Tuesday, September 07, 2010

Vibrato

For Mister Smiff, who hates vibrato, I found this neat performance of Brahms' "Geistliches Wiegenlied" by mostly-early-music singer, Karen Clark. The two Lieder for voice and viola are really lullabies, and this one comes off very nicely, I think, without some goldfish-mouthed Brünnhilde warbling like a megaphonic city pigeon.

Posted by IOZ at 1:16 PM | email »
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11 comments:

rowan said...

The main character on Glee has a vibrato that drives me crazy. It deserves more hate.

2:56 PM
IOZ said...

Well, I'm not even sure I'd classify that as vibrato. It's a very aggressive wobble.

3:02 PM
LA Confidential Pantload said...

So..you got a YouTube with her backed up by The National?

3:13 PM
Anonymous said...

WHY HAVE YOU NOT COMMENTED ON THIS STORY??

5:32 PM
Anonymous said...

I like the bright clarity of her tone - but, IOZ, her vibrato is present, and is NOT standard: in fact, it's a clean, "straight" onset followed by, well, almost a wobble, on any note at the end of a phrase or any note longer than a dotted quarter note (I presume this piece is in 6/8, given the basic pulse's subdivision into 3 and Herr Brahms' penchant for unstanched hemiola...). It's like what Barbra Streisand used to be famous for: straiiiiiiiiighhhhht tone breaking into WoOOooOOooOOoobly tone in a long note sung on one syllable -- the only difference is that this lady does the whole straight-to-wobble thing much faster, and at least once a phrase, and often several times in a phrase. Standard vocal vibrato is taught nowadays as consistent throughout the note, which you probably know.
Still, always nice to hear "Joseph lieber, Joseph mein" sung well, and at a time of year other than ... you know.

10:28 PM
davidly said...

Really really nice. Reminds me of creeper weed: Sneaks up on ya.

4:04 AM
The Promiscuous Reader said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
10:18 AM
The Promiscuous Reader said...

but, IOZ, her vibrato is present ... I thought that was the idea! Post some Florence Foster Jenkins next.

Meanwhile, how about this kid?

10:20 AM
dveej said...

Is it not child abuse to force a boy to dress up like Alfalfa and arpeggiate up to F⁶? Like a dog walking on his hind legs - he does it OK, but it's more a wonder he does it at all, and even more a wonder that his teacher allows it.
Hey, IOZ, as long as this thread is thoroughly hijacked, how about Emma Kirkby as a good example of vibratolessnessness?

5:09 PM
Michael J Smith said...

What a pleasant little morsel to find on my plate upon re-entry from my annual Maine rustication -- I mean the Brahms, of course, not the child monstrosity, erm prodigy.

Clark certainly does have a vibrato, but it's applied judiciously. In fact it's what an early-music guy like me would call an ornament -- you get it on some notes and not others. Same goes for that very conspicuous scoop she does from time to time. Ordinarily that's beyond the pale, but she deploys it so nicely one just calls it an appoggiatura and eats it up with a spoon.

Singing Brahms totally straight-tone would be weird anyway.

That said, there's a case for a restrained early-music-ish approach to Brahms. I play, or try to play, the Op. Post. 122 chorale preludes on a neo-Baroque von Beckerath. The performer, alas, is the problem, not the instrument. When I get the notes right, it sounds pretty good.

Ole B's stuff has good bones. A sound and a performance style that brings out those wonderful inner voices can reveal quite a lot.

Sang the Deutsches Requiem years ago with a conductor who kept saying, "Altos, this is YOUR MOMENT!" Made me realize how few moments altos get, with anybody but Brahms.

8:32 PM
The Promiscuous Reader said...

"So Michael's turning you into an opera queen. Stick to baseball, Nick, it's a lot cheaper."

11:18 PM

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