_02: I have performed three, and I covered the fourth that I could.
30:30
So there's four roles a countertenor could do in that opera,
30:32
and I've done them all.
30:33
SPEAKER_01: You know,
30:33
SPEAKER_01: I said the other day,
30:34
SPEAKER_01: wrote the other day,
30:35
SPEAKER_01: because Julius Caesar is being performed here at Salzburg.
30:38
SPEAKER_01: That thing is like one continuous highlights reel.
30:41
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
30:42
SPEAKER_02: It's a hit parade.
30:43
SPEAKER_02: It's one hit after the other.
30:44
SPEAKER_02: It's like Handel's Greatest Hits, but it's all in one opera.
30:47
SPEAKER_01: It's unbelievable.
30:48
SPEAKER_01: They're like 20 of them.
30:50
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
30:51
SPEAKER_01: Arias and duets.
30:53
SPEAKER_01: And it reminded me, I feel the same way about Messiah.
30:57
SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
30:59
You try to do a highlights album or just highlights excerpts
31:02
from Messiah.
31:03
SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
31:04
SPEAKER_01: It could be anything.
31:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, what do you cut?
31:05
SPEAKER_02: It's hard.
31:06
SPEAKER_01: And I also think of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker.
31:08
SPEAKER_01: We're familiar with a certain sweet or maybe two sweets.
31:11
SPEAKER_01: But the things that aren't in the sweet or sweets, they're all great.
31:18
SPEAKER_01: I guess I don't have a question.
31:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
31:20
uh it just must be a privilege to to sing that music absolutely
31:24
and caesar now i
31:25
would say is becoming my if i have a signature role it's that
31:28
i've done it yeah
31:29
i've done it four or five times i'm doing it next season in
31:32
spain the season after
31:33
in asia you know i'm sort of taking it around and uh oh my god
31:37
i love singing it
31:38
it's also just i mean the music is so exceptional but i just
31:42
love what handle does
31:43
SPEAKER_02: with a character like that is
31:45
you get to be the fierce warrior that everyone expects Julius
31:49
Caesar to be with
31:50
SPEAKER_02: lots of machine gun coloratura.
31:52
SPEAKER_02: And I love taking these arias at a tempo, um,
31:56
SPEAKER_02: that conductors sometimes go, really?
31:58
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
31:59
SPEAKER_02: And they're like, oh, wow.
32:00
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
32:00
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you can do it.
32:02
SPEAKER_02: And it really wows the audience.
32:03
SPEAKER_02: And it's fun for me.
32:04
SPEAKER_02: It's thrilling to be right on the edge of what's possible.
32:08
SPEAKER_02: So you get all of that kind of fiery intensity,
32:12
SPEAKER_02: but you also get incredible intimate intensity too.
32:14
SPEAKER_02: And that's just what I love.
32:16
SPEAKER_02: So in the role of Caesar,
32:17
SPEAKER_02: I mean,
32:18
my most favorite moment might be this accompanied recit that he
32:22
sings halfway
32:22
SPEAKER_02: through the first act when he's
32:24
SPEAKER_02: sort of mourning over the urn containing his rival's ashes.
32:28
SPEAKER_02: But it's just, you see such humanity.
32:31
You see such an intimate human,
32:34
sort of tender side of this magnificent warrior.
32:41
the aria Aure de Perpetan,
32:42
the third act,
32:43
when he's sort of washed ashore.
32:45
SPEAKER_01: That's not even one of the more famous ones.
32:47
SPEAKER_01: No, and it's just some of the most beautiful music ever written.
32:50
SPEAKER_01: Even the JV music, so to speak.
32:52
SPEAKER_02: But I just love that you get both sides.
32:54
SPEAKER_02: I mean, in one night, it's a really demanding sing.
32:57
SPEAKER_02: Uncut, I think it's 10 arias that I sing in that role.
33:00
SPEAKER_02: And I did it last summer at Glyndebourne, and we did it basically uncut.
33:04
SPEAKER_02: We did all 10.
33:05
SPEAKER_01: I will not keep from asking a very snarky question.
33:08
SPEAKER_01: You can choose not to answer it.
33:09
Do you ever get to appear in a production of Julius Caesar that
33:12
resembles Handel's opera?
33:14
SPEAKER_02: This was the one.
33:16
SPEAKER_02: Have you seen the David McVicar production?
33:19
SPEAKER_02: I can't remember whether I have.
33:21
SPEAKER_02: It is truly magnificent.
33:23
It's slightly updated,
33:25
but completely...
33:26
Were David Daniels and Stephanie Blythe in it?
33:28
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
33:29
SPEAKER_01: John Nelson conducting?
33:30
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
33:30
SPEAKER_01: I did see.
33:30
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
33:31
And this is the one that I just...
33:33
It has such...
33:35
It's so true to the story.
33:37
SPEAKER_02: It's really focused on telling the story and
33:40
SPEAKER_02: a complaint I might have not just about Julius Caesar,
33:42
SPEAKER_02: but about so many operas,
33:44
SPEAKER_02: just a lot of productions that are done today,
33:46
SPEAKER_02: it often feels like the director has a vision of an image,
33:50
SPEAKER_02: and that's what drives the whole production.
33:52
SPEAKER_01: The way I put it is the director steals the show.
33:54
SPEAKER_02: In a way.
33:55
SPEAKER_02: And we're in the age of the director.
33:57
SPEAKER_02: Steals it from the composer, the librettist.
