Rugger dissertation FINAL

SEEING THE VOICE, HEARING THE BODY: COUNTERTENORS, VOICE TYPE, AND IDENTITY David G. Rugger Submitted to the faculty of the University Graduate School in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Jacobs School of Music, Indiana University August 2018 Accepted by the Graduate Faculty, Indiana University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Doctoral Committee ___________________________________ Phil Ford, Ph.D. ___________________________________ Halina Goldberg, Ph.D. ____________________________________ Ayana Smith, Ph.D. ____________________________________ Dana Marsh, D.Phil. 5 June 2018 ii Copyright © 2018 David G. Rugger iii for Daisy iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This is not the dissertation I thought I would write when I entered the PhD program at Indiana University seven years ago, but that’s a good thing. I can’t speak for others, but I know that I did not begin my graduate work as a fully-formed intellectual, ready to take an active part in the academy. I am sure that my thinking will change with time, but this dissertation represents who I am right now as a scholar and performing musician, and I could not have gotten to this point without a broad network of personal, professional, and institutional support. I wish to begin by thanking all involved in the musicology department for both challenging me and for allowing me to find my own way, rather than forcing me into a predetermined mode of what a music scholar should be. The research for this project was underwritten primarily by the musicology department’s travel fund, and the writing was made possible especially through the Jacobs School of Music dissertation year fellowship. The members of my dissertation committee—Halina Goldberg, Ayana Smith, and Dana Marsh— were all formative mentors for me throughout my time at Indiana University, and each contributed substantively to this project in their own way. My advisor, Phil Ford, deserves special thanks. He did all the things a good advisor is supposed to do, guiding me through the process, pushing me to think more deeply, and helping me to turn the seemingly inchoate mass of evidence, ideas, and gut feelings into a cogent, cohesive narrative. I wish also to thank my formative voice teachers, Steven Rickards and Robert Harrison, for helping me to find my voice and for giving me the technical foundation I rely upon every day. Happily, the archival research for this project was, as a rule, productive, pleasant, and relatively quick, thanks in no small part to several kind archivists, librarians, individuals. Elaine v Andrews at the Morley College Library, Jo Wisdom at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, Matthew Chipping at the BBC Written Archives Centre, and Nicholas Clark at the Britten-Pears Archives were all wonderful to work with. I owe a special debt to Mark Deller for sharing his personal collection of archival materials related to his father, Alfred. I wish also to thank Ira Siff, Pat Keck, and Joey Arias for their time and for sharing their recollections of Klaus Nomi. This dissertation would be would not have been possible without my friends in the department, especially Nathan Landes, Molly Doran-Landes, Patrick Domico, and Kate Altizer. You all have heard me present my work, read my work, talked with me about my work, and put up with me as I tried to finish my work. I owe you all and I will be there whether you need collegial critique or friendly encouragement. Most importantly, I wish to thank my wife, Daisy Chew. She gave me the gift of time, working so that I could research and write. But more importantly, she gave me motivation and support. While my friends and mentors gave me great direction and feedback, Daisy helped push me to work a little harder, to write an extra few hundred words a day, and to finish a little faster. This is for you. vi David G. Rugger SEEING THE VOICE, HEARING THE BODY: COUNTERTENORS, VOICE TYPE, AND IDENTITY This dissertation attempts to answer the question “Why has falsetto been systematically excluded from normative modes of western masculine vocality?” Or, in simpler terms: “Why doesn’t falsetto seem to ‘fit’ the male body?” More broadly, this project examines how the voice became an organ of identity, supposedly capable of revealing the furtive truth of a subject’s being through vocal sound. I explore these issues through a series of case studies. Chapter 1 examines how the discourses on singing, physiology, race, and gender all converged in late-Victorian England to produce our modern notion of vocal subjectivity. Both the sound of the voice and the structure of the vocal organs became sites where the boundaries of class, race, gender, and health were policed, and where the aesthetics of normative vocality were learned, embodied, and ultimately naturalized. Within this environment, male falsetto came to signify a wide range of “otherness,” including effeminacy, racial inferiority, and illness. Chapter 2 explores the intersection of national musical identity, gender identity, and historically informed performance practice through an examination of the early career and reception of countertenor Alfred Deller. Deller rose to prominence singing the music of England’s past with a falsetto-dominant singing technique. I trace the audile techniques that arose around Alfred Deller’s voice, which offered the listener strategies for attending to the claimed historicity of the countertenor voice while quelling—or at least quarantining—longingrained anxieties regarding falsetto singing, thus maintaining the symbiotic relationship between “Englishness” and “Manliness.” vii On the opposite end of the spectrum, Chapter 3 discusses how the performance artist Klaus Nomi used falsetto to create a persona founded on disjunction and artificiality, and how his unique aesthetic sensibility emerged from gay male subculture, the East Village (New York) art scene, and New Wave pop. Finally, Chapter 4 explores the representation of countertenor bodies on the operatic stage in repertoire written specifically for the voice type since 1960, especially in the operas of Benjamin Britten, Philip Glass, and John Adams. This dissertation traces how the link between voice, body, and identity was forged, and how that negotiation plays out in the case of male falsetto. Ultimately, this project offers a critique of the way we currently think about our voices and ourselves. ____________________________________ Phil Ford, Ph.D. ____________________________________ Halina Goldberg, Ph.D. ____________________________________ Ayana Smith, Ph.D. ____________________________________ Dana Marsh, D.Phil. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements………………………………………………………………………………..v Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………………..vii List of Examples…………………………………………………………………………………..x List of Figures……………………………………………………………………………………xii List of Tables……………………………………………………………………………………xiv Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………1 The Head Voice and Other Problems Chapter 1…………………………………………………………………………………...…….20 Seeing the Voice: Falsetto, Physiology, and Late-Victorian Voice Culture Chapter 2……………………………………………………………………………………...….86 ‘Tis Nature’s Voice: Alfred Deller, The Countertenor Voice, and English Masculinity Chapter 3………………………………………………………………………………………..157 Klaus Nomi and the Dysintegrated Voice Chapter 4………………………………………………………………………………………..215 Hearing the Body: Countertenors on the Operatic Stage Conclusion…………….………………………………………………………………………..310 Bibliography………………………………………………………………...………………….316 Curriculum Vitae…………………………………………………………………………………... ix LIST OF EXAMPLES Example 1.1: Handel, “Fra l’ombre e gl’orrori” from Aci, Galatea e Polifemo (1708), conclusion………………………………………………………………………..………………34 Example 4.1: Comparing the text setting in Britten’s “I know a bank” to Purcell’s “Sweeter than Roses.”……………………………………………………………………………………….…237 Example 4.2: Benjamin Britten, A Midsummer Night’s Dream “Be kind and courteous”..……240 Example 4.3: Parody in Act 3 of Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream..................................242 Example 4.4: “Now the great Bear and Pleiades” from Britten’s Peter Grimes, Act 1 Scene 2………………………………………………………………………………………….252 Example 4.5: Quint’s arabesques in Benjamin Britten, The Turn of the Screw, Scene 8.........................................................................................................................................254 Example 4.6: Britten, Canticle IV, mm. 4–7……………………………………………………256 Example 4.7: Benjamin Britten, Death in Venice, Aschenbach’s opening declaration……...…262 Example 4.8: Death/Traveler’s recurring motive in Britten, Death in Venice……………………265 Example 4.9: Britten, Death in Venice, Elderly Fop singing “pretty little darling, don’t you know”…………………………………………………………………………………………...269 Example 4.10: Britten, Death in Venice, Barber holds up the mirror to Aschenbach, breaking into falsetto, at R298………………………………………………………………………………...270 Example 4.11: Britten, Death in Venice, R102 “So, my little beauty, you notice when you’re noticed”…………………………………………………………………………………………271 Example 4.12: Britten, Death in Venice, “The Dream”………………………………………...273 Example 4.13: Britten, Death in Venice, Second Phaedrus Song at R308……………………..275 Example 4.14: Britten, Death in Venice, “Adziu” heard from a distance at R324……………..276 Example 4.15: Glass, Akhnaten, Act 1, Scene 1, Male Chorus at R4…………………………..284 Example 4.16: Glass, Akhnaten, Act 1, Scene 2 Trio…………………………………………..285 Example 4.17: Glass, Akhnaten, Act 1, Scene 3 “Window of Appearances” Trio (third iteration)………………………………………………………………………………………...286 x Example 4.18: Glass, Akhnaten Act 2, Scene 2, Trio…………………………………………..289 Example 4.19: Astron’s entrance, Michael Tippett Ice Break (1977), Act 3…………………..297 Example 4.20: Adams, El Niño, instances of “synthetic voice”………………………………..304 xi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1: Illustration of autolaryngoscopic examination from Czermak, On the Laryngoscope and its Employment in Physiology and Medicine, 21………………………………..…………..40 Figure 1.2: Diagram of Vocal Sensation from Lili Lehmann’s How to Sing (1902)…………….51 Figure 1.3: Registers as Laryngeal Function, as illustrated in Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke, Voice, Song, and Speech: A Practical Guide for Singers and Speakers (1883)…………………53 Figure 1.4: Voice Types and Gendered Registration as Illustrated in William Shakespeare, The Art of Singing, 38–39…………………………………………………………………………….61 Figure 2.1: Opening frames from “Frank Ivallo: The Man With A Woman’s Voice” (14 April 1932) British Pathé, Canister PSP 732……………………...………………………………….112 Figure 2.2: Morley College Concert Program for 21 October 1944, Alfred Deller’s first concert, Morley College Archive……………………………………….……………………………….120 Figure 2.3: Morley College Friends House Concert Program for 31 December 1944, Morley College Archive……………….………………………………………………………………..122 Figure 2.4: Program booklet for the Eight Concerts of Henry Purcell’s Music put on as part of the Festival of Britain (1951), which featured essays by prominent Purcell scholars and performers. Underneath Purcell’s portrait is a brief overview of the composer’s life, as well as the dates of his famous contemporaries in British culture broadly, and musical history specifically…………..………………………………………………………………………….145 Figure 2.5: Program for English Song Series Concert, first concert. London Season of the Arts Programme, 44…………………………………………………...……………………………..150 Figure 2.6: Program for English Song Series, fourth concert. London Season of the Arts Programme, 45…………………………………………………………...……………………..151 Figure 2.7: Six Concerts of English Song, Third Concert Program. 9 June 1955, Wigmore Hall……………...………………………………………………………………………………153 Figure 3.1: Casting Call for New Wave Vaudeville (1978)……………………………...…….157 Figure 3.2: David McDermott rehearsing the opening number for the New Wave Vaudeville (1978)…………………………………………………………………………………………...160 Figure 3.3: Klaus Nomi backstage at the New Wave Vaudeville (1978)……………………....161 Figure 3.4: TV Party 8 January 1979…………………………………………………………...188 xii Figure 3.5: Laurie Anderson and Klaus Nomi’s “deer-in-the-headlights” blank stare…………199 Figure 3.6: 1980 advertisement for ARP Omni Keyboard……………………………………...202 Figure 3.7: Klaus Nomi performing at Classic Rock Night in Munich (1982)……………..….210 Figure 3.8: “Cold Genius” by Pat Keck (1984)………………………………………………...213 Figure 4.1: Photo from original production. Alfred Deller on far left with Jennifer Vyvyan as Tytania………………………………………………………………………………………….234 Figure 4.3: House altar from the early Amarna period depicting Akhnaten, Nefertiti, and Three Daughters, blessed by Aten………………………………………………………………….….280 xiii LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1: “Lightning Strikes” lyrics, verse 1..…………………………………………………192 Table 4.1: French Emplois as listed for the Comédie Française in Arthur Pougin’s Dictionnaire Historique et Pittoresque du Théâtre (1885)………………………………………………..….222 Table 4.2: “Range or pitch of all voices,” in Louis-Joseph Francoer, Diapason general de tous les instruments à vent, trans. Benjamin Narvey (Paris: Deslauriers, 1772), 72………………...224 Table 4.3: German Fach divisions for the soprano voice, after Kloiber, with English/Italianate equivalents……………………………………………………………………………………...226 Table 4.4: Text of “Sweeter than roses” and “Welcome wanderer…I know a bank”………….236 Table 4.5: Love poem found on royal mummy from the Amarna period, used in Act 2 Scene 2 for the Akhnaten/Nefertiti duet………………………………………………………………....288 Table 4.6: Akhnaten’s “Hymn to the Sun” compared to Psalm 104…………………………...292 xiv INTRODUCTION The Head Voice and Other Problems1 All voices are thus sort-of falsettos, because as much as we may wish to equate a voice with the body or person of the Other, we cannot ever completely know them through it but are nevertheless drawn to it as some intangibly beguiling marker of subjectivity.2 There is a wonderful anecdote, perhaps apocryphal, about an exchange between the countertenor Alfred Deller and a female fan: One night, after a successful recital on the continent, a German fan approached Alfred Deller, exclaiming, “Meester Deller, you are absolute eunuch, ja?”3 This was in the early days of the countertenor revival, when the sound of a male alto voice was even less familiar to audiences than it is now. In every aspect but the sound of his voice, Deller seemed conventionally masculine. He was tall, athletic, had a goatee, and was married with children. No stranger to this sort of question, he responded graciously: “I think you mean unique, Madame.”4 Now, imagine yourself at a concert, comfortably seated as the lights dim and the orchestra begins to play. A male soloist stands and prepares to sing. And then, that sound comes out. A voice behind you asks if the soloist is really singing. The singing continues. The 1 I borrow this title from that of an old voice manual that once sat on a shelf at eye level in Dr. Robert Harrison’s (my old voice teacher’s) studio. D. A. Clippinger, The Head Voice and Other Problems: Practical Talks on Singing (Boston: Oliver Ditson Company, 1917). 2 George Burrows et al., “What is Voice Studies?,” In Voice Studies: Critical Approaches to Process, Performance and Experience, ed. Konstantinos Thomaidis and Ben Macpherson (New York: Routledge, 2015), 205. 3 In some variations, the woman is German, in others, French. Only her heavily-accented English is necessary for the anecdote to work. 4 Mark Deller provided this anecdote about his father to Simon Ravens. Deller explains “It has gone through various transformations in the telling of it over the years, but it did indeed originate with my Dad. It happened to him in the 60s in Germany (rather than France) which makes the verbal misunderstanding more relevant.” Quoted in Simon Ravens, The Supernatural Voice: A History of High Male Singing (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2014), 182. 1 strangeness persists. “Is he…?” asks another voice. We know what the ellipses imply, generally if not specifically. Is he castrated, whole, different, other, or somehow not…? How else could he produce that sound? Perhaps we react this way. Or perhaps we, knowing better, draw on our knowledge of history or vocal technique to explain the countertenor. But we cannot explain away the strangeness, only blunt its impact. Both anecdotes illustrate how countertenors violate our notions of indexical vocality.5 In other words, we expect to be able to hear the component parts of an individual’s identity—their gender, orientation, nationality, race, class: all the contours of self and body—manifested in the sound of their voice. Within this listening paradigm, a countertenor’s body confounds us with its everyday wholeness. When they sing, we do not hear the sonic traces of the body we see before us. And this gap between sounding voice and seen body is only confounded by the fact that countertenors produce their voice naturally. In his cultural history of ventriloquism, Stephen Connor argues that when we listen to a voice, we create a “vocalic body,” a body we infer from the sound of the voice.6 In other words, there is a voice we expect when we see a body and a body we expect when we hear a voice, and the two do not necessarily match. In countertenors, this gap is exaggerated, often to the point of incomprehension. And reactions to the countertenor voice, both positive and negative, hinge on the disjunction between vocalic and real bodies. In contrast, Laurie Anderson creates a mismatch between her voice and body electronically.7 However uncanny or gender-troubling Anderson might sound in performance, we can take comfort in the technological artifice. Likewise, castrati looked conspicuously different; the 5 Especially since the 1990s, voice and identity have been central concerns of both anthropology and ethnomusicology. For a summary of the current scholarship, see Amanda Weidman, “Anthropology and Voice,” Annual Review of Anthropology 43 (2014): 37–51, esp. 43–44. 6 Stephen Connor, Dumbstruck: A Cultural History of Ventriloquism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 35. 7 I shall discuss Laurie Anderson at greater length in chapter 3. 2 evidence of their changed state was written in their flesh. Long limbs, smooth cheeks, extreme height, and feminine hips marked the castrato as different, as much as their voice. Whether one experiences surprise, disgust, or pleasure when listening to a countertenor, the incongruous mismatch of voice and body is ever present when they sing. Indeed, Alfred Deller’s female fan resorted to this very logic when she asked if he was a eunuch. Deller appeared conventionally masculine, but when Deller sang, his voice conspicuously lacked the markers of masculinity his body possessed. To account for this mismatch of voice and body, this absence of manly timbre, she inferred a corresponding physical absence. I remember my own first experience of “countertenor shock.” Despite a brief stint in a children’s chorus, I did not start singing seriously until high school, after my voice had changed. The effects of puberty on the male voice vary. Some voices gradually descend in pitch. Others “break,” producing that thoroughly embarrassing (or funny, depending on your perspective) multi-octave yodel. Mine was the latter type. And so, when I joined a musically-ambitious church choir my freshman year, my voice was an unruly thing, the deeper tones unreliable. Like just about everyone that age, I was tentatively sounding myself out, trying to figure out how I sound. After a brief audition for the choir director, I was told that I was a baritone, the part I sing to this day. At that first rehearsal, I saw and heard a man singing in falsetto, and I was stunned at the seeming incongruity, just as so many had been. But in time, male falsetto became mundane, even though I did not use it myself. My first voice teacher was a countertenor, as were (and are) many of my friends and colleagues. But countertenors were always treated as somehow different. When I sing, my voice is heard as the product of my body, where my countertenor friends’ voices are not. Even in praise, they are disembodied. For all my technical difficulties, no one has ever questioned whether the singing voice I produced “fit” my body, or whether I sang 3 with my “natural” voice, despite all the bodily maneuvers and modifications my very standard technique entailed. Whenever anyone praised my singing, adjectives like “virile,” “rich,” and “masculine” inevitably came into play, where my countertenor colleagues were unfailingly deemed “ethereal” or “angelic.” It might surprise many to learn that self-identified baritones and countertenors have roughly the same range, and that in practice, the difference comes down to technique.8 The two voice types produce their high notes differently, and manage the “break” differently. In the simplest terms, countertenors rely on falsetto for their high notes and blend that sound down so that the whole voice matches the timbre of their high notes. Baritones (and tenors, bass-baritones, and basses) rely on their modal, or chest voice. They (we) use a technique to bring their chest voice up past the break for even the highest notes. Both techniques are learned, and require years of practice. Or, in other words, they are equally “unnatural.” I enjoy a privileged relationship between my (singing and speaking) voice, my body, and my identity. Through a combination of chance, proclivity, and training, I stumbled into a normatively masculine voice. Lurking behind my investigation of countertenors is an uneasiness with my own vocal-somatic privilege and the unmarked status it affords me.9 In this dissertation, I interrogate the interrelationship between the sound of the voice, the structure of the body, and identity. I am interested in normative vocality, or the dominant, culturally-coded ways in which we assign meaning when we see someone and hear their voice, either in speech or song. Normative vocality also encompasses the practices by which we learn and internalize the normative voice. Even though I shall focus on performers, composers, and 8 According to contemporary performance practice. This assertion does not hold historically. The issue of historical voice type is particularly thorny with regards to the countertenor, as I shall discuss at greater length in Chapter 2. 9 I adapt the use of the term “unmarked” from Ruth Frankenberg, “The Mirage of an Unmarked Whiteness,” in The Making and Unmaking of Whiteness, ed. Birgit Brander Rasmussen, Eric Klinenberg, Irene J. Nexica, and Matt Wray (Durham: Duke University Press, 2001), 72–76. Frankenberg and others treat whiteness as a system of cultural, legal, and racial advantage maintained through various techniques, including an insistence on whiteness’s non-racial character. 4 compositions, my ultimate object of study is not music per se, but rather the voice. Countertenors serve as a compelling focus for such a study because falsetto—the register that so defines them—has been systematically excluded from notions of “natural” male vocality, even though it can be produced “naturally” by nearly every male. Normative vocality operates as a sort deep, underlying hermeneutic system, flickering at the edge of consciousness. It is how we decode peoples’ voices, and how we regulate our own in day to day life. But when something does not fit, or operate the way we think it should—such as a man singing in falsetto—we are forced to articulate why. In this way, countertenors foreground the usually unmarked assumptions of normative vocality. I align my project with the broad goals of contemporary masculinity studies and other related disciplines, which seek to demonstrate the historical and cultural contingency of various forms of identity by laying bare the discursive mechanisms by which they selfperpetuate and subjugate other forms of being.10 Identities, vocal identities among them, are performative.11 In other words, we do our identities rather than are our identities. Normative vocality, like other hegemonic forms of subjectivity—such as masculinity, heterosexuality, or whiteness—is often defined negatively, by what it is not rather than what it is.12 Or stated another way, my voice falls within the bounds of “hegemonic masculinity,” which sociologist R.W. Connell describes as the normative, most honored way of being a man, at any place and time.13 The process of exclusion leaves what 10 See Rodd W. Reeser, Masculinities in Theory: An Introduction (Chichester: Blackwell, 2010); Steven M. Whitehead, Men and Masculinities: Key Themes and New Directions (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002); R.W. Connell, Masculinities, 2nd Ed. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005). 11 For the classic account of gender performativity, see Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1990); Michelle Duncan, “The Operatic Scandal of the Singing Body: Voice, Presence, and Performativity,” Cambridge Opera Journal 16/3 (2004): 283–306; Annette Schlichter, “Do Voices Matter? Vocality, Materiality, and Performativity,” Body & Society 17, No. 1 (March 2011): 31–52. 12 Judith Butler, Bodies that Matter (New York: Routeledge, 1993), 2–3. 13 R.W. Connell and James Messerschmidt “Hegemonic Masculinity” in Gender & Society 19, No. 6 (Dec. 2005), 836. 5 Butler calls a class of “abject beings,” leftover identities and characteristics that are, if not outright reviled, treated as less than. Though it was not always the case, male falsetto has been excluded from the palette of manly sounds and from the realm of the masculine body. Falsetto— as I shall discuss in greater detail in the chapters that follow—is often pathologized, forbidden, or at least regarded with suspicion; and when it is praised, it is never treated as part of the body. I should also take the time to lay out what this dissertation will not do. I do not purport to offer a comprehensive history of either the countertenor voice or the use of falsetto in western musical practice, even though both narratives are central to this dissertation.14 Understandably, the bulk of the literature on countertenors is by performers and geared towards issues of performance practice. This is not a weakness, but rather a difference in focus. Performers naturally wish to address issues pertinent to their daily needs as performing musicians, such as pedagogy and repertoire choice. Historical context often serves as background for a contemporary practice.15 Likewise, the performance practice literature hinges on the questions of whether falsetto was used in this or that repertoire. While I happen to agree with scholars like Andrew Parrott who suggest that the countertenor, as we understand it, is essentially an invention of the twentieth century, my project is concerned with the way in which male falsetto related to vocal identity since the latter nineteenth century. Nor will this be a comprehensive account of western classical singing.16 Rather, this will be a partial history of the normative vocality told 14 For the canonical account of the countertenor revival, see Peter Giles, The History and Technique of the CounterTenor: A Study of the High Male Voice (Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1996). For a revisionist account, see Andrew Parrott, Composers’ Intentions? (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2015); and Simon Ravens, The Supernatural Voice: A History of High Male Singing (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2014). 15 However, some, such as Steven Rickards, did tremendous archival work in the process of their projects. His book, based on his dissertation, provides an encyclopedic survey of twentieth century countertenor literature without which my final chapter would not have been possible. See Steven Rickards, Twentieth-Century Countertenor Repertoire: A Guide (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2008). 16 For such an account, see John Potter, Vocal Authority: Singing Style and Ideology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); James Stark, Bel Canto: A History of Vocal Pedagogy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999); J.B. Steane, Voices, Singers, & Critics (Portland, OR: Amadeus Press, 1992). 6 sideways through the lens of male falsetto.17 There are many other forms of vocal identity— particularly trans vocality—with their own unique histories and experiences, and I feel that an attempt at comprehensive coverage would only do a disservice to all. Ultimately, this dissertation is a narrative, not the only one. Consider the opening passage from Charles Wesley Emerson’s 1898 voice manual, Psycho Vox, Or, The Emerson System of Voice Culture: It is true in nature, in both organic and inorganic matter, that sound reports the quality of substance, that is, the quality of the sound indicated the quality of the object which produces it. This is very apparent in the animal kingdom. The naturalist knows by the tone of the bird’s voice what kind of bird it is. The hunter knows by the voice of a wild animal heard in the distance whether it is carnivorous or herbivorous; for in the voice of the former he hears something which is savage, something which tears, while in the latter he hears the softer tones of the milder animal. In this treatise I shall consider the human voice as the natural reporter of the individual, his character, and his physical and mental states. I am not considering the individual in any narrow sense, but in the sense of his entire being—body and mind.18 What Emerson states explicitly, we implicitly assume to be true when we listen to people, either in song or speech. Sound reports the quality of matter. Voice indexes the individual. And since the individual’s character is legible in their body, their physiology, then there is an assumed correspondence between the sound of the voice and the appearance of the individual. Thus, one is their voice. The countertenor voice, then, seems stubbornly opaque. The sound, though beautiful, refuses to yield up the information we expect. Or conversely, within this frame of thought, falsetto might suggest some furtive form of alterity. And so, the countertenor voice represents an aporia in the western epistemology of the voice. 17 Although I do address it briefly in my conclusion, the phenomenon is too complex for me to gloss over, or especially to conflate with falsetto. 18 Charles Wesley Emerson, Psycho Vox, Or, The Emerson System of Voice Culture (Boston: The Barta Press, 1898), 1. I shall discuss voice manuals at length in Chapter 1. 7 This tenuous, often gender-troubled relationship between falsetto and the male body is the product of the ear, not the voice box. The sense of disembodiment, the gap, the mismatch, or whatever you wish to call it, stems from what Jonathan Sterne calls an “audile technique,” or a regime of listening which in the case of falsettists fits within an all-encompassing hermeneutics of the body.19 Essentially, when we divorce falsetto from the male body, we render it acousmatic. In the broadest sense, a sound is acousmatic when it is produced by an un- or underdetermined body; or in Brian Kane’s more elegant formulation, it is a “sound unseen.”20 The voice on the telephone is acousmatic. So, too is any sound coming from an indeterminate source, such as a crashing sound in the other room. Kane posits that acousmatic sound requires some form of supplementation to assign meaning. Though some, such as Mladen Dolar, argue that the voice is inherently acousmatic, I believe that, while some voices might afford acousmatic audition, the way in which we partition our sensorium and attend the singing body is deeply historical.21 While a baritone’s voice remains firmly anchored in the singer’s body, the countertenor’s is detached, rendered acousmatic by the listener who might deem the sound supernatural, or unnatural, but rarely the unproblematic sound of a masculine body. While he does not write specifically about the voice, the work of Michel Foucault is central to the way in which I conceive of the singer’s body, their subjectivity, and the discourses that shape them. I see a strong parallel between Foucault’s account of human sexuality and my own account of vocal subjectivity. Both cultural forms coalesced during the latter nineteenth century, and both sex and voice shifted from an activity to an identity. Foucault writes: 19 Jonathan Sterne, The Audible Past: The Cultural Origins of Sound Reproduction (Durham: Duke University Press, 2003). 20 Brian Kane, Sound Unseen: Acousmatic Sound in Theory and Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), esp ch. 4 and 5. 21 Mladen Dollar, A Voice and Nothing More (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006), 66–67. Chapter 2 offers a novel reading of the voice in music historical texts. 8 The nineteenth century homosexual became a personage, a past, a case history, and a childhood, in addition to being a type of life, a life form, and a morphology, with an indiscreet anatomy and possibly a mysterious physiology. Nothing that went into his total composition was unaffected by his sexuality. … It was consubstantial with him, less as a habitual sin than as a singular nature.22 The voice, like sexuality, shifted from something one did to something one was, as we can see clearly articulated by Emerson. And around this new identity sprang various discourses that rooted it in the body and regulated its expression. Leaning heavily on Foucault’s words, I treat vocal subjectivity as “the correlation of a domain of knowledge, a type of normativity, and a mode of relation to the self.”23 A singer’s experience is a complex amalgamation of various fields of study (vocal pedagogy, physiology, etc.), sets of rules (how to sound, how to look, what to sing, etc.), and a mode of relation between the individual and themselves (“I sound masculine” or “I am a baritone”).24 The term “break” deserves further clarification, both because it will figure prominently in this dissertation, and because the very act of defining it illustrates the problems inherent in discussing the interrelationship of voice, body, and identity. It refers to the point in one’s voice where they transition from one register to another. Like the voice itself, the break can be understood in many ways: as a metaphor, as a sound, as a sensation, and as a physiological process.25 However, finding the break is much easier than describing it. If one were to sing an ascending scale, starting in the comfortable speech register, they would reach a point where they felt something. One might perceive a change in timbre, or an increase in muscular tension, or 22 Michel Foucault, History of Sexuality Volume I: An Introduction, Trans. Robert Hurley (New York: Vintage Books, 1990), 43. 23 Michel Foucault, “Preface to The History of Sexuality, Volume II,” in The Foucault Reader, Ed. Paul Rabinow (New York: Vintage Books, 2010), 333. 24 Michel Foucault, “Preface to The History of Sexuality, Volume II,” 333–334. 25 There are, of course, others, like understanding voice as a “metaphor” 9 pressure, or, especially if they were an untrained singer, reach a point beyond which the voice simply would not go. This point—called the passaggio in classical pedagogy— is the border between registers, and it feels undeniably real. The break seems to exist beyond the contingencies of culture and history. Likewise, this locus of sensation, this break, occupies much of a singer’s training. Western classical vocalism is obsessed with the break, with managing it, traversing it, hiding it. I abstain from offering a more detailed explanation for a reason. As I will argue throughout this dissertation, the way in which we describe the processes at work in your voice, the physiological truths we ascribe to, the sounds we prize as normative, and those we cast off as undesirable, do indeed have a history, are culturally bound, and have tremendous ethical as well as aesthetic implications. As Bruno Latour argues, “to have a body is to learn to be affected.”26 I cannot claim to know what a body, an organ, or a voice transcendentally is, but I can trace the “dynamic trajectory by which we learn to register and become sensitive to what the world is made of.”27 To illustrate his point, Latour describes how “odor kits” are used to train “noses” in the perfume industry. One acquires “a nose” by learning to be affected by the fine gradations of scent. And the organ is made as much by the training device as by the appendage on one’s face. It is “coextensive with the body,” and must be considered of equal importance in an account of the nose.28 The specialist ear of a classically-trained musician can be considered in the same manner. The piano in the aural skills class, the recordings, the type of instrument one manipulates for 26 Bruno Latour, “How to Talk About the Body? The Normative Dimension of Science Studies,” Body & Society 10/2–3 (2004): 205–229, 205. 27 Latour, “How to Talk About the Body?,” 206. 28 Latour, “How to Talk About the Body?,” 207–208. 10 hours on end, and the spaces in which we perform and practice all create and sustain “the ear” just as much as the lumps of flesh on either side of your head. Singers in the western classical tradition develop a particularly intense relationship with their bodies. Like instrumentalists, singers are constantly torn between expressing their individuality and reproducing a received set of conventions and styles. Like Connor’s notion of the vocalic body, Naomi Cumming’s concept of the “sonic self” offers a productive way to explore the tension between technique—in her case, violin technique—and identity: Radically change a student’s basic technique and you have altered his or her expressive medium. Because the string’s sound is directly tactile in origin, and is commonly invested with expressive weight, a manipulation of the position and motion of the hands is more than a technical change … Making these changes requires an adjustment in how the musician experiences him- or herself as forming “expressive” sound, and as able to realize scores that require it.29 For Cumming, a violinist and music theorist, voice functions primarily as a metaphor for subjectivity rather than a material sound produced by a singing body. For singers, however, the interplay between our sung “sonic self,” our identity, and our body is less abstract, but also much more easily conflated. We are born with a certain set of vocal possibilities: the thickness and length of vocal folds, the shape of our resonators, etc. But Cumming’s work is relevant because it explores the way in which our techniques and practices become internalized, and eventually subsumed into our sense of self. Human bodies, though, are less stable than a violin. Even the materiality of the body is a product of discourse. There are of course some basic physiological limitations of any given body, a set of potentialities that are biological, but our bodily matter is an effect of dynamic power, indissociable from regulatory norms. Butler argues that performativity is not a single act that 29 Naomi Cumming, The Sonic Self: Musical Subjectivity and Signification (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2001), 7. 11 brings a subject into being, but a reiterative power that eventually produces the phenomena it names.30 Returning to Latour, it is the discourse on scent within the perfume industry, internalized through the odor kit that brings the seemingly stable “nose” into being. Or for a more everyday example, reflect for a moment on the muscles of your arm. The simple existence of an arm is not the product of discourse. However, the value one assigns to the arms shape and functionality is a product discourse. The way in which one interacts with the discourses on health and masculine bodies shapes the actions I have taken, again and again, whether exercise, or diet, or the normative ideal I hold myself against. So, too, with the voice. However, voices are epistemologically slippery, much more so than ears, noses, and arms. They are interstitial, poised between material sound and the metaphysical meaning, and between the interior and the exterior of the human. And if there is any consensus within the interdisciplinary field of voice studies, it is that there is no consensus.31 But, rather than being a limitation, I view the discipline’s theoretical omnivorism as a strength rather. As Konstantinos Thomaidis writes: The study of voice is, like voice, a practice: its contextual pragmatics matter. Any study of voice is therefore contingent, emergent and vested with (social, political, cultural) value. 32 Ultimately, I do not claim to know what a voice is or is not. My project is more epistemological than ontological. As a historical enterprise, this projects attempts to account for the way in which systems of knowledge coalesce, compete, and change over time; the way in which discourses on the voice operate subtly and relationally; and the way in which they create subjects. 30 Judith Butler, Bodies that Matter (New York: Routeledge, 1993), 2–3. For a marvelous illustration of this, as well as a concise summary of the field, see Martha Feldman, Emily Willbourne, Brian Kane, Steven Rings, and James Q. Davies, “Colloquy: Why Voice Now?,” Journal of the American Musicological Society 68, No. 3 (Fall 2015): 653–685. 32 Konstantinos Thomaidis, “What is voice studies” in Voice Studies, 215. Also Kreiman and Sidtis, “Foundations of Voice Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Voice Production and Perception (Boston: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011) 31 12 CHAPTER OUTLINE In my first chapter, I trace the emergence of vocal subjectivity as we understand it today. I argue that this way of attending to the body and identity through vocal sound emerged only in the mid-nineteenth century. The discourses on singing, physiology, race, and gender all converged in late-Victorian England to produce our modern notion of vocal subjectivity. Through a study of interdisciplinary texts—singing and elocutionary manuals, concert reviews, anthropological field reports, classified ads, and medical case studies—this chapter traces the emergence of normative vocality in late-Victorian England. Prior to the mid-nineteenth century, falsetto was perceived as an essential part of male vocalism, to be developed and deployed according the laws of taste. Gradually, though, singing style changed, and falsetto fell out of fashion. Around this time also, the first clinically practical laryngoscopes were developed. The nature of voices changed. Once one could observe the voice in action, vocal sound became an epiphenomenon of a physiological state; conversely, the sound of the voice revealed the sounding body’s fundamental state. Although there was already a well-developed physiological vocabulary, there was no analogous vocabulary for sound. To compensate, medical professionals borrowed musical terminology. Mid-century singing style became medically normative, and the classic vocal faults—nasality, throatiness, and falsetto in particular—came to signify all manner of alterity. To the anthropologist, falsetto suggested a “degenerate” culture. To doctors, falsetto was a symptom of disease. In short, once late-Victorians could see the voice, they learned to hear the body; developing a regime of listening—in which falsetto was always marked as “other”— through which they perceived the various facets of identity as immanent properties of vocal sound. 13 This chapter also serves to fill a strange gap I have noticed in the scholarship. Numerous scholars have noted how laryngoscopy, popularized by the voice pedagogue Manuel Garcia II, fundamentally changed our understanding of the voice. Some, like Nina Eidsheim, have offered potent critiques of the way we listen to people and the assumptions we make.33 Likewise, there has been a renewed interest in the relationship between sound and science, especially regarding the interrelationship of music, medicine, and the voice during the early nineteenth century.34 And while I wholeheartedly agree with this basic premise, they have been overly concerned with the extent of Garcia’s individual influence, or who actually invented the first laryngoscope. Instead, I situate Garcia and the laryngoscope within a broader cultural desire to see the voice, and to trace precisely how the voice was integrated into constructs of health, race, and gender norms once they could see it. In my second chapter, I explore the early career of Alfred Deller, father figure and fountainhead of the modern countertenor revival. Alfred Deller built his career—first performing with Michael Tippett at Morley College, and then through frequent broadcasts on the BBC— performing the music of England’s past, especially Purcell. To Purcell revivalists, Deller’s voice seemed to solve a thorny issue of performance practice. It fit the composer’s many prominent countertenor parts, which had proven a stumbling block for tenors and female contraltos alike. 33 See Nina Sun Eidsheim, “Marian Anderson and ‘Sonic Blackness’ in American Opera,” American Quarterly 63, No. 3 (September 2011): 641–671. Also her “Voice as a Technology for Selfhood: Towards and Analysis of Racialized Timbre in Vocal Performance” (PhD diss., University of California, San Diego, 2008). 