33:59
But to me,
34:00
the greatest productions,
34:01
the one that we all walk away from performing in,
34:04
And the ones we walk away from seeing in the audience thrilled
34:07
are the ones that
34:08
SPEAKER_02: really focus on telling the story.
34:10
SPEAKER_02: And so that McVicar production of Caesar is completely about that.
34:13
He,
34:14
even though it was a revival at Glyndebourne,
34:15
it's McVicar's favorite production of his.
34:17
SPEAKER_02: And so he says he won't let anyone else put their hands on it.
34:20
SPEAKER_02: So he rehearsed for six weeks with us every day.
34:23
SPEAKER_02: He had a vision for every line, every word of every recitative.
34:28
SPEAKER_02: I mean, just how to bring it alive, how to tell the story so vividly.
34:32
SPEAKER_02: He's a smart guy, isn't he?
34:33
SPEAKER_02: Completely.
34:34
SPEAKER_02: So much energy in the rehearsal room.
34:35
SPEAKER_01: I think he's Sir David, actually.
34:36
SPEAKER_01: He is.
34:37
SPEAKER_02: He's Sir McVicker.
34:38
SPEAKER_02: And for good reason.
34:39
SPEAKER_02: And it's funny, actually, here we are talking about that.
34:42
The only director I have ever worked with who has as much
34:44
energy and vision for
34:46
every minute detail is actually the director this summer in
34:50
Salzburg of Three
34:51
SPEAKER_02: Sisters,
34:52
SPEAKER_02: the opera that I'm here doing.
34:54
SPEAKER_02: So this director, Evgeny Titov, who's a young guy, sort of up-and-comer.
34:58
SPEAKER_02: It's a brilliant production.
35:01
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
35:01
SPEAKER_01: It does something shocking.
35:03
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
35:03
SPEAKER_01: It matches the score.
35:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
35:04
SPEAKER_02: Isn't that weird?
35:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
35:06
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
35:06
He really – it's a play that – so Titov started as an actor in
35:10
the Soviet Union,
35:11
SPEAKER_02: and it's a play he knows intimately about.
35:14
SPEAKER_02: And he had a vision.
35:15
SPEAKER_02: I mean, sometimes the rehearsals.
35:16
SPEAKER_01: This is Chekhov, by the way, y'all.
35:17
SPEAKER_01: Just tell me, audience.
35:18
SPEAKER_02: Yes, exactly.
35:18
SPEAKER_02: Chekhov's Three Sisters adapted into an opera by Peter Etvosh,
35:21
SPEAKER_02: this Hungarian composer who just passed away last year.
35:24
SPEAKER_01: Well-pronounced, are you?
35:26
SPEAKER_02: It's not easy to do all those dots and all those Hungarian stuff.
35:29
SPEAKER_02: It's true.
35:30
I've been working on his music now for a year,
35:32
so I would hope by now I have it mastered.
35:36
But it's a really,
35:37
it's a shocking piece because the play ends with a bit of hope.
35:41
SPEAKER_02: It's the story of these three sisters, this family.
35:43
SPEAKER_02: I play the oldest sister, Olga.
35:45
It's the story of this family who are exiled from Moscow and
35:48
will never make it back.
35:49
SPEAKER_02: And their lives have turned to misery.
35:51
SPEAKER_02: But the play ends with a bit of hope of them saying,
35:53
SPEAKER_02: well,
35:54
SPEAKER_02: we suffer,
35:54
SPEAKER_02: we suffer,
35:55
SPEAKER_02: we suffer,
35:56
SPEAKER_02: but we suffer for a reason.
35:57
SPEAKER_02: Future generations will live better than we do.
36:00
SPEAKER_02: But in the opera,
36:01
SPEAKER_02: he sort of deconstructed the play,
36:04
SPEAKER_02: and you actually start with that epilogue as the prologue.
36:07
SPEAKER_02: So you start with this bit of hope,
36:09
and then it's the family sort of looking back on the events
36:12
that have transpired.
36:14
SPEAKER_02: And you sort of go through the same events from three perspectives
36:19
SPEAKER_02: each of which ends in absolute tragedy.
36:21
SPEAKER_02: So it's a really dark story, but brought darkly to life by the music.
36:28
SPEAKER_02: And Titov had a vision for
36:30
SPEAKER_02: Every inch of this broad,
36:32
SPEAKER_02: grand stage here in Salzburg,
36:34
SPEAKER_02: the Felsenreitschule,
36:36
SPEAKER_02: it's the stage that we Americans know from The Sound of Music,
36:40
SPEAKER_00: right?
36:40
It's the one that the von Trapps are singing Edelweiss on at
36:43
the end at the festival.
36:45
SPEAKER_02: You know,
36:45
SPEAKER_02: the Salzburg Festival now has many theaters around town,
36:48
SPEAKER_02: of course,
36:48
SPEAKER_02: where it's performing.
36:49
SPEAKER_02: But...
36:50
SPEAKER_02: When I found out that's the theater we were in, I was thrilled.
36:53
SPEAKER_02: And it's a really wide space.
36:55
SPEAKER_01: By the way, can I just say, I am so sick.
36:57
For 25 years,
36:58
I've heard Salzburgers say proudly that they've never seen the
37:02
sound of music.
37:03
SPEAKER_01: I know.
37:04
SPEAKER_01: It's a gem.
37:04
SPEAKER_01: Come on.
37:06
SPEAKER_01: Quit beating your breast about it, for God's sakes.