34 James Q. Davies, Romantic Anatomies of Performance (Berkeley: University of California Press); Gregory Bloch, “The Pathological Voice of Gilbert-Louis Duprez,” The Cambridge Opera Journal 19, No. 1 (2007): 11–31; James Q. Davies and Ellen Lockhart, ed, Sound Knowledge: Music and Science in London, 1789–1851 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017). Céline Frigau Manning, “Phrenologizing Opera Singers: The Scientific ‘Proofs of Musical Genius,’” Nineteenth Century Music 39, No. 2 (2015): 125-141; David Trippett “Exercising Musical Minds: Phrenology and Music Pedagogy in London circa 1830,” Nineteenth Century Music 39, No. 2 (2015): 99– 124. 14 Though his voice was beautiful, and it fit the music he sang perfectly, his use of falsetto posed a problem. As I argue in my first chapter, falsetto came to signify a wide array of alterity. I agree with Xin Ting Ch’ng, who argues in her dissertation that Deller’s voice came to symbolize Englishness.35 However, I fundamentally disagree that Deller’s emergence heralded a shift in the paradigm of vocal gender. Alfred Deller’s career did not alter normative vocality. Rather, the audile techniques which arose around the countertenor voice served to insulate this construct. Falsetto remained “othered,” but in the context of the historically informed performance of English music, that alterity became temporal rather than pathological. Countertenors posed something of a threat to England’s musical identity. Indeed, the perceived effeminacy of the falsetto singing was as potentially destabilizing to the national sense of self as “foreign influence.”36 If countertenors were “quintessentially English,” and if Alfred Deller’s falsetto-dominant way of singing was historically authentic, then the countertenor’s equivocal masculinity was significant because it problematized the inextricably linked ideologies of gender and national identity. Alfred Deller’s story is not one of a plucky, underdog performer with an unusual voice who won over English hearts and minds solely through the beauty of his singing, though that is precisely the story told in his official biography.37 Deller’s biography and the popular narrative of the countertenor voice re-emerging from the murk of history to reinvigorate the performance of English music were the result of a campaign to normalize Deller’s voice. The historical narrative of male falsetto singing both in seventeenth century England specifically and within 35 “The English Voice of the Mid-Twentieth Century: Ferrier, Deller and Pears,” (PhD diss., University of Southampton, 2016). 36 This trope is overwhelmingly common. But for a good, albeit somewhat sensationalist account, see Meirion Hughes and Robert Stradling, The English Musical Renaissance, 1840–1940: Constructing a National Music, 2nd rev. ed (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001). 37 Michael and Mollie Hardwick, Alfred Deller: A Singularity of Voice (London: Proteus, 1980). 15 English church rests on shaky evidence, cherry-picked by twentieth century advocates of the voice type and retold to this day as a sort of origin myth.38 In this chapter, I explore the propaganda campaign itself that ran in tandem with Deller’s career. Through reviews, letters, and previously unexamined radio scripts, I trace the audile techniques that arose around Alfred Deller’s voice, which offered the listener strategies for attending to the claimed historicity of the countertenor voice while quelling—or at least quarantining—long-ingrained anxieties regarding falsetto singing, thus maintaining the symbiotic relationship between “Englishness” and “Manliness.” Next, I turn to Klaus Nomi, a German ex-pat countertenor whose brief career (1978– 1983) began in the New York club scene and almost bloomed into fully-fledged pop stardom before he was cut down by AIDS. Nomi was strange and unique; a complex amalgam of cultural references that defy interpretation. In particular, he used his voice and especially his classicallyinflected falsetto to create a fractured, bricolage performing persona. I am interested in how Nomi’s voice and persona don’t fit; and how, along with other like-minded artists, this dysintegration disrupts the privileged link between the voice, body, and notions of authenticity. In this chapter, I situate Nomi within three contexts: gay male opera fandom, the East Village scene, and new wave pop. Rather like the synthesizer stars who came to define New Wave, Nomi’s act hinged on a sense of artificiality. Of course, he produced his voice through technique rather than technological supplementation. But although they were produced by a body, the voices Nomi used were not meant to suggest a single cohesive vocal subject. In so doing, he highlights the 38 Andrew Parrott, “Performing Purcell,” in The Purcell Companion, ed. Michael Burden (London: Amadeus Press, 1995), 385–444; Simon Ravens, The Supernatural Voice: A History of High Male Singing (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2014). 16 constructed, performative quality of his persona, rather than investing it with the image of authenticity. In my final chapter, I examine the representational strategies that have emerged within opera around the countertenor voice since the latter twentieth century. Countertenors were not a widely accepted voice type until after the twentieth century revival was well underway. Although male falsetto was an essential part of operatic vocalism prior to the mid nineteenth century, it had long since fallen out of common theatrical practice. Countertenors pose a particular challenge when they are staged. As I will explore in greater detail in the chapter, nearly all theatrical traditions rely on a stereotyped relationship between the voice, the body, and the character portrayed. Obviously, the specific character types and representational strategies vary tremendously depending on place, time, and specific tradition; but, especially in modern Western theater, stock characters are omnipresent. In opera, the voice is central, and therefore operatic characterization hinges on fine gradations of vocal timbre. At first, countertenors do not seem to fit within this representational paradigm because their voices do not seem to fit their bodies. However, rather than upending theatrical logic altogether, they were interpolated as a special class character whose “type” relied on their apparent voice/body disjunction. There is already rich musicological discourse on opera and gender, primarily concerned with women and opera. As Freya Jarman argues, the sound of masculine operatic heroism has changed radically. 39 The slow shift in taste from the heroic castrato to the modern tenor encapsulates much more than an emergent taste for the “natural.” Shifting notions of gender, 39 Freya Jarman, “Pitch Fever: The Castrato, the Tenor, and the Question of Masculinity in Nineteenth-Century Opera,” in Masculinity in Opera: Gender, History, and New Musicology, Ed. Philip Purvis (New York: Routledge, 2013), 51–66. See in the same volume Susan McClary, “Soprano Masculinities,” 33–50, which deals with some of the issues I do in this dissertation, but in a casual way. Masculinity has only recently entered the musicological discourse. See also Ian Biddle and Kirsten Gibson, eds. Masculinity and Western Musical Practice (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2009). 17 operatic style, and views on the voice’s relationship to the body and identity all contributed to this change. For example, Roger Freitas offers a revisionist reading of the castrato’s body, situating the fascination with both the voice and the castrato’s androgyny within the early modern discourse on gender.40 Furthermore, Naomi André’s reading of travesti singers of the early nineteenth century hinges on the sound of the voice, and the way in which, during the decline of the castrato, women in male roles fulfilled the aesthetic desire for a male hero with a high, treble voice. Within my chapter, I examine the representational strategies that emerged around the countertenor voice since 1960.41 For all their variety of style narrative structure, composers tend to be quite conservative in their approach to voice type. I perceive three broad, often overlapping representational strategies that composers take when creating a role for a countertenor. In each role, the countertenor voice is marked as somehow out of the ordinary. The first and most pervasive of these is the use of the countertenor voice for supernatural characters. Fairies, demons, gods, and angels make up the bulk of countertenor roles to this day. Others portray “othered” characters, or in other words, their voice marks them with some form of alterity other than being magical or divine. And finally there is the countertenor as synthetic voice. By “synthetic” I mean “combined with…” or “augmented,” which often entails combination with instruments, other voices, and often other countertenors. Systems—mechanical, bodily, ideological—demand our attention when they break down. Just as we ignore our backs until a disc slips, or take our car for granted until the day it does not start, voices often evade our notice until that moment when they do not function the way we 40 Roger Freitas, “The Eroticism of Emasculation: Confronting the Baroque Body of the Castrato,” The Journal of Musicology 20/2 (2003): 196–249. 41 1960 marks the first countertenor role in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as I shall discuss in Chapter 4. 18 think they should. Countertenors represent just such a breakdown, a glitch in the system of normative vocality, precisely because their use of falsetto does not suggest the body we intuit to our enculturated ears. Although normative vocality and vocal subjectivity enjoy a concrete social reality, they are, I argue, historical and contingent. But even though our vocal epistemology works well, that does not make it natural. This dissertation will tell a story of how the link between voice, body, and identity were forged, and how that negotiation plays out in the case of male falsetto. Ultimately, this dissertation offers a critique of the way we currently think about our voices and ourselves. 19 CHAPTER 1 Seeing the Voice: Falsetto, Physiology, and Late-Victorian Voice Culture On March 1, 1883, the English journal Musical Opinion published a few paragraphs on the voice that summarized the views of one Dr. Delaunay, one of the many now-forgotten vocal experts active in London late in the nineteenth century: The voice is more acute among the inferior than in the higher orders of animals, in the birds than in the mammalia, in the smaller species than in the larger. The ancient nations must have had higher voices, because the Adam’s apple, which is the more prominent the lower the voice, was regarded as a deformity. In proportion as races are developed the anteroposterior diameter of the larynx is increased. The Adam’s apple becomes more and more pronounced, and the voice tends constantly to become lower. The primitive peoples of Europe must have had nothing but tenor voices; their actual descendants are baritones; our posterity in the future, according to the doctor’s theory, will be all bassos. We are descending the scale of sounds. The races which are still in the rear of civilization ought, therefore, at the present moment, says Dr. Delaunay, to have higher voices than the white races. This, he affirms, is the case with the negroes and the Mongolians. The height of the voice, he continues, is so clearly a characteristic of the stage of evolution that as age advances, the limits of the human voice continue to remove from the acute to the grave, consequently one may be a tenor at sixteen, a baritone at twenty-five, and a bass at thirty-five years of age. In general—it is always the doctor who speaks—sopranos and tenors are blonde, while the contraltos and basses are brown. Tenors are thin, basses are fat. The voice is grave in men of seriousness and intelligence. It is fluty—we are still quoting Dr. Delaunay—among the frivolous and empty-headed. The voice is higher before eating than after. This is the reason why tenors and sopranos dine early. Stimulant foods and strong liquors, by provoking a certain congestion of the larynx, make the voice lower. Therefore tenors are sober and avoid alcoholic drinks; on the other hand, the bassos can with impunity eat and drink what they like. The action of singing, again, determines a congestion of the organs of phonation. A tenor who uses his voice too much loses his high notes, and becomes a baritone. All singers, whether male or female, can go higher in the morning than in the evening. The music of matins is higher than vespers. The voice is higher in the south than in the north. The majority of French tenors come from departments which border the Mediterranean or the Pyrenees. On the other hand, in the north 20 we find the basses. At the Russian Church in Paris there are basses who can give the contre-ut-de poitrine. The voice is somewhat higher in summer than in winter. The pitch is affected by the variations of temperature. M. Delaunay might have added that it depends also on the variations of the barometer.1 While it seems utterly plausible to a modern-day reader that genetics, diet, and environment might affect the voice, the extent of Delaunay’s speculation borders on the ridiculous. Even in his own day, it seemed so absurd that the entire passage was quoted in another, much more respected voice manual as an example of overstated quackery.2 But to nineteenth century readers, the passage’s folly would have been a matter of degree, not kind. As I will show, by the late nineteenth century, the voice had become the bearer of many truths: it indexed race, gender, health, and class. “The throat,” writes Leo Kofler, “is the barometer of the whole man—soul and body.”3 There is little to commend Kofler’s name to posterity save for his elegant formulation of a sentiment that persists to this day. He was but one of the many now-forgotten interlocutors in the trans-national, inter-disciplinary discursive space known as “Voice Culture,” which coalesced during the second half of the nineteenth century and flourished into the early years of the twentieth. Within it, the voice became an organ of identity, capable of speaking the furtive truth of a subject’s being. Both the sound of the voice and the structure of the vocal organs became loci of disciplinary power, sites where the boundaries of class, race, gender, and health were policed, and where the aesthetics of normative vocality were learned, embodied, and ultimately 1 Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke, Voice, Song, and Speech: A Practical Guide for Singers and Speakers, 4th ed. (London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle and Rivington, 1886), 96–98 2 Browne and Behnke, Voice, Song, and Speech, 96–97. The author writes, “It is possible that the capacity of the chest, the structure of the whole body, or even, as imagined by some, the complexion, may have something to do with the kind of voice a person possesses;…To what extent such speculation is carried by some writers may be seen from the following amusing paragraph…” 3 Leo Kofler, Take Care of Your Voice, or The Golden Rule (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., 1889), 3. 21 naturalized.4 Kofler continues: What and how we breathe, or, in other words, the respiratory process; what we eat and drink, or the state of the digestive apparatus; the condition of the blood, and its circulation; the mode of dressing; the character of our dwellings; our occupations, social enjoyments and individual pleasures; the amount of control we have of our nerves and darker passions and feelings;—all these must receive careful attention in order to keep the throat in such a condition as to preserve the voice.5 In short, the voice is indiscreet, acting as an informant, casually revealing one’s secret self to even the most casual ear. The title’s imperative cast—Take Care of your Voice, or The Golden Rule—is a call to self-regulation. The voice registers all: one’s health, how one lives, how one dresses, one’s pleasures, one’s vices, and even “the amount of control we have of our nerves and darker passions and feelings.”6 The voice lays bare everything one is or does. In this chapter, I trace the emergence of western vocal subjectivity through a case study of late-Victorian Voice Culture, specifically the way in which Voice Culture defined and regulated normative vocality. Late-Victorian England might seem at first glance a strange place to focus my attentions, especially since Voice Culture was a transnational phenomenon.7 Many of the most prominent vocal physiologists were French, and were especially active throughout the eighteenth century and well into the nineteenth century. Likewise, many of the most prominent singers and teachers of singing were Italian, or were at least trained in the Italianate manner, and were active across Europe. But late nineteenth century England was the point of 4 Here I use the term “disciplinary power” in the Foucauldian sense, as an invisible technology or surveillance that serves to control the subject, and which is ultimately internalized by the subject as a form of consciousness and selfdiscipline. See his discussion of “Panopticonism” in Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. Alan Sheridan (New York: Vintage Books, 1995), 216–218. 5 Leo Kofler, Take Care of Your Voice, or The Golden Rule (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., 1889), 3. 6 Kofler, Take Care of Your Voice, 3. 7 For an excellent discussion of Voice Culture in an American context, see Scott A. Carter, “Forging a Sound Citizenry: Voice Culture and the Embodiment of the Nation, 1880–1920,” American Music Research Center Journal 22 (2011): 11–34. Likewise, Grant Olwage addresses voice culture from a post-colonial perspective. See particularly his “Discipline and Choralism: The Birth of Musical Colonialism,” in Music, Power, and Politics (New York: Routledge, 2005), 25–46. 22 coalescence, where the discourses of vocal physiology and practical singing converged. Vocal sound became important—worthy of analysis, cultivation, and preservation—because it revealed essential truths. Late-Victorian English Voice Culture is a rich context to explore for several reasons. England predicated its colonial identity on a sense of superiority, construed either in the vague terms of “civilization” or in more concretely in racial terms. As the voice came to index an individual’s station, race, and gender, cultivating a cohesive national vocality became tremendously important. Voice Culture was an integral part of the colonial project. Massed amateur choral singing served as a disciplinary tool for both the lower classes and colonial subjects.8 The emergent field of laryngology, in conjunction with the broader fields of physiology and medicine, scientifically validated the tenets of normative vocality, which, as I will show, drew on the terminology and cultural prestige of historical voice pedagogy. Though they might not seem connected at first, the voice manual—a seemingly modest genre of pedagogical texts— functioned alongside the fields of anthropology, human geography, and ethnology as means of articulating and policing a vocal hierarchy predicated on racial, gender, and class difference. But as I will show below, the voice manual and anthropology represent two sides of the same coin. Where anthropology and its related disciplines constructed the “other” in vocal terms, the voice manual offered a means of learning and internalizing the ideals of normative vocality. And although normative vocality was only ever described in the terms of hygiene and function, it always put forward a sonic ideal that was at least implicitly male and 8 See especially Grant Olwage, “The Class and Colour of Tone: An Essay on the Social History of Vocal Timbre,” in Ethnomusicology Forum 13, no. 2 (2004): 203–226; also his “Discipline and Choralism: The Birth of Musical Colonialism,” in Music, Power, and Politics, 25–46 (New York: Routledge, 2005). Although he does not take an explicitly Foucauldian perspective, Charles Edward McGuire offers an excellent account of the social aims of choralism among the English working classes through the lens of one of the most prominent movements in his Music and Victorian Philanthropy: The Tonic Sol-Fa Movement (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009). 23 Euro-centric. Countertenors, the topic of this dissertation, will be admittedly tangential to the narrative of this chapter. They existed, but largely on the periphery. However, falsetto—that register which so defines the modern countertenor’s vocal identity—was a central concern of Voice Culture. Within an environment where the sound and structure of one’s voice indexed multiple identities, falsetto became pathological, a marker of disease, difference, degeneracy, and effeminacy. But it was not always so. SEEING THE VOICE The voice—its mechanism, sound, and appearance—has fascinated musicians and scientists alike for centuries. However, prior mid nineteenth century, musical and scientific interest in the voice developed separately, for the most part. Singing treatises largely ignored vocal physiology, with a few notable exceptions, and physiologists were rarely concerned with the practicalities of singing.9 The problem with vocal physiology, as with many of the body’s systems, is one of observability: voices—or more precisely, the vocal organs—cannot be seen by the naked eye while in use. Since Galen, physiologists have understood the basic structure of the vocal mechanism, which is comprised of the trachea, the larynx, the glottis, and the lungs. A persistent debate centered on the interplay of the vocal organs; namely, which structures produced the sound, and how. Lacking direct visual access to a functioning human voice, physiologists relied on two complementary strategies. First, many relied on analogy, often comparing the human voice to musical instruments. Galen, whose theory reigned supreme until the eighteenth century, 9 Agricola was a notable exception. See Introduction to the Art of Singing by Johann Friedrich Agricola, trans. and ed. by Julianne C. Baird (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), esp. 68–80. 