37:08
SPEAKER_01: If you don't want to see it, don't see it.
37:09
SPEAKER_01: But don't brag about not seeing it, for heaven's sakes.
37:11
SPEAKER_01: It's a treasure.
37:12
SPEAKER_01: It's an incredible score.
37:13
SPEAKER_01: It's been a real moneymaker for this city, by the way.
37:15
SPEAKER_01: Lord knows.
37:16
SPEAKER_01: It's been a golden egg.
37:17
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
37:18
SPEAKER_01: The number of Americans and Asian tourists,
37:20
SPEAKER_01: too,
37:20
SPEAKER_01: I think,
37:21
SPEAKER_01: who just come and go right onto a bus tour.
37:23
SPEAKER_01: When I take my walk, and sometimes they ride bikes.
37:25
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
37:26
SPEAKER_01: And you can hear Julie Andrews singing.
37:27
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
37:27
SPEAKER_01: You know, they have some kind of recording.
37:29
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
37:30
SPEAKER_01: And they're all smiling, and it's a beautiful thing.
37:32
SPEAKER_02: And it's just a joyful film.
37:34
SPEAKER_02: I think every Salzburger should watch it as well.
37:37
SPEAKER_02: Or at least be grateful for it.
37:38
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
37:39
SPEAKER_02: And not bitch about it.
37:40
SPEAKER_02: Let's start with that.
37:40
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
37:41
SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
37:41
SPEAKER_02: But so the theater, it's a really wide stage.
37:44
SPEAKER_02: It's about two to three times as wide as a traditional stage.
37:48
SPEAKER_02: It's built into the edge of a mountain.
37:49
SPEAKER_01: In American terms, how many football fields?
37:52
SPEAKER_01: Would you say it's about two?
37:53
SPEAKER_02: It's at least one football field.
37:55
SPEAKER_02: I would say it's probably about a football field.
37:57
SPEAKER_02: About a hundred yards.
37:58
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, probably.
37:59
SPEAKER_01: And much narrower than that.
38:00
SPEAKER_02: And much narrower.
38:00
SPEAKER_02: But think a traditional stage is half that, if that.
38:03
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's a football field and a half.
38:05
SPEAKER_02: It's really wide.
38:05
SPEAKER_01: It's the most horizontal experience you can have.
38:09
SPEAKER_02: And I imagine not every production utilizes the space itself.
38:13
SPEAKER_02: Perfectly.
38:14
SPEAKER_02: Right.
38:14
SPEAKER_02: It's, it's a tough space for a director.
38:15
SPEAKER_02: It's unconventional.
38:17
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
38:17
SPEAKER_02: It's not a proscenium that you're used to using and working with.
38:20
SPEAKER_01: It's like, it's like a Montague production on a strand of spaghetti.
38:23
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
38:23
SPEAKER_02: It was just a long string.
38:25
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
38:26
And Titov had a vision for every inch of the stage in every bar
38:30
of the score.
38:31
SPEAKER_02: I mean,
38:32
the rehearsals sometimes felt a bit laborious because we would
38:35
do the same two
38:36
SPEAKER_02: minutes for a three-hour rehearsal.
38:39
And if one of the actors who's playing a firefighter is
38:42
slightly too far to the
38:43
SPEAKER_02: left,
38:44
SPEAKER_02: stop,
38:45
SPEAKER_02: stop,
38:45
SPEAKER_02: katastrofa!
38:47
And he would stop and say,
38:48
you know,
38:49
Marco,
38:49
Marco,
38:50
a little bit to the right.
38:52
SPEAKER_02: Sorry, he's not Italian.
38:52
SPEAKER_02: He's Russian.
38:55
SPEAKER_02: Close enough.
38:55
SPEAKER_02: He says, Marco, Marco, a little bit to the right.
38:57
SPEAKER_02: And Marco goes a little to the right.
38:58
SPEAKER_02: He says, no, no, no, a little to the left.
39:00
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
39:01
SPEAKER_02: Okay, sisters are right there.
39:02
SPEAKER_02: And then, okay, everyone resume.
39:04
SPEAKER_02: Go back to the beginning.
39:05
And so he had this kind of intense vision and so much energy
39:09
the way that McVicar
39:10
SPEAKER_02: did when I rehearsed Cesare with him.
39:12
SPEAKER_02: And in both cases obviously turned out to be big successes.
39:16
SPEAKER_02: This is an opera that pretty much no one has ever heard of.
39:19
SPEAKER_02: I would say 99% even of opera goers have never heard of Three Sisters.
39:22
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, including me.
39:23
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I didn't know it before I got asked to do it myself.
39:27
SPEAKER_01: I knew him as a conductor.
39:28
SPEAKER_01: He conducted Bluebeard's Castle here.
39:30
SPEAKER_01: Oh, wow.
39:30
SPEAKER_01: Excellent conductor.
39:31
SPEAKER_01: Really?
39:31
SPEAKER_02: He was an all-round musician.
39:33
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
39:34
SPEAKER_02: And he wrote numerous operas.
39:35
SPEAKER_02: This was his first one, and this is the one that's had a life, right?
39:39
SPEAKER_02: This was the one that's been a big success.
39:41
SPEAKER_02: But who would have thought,
39:41
SPEAKER_02: you know,
39:42
SPEAKER_02: a lot of the reviews for the show have said,
39:44
SPEAKER_02: you know,
39:44
SPEAKER_02: this is the hit of the summer.
39:45
SPEAKER_02: This is the best production of the summer.
39:47
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
39:48
SPEAKER_02: I don't think anyone would have predicted that with Three Sisters,
39:50
SPEAKER_02: but it's a really special production,
39:52
SPEAKER_02: and it's a great cast,
39:54
SPEAKER_02: top to bottom.
39:55
It's a big cast,
39:56
and you need strong principles,
39:57
and we're lucky to have it.
40:01
SPEAKER_01: It is the best production of the summer.
40:02
SPEAKER_01: If others want to say that's a low bar, I'll let them say it.
40:06
SPEAKER_01: I'm being a total jerk.
40:09
SPEAKER_01: No, it's wonderful stuff, wonderful stuff.
40:12
SPEAKER_01: Let's talk a little Messiah.
40:13
SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
40:14
I'm going to do something weird,
40:15
which is ask a question I don't know the answer to.
40:18
SPEAKER_01: What are you seeing in Messiah?
40:21
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so I sing the alto solo in Messiah.
40:23
SPEAKER_02: So you start with, but who may abide?
40:26
SPEAKER_02: Oh, thou that tellest good tidings of Zion.
40:29
SPEAKER_02: My favorite aria is, he was despised.
40:31
SPEAKER_02: So you're essentially the mezzo.
40:33
SPEAKER_01: The mezzo, exactly.
40:34
SPEAKER_02: Oh, I see.
40:35
And in Handel's life,
40:36
it was sung by women and men and countertenors as well.
40:39
SPEAKER_01: Oh.
40:40
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
40:40
SPEAKER_01: Do you sing Rejoice or is that the other?
40:42
SPEAKER_02: No, that's Soprano.
40:43
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
40:43
SPEAKER_02: Thankfully, I leave that to her.
40:46
SPEAKER_02: Do you love the music though?
40:48
SPEAKER_02: I do.
40:48
SPEAKER_01: I mean...
40:51
SPEAKER_02: Who couldn't?
40:51
SPEAKER_02: And I'll say now, it's a piece I do pretty much every year.
40:54
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
40:55
SPEAKER_02: Of course.
40:56
SPEAKER_02: And the couple years where I've been in Europe rehearsing an opera,
41:00
SPEAKER_02: so there'll be times where,
41:01
SPEAKER_02: and even like I know this is going to be the case again in two years,
41:05
SPEAKER_02: you know,
41:06
SPEAKER_02: like,
41:06
SPEAKER_02: oh,
41:06
I'm going to be in City X rehearsing a new production of an
41:10
opera so I won't be
41:10
SPEAKER_02: free to go do a Messiah.
41:13
SPEAKER_02: And even I'll ask the company, this just happened.
41:15
SPEAKER_02: Can I be released to go do Messiah with this major orchestra?
41:17
SPEAKER_02: And they say, no, sorry.
41:18
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
41:19
But a year where I don't get to sing Messiah in December,
41:22
I feel incomplete.
41:23
SPEAKER_02: I mean, it's just...
41:24
SPEAKER_02: It has that, it's that good of a piece, right?
41:27
SPEAKER_02: That I could sing a thousand performances of it and sitting on stage,
41:31
SPEAKER_02: listening to all the brilliant choruses and the other solos.
41:34
SPEAKER_02: It's really inspiring.
41:35
SPEAKER_01: You never get tired of it.
41:36
SPEAKER_01: You know, he wrote it so fast.
41:37
SPEAKER_01: So fast.
41:38
SPEAKER_01: And so it just must have been bolts of inspiration.
41:40
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
41:41
SPEAKER_02: And a mastery just pouring out onto the page.
41:44
SPEAKER_01: Give us some of your favorite singers.
41:48
SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
41:49
SPEAKER_01: In opera, song.
41:50
SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
41:52
SPEAKER_01: Don't exclude pop singers if you want to.
41:55
SPEAKER_01: Just a few.
41:56
SPEAKER_01: Not a complete list.
41:57
SPEAKER_01: We're not holding you to it.
41:59
SPEAKER_01: Just some.
42:00
SPEAKER_02: So my favorite classical singer who I never got to hear live,
42:03
SPEAKER_02: she died right before I sort of got into all of this,
42:06
SPEAKER_02: was Lorraine Hunt Lieberson,
42:08
SPEAKER_02: who I've listened to every recording I've heard truly a million times.
42:12
SPEAKER_01: Guess who said the same thing on this podcast a few days ago?
42:16
SPEAKER_01: Fleur Barrow.
42:17
SPEAKER_02: Fleur, I believe it.
42:18
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
42:20
SPEAKER_02: Lorraine, yeah, she just had this humanity.
42:24
I was talking earlier about bringing humanity to what we do and
42:29
sort of baring her soul.
42:30
SPEAKER_02: She really, she bared her soul on every performance she gave.
42:34
And my favorite recordings of hers were these live recordings
42:37
where her voice was
42:40
SPEAKER_02: so beautiful and there was so much depth.
42:43
SPEAKER_01: And especially I... She was beautiful, by the way.
42:46
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
42:46
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
42:47
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
42:48
SPEAKER_02: And the...
42:51
SPEAKER_02: And one of her specialties was Handel.
42:53
And the depth of emotion that she brought to Handel inspires me
42:58
every day.
42:58
SPEAKER_02: Because it's music that people think of as being very sort of stale.
43:02
SPEAKER_00: Cool, objective, and remote.
43:02
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
43:03
SPEAKER_02: And for me, it is such passionate, powerful, emotional music.