24 argued that the vocal organ was like a flute, and that vocal pitch was controlled by the length of the trachea.10 Changes in pitch, according to Galen, entailed a shortening or lengthening of the trachea. In 1700, French scientist Denis Dodart challenged Galen’s theory. Dodart retained the comparison between the human voice and the flute, but he argued that the glottis, rather than the trachea, determined pitch.11 Antoine Ferrein offered a further revision in 1741. He argued that the folds of the glottis—which he dubbed “vocal cords”—produced vocal sound when air, passing through the glottis, rushed across them and stirred them into vibration. Pitch, for Ferrein, was controlled by the lengthening and shortening of the vocal cords, like the string of a violin.12 In addition to using analogous reasoning, philosophers and physiologists created artificial models of various bodily systems to supplement the knowledge gained from dissection and vivisection. There is a long tradition of speaking machines often linked to supernatural causes. But by the early modern period, speaking machines, like other artificial models, offered scientists the opportunity to imitate and understand natural phenomena. For example, Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis (1626) imagines a facility, called “Salomon’s house,” which could produce practical knowledge for the improvement of mankind through the creation and study of artificial devices.13 Bacon describes “sound houses” in which one can “practice and demonstrate all sounds and their generation,” and where one can “represent and imitate all articulate sounds and letters, and the 10 See also Édouard Fournié, Phsiologie de la voix et de la parole (Paris: Adrien Delhay, 1866), which contains a lengthy discussion of the history of physiology. 11 “Mémoire sur le causes de la voix de l’homme, et de ses différens tons,” Mémoires de l’Académie royale des sciences (Paris, 1700), 238–287. 12 “De la formation de la voix de l’homme,” Mémoires de l’Académie royale des sciences (Paris, 1741), 409–432. Ferrein’s theory was not accepted without struggle. There was much debate over whether the voice was more like a flute or a string instrument during the years 1741–1748. See N. F. J. Eloy Dictionnaire historique de la médecine ancienne et modern, 4 vols. (Mons: chez H. Hoyois, 1778), ii. 223–4, 327–8, iii. 323. See also Steven Connor, Dumbstruck: A Cultural History of Ventriloquism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 199–200. Another novel, but relatively isolated, analogous theory of vocal production was forwarded by Félix Savart in his Mémoire sur la voix humaine (1825), in which he argued that the larynx was in fact most like a hunter’s bird call: a short cylinder, each end of which was covered by a thin plate with a hole in the center. 13 Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning and New Atlantis, ed. Arthur Johnston (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974), esp. 239–244. 25 voices and notes of beasts and birds.”14 To early modern thinkers, functioning artificial models offered a way to understand natural phenomena, as well as a means of illustrating that understanding to others.15 Most models were meant to be explanatory rather than imitative, seeking to disclose the physiological operations of the body rather than to reproduce them artificially.16 Regardless, the practice of creating and studying artificial voices persisted well into the nineteenth century until it was replaced by laryngoscopy.17 Despite the rich interest in vocal physiology, the scientific and musical discourses on the voice remained largely separate. Authors of singing treatises rarely concerned themselves with the inner workings of the vocal organs.18 Most voice teachers were primarily singers or composers, trained extensively in the art of ornamentation, solfeggio, the portamento, and the messa di voce. Many knew what a glottis and a trachea were, some even mentioned the vocal organs in passing, but vocal physiology was never an important part of the method itself. Physiological theory had little effect on the daily life of a singer, especially since one could not, prior to the later nineteenth century, observe the vocal apparatus in action. But that does not mean that singers were uninterested in the body. As James Q. Davies points out, “mouths were 14 Bacon, New Atlantis, 244. Thomas L. Hankins and Robert J. Silverman, Instruments and the Imagination (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014), 173–220, esp. 185. Georges Canguilhem, “The Roles of Analogies and Models in Biological Discovery,” in Scientific Changes, ed. A. C. Crombie (New York: Basic Books, 1963), 507–520. Projects to build artificial vocal organs were often associated with projects to build artificial circulatory systems. Like the voice, the circulatory system was difficult to observe in a live subject, and so many scientists attempted to construct artificial models of both. 16 However, between 1770 and 1790, Abbé Mical, Christian Gottlieb Kratzenstein, Wolfgang von Kempelen, and Erasmus Darwin, working separately and with no apparent knowledge of one another, managed to produce functional speaking machines. See Hankins and Silverman, Instruments and the Imagination, 186–198. 17 See for example John Bishop, “On the Physiology of the Human Voice,” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London 136 (1846): 551–571, esp. 563–566. Bishop provides an excellent summary of the scientific thinking on vocal physiology, and gives special attention to the theories of falsetto production. Bishop mentions singers music briefly, but only in passing to provide concrete examples of certain vocal phenomena. 18 However, Johann Friedrich Agricola’s 1755 translation offers one of the earliest and most extensive considerations of vocal physiology in a text devoted to singing. See footnote 8. 15 26 all consuming” for pedagogues before about 1850.19 They wrote extensively on the position of the teeth, the jaw, and the tongue, and many advised their pupils to practice before a mirror.20 Giovanni Battista Mancini devoted an entire chapter to the mouth and its many positions in his Pensieri, e riflessioni pratiche sul canto figurato (1774/1777), declaring that the “resounding quality of the voice always depends … on the shaping of the position of the mouth.”21 Though their aims differed, musicians and scientists were bound together in their desire to see the inner workings of the voice. Historical singers and listeners alike were interested in the body insofar as it pertained to the emission of sound, rather than the way in which the voice manifested the immanent timbral properties of a sounding body. Voices, especially in the context of singing, were prized for their poetic and affective abilities, rather than for realizing an innate tone or type. The modern notion that one should find one’s own innate timbre, and that one should develop a single, homogenous sound, did not emerge until much later in the nineteenth century. Giuseppe Concone—an Italian singer active in Paris from 1837–1848—argued that each voice type had a “timbre naturel” that should be exploited by cultivating a single “homogenous sonority.22 As I shall show at greater length below, critics and audiences prized variety and skillful artifice in singing rather than a singularly beautiful sound. Indeed, Concone’s notion of vocal timbre, novel in the early nineteenth century, is simply taken for granted today. For modern scholars and singers alike, historical treatises are frustratingly silent when it comes to how voices sounded. While they lack for neither adjectives 19 James Q. Davies, Romantic Anatomies of Performance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2014), 129–136, especially 130. 20 See for example Mr. Tanducci’s Instructions to His Scholars (London, 1785), see “rule 10.” 21 Giovanni Battista Mancini, Practical Reflections on the Figurative art of Singing, trans. Pietro Buzzi (Boston, 1912), 92. Quoted in Davies, Romantic Anatomies of Performance, 130. 22 Giuseppe Concone, Introduction à l’art de bien chanter (Paris, 1845), esp. 324. Concone was born in Rome and studied with the famous composer and singing master Nicola Porpora, whose other students included Farinelli and Joseph Haydn. 27 nor descriptions of various vocal ornaments and their rhetorically appropriate deployment, treatises before the mid nineteenth century rarely address the issue of timbre. For example, Pier Francesco Tosi never differentiates between voice types or genders in his Opinioni de' cantori antichi, e moderni…(1723). Perhaps this is because the sounds a singer cultivated depended much more on specific musical demands rather than gender or type. Or, put another way, while I as a modern singer am concerned with what voices are, Tosi and his contemporaries focused instead on what voices do.23 Just as good orators would alter the timbre, speed, and intensity of their voice to fit their intended meaning, skilled singers were expected to have at their disposal a wide variety “voices,” each of which was suited to a particular effect. Domenico Corri (1746–1825)—a voice teacher, composer, and impresario active in London around the turn of the nineteenth century—draws a comparison between the vocal and the visual arts: Singing may be compared to painting,—which art has various styles,—historical, landscape, portrait, miniature, scenery, &c. &c. And each of those styles may be finished with more or less accuracy; but the effect of each is produced from design, proportion, light, and shadow;—so the vocal art affords various characters,—the sacred, the serious, the comic, anacreontic, cantabile, bravura, &c., &c. And though each style requires different gifts and cultivation, yet true intonation, the swelling and dying of the voice, with complete articulation of words, are essential to all. Thus, whatever style you may wish to attain and possess the natural qualifications for, the ground work, the foundation, must be subject to the same principles. …The voice,—this is capable of great improvement, and, like metal or stone, may be polished to a high degree of perfection; it is not the extent or compass, not the body of voice, which alone constitute a good singer, but its proper and skillful management;—good quality, or sweetness of voice, however, is a very desirable possession.24 23 And so, the modern desire to recreate an “early music voice” is perhaps motivated by an ahistorical set of aesthetic precepts. Early vocality should instead be characterized by its radical variety, its cultivation of many “voices.” 24 Domenico Corri, The Singer’s Precentor (London, 1810), 1. Corri was born in Rome and studied with the famous teacher Nicola Porpora, who taught, among many others, Farinelli and Joseph Haydn. 28 Of course, one voice might be naturally more beautiful than another. But an inherently sweet sound was merely the foundation upon which one built, not an end in and of itself. And here is the key difference: voices were made, crafted through arduous practice and exercise rather than miraculously “revealed.” In fact, most treatises from this era are devoted primarily to the various techniques and expressive devices a singer could employ: the shake, the roulade, the trillo, the messa di voce. For example, Mancini’s Pensieri, e riflessioni shows this tendency, not only in the portion of the treatise dedicated to the various singing techniques, but also in the brief reflections on eminent singers.25 Mancini recalls how the singer Baldassarre Ferri could make his voice “joyful, fierce, grave and tender, all at will,” and that he was able “(in one breath) to go up and down two octaves trilling continually and marking every degree.”26 Likewise, Antonio Pasi—a pupil of the famed Bolognese teacher, Pistocchi—amazed audiences with “graceful gruppetti, turns, light passages, trills, mordents, and tempo rubato, which he rendered so perfectly and in their proper place.”27 Singers and listeners of the era were interested in the body insofar as it pertained to the poetic emission of sound, rather than the way in which the voice manifested the immanent timbral properties of a sounding body. Heard within this context, it is perhaps not so strange that until about the mid nineteenth century, falsetto (sometimes “voce di testa” or “head voice”) was believed to be the natural upper register of all voices, male and female. It was to be cultivated and deployed with good taste in a wide variety of circumstances, including the operatic stage. 25 Giambattista Mancini, Practical Reflections on Figured Singing, trans. Edward Foreman (Champaign, 1967). Mancini maintains a similar division between head and chest register, 20. 26 Mancini, Practical Reflections, 28. 27 Mancini, Practical Reflections, 32. 29 Then, as now, teachers and singers were concerned with producing an even voice: one that can pass without (apparent) effort across registral breaks and sound with equal ease at any point in one’s range. For all their disagreements and variants, singing treatises almost universally stressed the need for an even voice. But, “evenness,” in the historical sense, is not the same as the homogeneous, chest-voice based timbre we expect from contemporary male singers. Rather than learning to carry the modal voice up, well beyond the limits of one’s normal speech range, as most male singers have done since roughly 1840, “evenness” meant learning to subtly obscure the switch between two seemingly disparate registers. It was a matter of art and finesse rather than effortful will, or at least the impression of finesse. Both techniques require fine-tuned physical coordination, but chested high notes often derive their affective power from the sense of raw, athletic physicality. Joseph Corfe, an English singer active at the end of the eighteenth century, offers a typical if elegant formulation of the earlier aesthetic: The Voice should be formed in the most pleasing tone possible, and delivered steady and clear, without passing through the nose, or being choked in the throat, which are two of the greatest imperfections a singer can be guilty of. The voice should likewise be perfectly in time, for without an accurate intonation, it is impossible to sing well. The lower notes should be sung firm, and great care must be taken to unite the natural voice with falsetto or feigned voice, that they may not be distinguished; for if they are not carefully united, the voice will consequently lose much of its beauty; this may be done, by not forcing it too much on that part where the break is, as others it will be of different registers. The high notes should be by no means be sung too strong, but fixed sweetly without fluttering or tremulous motion.28 This passage deserves a bit of unpacking because it presents several concepts that will arise throughout this chapter in a wide variety of contexts, taking on new meanings and connotations. 28 Joseph Corfe, A Treatise on Singing (London, 1799), 3. Corfe was a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal and an Organist at Salisbury. His treatise is largely derived from Tosi’s Opinioni, which had been available in England since around 1740, in an English translation by Johann Ernst Galliard. 30 First, there is the issue of placement, or where the sound goes. Like Goldilocks’s preferred bowl of porridge, the sound must be just right, neither too far forward nor too far back; in a word: balanced. Tosi (on whom Corfe based his treatise) states that the voice “should always be pure and clear, without (as one says) going through the nose or getting stuck in the throat.”29 Although the terminology varies a bit between writers and across time, nasality and throatiness are two of the most repeated, universally condemned faults in western classical vocalism. Again, Tosi argues that “these are the two worst defects in a singer and, once entrenched, are impossible to correct.30 Of course, it is impossible to know what sort of a sound constituted a “nasal” or a “throaty” voice to a historical set of ears, much less what a “pure” voice might sound like. Like so many other aesthetic judgements, they are subject to the contingencies of place, time, and individual bias. If one asks contemporary singers about vocal placement, one can be sure only of their imminent disagreement. Regardless, the concepts of nasality and throatiness retained (and still retain) their cultural currency as fundamental vocal faults. And as I will argue later in this chapter, as the voice came to be regarded as a fail-proof index of class, race, and health during the latter nineteenth century, the classic vocal faults of nasality and throatiness were transposed beyond their original context of singing pedagogy and into other disciplinary realms. As I will demonstrate, a nasal or throaty voice could mark a culture as primitive for an anthropologist; it could suggest poorly-bred and poorly-schooled speaker to an elocutionist; or it could indicate a diseased body and mind to a medical doctor. And then there is falsetto, or head voice. Music historians, especially those interested in opera, focus primarily on the decline of the castrati and the rise of the romantic, full-voiced 29 Introduction to the Art of Singing by Johann Friedrich Agricola, translated and edited by Julianne C. Baird (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 67. 30 Introduction to the Art of Singing, 67. 31 tenor. Naomi André, for example, chronicles the early nineteenth century as a period when there was a tremendous flux in vocal aesthetics, when the castratos’ waning popularity did not necessarily translate into a distaste for high heroic singing. Leading male and female characters continued to occupy the same pitch space and had similar timbres, but leading male characters were often played by women en travesti.31 Even as tenors began to take on leading roles in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the timbres of the leading characters were much more similar than they are today. As John Potter convincingly argues, most famous tenors during this period studied with castrati and would likely have employed the highly ornate, dual-register technique for which the castrati were famed. And they probably would have sounded much like modern countertenors.32 In Italianate singing technique, all voices—male or female, high or low—were expected to cultivate and use their falsetto in performance. Of course, not all singers were as skilled in deploying their falsetto, nor were all composers uniform in the way they wrote for certain voice types. Corfe, speaking quite generally, differentiates between the voice types, their relative strengths using falsetto, and their affective tendencies: The Soprano has general most volubility, and seems best calculated for it. It is likewise capable of the Pathetic. The Contralto has more of the Pathetic than of the Bravura. The Tenor is very often capable of both the Pathetic and Bravura. The Bass is the most dignified, but ought not be so boisterous as it is generally practiced. It has always been a matter, not to be accounted for by Professors of Music, why the deepest Bass Voices should, in general, sing in a Falsetto, and with greater taste than in their natural voices, and that the Contr’alto should have the least Falsetto of either of the other voices.33 31 See especially Naomi André, Voicing Gender: Castrati, Travesti, and the Second Woman in Early-NineteenthCentury Opera (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006), 32 John Potter, “The Tenor-Castro Connection, 1760–1860,” Early Music 35, No. 1 (Feb., 2007): 97–110. 33 Joseph Corfe, A Treatise on Singing (London, 1799), 9. 32 Likewise, composers differed in the way they wrote for singers’ upper ranges, responding to their own aesthetic predilections and the abilities of the singers they had on hand. Handel’s tenor roles, for instance, rarely extend beyond G4 or A4 (above middle C). But that does not necessarily mean that Handel’s tenors exclusively utilized their chest registers when they sang. Especially in the works he composed for Italian singers—singers almost universally trained in the dual-register technique—it seems unlikely that they did not use it at least sometimes. For example, Handel likely expected the use of falsetto for comic reasons in his ponderous basso buffo aria, “Fra l’ombre e gl’orrori” (“In Darkness and Horror”), from his serenata Aci, Galatea e Polifemo (1708). In this aria, the cyclops Polifemo sings about a moth desperately searching for the light of an extinguished lamp (Example 1.1). The range is grotesque, leaping at one point from an A4 down to a D1. It is almost impossible if attempted strictly in chest voice. Some modern singers manage it, but especially considering the frequent injunction that one sing high notes softly, it seems more likely that Handel would have expected falsetto. However, the extraordinary range we see in Polifemo’s aria was by no means limited to portrayals of the grotesque and the comic. As tenors began to take on starring roles towards the end of the eighteenth century, and as composers such as Haydn, Mozart, and Bellini began to write for them in a manner they once reserved for virtuosic castrati, we see more discussion of tenor falsetto. These castrato-trained tenors were expected to sing extraordinarily ornate music, featuring rapid divisions, huge ranges, and enormous skips, all of which they were expected to execute with apparent ease. 33 EXAMPLE 1.1: Handel, “Fra l’ombre e gl’orrori” from Aci, Galatea e Polifemo (1708), conclusion. Rather than a coequal part of their voice, falsetto became tenors’ prized register, their vehicle to operatic stardom, much as the chested high C would become later in the nineteenth century. Contemporary reviews offer further evidence that falsetto was not only tolerated but prized, especially in tenors, well into the nineteenth century. If we look at English periodicals from the early to the mid-nineteenth century, “falsetto” appears to be neutral term for a technique. A singer could be criticized for his deployment of falsetto, just as he could be praised for it. It was generally, in the context of music criticism, only used to describe high male singing. For example, in an 1816 review of Castle of Andalusia—a now-forgotten opera—a tenor named Mr. Short is described as having “a voice which is not remarkable for compass or power,” but which is well-kept, and that he “has frequent recourse to a falsetto voice, which, however, he 34 manages with much greater skill; and he joins to unquestionable taste and elegance.”34 Likewise, in a performance of The Siege of Belgrade at the Drury Lane Theatre in 1824, a singer named Mr. Sapio is noted as a “fine tenor, full of richness and expression.” The critic writes: His falsetto is bold, and were we to object to the management of his voice in any instance, that objection would be directed against the manner in which he runs from his natural to his feigned tones. There is an abruptness in the transition from the one to the other—a want of that softness and delicacy through the medium of which the lower notes ought to glide gently into the higher—which was offensive to a correct ear.35 Falsetto was a technique one could expect to hear from a high male singer in the context of an opera, unremarkable save for the fact that it was one of the various aspects of a vocal performance upon which a critic could remark. But like any technique, it had an appropriate context and mode of production. In the above examples, the men are not chastised for their use of falsetto. Mr. Sapio is chided for his clumsy transition into the falsetto register, an inelegant move from one register to the next, rather than the categorical use of that register at all. This is all consistent with classic Italian vocal technique of the eighteenth century, as exemplified by Tosi. In contrast to the inelegant Sapio, John Braham—one of the most famous English tenors of the early nineteenth century and a pupil of the castrato Rauzzini—was famed for his ability to disguise his transition from chest voice to falsetto. Of his voice, The Musical Quarterly wrote in 1818: Mr. Braham can take his falsetto upon any note from D to A at pleasure and the juncture is so nicely managed that in an experiment to which this gentleman had the kindness to submit, of ascending and descending by semitones, it was 34 35 “English Opera,” The Times 21 June 1816. “Drury-Lane Theatre,” The Times 2 December 1824. 35 impossible to distinguish at which point he substituted the falsetto for the natural note.36 Likewise, Giovanni Battista Rubini (1794–1854), Rossini’s favorite tenor, was particularly famous for his refined falsetto, which he had “in the highest perfection and under the most perfect control.”37 But things changed and falsetto fell out of fashion. The French tenor Gilbert-Louis Duprez is best remembered as the inventor of the “C from the chest” which he first presented to Parisian artists in 1837. As Gregory Bloch notes, there were singers before Duprez who sang their high notes “from the chest” rather than flipping into a lighter, falsetto mechanism.38 The real innovation was Duprez’s almost constant use of voix sombrée or “darkened voice,” which is a technique for lowering the larynx and carrying the timbre of the chest voice up to the highest part of one’s range at great volume. This technique is taught to modern voice students to this day, and it is what allows tenors their forceful, clarion high notes. Where once a singer focused on smoothing the transition from one voice to another, singers utilizing the new technique learned to eliminate it altogether. And while the highest chest-voice notes in the voice are the most memorable and the most forceful, they only exist because of a radical technical shift in how singers managed the break, or, since about 1840, seemingly eliminated the break and extended the chest voice beyond its previous domain. Falsetto gradually ceased to resonate with the public. Of course, the technical switch was neither immediate nor universal. A review of a London performance of Lucia di Lammermoor in The Times from 1844 offers an interesting comparison between the 36 M. Sands, “These were singers,” in Music & Letters xxv (1944), 106. Quoted in Potter, “The Tenor-Castrato Connection,” 101 37 Frances Hullah, Life of John Hullah (London, 1886), 71. 38 Gregory Bloch, “The Pathological voice of Gilbert-Louis Duprez,” The Cambridge Opera Journal 19/1 (2007): 11–31. 36 older and newer method of singing. The critic compares the tenor playing Edgardo, a Signor Morliani, to Rubini’s performance of the same role a few years earlier. They write: The first thing that strikes in this new vocalist is the compass of his pure tenor voice. The music which Rubini used to adorn with a thousand flute-like embellishments he sings with scarcely a recourse to falsetto; the whole of the famous scena, “Tu, chi a Dio,” proceeds from the chest. There is no strain in his singing, no abruptness, but the organ is even, and seems equally perfect in every aspect.39 Although “evenness” continued to be prized in singers after the change in technique, its meaning had shifted subtly. The term no longer suggested an imperceptible transition from chest to falsetto. In the newer technique, the evenness comes more from a uniformity of vocal timbre across the compass of the voice, so that the timbre of one’s lowest notes matches those of the top. However, all this would be little more than an extended footnote in the history of singing technique were it not for the development and wide-spread adoption of the laryngoscope around mid-century. As I will show below, the vocal aesthetics of mid-century singing technique became medically normative; the technical artifice of opera singers was subsumed into notions of natural superiority, health, social standing, and racial identity. SCIENTIFIC VOICE Manuel Garcia II (1805–1906) is best known both as the father of modern vocal pedagogy and as an early pioneer of the laryngoscope. Born in Spain to a musical family, Garcia began his career as an operatic baritone, but quickly traded the stage for the studio. He secured an appointment at the Paris Conservatory (1830–1848), and later moved to England where he 39 “Her Majesty’s Theatre,” The Times 28 June 1844. 37 taught at the Royal Academy of Music (1848–1895). Garcia developed a practical version laryngoscope in 1854, and brought it to the public’s attention the following year when he presented his findings at the Royal Society of London. In his influential paper, Garcia writes: The method which I have adopted is very simple. It consists in placing a little mirror, fixed on a long handle suitably bent, in the throat of the person experimented on against the soft palate and uvula. The party ought to turn himself towards the sun, so that the luminous rays falling on the little mirror, may be reflected on the larynx.40 Although he was the most influential early pioneer of the laryngoscope, Garcia was not the first person who thought to peer down someone’s throat. Nor was he the first scientifically-inclined musician. Francesco Bennati, an Italian doctor and accomplished singer active in Paris, was a key figure in the medicalization of the voice. In 1832, Bennati advertised a “speculum” which could be used to observe the voice.41 On the other side of the channel, Dr. Robert Liston claimed to have successfully employed a laryngoscope in medical practice in 1840.42 But like many others, both Bennati’s and Liston’s work became a footnote to Garcia. However, Garcia’s instrument failed to offer unfettered visual access to the inner workings of the human voice. Garcia admits as much. The larynx was only visible in certain registers in which the “epiglottis remains raised.”43 The voice did not make itself readily available to the observer. Neither the technique he taught nor the instrument he developed sprang 40 Manuel Garcia, “Observations on the Human Voice,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 7 (1854–1855): 399. 41 Davies, Romantic Anatomies of Performance, 133. See Francesco Bennati, Recherches sur la mécanisme de la voix humaine (Paris, 1832). Likewise, Bennati addressed Académie des science, claiming that his instrument could offer a good view of the larynx. Gazette médicale de Paris 3, no. 130 (29 December 1832): 896. 42 Johann Nepomuk Czermak, “On the Laryngoscope and its Employment in Physiology and Medicine,” trans. Duncan Gibb, in Selected Monographs, 1–70 (London: The New Sydenham Society, 1861) 1–6. Czermak notes, “Already in 1840 [Robert] Liston mentioned the successful employment of this instrument in medical practice…Nevertheless, it seems that the observations of Liston have been completely forgotten.” 43 Manuel Garcia, “Observations on the Human Voice,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 7 (1854–1855): 401. 38 ex nihilo from his fertile mind. Nonetheless, his is an epoch-defining name, so much so that earlier singing methods are often referred to as “pre-Garcian.” Rather than a progenitor, it is best to think of Garcia as a point of convergence. Garcia’s publication marks not only a shift in vocal pedagogy, but also the beginning of an intense transdisciplinary interest in the voice. The real importance of his contribution lies not so much in what he said, but rather the way in which he broke down disciplinary boundaries. He was the first vocal pedagogue to be considered seriously by the medical community. With the advent of practical laryngoscopy, physiologists shifted from a descriptive to a prescriptive role with regards to vocal function, health, and sound. There arose a new class of scientificallyminded singers and musically-inclined scientists became increasingly prescriptive in their approach to vocal function, health, and sound. Just as vocal pedagogues began to rely on the findings and methodologies of science, so too did scientists began to take an active role in aspects vocal production such as speaking and singing. Or put another way, just as singing became more scientific, science became more concerned with the aesthetics of voice. Shortly after Garcia’s publication, the laryngoscope was improved by Johann Nepomuk Czermak (1828–1873), an Austro-German physiologist. Though minor, Czermak’s improvements—most notably the use of artificial light and a slight change to the angle and shape of the mirror— made the laryngoscope much more practical (Figure 1.1).44 Likewise, Czermak trained several young physicians in his Vienna clinic who went on to become influential practitioners across Europe and England. The laryngoscope entered normal clinical practice within a few years, especially after the publication of his treatise “On the Laryngoscope and its Employment in Physiology and Medicine,” which was published in German and French in 1860, 44 Czermak, “On the Laryngoscope,”11–34. 39 and in an English translation by George Duncan Gibbs in 1861. With Czermak’s improved instrument and technique, one could see the entire vocal apparatus in action. FIGURE 1.1: Illustration of autolaryngoscopic examination from Czermak, On the Laryngoscope and its Employment in Physiology and Medicine, 21. But even Czermak’s methodology was not without drawbacks. Czermak notes: Nevertheless, in spite of the simplicity of the principle [of laryngoscopic observation], many obstacles and difficulties present themselves against the advantageous employment of the laryngoscope, and its correct appreciation by physiologists and physicians…even actually notwithstanding the numerous proofs 40 of its application, many persons become discouraged after certain fruitless attempts, as did my predecessors up to the time of Garcia. These difficulties and obstacles in part from the excitability, sometimes very considerable, at the back part of the mouth, on its coming into contact with a foreign body; from the difficulty which many persons experience in opening their mouths wide enough, and of mastering the movements of the tongue; also from the conformation and unfavorable disposition of the organs’ and in fine, chiefly from the inexperience and awkwardness of the investigator.45 In short, the laryngoscope could not unobtrusively reveal the voice’s inner workings. The observer’s presence was certainly felt as the little mirror was shoved into the back of the vocalist’s mouth, often with gag-inducing results. Nor was it universally useful, especially in cases where unique anatomical proportions might obscure the sought-after organs. But it was practical enough to enter common clinical usage. Despite the difficulties inherent in laryngoscopy, Czermak was quickly recognized within the Anglophone medical world as the leading authority on vocal physiology and clinical practice. In 1862, an overview of the field appeared in The British Medical Journal. Voices had vexed physiologists for a long time, and so medical professionals seemed quite excited about the laryngoscope. Garcia was certainly mentioned, but Czermak was singled out as the one who brought the tool to “perfection:” By means of this instrument, the whole glottis and the adjacent parts are clearly seen; its condition during vocalization and the changes of the cords in the production of different chest and falsetto notes become patent to the eye; and the ingenious contriver has actually succeeded in producing photographs, nay, even stereoscopic views, of the phenomena. It is needless to enlarge on the physiological value of this visual test applied to the various speculations on the voice. I notice it here as a conspicuous example of an unseen process in the 45 Czermak, 9. Italics original 41 human body, which has remained hidden through all bygone time, being in our own day brought fairly into light.46 Over the course of a few short years, the fundamental nature of the voice changed. Physiology, rather than an explanation of vocal production, became its precondition. Once they became observable, falsetto and chest notes, and registers in general, ceased to be primarily sounds or sensations and became products of a physiological structure. All this is not say that sound was ignored, in fact the opposite is true. Various disciplines, especially in the hard and social sciences, became fascinated with vocal sound. But vocal sound was treated as a symptom, a readily accessible epiphenomenon that pointed to a deeper physiological or psychological truth. But just because one could now see the voice did not mean that there was a sudden consensus on its structure and function. This scientific breakthrough occurred at a critical juncture in English society. Late Victorians, for all their reputed prudishness, were obsessed with their bodies and how they functioned. The reasons are philosophical and theological as well as purely scientific. As the historian Bruce Haley argues, nineteenth century critiques of Cartesian dualism essentially recombined body and mind into a single system.47 Thus, the state of the body was believed to reflect the state of the mind and of the spirit. Some, like Anglican clergyman Charles Kingsley, viewed physical heath as a moral and theological imperative.48 This period also saw the remarkable popularization of organized sports across all classes.49 As Haley further argues, the 46 W. Sharpey, “The Address in Physiology,” The British Medical Journal 2/85 (1862): 164. Bruce Haley, The Healthy Body and Victorian Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), 19. See Jennifer R. Sheppard, “Sound of Body: Music, Sports and Health in Victorian Britain,” in Journal of the Royal Music Association Vol. 140 No. 2 (2015): 343–369, esp. 348–349. 48 Haley, The Healthy Body and Victorian Culture, 19. 49 J. A. Mangan, Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public Schools: The Emergence and Consolidation of an Ideology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981). See also Dominic Erdozain, The Problem of Pleasure: Sport, Recreation and the Crisis of Victorian Religion (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2010). 47 42 most popular expression of muscular Christianity was the motto ‘mens sana in corpore sano’ – ‘a sound mind in a sound body.’50 Physical health and beauty not only bespoke a healthy individual but also a healthy nation. The Victorian health craze coalesced around the recurring urban epidemics, which resulted from the nation’s rapid industrialization.51 Likewise, citizens played a metonymic role within the nation, their individual health speaking to the broader health of the nation.52 Athleticism, and the values indirectly inspired through organized sports, supported subjects’ imperial duty. Fears of feminization and degeneracy, cast in the terms of social Darwinism, made the ideals of masculine health and conduct a matter of national importance.53 Within this scientifically-minded, body-conscious atmosphere, the newly knowable voice was integrated into a totalizing conception of health and subjectivity. After mid-century, medical and elocutionary texts frequently mentioned falsetto as a form of dysphonia, never in a positive light, and usually as a symptom of a serious malady. In short: falsetto was pathological; not falsetto technique as such, but rather the idea of falsetto as something distinct from the “natural” voice, and therefore falsetto was categorically excluded from medically- and socially-normative modes of vocality. As we shall see, a wide variety of sounds came under the conceptual umbrella of “falsetto,” very few of which would have sounded remotely akin to the technique deployed by elite singers trained in the earlier Italianate technique. The basic terminology of singing did not change along with the shift in vocal aesthetics, lending a deceptive aura of continuity. The terminological distinction between “natural/chest” and “feigned/falsetto/head” existed for centuries before chested high notes 50 Haley, The Healthy Body and Victorian Culture, 21. “Muscular Christianity” was an important social movement that originated in mid-nineteenth century England. It emphasized patriotism, manliness, teamwork, and discipline. For the classic treatment, see Donald E. Hall, editor, Muscular Christianity: Embodying the Victorian Age (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), esp. 3–16. 51 Haley, The Healthy Body and Victorian Culture, 6. 52 I discuss this issue at greater length in the next chapter. 53 Sheppard, “Sound of Body,” 348–349. 43 became de rigeur for male singers. As Andrew Parrott notes, the etymology of the term “falsetto” is something of a musicological red herring, especially when one tries to reconstruct Medieval and Renaissance vocal performance practice.54 But it is quite clear that falsetto, as we understand it today, was consistently taught and prized in performance for more than a century and a half before the mid-nineteenth century. Put another way, in the earlier technique, the distinction between “falsetto” and “natural” voice was merely descriptive, and artifice was a necessary precondition of rhetorically-effective singing; later the difference was proscriptive, and anything existing outside of the sphere of the “natural” was deemed a flaw. Of course, the complexity with which individual voice specialists treated the voice varied based on their respective fields and expertise. Throat specialists and elocutionists were more apt to resort to in-depth physiological explanations and laryngoscopic examinations than general practitioners or social scientists. But within the scientific community, vocal sound bore the burden of truth. And once the voice could be consistently observed and explained, it became an important tool within all-encompassing hermeneutics of the mind and body. One of the earliest medical references to falsetto occurred in 1853 in the Association Medical Journal in a section dedicated to cases of Cholera. Dr. John Grove, in assessing the physical state of his patient, a 14-year-old boy, made the following observations about his state of health upon being summoned: He was perfectly pulseless; his countenance was sunken and livid; his lips were blue; he had dark areolae around the eyes; his hands and feet were purple, and the skin shrunken. There was no sweat. The voice was peculiar, resembling the falsetto.55 54 See Andrew Parrott, “Falsetto Beliefs: the ‘Countertenor’ Cross-Examined,” in Early Music 43, Issue 1 (Feb., 2015), 79–110. 55 John Grove, “Cases of Cholera, without Comments,” Association Medical Journal 1/47 (1853): 1036. 44 Nor was this a singular reference to falsetto in relation to cholera. Of an outbreak of cholera in Newcastle, Dr. D. B. White describes his patient let forth a “cry of agony in calling on his friends to soothe his dreadful cramps, ‘Rub me, rub me,’ in that falsetto voice so characteristic of the disease in its severest form.”56 The sound of the child’s voice might very well have resembled falsetto, or some other form of dysphonia. But importantly, this account marks one of the first instances in which a medical doctor published an account that treated the voice as a bearer of an essential truth. The sound of the voice, in tandem with other symptoms, told the doctor something essential about the child. It was admissible evidence. Increasingly, the term “falsetto” was used only with negative connotations. Here, it was a tell-tale sign of some malady, a symptom, just like the patient’s weak pulse and pallid complexion. Gradually, “falsetto” was dissociated from cultivated singing and treated as an unacceptable form of dysphonia, aesthetically undesirable and indicative of some improper vocal production. Here it became linked with the scourge of urban epidemics, the sound of an unhealthy body living in an unhealthy state. There was no universally accepted definition of the word falsetto. By the late nineteenth century, there was already a rich literature on what falsetto was and how it might be produced.57 Anatomists and vocal pedagogues were equally confounded on the matter, and conflicting opinions persisted even into the twentieth century. Sometimes it was a strictly male phenomenon, sometimes it was available to both sexes. In this respect, it was rather like Justice Stewart Potter’s definition of obscenity: it is hard to define, but you know it when you hear it. Regardless, falsetto was invariably “othered.” 56 D.B. White, “Transactions of Branches,” The British Medical Journal 2/257 (1865): 573–580, esp. 575. For an excellent summary of the physiological research on falsetto up to about the mid nineteenth century, see John Bishop, “On the Physiology of the Human Voice,” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London 136 (1846): 551–571, esp. 563–566. 