43:09
SPEAKER_02: Like a piangero.
43:10
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
43:11
SPEAKER_01: Oh, my God.
43:11
SPEAKER_02: These are the... And to me, what makes Handel's music so remarkable is...
43:16
SPEAKER_02: If you think about a composer a few hundred years later,
43:18
SPEAKER_02: like Uttvers,
43:19
SPEAKER_02: who wrote Three Sisters,
43:21
SPEAKER_02: the tools that he had at his disposal were immense.
43:24
Whereas Handel was working within such a limited world of
43:27
musical knowledge.
43:28
SPEAKER_02: Not to him, though.
43:29
SPEAKER_02: No, exactly.
43:30
And the depth of emotion that he was able to create with
43:34
literally a fraction of
43:35
SPEAKER_02: the chords and sounds that composers now can create...
43:39
SPEAKER_02: You take an aria like Piangero,
43:40
SPEAKER_02: I mean,
43:42
you could name almost any aria in Caesar or so many of these
43:45
other operas,
43:46
SPEAKER_02: right?
43:46
SPEAKER_02: The depth of emotion with such limited means astonishes me,
43:50
and Lorraine brought that to life in such a powerful way that
43:53
it's something I
43:53
SPEAKER_02: always aspire to do.
43:55
SPEAKER_02: So she was my favorite singer.
43:57
SPEAKER_02: I mean, she's my favorite classical singer, period.
44:00
SPEAKER_02: I'll say among countertenors,
44:02
the two sort of countertenors who were at their peaks at the
44:04
same time in the 90s,
44:06
SPEAKER_02: who were the two that I sort of listened to in the early 2000s,
44:09
SPEAKER_02: in the 2000s and 2010s,
44:12
SPEAKER_02: were Andreas Scholl and David Daniels,
44:14
SPEAKER_02: both of whom had very different voices.
44:15
SPEAKER_01: Very.
44:17
SPEAKER_02: And who had different strengths in their voices, essentially.
44:19
SPEAKER_01: It proves that a countertenor is not a countertenor is a countertenor.
44:21
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
44:22
And they were the first ones who there could be two super
44:24
famous countertenors at one time,
44:26
SPEAKER_02: And a festival could display different ones singing different things.
44:29
And there are aspects of both of their singing that I just have
44:32
always admired.
44:35
SPEAKER_02: And then outside of classical music,
44:37
SPEAKER_02: I would say,
44:38
SPEAKER_02: frankly,
44:39
I don't listen to that much classical music outside of work and
44:42
outside of my own
44:42
SPEAKER_02: repertoire and things that I'm researching and learning and loving.
44:46
SPEAKER_02: Because it's work in a way.
44:47
SPEAKER_02: What are you rocking out to?
44:48
SPEAKER_02: Well, exactly.
44:49
SPEAKER_02: So I still listen to a lot of the classic rock that I grew up with.
44:52
SPEAKER_02: Crosby, Stills, and Nash, and Dylan.
44:55
But I really love actually a lot of sort of new grass and folk
44:58
and sort of modern
44:59
SPEAKER_01: singer-songwriter.
44:59
SPEAKER_02: Sorry, did you say new grass?
45:01
SPEAKER_02: New grass, yeah.
45:01
SPEAKER_02: I've never heard that.
45:02
SPEAKER_01: What a term.
45:03
SPEAKER_01: I'm probably the last person to have heard that.
45:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I know.
45:06
SPEAKER_02: Like bands like the Punch Brothers led by Chris Thiele.
45:08
SPEAKER_02: My favorite, favorite singer is Andrew Byrd.
45:11
SPEAKER_02: He's an amazing artist from the Chicago area.
45:14
SPEAKER_02: Started out as a classical violinist, actually.
45:17
SPEAKER_02: It's interesting.
45:18
A lot of the pop music that I love are people who started as
45:20
classical musicians.
45:21
SPEAKER_02: Same thing,
45:22
SPEAKER_02: a band I love is called Lake Street Dive,
45:24
who met at New England Conservatory and now have gone on to be
45:27
sort of soulful,
45:29
SPEAKER_02: bluegrass-y...
45:31
SPEAKER_02: folky singer.
45:32
SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
45:32
SPEAKER_02: It's like sort of defy genre, but you are cool.
45:35
SPEAKER_02: Um, yeah, it's good stuff.
45:37
SPEAKER_02: But yeah, Andrew bird, Lake street dive.
45:39
I also,
45:39
I love Brandi Carlisle who has such a distinct timbre to her
45:42
voice.
45:43
SPEAKER_02: It's something a conductor said to me early on when I did a,
45:46
SPEAKER_02: like the first training program I did,
45:47
SPEAKER_02: he said,
45:48
SPEAKER_02: the great singers,
45:49
SPEAKER_02: you can tell the second you hear them who it is.
45:52
SPEAKER_02: This,
45:52
SPEAKER_02: he was talking about classical singers,
45:54
SPEAKER_02: but the first note you hear,
45:55
SPEAKER_02: you can tell who it is.
45:56
SPEAKER_02: And they sound exactly like themselves top to bottom of their range.
46:00
And I sort of took that to heart and it's something I've always
46:02
aspired to do.
46:03
And I think the pop singers who I love have a similar sort of
46:08
nature to them.
46:08
So the lead singers of these bands have such distinctive voices
46:12
and they're so
46:13
SPEAKER_02: beautiful and well integrated top to bottom.