57 45 Shortly after Czermak’s innovations with laryngoscopic technique, there arose a rapidly expanding group of scientific voice specialists. They treated vocal maladies, presented and published their research, and, notably, ventured into writing singing and elocutionary manuals. With the advent of the laryngoscope, vocal sound became the product of observable physiological processes. Vocal sound shifted from a purely aesthetic object, governed by taste, to a knowable, scientific phenomenon. As such, accounts of the voice across the disciplines became increasingly prescriptive, insisting upon a narrow range of vocal expression as at once beautiful and healthy. Medicine and its related disciplines in the hard sciences now trafficked in vocal aesthetics, just as teachers of singing and elocution used science to validate their claims to beauty. Morrell MacKenzie was one of the founding members a group of prominent London laryngologists. In addition to his studies in England, he worked in prestigious clinics on the continent, most notably under Johann Czermak, from whom he learned to use the newlyperfected laryngoscope. He made a career for himself immediately upon his return to London in 1862, presenting and publishing widely on issues of the human throat.58 Like many voice culturists, Mackenzie worked across disciplinary boundaries. His work was respected by both the medical and the musical communities. In an early article, published in 1863, only a few years after the laryngoscope entered standard clinical practice, MacKenzie describes how he used galvanism (electric shock) to cure vocal maladies. One of the more detailed accounts dealt with a young woman who had lost her voice: 58 Although I will be discussing his work as it relates to voice culture, he is best known to posterity for his ill-fated association with Emperor Frederick III of Germany. By 1887, Mackenzie was the leading throat specialist. As such, the then Prince Frederick sought out Mackenzie for a second opinion on a lesion in his throat. Contradicting Frederick’s German doctors, Mackenzie incorrectly declared that the lesion was not cancerous. Mackenzie was decorated at home and abroad. In March 1888, Frederick became emperor, and died on June 15 of throat cancer. R. Scott Stevenson, Morell Mackenzie: The Story of a Victorian Tragedy (New York: Schuman, 1947). 46 [I]n making a laryngoscope examination, the vocal cords were seen to be very pale and narrow, as if atrophied. On attempted phonation, they approximated well, but still were distinctly relaxed; and the upward bulging towards their centers was quite perceptible. I at once applied galvanism to the cords, by means of my own “laryngeal galvanizer.” The operation was repeated every two or three days; and after the fourth application of the electro-magnetic current, the voice returned.59 It seems rather innocuous. A woman cannot speak and seeks medical attention. A laryngoscopic examination reveals that her vocal folds are not approximating (coming together) correctly and that they appear to be atrophied. Aside from implementing a new instrument (the laryngoscope) and clinical technique (galvanization), this case study seems fairly standard: a dry, detailed account of symptoms, treatment, and outcome. But note how he assesses her once the voice starts to return: It was very gruff at first, and “came and went”; so that though the young lady recovered her voice one evening, when she came to tell me of her good fortune the next day, she was unable to produce a sound. Gradually the voice became more constant, though its monotony was very striking; every syllable and every sentence was pronounced in the same tone, with an entire absence of expression. After the larynx had been galvanized altogether eight times, the voice was completely restored, and perfect as regards modulation. The laryngoscopic evidence of relaxation of the cords disappeared after the third application of galvanism.60 MacKenzie, like many of his contemporaries, bridges the gap between a medical assessment of physiological function and an aesthetic judgment of vocal inflection. Put another way, once he could observe the voice in action vis the laryngoscope, he was in a position to differentiate between normal and pathological function; and once he could do that, he felt he had the authority to dictate aspects of vocal inflection and expression. And although there was already a richly developed vocabulary which could describe the physiological structure of the 59 Morrell MacKenzie, “The Treatment of Hoarseness and Loss of Voice by the Direct Application of Galvanism to the Vocal Cords: Illustrated with Cases,” British Medical Journal 2/142 (1863): 314. 60 MacKenzie, “The Treatment of Hoarseness and Loss of Voice,” 314. 47 voice—i.e. describing the muscles and their movement—clinicians lacked a similarly nuanced vocabulary which could describe vocal sound. Once the larynx comes into view, the sound of the voice becomes equally intelligible; evidence of a body either healthy or diseased. The diagnosing ear, like the mirror, is seemingly objective. And the language used by doctors to describe vocal inflection is often borrowed from singing, which had the most developed vocabulary. Non-normative vocal production—especially falsetto, frequently nasality and throatiness, and sometimes simply “faulty” or “poor” vocalization—suggested an abnormal body, made so either temporarily by disease or permanently by one’s race, class, or other identity. Vocal sound and vocal physiology were incorporated into an already established way of labelling people. And as I will discuss later, the hegemonic group, which in this case meant upper and upper-middle class Englishmen, became fixated on preserving a uniformly “pure” mode of vocal production amongst the entire populace. Superiority, often described in physical and moral terms, also had a vocal dimension. Difference had to be all-encompassing. If someone was racially different, it was naturally assumed that their voices sounded different, a result of some different (presumed “inferior) physiological makeup. A curious case in The British Medical Journal illustrates how, by the latter nineteenth century, falsetto was thought to signify some sort of malady. In 1880, A thirty-year-old singer and contortionist came to a doctor’s attention complaining of a sore throat. He warranted international attention because he possessed “two voices,” both a “baritone and a falsetto voice.”61 With surprise, the author notes how the subject experienced “no discomfort” in switching between the two voices, and how he had “no preference as to which to use.”62 As I will show below, falsetto was characterized in both the medical and the pedagogical literature as 61 62 “Two Voices and a Double Epiglottis,” The British Medical Journal 2/1025 (1880): 311–312. “Two Voices and a Double Epiglottis,” 311–312. 48 inefficient, uncomfortable, and impossible to develop. And so, the author naturally assumed that this man’s facility and ease in the falsetto register was a symptom of some disease or abnormality. The falsetto was smoke and the author needed to find the fire. An examination of the subject’s throat revealed some anatomical irregularities, but the author could not assert with certainty that they had “anything to do with his ability to command the two voices.”63 Ease and comfort in the falsetto register was no longer an asset. It was clear evidence of some undisclosed malady; a symptom in search of a disease. With the invention of the laryngoscope, what had previously been a matter of style had now become a matter of medical fact. Medicine drew on the developed vocabulary of singing to describe vocal maladies, as well as in cases where the sound of the voice indicated some other underlying malady, such as cholera. But just as medicine became more musical, the inverse was also true, due in no small part to the porous disciplinary boundaries at the time. As I have already mentioned, there is a long tradition of musically-minded scientists and scientifically-minded musicians. The real shift during the latter part of the nineteenth century was the wholesale absorption of scientific vocal research into practical voice instruction. Lennox Browne (1841–1902) was another influential early laryngologist active in England. The son of a surgeon, Browne studied medicine at St. George’s hospital in Edinburgh. He became connected with Sir Morell Mackenzie in 1865, served as his assistant until 1873, and in 1874 he founded the Royal National Throat Nose and Ear Hospital. A lifelong art enthusiast whose career aspirations were thwarted at an early age, he provided the anatomical drawings for his own and Mackenzie’s publications, until 1883, when, in conjunction with Emil Behnke (1836–1892), the pair managed to produce and present high quality photographs of the larynx 63 “Two Voices and a Double Epiglottis,” 312. 49 during singing.64 Although not medically trained, the Polish-born Behnke was one the foremost experts on the voice in England, both in terms of physiology and practical use. John Spencer Curwen, who took over from his father as the figurehead of the influential Tonic Sol-Fa singing movement, regarded Behnke highly, and referred to him as “halfway between the doctor and the singing master.”65 And although they presented and published independently—Browne in the medical field, Behnke in the musical—their collaborations were numerous and successful, especially the monumental The Voice in Song and Speech (1883), which went through twentyone editions.66 Behnke and Browne were novel in their approach to the singing voice, particularly the way in which they redefined vocal registration. Previously, as I have already discussed, vocal registers were described in terms of the singer’s sensation. There was interminable disagreement over the number and type of registers, but most pedagogues utilized some variation of the old chest and head voice paradigm. While the site of vocal production does not change from singer to singer, the performer’s sensations while singing are quite intense and varied. In certain parts of the lower registers, many singers experience a sense of vibration in their chest. Singers learn to be attuned to it, to cultivate it, and to perceive it as a sign of a properly produced, resonant lower register. Likewise, higher pitches in a singer’s range can feel as though they are produced 64 “Obituary Notice: Lennox Browne, F.R.C.S.E.,” The Journal of Laryngology, Rhinology, and Otology XVII/12 (1902): 629–631. 65 J. Spencer Curwen, “Emil Behnke,” The Musical Herald 535 (1892): 291–294; 291. 66 Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke, Voice, Song, and Speech: A Practical Guide for Singers and Speakers, 4th ed. (London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle and Rivington, 1886). See also their Emil Behnke and Lennox Browne, The Child’s Voice: Its Treatment with Regard to After Development (Boston: Oliver Ditson, 1884). Lennox Browne, “On Medical Science in Relation to the Voice as a Musical Instrument,” Proceedings of the Musical Association, 2nd Session (1875–1876): 94–110. Emil Behnke, “The Mechanism of the Human Voice,” Proceedings of the Musical Association, 6th Session (1879–1880): 1–13. Emil Behnke, “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” Proceedings of the Musical Association 10th Sess. (1883–1884): 21–39. “Fifty-First Annual Meeting of the British Medical Association,” The British Medical Journal 2/1181 (1883): 324–339. Lennox Browne, “On Photography of the Larynx and Soft Palate,” The British Medical Journal 2/1191 (1883): 811–814. Emil Behnke, “The Registers of the Voice,” Proceedings of the Musical Association 13th Sess. (1886–1887): 1–16. 50 in the head, with intense vibrations in the sinuses, face, and cheeks. Prior to the invention of the laryngoscope, this form of sensation-based, empirical voice pedagogy privileged the singer’s sensations in performance and in defining register. The diagrams from Lili Lehmann’s singing manual (see Figure 1.2) are particularly famous illustrations of the pervasive way of conceptualizing vocal production. Following the invention of the laryngoscope, empirical voice pedagogy continued to exert influence. Indeed, it does still to this day. But scientific pedagogy, which relied on externalizing technologies like the laryngoscope, enjoyed a privileged status outside of the strictly musical discourse, influencing a much broader range of fields. FIGURE 1.2: Diagram of Vocal Sensation from Lili Lehmann’s How to Sing (1902) 51 Post-Garcian vocal pedagogues tended to modify the classical terminology of empirical vocal pedagogy. Terms like “head voice” and “chest voice” were still used, but they were often reinforced with detailed descriptions of the physiological processes that occurred in each part of a singer’s voice. However, Behnke and Browne took a much more radical approach and defined registers purely in terms of laryngeal function. As such, they represent the far extreme on the spectrum between Empirical and Scientific pedagogy. Rather than hearing or feeling the voice, Behnke and Browne conceived of the voice as first and foremost a visually observable physiological phenomenon. Registers, rather than a sensation, were defined as “a series of tones which are produced by the same mechanism.”67 To learn to sing, one had to first see the action. And in order to see the voice, Behnke and Browne advocated that the student learn to sing with the aid of a laryngoscope. The student was to reproduce, first and foremost, the laryngeal arrangement described in the text book (Figure 1.3). Sound and sensation were secondary. This approach to register seems to have originated from Emil Behnke in his 1879 article “The Mechanism of the Human Voice.” Behnke writes: We thus see that the names chest, falsetto, and head are purely arbitrary; but more, they are also misleading, and they help to confuse the ideas on a subject which is most important, and on which a clear understanding is imperatively needed. I therefore propose, in accordance with physiological facts, to use the terms thick, thin, and small registers instead of chest, falsetto, and head registers.68 The terms “thick,” “thin,” and “small” are meant to describe the ideal position of the vocal mechanism in each distinct register, or more specifically, to describe the approximation of the vocal folds within each range. 67 Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke, Voice, Song, and Speech: A Practical Guide for Singers and Speakers, 4th ed. (London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington, 1886), 163. 68 Emil Behnke, “The Mechanism of the Human Voice,” Proceedings of the Musical Association, 6th Session (1879– 1880): 1–13, 7. 52 FIGURE 1.3: Registers as Laryngeal Function, as illustrated in Lennox Browne and Emil Behnke, Voice, Song, and Speech: A Practical Guide for Singers and Speakers (1883) a. “Lower Thick Register,” 163 b. “Lower Thin Register,” 167 53 c. “Small Register,” (falsetto), 169 d. Male and Female Vocal Ranges with Registers, 171 54 Within the context of scientific vocal pedagogy, male falsetto represented an epistemic sticking point. As I have already shown, falsetto was out of fashion by the late nineteenth century, and the term had come to signify dysphonia and disease in a medical context. However, scientific voice pedagogy was founded on the principle that the voice was first and foremost a physiological process. Register, rather than a sound or sensation, was a mechanism. And so, simply finding the sound of falsetto distasteful was not sufficient. In order to discount falsetto aesthetically, falsetto had to be first defined as a physiological process and then attacked from the standpoint of vocal function and efficiency. Behnke and Browne took special pains to do just that in 1883 when they collaborated to produce photographs of the voice during the act of singing. They presented their findings separately, Behnke within the field of music and Browne within the field of medicine. Although their work sought to document the physiological processes involved in all vocal registers, both men devoted an exceptional proportion of their presentation to defining and discounting falsetto. The reception of their work shows, and the ensuing discussion among those present at the meeting suggests that falsetto preoccupied many minds. Browne’s paper to the British Medical Association is preserved only in summary. However, compared to the other presentations at the same conference, where other papers were given a sentence or two, paragraphs were devoted to Browne’s, suggesting an unusual level of interest: The results of these investigators being also exhibited on the screen, many points of interest, chiefly physiological and musical, were elucidated by means of these photographs; perhaps the two principal results were, first, to demonstrate how very conventional is the usually depicted laryngoscope image; and, secondly, as illustrating how appropriate and exact are the terms thick, thin, and small, applied by scientific musicians to the various registers of the human voice; and how valueless, from a musical point of view, is the falsetto.69 69 “Fifty-First Annual Meeting of the British Medical Association,” The British Medical Journal 2/1181 (1883): 333. It should be noted that Morell Mackenzie came up with an analogous set of registration terminology, based also on 55 In his paper to the Musical Association, entitled “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” Emil Behnke came to identical conclusions, again working through a series of photographs of the larynx in action, explaining each as he went along, tailored to a musical audience. He showed the difference between male and female voices, and how the muscular coordination changed with each new register. It is unfortunate to note, however, that none of these photographs could be included in the published version of Behnke’s paper. However, when he reached the upper limits of the male voice, Behnke was emphatic in differentiating between “falsetto,” an unacceptable mechanism, and “voix mixte” or “mixed voice,” the form of high, soft singing allowed to men: Now we come to an image showing the falsetto, which I daresay will be particularly interesting to many of you. The term falsetto, as we all know, is interpreted in different ways, and it is not always easy to understand what is really meant by it. I am anxious to make myself quite clear on this point, and therefore I wish to say that, so far as I understand the voice, there are two mechanisms (I am now speaking of the tenor), that is, the chest voice, to use that old orthodox term, and the mixed voice, in which there is muscular tension. The vocal ligaments are close together, and the soft palate is contracted; there is tension everywhere. On the other hand, you may produce a tone which is commonly described as falsetto, and there the circumstances are quite different.70 As sounds, falsetto and mixed voice (sometimes referred to as “mezza di voce”) can seem quite similar. But Behnke attempts to insulate mixed voice from the taint of falsetto by distinguishing between their modes of production. And he was not alone in his concern. Voice manuals often went to great lengths differentiating one from the other. Although similar in sound, only mixed voice was desirable. The student had to be armed with the means of telling one from the other, lest they stray into falsetto. For example, Voice Culturist John Howard writes, “If there is fear that the tone is a genuine falsetto tone, and not a mezza-voce one, the pupil should swell it the appearance of the larynx. See Sir Morell Mackenzie, The Hygiene of the Vocal Organs: A Practical Handbook for Singers and Speakers, 6th edition (London: MacMillian, 1888), esp. 33–44. 70 Emil Behnke, “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” Proceedings of the Musical Association 10th Sess. (1883– 1884): 27–28 56 gradually and may know that it is not mezza voce if the voice breaks on its way to full power.”71 Behnke then goes on to discount falsetto on mechanical and aesthetic grounds. First he asserts the supposed inefficiency of the register, arguing that there is “a great waste of air.” The vocal folds do not fully approximate in falsetto, leaving “a slit between them,” which “accounts for the waste of air in that register.”72 Because of this flawed mechanism, “the tone runs away, it is a poor, fluty tone; you can do nothing with it.” Behnke continues, “You cannot cultivate it, you cannot get a crescendo or diminuendo, and you may sing in it as long as you like it, you will never strengthen it.”73 Behnke discounts the register in every way imaginable. It is inefficient, ungovernable, profligate in its waste of air. The sound, which Behnke also finds disagreeable, is simply further proof of the mechanical flaw inherent in falsetto. He concludes, “The falsetto, as I understand it, is essentially a false production of tone, a tone with which we can do nothing.”74 The discussion following Behnke’s paper was devoted largely to the issue of falsetto, and how it differed physiologically from the acceptable modes of male phonation. Rev. Thomas Helmore, an esteemed Anglican church musician, asked about male altos and their use of falsetto. Behnke, aided by Dr. Browne, who was also present, described their encounter with a male alto who had gained some notoriety singing with the Moore and Burgess Minstrels, and who came to both Behnke and Browne regarding a sore throat. Behnke, upon looking down the singer’s throat, stated that he observed a “laryngeal slit” similar to what one would see in a female voice, and that as the singer ascended the scale “that slit became smaller and smaller, just as in the case of a woman, and as in the case of a boy.”75 Falsetto, therefore, is effeminate not 71 John Howard, Expression in Singing, Including Thirty-One Exercises for Voice Culture (New York, 1904), 13. Behnke, “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” 28. 73 Behnke, “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” 28. 74 Behnke, “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” 28. 75 Behnke, “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” 32. 