46:15
SPEAKER_01: Do you mind making an exception for Maria Callas?
46:17
SPEAKER_01: Oh, sure.
46:18
SPEAKER_01: She joked about her three voices.
46:20
SPEAKER_02: It's true.
46:20
SPEAKER_01: And they were all great.
46:22
SPEAKER_01: All three were magnificent.
46:23
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
46:23
SPEAKER_01: And frankly, to me,
46:25
SPEAKER_01: People gave her a hard time.
46:26
SPEAKER_01: They all sounded like her.
46:27
SPEAKER_02: Oh, yeah, exactly.
46:28
SPEAKER_02: I wouldn't have changed her.
46:29
SPEAKER_02: I wouldn't have wanted her any different.
46:31
SPEAKER_02: Agreed completely.
46:31
When I got my first car and I had sort of big speakers I could
46:35
listen to for the
46:36
SPEAKER_02: first time,
46:37
SPEAKER_02: I put on the sort of Callas Greatest Hits disc and I cranked the car up.
46:41
SPEAKER_02: And, you know, here I was in New York.
46:43
SPEAKER_02: A lot of people are probably hotboxing their cars or blasting hip hop.
46:46
SPEAKER_02: And I was blasting Maria Callas.
46:48
SPEAKER_02: But just hearing the depth...
46:50
That you can hear all throughout her voice in her such a unique
46:53
timbre through my
46:55
SPEAKER_02: big car,
46:55
SPEAKER_02: you know,
46:56
SPEAKER_02: Bose car speakers.
46:57
SPEAKER_02: I was so excited.
46:59
All the ones who snarked at her would have wanted it,
47:01
would have traded for it in a second.
47:03
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
47:03
SPEAKER_02: Isn't that true of everyone, everything?
47:05
SPEAKER_02: Pretty much.
47:08
SPEAKER_01: So at home, you listen to...
47:11
SPEAKER_01: You're married, right?
47:14
SPEAKER_01: Is she a musician?
47:15
SPEAKER_02: She's not.
47:16
SPEAKER_02: She's a kindergarten first grade teacher.
47:18
SPEAKER_02: Fabulous.
47:19
SPEAKER_02: But she grew up in a sort of musical family.
47:22
Her mom is a voice teacher,
47:23
so she grew up being dragged to a lot of performances.
47:27
SPEAKER_01: So I was going to say she's music adjacent.
47:30
SPEAKER_01: No, she's actually in the middle of it.
47:32
SPEAKER_02: She sings the ABCs to the kids, and she's always singing in school.
47:35
SPEAKER_02: It's a little bit different, and
47:37
SPEAKER_02: And now we have a little four-month-old boy as well.
47:39
SPEAKER_02: Oh, no kidding.
47:40
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, cute little guy who's already very musical.
47:43
SPEAKER_02: He spent the whole summer here in Salzburg with us.
47:46
SPEAKER_02: What's his name?
47:46
SPEAKER_02: His name is Eli, little Eli.
47:50
SPEAKER_02: he's definitely going to be a musical one.
47:52
SPEAKER_02: We were playing some Beyonce for him or different artists.
47:55
SPEAKER_02: And he was literally sitting in his little bouncer chair,
47:57
SPEAKER_02: you know,
48:00
SPEAKER_02: sort of trying to sing along as much as he ever does.
48:04
You know,
48:04
you can tell he was relating to the music and,
48:06
uh,
48:06
he's our son.
48:09
SPEAKER_01: Do you,
48:09
SPEAKER_01: uh,
48:10
SPEAKER_01: here at the end,
48:10
SPEAKER_01: this is,
48:11
SPEAKER_01: uh,
48:12
SPEAKER_01: what's my,
48:13
SPEAKER_01: my,
48:13
SPEAKER_01: my late friend and employer,
48:15
SPEAKER_01: Bill Buckley once said,
48:16
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to ask a question.
48:18
SPEAKER_01: People are bored of hearing,
48:19
SPEAKER_01: and I'm bored of asking,
48:20
SPEAKER_01: but his question was,
48:23
SPEAKER_01: why is socialism so successful in free countries,
48:26
SPEAKER_01: given socialism's record,
48:28
SPEAKER_01: so successful at the ballot box?
48:30
My question is the old one about the future classical music or
48:34
the present.
48:34
SPEAKER_01: Let's talk about our country, the United States.
48:37
SPEAKER_01: I imagine you get a lot of work in Europe.
48:39
SPEAKER_02: Yes, there's much more to be had here, for better and for worse.
48:44
SPEAKER_01: What can we do with it?
48:45
SPEAKER_01: Is it a problem even?
48:46
SPEAKER_01: Or am I, you know?
48:48
SPEAKER_02: It is, yeah.
48:49
SPEAKER_01: All older people say, well, this is it, man.
48:51
SPEAKER_01: The lights are dimming.
48:52
SPEAKER_01: And, of course, it keeps going.
48:55
SPEAKER_01: And I'm often quoting Charles Rosen,
48:57
SPEAKER_01: the late pianist scholar,
48:59
that the death of classical music is perhaps the oldest
49:02
tradition of classical
49:03
SPEAKER_00: music.
49:03
SPEAKER_01: And so I don't mean to be, to talk Armageddon, but...
49:11
SPEAKER_01: It is worrying, is it not?
49:13
SPEAKER_02: It is.
49:14
SPEAKER_02: I think there are a few things that we have to do to make it.
49:20
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, this is my agenda for the future of opera.