72 57 because it sounds like a woman’s voice, but because, first and foremost, the mechanism used to produce it imitates that of a woman’s or boy’s voice. As such, it cannot be allowed in a proper man’s voice. Of his own encounter with the singer, Browne recounts: As to the alto of whom Mr. Behnke has spoken, I might say that he came to me as a patient, having lost his voice. He had made a large sum of money with Moore and Burgess; he had received a good salary, but he had lost his voice. I told him distinctly, “Your voice has failed because you are employing a wrong production, and this is the penalty; you ought to have kept your money while you were making it, because I could have told you at the beginning that if you went on using your voice in the way you have been doing the means whereby you had earned it would be exhausted." He went to Mr. Behnke, who, confirming my view, showed him how to sing-not with that unnatural voice, but still, with a very good serviceable voice if he liked. The patient, however, preferred keeping a public house to singing in a natural manner.76 Behnke and Browne account for their disgust in the terms of efficiency and aesthetic value. Although the photographs they used for this presentation do not survive, we can surmise what they looked like from the anatomical drawings from their slightly earlier publication, Voice, Song, and Speech: A Practical Guide for Singers and Speakers. The side-by-side diagram of male and female vocal registers serves to illustrate their attitudes towards falsetto. Behnke and Browne used the term “small” to refer to falsetto. Both the “upper thin” and “small” registers are excluded from the male side. Likewise, they go to lengths to specify that the laryngeal drawing of the “small” register is for female and child voices only. Although male voices are clearly able to produce this register, it violates gender norms because, in Behnke and Browne’s opinion (shared by many), male falsetto attempted to imitate female physiology and therefore could not be permitted. Indeed, Victorian gender identity was radically binary, with the masculine and the feminine occupying separate “spheres.”77 Activities, spaces, and attributes were divided along 76 Behnke, “Photographs of the Throat in Singing,” 33 See J. Tosh, Men at Home: Domesticity and the Middle-Class Home in Victorian England (Yale University Press, 2007), and R. B. Schoemaker, Gender in English Society, 1650–1850 (New York: Routledge, 2013). For an 77 58 gendered lines, as were bodies generally and voices specifically. Although men and women frequently sang many of the same pitches, timbre and register were carefully policed to ensure that men sang like men, and that women sang like women. In terms of sound and physiology, the falsetto register was deemed feminine, and was therefore unfit for masculine musicality. Where Behnke and Browne completely rejected the head/chest voice paradigm, Morell Mackenzie struck a more moderate tone. While borrowing some terminology from the empirical pedagogy, he also developed register terminology analogous to Behnke and Browne’s. Though less complex, Mackenzie developed the terms “long reed” and “short reed” to describe the mechanisms of the chest and head registers respectively as physiological phenomena.78 Throughout his method, Mackenzie uses his physiological terminology interchangeably with the older register terms. Although less polemical in tone than Behnke and Browne, voice for Mackenzie is first and foremost a physiological mechanism, rather than a sound or a sensation. Likewise, he discounts the use of male falsetto because it too closely resembles the female voice, “of which it is an imitation.”79 But Mackenzie remained ambivalent about falsetto, torn between an attraction to the sound and the “unnaturalness” of the mechanism. He writes, “As the name implies, it is an artificial or ‘false’ in contradistinction to the natural or ‘chest’ voice, just as ‘false’ teeth, however useful and beautiful in themselves, are still not natural.”80 Almost all vocal pedagogues accepted the physiological premise of singing. However, in practice, they operated along a broad spectrum ranging from the exclusively scientific—such as Behnke and Browne—to the more empirical. Of this latter type, William Shakespeare (1849– excellent summary of the literature, especially in relation to music, see Emily C. Hoyler, “Broadcasting Englishness: National Music in Interwar BBC Periodicals, PhD diss., (Northwestern University, 2016.), 109–119. 78 Sir Morell Mackenzie, The Hygiene of the Vocal Organs: A Practical Handbook for Singers and Speakers, 6th edition (London: MacMillian, 1888), 32–33. 79 Mackenzie, The Hygiene of the Vocal Organs, 33. 80 Mackenzie, The Hygiene of the Vocal Organs, 33. 59 1931) practiced a sort of scientifically updated version of the classical, empirical method. Shakespeare was an English tenor and professor of singing at the Royal College of Music. He was a student of the famous Italian pedagogue Francesco Lamperti in Milan, and drew heavily on his teacher’s concepts in his writing.81 Shakespeare’s notion of register relies on the old chest voice/head voice paradigm, but he updates his essentially empirical methodology with a modern distaste for falsetto and the occasional physiological explanation. For Shakespeare, “head voice” differs from the “chest” and “medium” registers in “character,” although he concedes that these registers are “presumably produced by a different action of the vocal cords.”82 Shakespeare continues: It [head voice/falsetto] is characterized by a fluty and bird-like quality, lovely and essentially womanly. It can be produced by both sexes, but while in a man it is so feeble and effeminate that few would venture to sing it in public, its use by mezzo-sopranos and sopranos is in the present day more highly prized, not only by reason of the loveliness of its quality, but because of its comparative rarity. The vocal cords are said to vibrate for this register in only a small portion of their length.83 Like Mackenzie, Shakespeare argues that male falsetto is essentially a feminine register, similar in sound and physiological process. Where Behnke and Browne argue against falsetto from the position of efficiency, control, and health; both Shakespeare and Mackenzie suggest that falsetto can be beautiful, but that it must be discouraged in men precisely because it sonically blurs the distinction between male and female voices (Figure 1.4) Shakespeare classes male falsetto as a vocal fault, alongside the classical list of errors, such as “throaty” and “nasal” singing. He writes: the falsetto of our cathedral altos—the attempt of a bass or baritone to make use of the effeminate head-register—too often affords an example of the unintentional use of the objectionable method of production.84 81 J. A. Stark, Bel Canto: A History of Vocal Pedagogy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999), 43–44. William Shakespeare, The Art of Singing (1899), 37. 83 William Shakespeare, The Art of Singing (1899), 37. 84 William Shakespeare, The Art of Singing (1899), 31. 82 60 Voices generally, and falsetto specifically, had been subsumed under the binary logic of Victorian gender. The laryngoscope provided an invaluable technology of naturalization, rendering what had formerly been a matter of taste into one of immutable scientific fact. And although singing was still viewed as an art, an “artificial” voice no longer had a place in it. FIGURE 1.4: Voice Types and Gendered Registration as Illustrated in William Shakespeare, The Art of Singing, 38–39. HEGEMONIC VOICE As I have shown, by the late nineteenth century, male falsetto was out of fashion musically, a marker of effeminacy, a symptom of disease, and viewed as functionally inefficient. As such, it was carefully excluded from normative vocality. Thus far, I have discussed falsetto within pedagogical and medical contexts, which, I argue, overlapped substantially during the 61 nineteenth century. Although I have not referred to it directly very much in this chapter, this broad, interdisciplinary discursive space that centered on the voice was a part of Voice Culture. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word “culture” had two distinct meanings during the nineteenth century. Of Anglo-Norman etymology, the word “culture” referred originally to the husbandry of the land. It was active—natural potential directed and perfected through human intervention. However, for the nineteenth century mind, one could cultivate the self just as one could cultivate a plant. And so “culture” could mean also a “refinement of mind, taste, and manners.” But culture was also a static thing, the “distinctive ideas, customs, social behavior, products, or way of life” of a people.”85 Voice Culture captured both these meanings. It was both a set of ideas and practices which determined what a voice was and how one should use it. As a term, “Voice Culture” came into use in during the latter part of the nineteenth century in relation to a very particular sort of scientifically-validated vocal pedagogy that encompassed both speech and singing. Voice Culture spread primarily through the genre of the voice manual, pedagogical texts that enjoyed amazing popularity in the waning years of the nineteenth and into the twentieth century. The purpose of the voice manual was twofold. First, it offered the individual a means of internalizing vocal norms for the purposes of self-regulation. But perhaps more importantly, Voice Culturists were concerned with the norm itself, a sort of ideal vocality, an average voice abstracted from the utterance of all who spoke and sang. In short, in an environment where the voice indexed health and civilization, Voice Culture emerged as the means of defining with maintaining a national voice—an English voice. 85 "culture, n.". OED Online. December 2016. Oxford University Press. http://www.oed.com.proxyiub.uits.iu.edu/view/Entry/45746?rskey=e70LYM&result=1&isAdvanced=false (accessed March 06, 2017). 62 The discourse surrounding English vocality closely mirrored the concerns with English musical identity that arose around the turn of the twentieth century. Both were marked by a national inferiority complex, a deep-seated cultural anxiety that England’s sounded cultural identities paled in comparison to other European nations. While all Voice Culturists were concerned with national vocality, at least implicitly, some authors made their nationalist agenda more explicit. In his elocution manual, The Cultivation of the Speaking Voice, conductor and composer John Pyke Hullah writes: It is generally admitted that the Anglo-Saxon race, now the majority of the population of Great Britain, are less gifted vocally—have the vocal apparatus naturally in less perfection, and artificially in worse order—than any other variety of Indo-Europeans. As a rule, the English voice, if not always of inferior quality, is almost always, in intensity or capacity, inferior to (for instance) the Italian, the German, or the Welsh.86 National vocality was necessarily multi-faceted. In one sense, the sound of the national voice was a product of language. As such, the innately sonorous qualities of the English language were always scrupulously defended in Voice Culture manuals. For example, Hullah writes that, “a careful and impartial comparison of modern European languages must inevitably result in the conviction that, in sonority, only one surpasses, and only two or three equal, our own.”87 The idealized sound of the English language offered a fixed, unifying vocal ideal toward which Voice Culturists could strive. National vocal production, then, became a central concern. Institutions and individual authorities felt compelled to define and regulate the national voice, just as ordinary people from all walks of life keenly monitored their own utterances as they attentively listened to others. In Foucauldian terms, the national voice became a locus of disciplinary power. 86 87 John Pyke Hullah, The Cultivation of the Speaking Voice (Oxford: Clarendon, 1884), 1. Hullah, The Cultivation of the Speaking Voice, 8. 63 How one sounded—one’s pronunciation, one’s posture, one’s breathing, and one’s resonance— became issues of national importance. On the topic of falsetto in particular, Hullah fumes: It is singular that the use of this mode of utterance or production, the very name of which, falsetto, is a reproach, and the result of which is a quality of sound which, if not exactly effeminate, is certainly epicene, should be confined to a people so justly priding itself on manliness of character and simplicity as the English.88 By no means unique, Hullah evokes many of the rhetorical tropes of British musical masculinity. Native simplicity stands in opposition to complexity and artifice, with the foreign “other” always occupying the feminine position in the gendered binary. Indeed, Victorian gender identity was radically binary, with the masculine and the feminine occupying separate “spheres.”89 Activities, spaces, and attributes were divided along gendered lines. So, too, was vocality, more broadly. Although men and women frequently sang many of the same pitches, timbre and register were carefully policed to ensure that men sang like men, and that women sang like women. The falsetto register was deemed feminine, and was therefore unfit for masculine English vocality. While the English voice was a sounded identity, discussed in terms borrowed from classical singing, it was not necessarily musical. Voice Culturists were concerned with all forms of vocal utterance, including speaking and singing. And just as falsetto was phased out of male singing technique, so too was it to be avoided in a male speaking voice. So much so, that by 1855, one could find advertisements offering cures for falsetto. A classified ad in The Times reads: 88 Frances Hullah, Life of John Hullah, 71. See J. Tosh, Men at Home: Domesticity and the Middle Class Home in Victorian England (Yale University Press, 2007), and R. B. Schoemaker, Gender in English Society, 1650–1850 (New York: Routledge, 2013). For an excellent summary of the literature, especially in relation to music, see Emily C. Hoyler, “Broadcasting Englishness: National Music in Interwar BBC Periodicals, PhD diss., (Northwestern University, 2016), 109–119. 89 64 The Falsetto or Unnatural Voice.—Gentleman who are afflicted with the falsetto or unnatural voice can now obtain relief from that distressing impediment to their advancement in life…90 The man offering this therapy was no charlatan, but rather Frederick Webster, who was a Professor of Elocution at the Royal Academy of Music. And it seems that he was successful since his ads were reprinted almost weekly in The Times for years to come. Another similar ad in the Times in 1860 reads: Elocution.—Mr. George Vining, of the Royal Olympic Theatre, and Professor of Elocution to Queen’s College, Tufnell-park, continues to give INSTRUCTION in the ART of PUBLIC SPEAKING and READING upon modern principles. The voice improved, the falsetto overcome, defect of speech eradicated, the clergyman’s sore throat prevented and cured, for which references can be given.91 These advertisements, like so much of Voice Culture, are aimed at the upper middle class gentleman. Up until this point, the voice has rarely been mentioned within the practical confines of labor. But just as men of the working class relied upon the nimbleness of their hands and the strength of their back to sustain them, so the gentleman relied upon his voice to perform his labor. The barrister, the clergyman, and the politician relied upon their throats as surely a farmer did upon his plow. Falsetto, then, seemed to suggest something other than an able-bodied and able-minded gentleman. And if the remarkable volume of publications suggests such a thing, there was tremendous demand for vocal cures. People judged one another on the sound of their voice, and thus cared about the sound of their own. Voice did double duty. It was the stamp of the individual, but also had to sound one’s multitudinous identities. Within this environment where the voice indexed the individual, normative vocality was often defined and regulated under the auspices of health and efficiency. Individuals internalized 90 91 “Falsetto,” The Times, 19 January 1855. “Elocution,” The Times 12 March 1860. 65 vocal norms in day to day use, self-defining and self-regulating in the terms proscribed by the discourse. Increasingly, however, governing bodies became interested in controlling the vocal health of the general populace. The way voices were controlled depended very much on class. For the working classes, choralism was used as a more explicit form of control. Group singing was touted as a wholesome form of social activity and a way to prevent drunkenness.92 Singing was a preventative. For the professional and upper classes, the voice was more often addressed in the more abstract terms of health, beauty, and preservation. For all the potential moral and physical benefits singing could provide, music and musicians remained inherently suspect. The Victorian treatment of music roughly mirrored Plato’s. Music could be enjoyed and could be a force for social good, but only if enjoyed properly. Music could also have deleterious effects. In article on “Manliness and Music” submitted to the Musical Times and Singing Class Circular in 1889, the anonymous author speaks to the suspicion with which many viewed music: In a country like England, where devotion to athletics forms a cardinal tenet in the national creed, such an impression [that music is unmanly] cannot fail to have operated greatly to the prejudice of the art—indeed, of all arts, for there are many examples with whom the term “artist” is simply a synonym for “Bohemian” or “black sheep.”93 By no means anti-musical, the author seeks to distinguish between properly English musicians whose pursuits reflect the nation’s manly virtues from those who do not. Of the latter group, he offers a telling catalog: There is the drawing-room tenorino, a manikin who fully justifies in his own person Von Bülow’s strictures quoted in a recent number of The Musical Times. He is, in truth, “not a man, but a disease.” There are dusky warblers of erotic inanities, skilled in the use of the falsetto, whose fervid folly plays havoc with the heart-strings of gullible women. There are violinists who profane a beautiful 92 See Charles Edward McGuire, Music and Victorian Philanthropy: The Tonic Sol-Fa Movement (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009). 93 “Manliness in Music,” The Musical Times and Singing Class Circular 30, No. 558 (1889): 460. 66 instrument by imbecile buffoonery, and, if they ever condescend to play anything in the countable style, render their soapy tone still soapier by the constant use of the mute. And about these pests of the drawing-room congregates a swarm of pallid dilettanti, cosmopolitan in sentiment, destitute of any manly vigor or grit, who have never played cricket or been outside a house in their lives. It is from contact with these nerveless and effeminate natures that the healthy average wellborn Briton recoils in disgust and contempt; and, without pausing to inquire, he proceeds forthwith to label all male musicians as unmanly and invertebrate.94 The “Dusky warblers” use of falsetto is just as insidious as the violinist’s use of the mute. Invariably, the high, the soft, and the interior (whether indoor or emotional) are feminized, treated, as the author put it, with “disgust and contempt” by the “healthy average well-born Briton.” The use of the terms “cosmopolitan,” “dilletanti,” and “tenorino” doubly “other” these forms of musicking, rendering them a foreign as well as feminine threat to the national character. All these are contrasted with the outdoorsy grit of normative British masculinity. Vocally, at least, high soft singing is particularly suspect. But musicians were not inherently bad; rather they were an at-risk population practicing a potentially dangerous art. In a nation preoccupied with moral and physical degeneracy, the musician’s lack of physical fitness was a matter for concern. In 1895, the Musical Standard lamented at musicians’ lack of care for their physique. The author notes, “Tis almost a cause of pity to see a congregation of musicians and notice the extreme weakness of their physique. Even those that are strongly made by nature allow themselves to run to seed, and the weak become weaker still.”95 But the concern for voices went well beyond musicians. In 1893, the British Medical Association issued a “Memorial on Voice Training,” aimed specifically at Public School, Universities, and “other public bodies interested in the question” of 94 “Manliness in Music,” 462. “Athletics and Musicians,” Musical Standard 4 (1895), 267. Quoted in Jennifer Sheppard, “Sound of Body: Music, Sports, and Health in Victorian Britain,” 364. 95 67 vocal health.96 In response, the Education Department issued two Circulars in 1897 on the issue of speaking and “Voice Economy.” The first, Circular No. 407, addressed the “unsatisfactory” teaching of reading in classroom settings, especially at the primary school level.97 “Reading” in this case clearly meant “reading aloud,” and indeed it made no reference to reading comprehension or grammar. Instead, the Department of Education was primarily concerned with the “modulation of the voice,” specifically as it relates to the “audibility of speech” and “intelligent expression.” Group recitation was singled out as undesirable because it resulted in a “slipshod indistinctness of utterance” which encouraged “unthinking uniformity and represses individual effect.” In other words, this Circular was concerned primarily with crafting vocal subjects, ready to take their place within the affective economy in which how a thing was said matters as much, if not more, than what was said. England was a highly class-conscious society well before the nineteenth century. If the explosion of voice manuals—many of which were geared solely towards elocution— suggests anything, it is that the vocal sound became much more important, even as a marker of class distinction.98 There exist numerous earlier texts concerned with proper speech, some of which even take up the issue of pronunciation, but they conceived of accent almost solely as a marker of class. Take for example the popular Vulgarities of Speech, which featured an extended “Table of Vulgar-Genteel Pronunciation.”99 Although the book purports to offer a means of acquiring finer speech, the author ultimately suggests one ought not to reach beyond their vocal station. 96 Reprinted in Miss D’Orsey, Voice Economy: A Lecture Delivered at Oxford, August, 1901 (Oxford: Alden, 1901), 28–29. 97 “Circular 407,” Justice of the Peace and Local Government Review December 25, 1897, Vol. 61, 826–827. 98 The benchmark study is K. C. Phillips, Language and Class in Victorian England (Oxford: Basic Blackwell, 1984. 99 The Vulgarities of Speech Corrected: With Elegant Expressions For Provincial and Vulgar English, Scots, and Irish; For The Use of Those Who Are Unacquainted with Grammar, 2nd Edition (London: F.C. Westley, 1829), 14– 20. 