49:23
The first thing is we need to not get rid of the fact that it
49:28
feels special to go
49:29
SPEAKER_02: out to the opera or the symphony,
49:31
SPEAKER_02: but we have to make it a more welcoming environment for young people.
49:35
SPEAKER_02: And even I, as devoted as I am to the art form, have been
49:41
SPEAKER_02: made to feel uncomfortable by other older classical music lovers.
49:45
There was one time I was at a song recital at Carnegie Hall
49:48
seeing Ian Bostridge,
49:50
SPEAKER_02: I think it was Vinteriza,
49:51
SPEAKER_02: he was performing,
49:52
SPEAKER_02: and we had paper printed translations.
49:56
And I am very delicately turning the page of the translation
50:00
and this man in the
50:01
box next to me shushing me and started yelling at me where
50:04
people in the other
50:05
SPEAKER_02: boxes then were shushing him
50:07
SPEAKER_02: because it was distracting from the performance.
50:09
SPEAKER_02: And I was made to feel so uncomfortable.
50:11
And just to think,
50:12
if this were someone's first time at Carnegie Hall...
50:16
Who wouldn't go back.
50:16
SPEAKER_02: ...never would step foot in again.
50:18
SPEAKER_02: And if you love this art form,
50:20
SPEAKER_02: sir,
50:20
what you have to do is help other people feel comfortable
50:23
filling those seats.
50:24
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and shut the hell up, too.
50:26
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
50:26
SPEAKER_02: And now you're disturbing everyone.
50:28
SPEAKER_01: The shushers are always worse than the people they're shushing.
50:32
SPEAKER_01: Because they're showing off as scold, as the polizai of the...
50:36
of the of the hall it's awful exactly so we need to completely
50:40
eliminate that and i
50:41
think there are certain small sort of changes like allowing
50:44
people to take the
50:46
champagne that they brought in the lobby a lot of houses have
50:49
started doing this
50:49
where you know if you put it in an enclosed cup you can bring
50:52
it into the hall
50:54
SPEAKER_02: please you know i as a performer even if
50:57
SPEAKER_02: God forbid, and it's happened, I hear a cup tip over.
51:00
I would rather that there are more young people sitting there
51:03
out enjoying a date
51:04
SPEAKER_02: night with a cocktail in hand the way you do on Broadway.
51:07
You know,
51:07
you can go and get your $45 double,
51:09
you know,
51:11
rum and coke and bring it in with you.
51:13
SPEAKER_02: You know, let people bring in a drink.
51:15
SPEAKER_02: Let it be that sort of festive environment.
51:19
SPEAKER_02: And I think that's just absolutely essential.
51:21
And so we have to make it a more welcoming environment and
51:24
create an environment in
51:25
SPEAKER_02: which young people feel comfortable.
51:29
I think there's also opera houses should be doing a lot more to
51:33
create sort of date
51:34
SPEAKER_02: night packages.
51:35
SPEAKER_02: Because if you think about,
51:36
SPEAKER_02: you know,
51:37
SPEAKER_02: I look at a city like San Francisco,
51:38
there are so many 30-somethings like myself who have a lot of
51:42
money and work in
51:43
SPEAKER_02: tech,
51:43
SPEAKER_02: right?
51:43
SPEAKER_02: There's all of these.
51:45
SPEAKER_02: And they don't think to come to the opera.
51:47
SPEAKER_02: But if the opera were putting together,
51:49
SPEAKER_02: you know,
51:49
SPEAKER_02: $250,
51:50
SPEAKER_02: two orchestra seats and a three-course prefix at this restaurant in the
51:56
SPEAKER_02: neighborhood,
51:56
SPEAKER_02: you know,
51:57
SPEAKER_02: creating that sort of special evening for people.
52:01
SPEAKER_02: People love a date night.
52:02
SPEAKER_02: People love that sort of elevated experience.
52:05
SPEAKER_02: You just have to bring them in.
52:07
So I think we should be doing a lot more like that,
52:11
which Broadway does more successfully.
52:13
There's all these pre-theater restaurants around,
52:16
and it's sort of a built-in experience.
52:18
You go get your Italian meal,
52:19
and then you pop down two blocks and go to your show.
52:22
We should be doing a lot more of that,
52:24
creating a curated experience for people.
52:27
SPEAKER_02: But then the real, the biggest fundamental issue is cost, right?
52:31
SPEAKER_02: Costs have gotten so out of hand and frankly,
52:36
SPEAKER_02: I think out of proportion and it's not a popular thing to say,
52:39
but the cost of putting on a performance is so profound and
52:44
it's not because of the
52:46
SPEAKER_02: singers.
52:47
SPEAKER_02: So we are making significantly less than our predecessors did.
52:52
SPEAKER_02: Per performance, per year, et cetera, et cetera.
52:55
SPEAKER_02: But the costs of all,
52:57
SPEAKER_02: I mean,
52:58
SPEAKER_02: sort of all of the labor of all of the whole operation,
53:03
SPEAKER_02: it's so expensive to put on a show,
53:04
SPEAKER_02: for example,
53:05
SPEAKER_02: that the Met last season canceled a few productions that they had already
53:08
SPEAKER_02: contracted singers for.
53:11
SPEAKER_02: And they had to pay out all of the singers.
53:13
They had to pay them all their entire fees for all eight
53:16
performances or whatever.
53:17
But that is such a tiny fraction of the cost of putting on a
53:21
performance that it
53:22
SPEAKER_02: saved them so much money and they had to do it.
53:25
SPEAKER_02: that tells me there's a serious problem.
53:26
SPEAKER_02: And that the balance of,
53:29
SPEAKER_02: and again,
53:30
SPEAKER_02: I don't mean to disparage my colleagues,
53:32
SPEAKER_02: everyone is very hardworking,
53:35
SPEAKER_02: but if we all care about the future of the art form,
53:38
if an opera house is working with a budget of tens and tens and
53:41
tens of millions of
53:42
SPEAKER_02: dollars and is only able to put on 40 performances a year,
53:45
SPEAKER_02: 50 performances a year,
53:47
SPEAKER_02: something's wrong.
53:48
SPEAKER_02: And we have to really, really reckon with that.
53:51
And it's going to be painful because people have gotten used to
53:54
a certain level of
53:54
SPEAKER_02: comfort,
53:55
SPEAKER_02: certain contracts,
53:56
SPEAKER_02: of course,
53:57
SPEAKER_02: because we used to,
53:58
SPEAKER_02: you know,
53:58
SPEAKER_02: major American companies used to perform twice as much as they do.
54:02
SPEAKER_02: And yet we, the singers, are getting paid per performance.
54:06
SPEAKER_02: So we're not making nearly as much as we used to,
54:08
SPEAKER_02: but everyone else on staff is making more than,
54:10
SPEAKER_00: you know,
54:11
in many cases making more than they used to because the
54:13
contracts grow and grow and
54:14
SPEAKER_02: grow.
54:14
And so there just has to be a real reckoning with how we make
54:17
this art form survive
54:18
SPEAKER_02: for the future.
54:20
SPEAKER_02: And I'm a proud union member.
54:21
SPEAKER_02: I'm on the board of our union, AGMA, American Guild of Musical Artists.
54:25
SPEAKER_02: I'm the Western Region soloist representative.
54:27
SPEAKER_02: I'm very pro-union,
54:29
SPEAKER_02: but I think all of us in our various unions,
54:32
SPEAKER_02: if we believe in the future of this art form,
54:33
if we want to make sure that it will still exist in 100 years
54:37
and thrive even more
54:38
SPEAKER_02: than it does now,
54:39
SPEAKER_02: we have to get real.
54:42
SPEAKER_01: So good to talk to you, Aryeh.
54:44
SPEAKER_01: And before we part, I want to ask you, have you sung in Israel...
54:49
SPEAKER_01: And I know that you have a Judaic studies minor, I think.
54:54
SPEAKER_01: You have your cantorial experience.
54:56
SPEAKER_01: You have a big rep.
54:58
SPEAKER_01: Have you gone there to sing yet?
54:59
SPEAKER_02: I have not.
55:00
SPEAKER_02: It's obviously a complicated moment right now.
55:03
SPEAKER_02: I forgot about that for a second.
55:05
SPEAKER_02: Sorry about that.
55:06
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
55:06
But that aside,
55:07
my manager has been trying to get me a gig at the Israeli opera
55:09
for many years.
55:11
SPEAKER_02: And they haven't come calling.
55:12
And they've actually done a couple of operas with countertenors
55:15
in the last few years.
55:16
SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, come on, guys.
55:17
SPEAKER_02: If there ever were a countertenor,
55:19
SPEAKER_02: to perform in the Holy Land,
55:21
SPEAKER_02: you'd think it'd be,
55:22
SPEAKER_02: So hopefully one day,
55:25
SPEAKER_02: my wife Abby's never been to Israel,
55:27
SPEAKER_02: obviously our little son hasn't,
55:29
SPEAKER_02: and I want to bring them there.
55:31
SPEAKER_02: And by the way,
55:32
SPEAKER_01: Ari,
55:34
SPEAKER_01: if you wait for that region to be peaceful,
55:36
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
55:36
SPEAKER_01: there are always crises.
55:37
SPEAKER_01: It's true.
55:38
I recall,
55:38
people my age will recall Isaac Stern performing wearing a gas
55:43
mask.
55:44
SPEAKER_01: very moving photos of that.
55:46
SPEAKER_01: I forget the year, but it can be Googled.
55:48
SPEAKER_02: It's true.
55:49
So maybe not wait for peace,
55:51
but at least hopefully wait for the current horror to end.
55:55
SPEAKER_02: I mean,
55:55
it's just been a few years of just horrendous images and
56:01
profound suffering that is
56:02
SPEAKER_02: in no one's best interest.
56:04
SPEAKER_02: And I pray it ends soon.
56:06
SPEAKER_01: I remember Ariel Sharon saying, I want 10 days of quiet.
56:10
SPEAKER_01: I sometimes ask for that in my own life.
56:13
SPEAKER_01: Well, I am Jay Nordlinger for Q&A.
56:18
SPEAKER_01: We, Aryeh and I, are at the Salzburg Festival at the moment in Austria.
56:23
SPEAKER_01: And he is, again, Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen.
56:26
So he is Nussbaum Cohen,
56:28
not Cohen,
56:28
but the whole thing,
56:29
no hyphen,
56:31
Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen.
56:34
SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much and all the best to you.
56:35
SPEAKER_01: And I look forward to hearing you for years to come.
56:39
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
56:39
SPEAKER_02: Thanks, Jay.
56:40
SPEAKER_02: Such a pleasure to be with you.
56:41
SPEAKER_02: So long, everyone.
56:43
SPEAKER_01: Till next time.