68 The author cautions, “You may easily avoid the glaring error of speaking in the vulgar-genteel style, by avoiding affectation, or endeavouring to speak finer than your associates.”100 The relationship between class and voice persisted into the latter nineteenth century and beyond, but the causes of proper vocality were abstracted into a more amorphous sense of “environment.” Circular 407 was by no means exceptional in its emphasis on children’s voices. Many voice manuals were devoted specifically to the topic of young voices, often from the standpoint of training boy choirs.101 But speaking, too, garnered considerable interest. Albert Bach’s influential manual, The Principles of Singing, argued that a child’s sonic environment should be carefully curated.102 “Children’s minds,” Bach writes, “like their voices, are soft and susceptible,” and therefore should be controlled since “the children of the present form the men of the future.”103 Bach continues: From the first days of our existence the ear becomes accustomed to good or bad sounds. The more it hears of the better ones, the more susceptible does the child’s ear become to them…I have known children to sing false because their mothers and nurses sang false, and spoiled their ear. It is not the voice which is false; it is the perception of the intervals which has been falsified by vicious culture. Children should never hear impure tones at home, nor play with toy instruments which are out of tune; in short, they should have no opportunity of hearing bad music.104 The child’s voice must be cultivated, their sonic environment managed with the utmost care. Likewise, Behnke and Browne’s sequel to Voice, Speech, and Song (1883) focused solely on children’s voices. The Child’s Voice (1884) was novel in that the authors solicited advice and 100 The Vulgarities of Speech Corrected, 9. See for example Emil Behnke and Lennox Browne, The Child’s Voice: Its Treatment with Regard to After Development (Boston: Oliver Ditson, 1884); and John J. Dawson, The Voice of the Boy: A New Conception of Its Nature and Needs in Development and Use, and of its Relation to the Adult Male Voice (Chicago and Newark: Laidlaw Brothers, 1919). 102 Albert B. Bach, The Principles of Singing, 2nd Edition (London: William Blackwood and Sons: Edinburgh and London, 1894). 103 Bach, The Principles of Singing, 100. 104 Bach, The Principles of Singing, 101. 101 69 opinions on youthful voices, arranged around general themes, and then added their own medically-informed gloss to comments they felt were especially pertinent. In a section devoted to the importance of proper instruction, the authors touch on the intertwined issues of class, health, music, and masculinity: The teacher who habitually shouts to his pupils has no right to complain if the children adopt the same style of addressing each other. Mr. Turpin has touched on this point in his communication to us in the following words:— “Rough play in noisy streets, attended by loud shouting, I find to be, through forcing the tones of the lower register, the most frequent cause of failure in training boys’ voices; so boys of superior classes make the best singers.” This is no doubt largely true; but as children are possess of great imitative faculties, there is no reason why boys of inferior classes should have less good voices, provided the teachers are not also inferior. The question is one, however, not devoid of practical difficulty, and we are aware that in some choir schools the authorities do not view with favor any endeavor on the part of the singing-masters to moderate shouting during the play-hours of the boys; for they say that any such restraint is likely to interfere with their growth in manliness and cheerfulness. In this, as in other matters, the best guide is by the safe middle way; the master should speak gently, the boys should be told that force is no more proof of beauty than that it is an indication of or conducive to health.105 The superiority of high born singers seems self-evident to Behnke and Browne, though they attribute it to circumstance rather than natural capability. The authors speak of a careful balancing act between cultural cultivation and masculine ideals. While “rough” voices speak to “rough” circumstances, their exuberance should not be too resolutely curtailed since such a course of action risked hindering their “growth in manliness and cheerfulness.” The authors imply that a total softening of the child’s voice could result in a soft, effeminate man. Undergirding their “boys will be boys” sentiment is the muscular Christian imperative that boys must become men. 105 Behnke and Browne, The Child’s Voice, 25–26. 70 Issued the same day as Circular 407, No. 408 was written from the perspective of the “teacher’s throat,” and dealt with the issue of speaking and reading in Training Colleges and Schools.106 The impetus for Circular 408 was nominally the issue of teacher intelligibility and vocal health. Teaching taxes the voice, then as now. Logically enough, it states that “a teacher cannot teach well unless easily understood,” and that to be understood, the voice must be in good working order; free from those “common forms of throat disease to which those who live by talking are prone.”107 To achieve this functional voice, Teaching and Training Colleges were encouraged to enlist the help of a “voice specialist,” and individuals were prompted undertake a course of study which encompassed both the theory of acoustics and physiology, as well as a practical course of exercises.108 But before learning to speak well, teachers were encouraged to internalize vocal norms, to discover their own “idiosyncrasies and provincialisms” and conform to the “standard of pronunciation and intonation common amongst people of fair cultivation.”109 In order to accomplish this, young teachers were encouraged to “range themselves with other liberally educated persons, but also because provinciality and inaccuracy of accent carry with them certain social disadvantages which lower the average acceptability of teachers.”110 Once teachers learned to recognize proper intonation, they were to internalize it through breathing and vowel exercises, gradually reshaping their bodies to reproduce vocal norms which they were to then instill in the next generation. Beyond the strict confines of professional and social standing, Voice Culture was broadly concerned with the interrelationship between general physical health and the voice. Vocal sound 106 D’Orsey, Voice Economy, 17. “Circular 408,” Justice of the Peace and Local Government Review December 25, 1897, Vol. 61, 827. 108 “Circular 408,” 827. 109 “Circular 408,” 827. 110 “Circular 408,” 827. 107 71 indexed more than the health of the vocal organs. It was a powerful diagnostic tool, as useful to the medical professional as to the everyday interlocutor. But the voice did more than simply reveal, it was also a means to an end. Albert Bach suggests that singing, with its emphasis on posture and breathing, could prove more effective than gymnastic exercise in developing the thorax, improving circulation, and elimination hypochondria.111 The author further argues that gymnastics should be carefully practiced in elementary schools, “particularly in poorer districts,” because, lacking proper food, they could become thin and tired. In contrast, “artistic singing strengthens the body without fatiguing it; and it will, especially with poorer children, repay the trouble by a better bodily proportion.”112 THE VOICE OF THE OTHER Taxonomies of race existed long before the advent of Voice Culture and the invention of the laryngoscope. Many tools had been used to subdivide humanity into groups, often with the aim of exploiting those relegated to the category of “other.” Nor were the British the first to leverage racial theories as a pretext for colonialist expansion.113 But as the aesthetico-scientific discourse on the voice expanded across various disciplines, it was also integrated into pre-extant theories of racial difference. Voice became one of the numerous measures by which Europeans calculated their superiority to racial others. Starting in the final third of the nineteenth century, the voice became something one noticed as an essential marker of difference. Like so many other characteristics—skull shape, facial geometry, bone structure, language, culture, geography—the 111 Albert B. Bach, The Principles of Singing, 2nd Edition (London: William Blackwood and Sons: Edinburgh and London, 1894), 104. 112 Bach, The Principles of Singing, 104 113 See especially Martin S. Staum, Labeling People: French Scholars on Society, Race, and Empire 1815–1858 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2003), esp. Ch. 6 72 voice was thought to index something else; it was the legible symptom of a fundamental state. In short, the voice was part of the totalizing hermeneutics of the body. During the nineteenth-century, there were many competing theories of race and ways of measuring it: phrenology and physiognomy, monogeneticism and polygeneticism, theories predicated on linguistic difference and others on the influence of climate. Voice Culture and voice science did not prove or disprove any of these, nor did they radically re-orient the field of scientific racism. However, the nature of the voice remained somewhat flexible. Advances in science lent the voice scientific credence, but vocal sound remained sufficiently underdetermined to complement any and all theories of difference. Voice could be a product of language, climate, physiology, or all three. It functioned symbiotically alongside pre-extant theories, adapting readily to arguments already made, and providing just one more seemingly self-evident proof of racial difference. Within physiology and medicine, the advent of the laryngoscope was greeted as a revolutionary technology. But within the disciplines of anthropology, human geography, and ethnology it caused no such stir. In an environment where many scholars were fascinated with the voice and the new avenues of research afforded by technological advancement, it seemed only logical that many began to consider the relationship between race and the voice. The notion of racial vocality was adopted without much debate because it confirmed the underlying premise that difference was total, and that it manifested psychologically as well as physically. As such the voice started to figure more prominently in accounts of distant lands and foreign peoples. The voice did not suddenly emerge as a marker of difference in the late nineteenth century. Many prominent racial theorists casually mentioned the voice, but it was not afforded a privileged position until later. Johann Friedrich Blumenbach’s theory of racial difference was influential across Europe, and especially within England during the nineteenth century. In his 73 treatise, On the Natural Varieties of Mankind (1775), Blumenbach’s theorizes five racial types (Caucasian, Mongolian, Ethiopian, American, and Malay) distinguished by skull shape, but makes no mention of voice in relation to race. However, he does discuss the voice in his later book The Elements of Physiology, devoting an entire chapter to the voice and speech.114 The link between race and voice is somewhat tenuous, but present nonetheless. Consider the way he differentiates between voice and speech. Voice, in Blumenbach’s opinion, is the raw phonation produced by the larynx. In contrast, speech is produced by: the expiration of air through the mouth or nostrils, and in a great measure by the assistance of the tongue, applied and struck against the neighbouring parts, the palate and front teeth in particular, and by the diversified action of the lips.115 The distinction between voice and speech is important because Blumenbach considers the latter a mark of civilization: Voice is common to both brutes and man…But speech follows only the culture and employment of reason, and is consequently, like it, the privilege of man in distinction to the rest of animal nature.116 By locating speech in the head rather than the chest, Blumenbach privileges it as a distinguishing feature of “advanced” races. He divides the races by skull shape, and so the head is the seat of identity. But, as an anatomist writing before the advent of the laryngoscope, Blumenbach does not develop the notion of racial vocality any further because “the mechanism of speech and articulation is so intricate and so little understood.”117 In other words, the link between racial difference and vocal difference seems self-evident to Blumenbach, and that link should be explainable in physiological terms, but science simply lacked the means of elucidating that link 114 Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, The Elements of Physiology, translated by John Elliotson 4th edition (London: Longmon, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green, 1828), esp. 139–153 115 Blumenbach, The Elements of Physiology, 141. 116 Blumenbach, The Elements of Physiology, 141–142 117 Blumenbach, The Elements of Physiology, 142 74 when Blumenbach wrote. One could observe the shape of a skull, after all, but not the minute inner workings of the voice. One can find the occasional mention of the voice in many of the canonical texts on racial difference, but rarely any substantive discussion. For example, in his Researches into the Physical History of Mankind (1836), James Cowles Prichard casually notes how the American Potowatami Indians possess “feeble and low” voices which becomes “very shrill” in an excited state; and that the Chippewas possess a “strong and harmonious” voice and good ears, but that one should not esteem their musicality, for “we heard one of their songs, which accompanies the scalp-dance.”118 Likewise, Artur de Gobineau argues that differing pronunciation and timbre, not just linguistic structure, supported his polygenetic argument: There is a different modulation of the voice in each [race] In one, the lips are used to produce the sounds; in another, the contraction of the throat; in another the nasal passage and the upper part of the head.119 Though his physiological theory is crude even by mid-nineteenth century standards, Gobineau’s fascination with pronunciation partakes in a broader trend. The same impulse that led Gobineau to theorize a fundamentally different manner of pronunciation and phonation along racial lines also led English elocutionists and Voice Culturists to fret about the state of the English voice and the quality of English pronunciation among the general populace. Racially-tinged fears of degeneracy always haunted discussions of vocal hygiene, for just as the “savage” could be distinguished by his uncouth voice, so too must the civilized Englishman’s superiority be evidenced by his pure pronunciation and immaculate vocal health. 118 James Cowles Prichard, Researches into the Physical History of Mankind, Vol. 5 (London: Sherwood, Gilbert, and Piper, 1847), 388–390. 119 Artur de Gobineau, The Inequality of Human Races, trans. Adrian Collins (London: William Heinemann, 1915), 183. 75 But, regardless of the scholar’s methodological outlook, the voice—whether regarded as a sound or the product of a structure—lent itself handily to constructions of race. And so, in anthropological accounts, the voice was included, often on the side, as a symptom or a peripheral observation, a casual entry in the bureaucratic taxonomy of difference. As in the medical discourse on the voice, normative vocal sound and function was defined borrowing terminology from classical vocalism. A musically euphonious voice marked one as civilized. Just as the characteristics of western operatic vocalism became associated with health, so too they became essential markers white racial identity. Likewise, racial difference was characterized in terms of vocal “fault” borrowed from singing, such as nasality, rough or guttural timbre, limited range, a lack of control, and falsetto. In contrast, normative vocality, which was always best exemplified by European cultures, was characterized by technical facility throughout a large range, a sonorous tone (as opposed to “noise”), and vocal power. Whether these other disciplines borrowed singing terminology on purpose or out of convenience, they in effect transmuted a relatively narrow vocal aesthetic—conceived in the terms of elite classical singing—into a transhistorical and trans-cultural standard of vocal health and racial timbre. In a paper presented to the Anthropological Society of London in 1868, anthropologist James McGrigor Allan used vocality to theorize the difference between American and European racial identity. Although he argues that “American character, if closely scrutinized, will appear nothing more than European character changed, modified, or developed by new conditions of existence” he could not help but be struck by a radical vocal difference.120 “The peculiar shrill nasal voice, the Yankee drawl” seems to offer the author the most convincing proof of some sort of racial divergence between Americans and their European forebears. Although he still seeks 120 James McGrigor Allan, “Europeans, and Their Descendants in North America,” Journal of the Anthropological Society of London 6 (1868): cxxvi–clxcii, cxxxv. 76 some authoritative statement on the matter from “some medical gentleman” to explain “this peculiarity of voice,” Allen theorizes that “climate has something to do with it, weakening the chest, and producing a falsetto voice.”121 Allen’s comments on the American national voice obviously struck a chord with his audience, because the questions centered on the relationship between climate and racial vitality as evidenced by the national voice. A Mr. Donovan, who claimed to have spent a few years in America, argued that Englishmen were “enfeebled” by the American climate. Donovan observed, “the women become old looking and worn early in life; and the men were characterized by a remarkable weakness of voice, in consequence of the lungs diminishing in size.”122 Another respondent to Allen’s paper took the “Yankee drawl” as a dire warning of racial degeneration: Alterations in physique were a solemn warning to intrusive races, that the climate had not been made for them, nor they for the climate… A marked indisputable symptom of decline is—emaciation. Early loss of teeth and hair, absence or beard, non-development of the female bust, spare figures, falsetto voice, and pale complexion; such proofs of physical degeneracy are not trivial, but important anthropological facts bearing on the future of European colonies in America.123 The following year, the laryngologist Duncan Gibb presented a paper at the Anthropological Society of London—entitled “On the Character of the Voice in the Nations of Asia and Africa, Contrasted with That in the Nations of Europe”—which offered the most rigorous theorization of racial vocal difference to date. Although other ethnologists and anthropologists had mentioned the voice in passing, Gibb’s paper gave racial vocality a thorough scientific grounding. Duncan Gibb (1821–1876) was a Canadian immigrant to England who quickly integrated into the relatively small but prestigious group of London laryngologists in the late nineteenth century. Before his anthropological article, Gibb notably translated Czermak’s 121 Allan, “Europeans, and Their Descendants in North America,” cxxvi–clxcii, cxxxv. Allan, “Europeans, and Their Descendants in North America,” cli. 123 Allan, “Europeans, and Their Descendants in North America,” clx. 122 77 monograph on the laryngoscope in 1861 and enjoyed a reputation as one the country’s foremost medical experts on the voice and its pathologies.124 Unfortunately the full text of the paper was never published, but an abstract of the paper and a transcript of the subsequent questions were. Although the paper focused on how racial vocal difference manifested sonically, Gibb prefaced the reading of his paper with “several large coloured diagrams” which showed the audience how “the different organs contribute to the production of articulate speech,” and especially how the “difference in the position of the vent of the Negro from their position in Europeans.”125 Although the greater portion of the paper appears to have been devoted to how the races of the world sounded different, their essential physiological structure served as a premise to the argument, a scientific grounding which verified Gibb’s aesthetic judgment. In other words, the notion of racial voice gained legitimacy and warranted attention because it could be attributed to “the condition of the larynx, the length of the vocal chords, and other circumstances.”126 The Chinese and Japanese were ascribed a voice “of lower power, feeble compass, and whining in its tone, possessing at times a sort of metallic twang.” Tartars, Tibetans, and Mongols had “louder” voices “yet still partaking of the metallic twang.” Those of India and Birmah [sic.] were described as “soft and very feminine.” Special attention was paid to the “Negro” voice, “whose larynx was of intermediate proportions” but which “differed from all other races of mankind in certain peculiarities.” The African voice was described as “wanting power,” but also of sounding like a “bellowing or roaring voice, a deafening noisy sound, without harmony or distinctness.” 124 Rae Duncan Laurenson, “George Duncan Gibb (1821–1876): London’s Foremost Laryngologist.” Journal of Medical Biography 5 (1997): 205–209 125 Duncan Gibb, “On the Character of the Voice in the Nations of Asia and Africa, Contrasted with That in the Nations of Europe,” Journal of the Anthropological Society of London 7 (1869): lxii–lxvi, lxii. 126 Gibb, “On the Character of the Voice in the Nations of Asia and Africa, Contrasted with That in the Nations of Europe,” lxii. 78 All these stood in contrast to European voices, which, although varied by national character, “all agreed in power, full compass, range, clearness, and loudness of sound.”127 Gibb’s paper did not radically shift racial thinking on the voice. Rather, he offered seemingly scientific proof for a belief that many casually held and articulated. According to the prevailing logic, race, gender, and identity all manifested in one’s bodily composition and psychological capabilities. It seemed only self-evident that one could hear race—and indeed relative civilization in the sound of the voice, just as one could observe it in fundamentally different physiology. The voice figured more prominently in the work of anthropologists and ethnologists following Gibb’s paper. Whether this was due to direct influence, a sense of validation, or simply that Gibbs represents an early and important interlocutor in an everbroadening discourse on the voice, one cannot be sure. Charles Darwin explicitly cites his indebtedness to Gibb in his The Descent of Man (1871), and essentially summarizes Gibb’s findings on racial vocality.128 Beyond theorizing racial difference, Darwin privileges vocal sound as an essential characteristic of human males and females: Man on average is considerably taller, heavier, and stronger the woman, with squarer shoulders and more plainly-pronounced muscles. Owing to the relation which exists between muscular development and the projection of the brows, the superciliary ridge is generally more marked in man than in woman. His body, and especially his face, is more hair, and his voice has a different and more powerful tone.129 127 Gibb, lxii. Charles Darwin writes “According to Sir Duncan Gibb, the voice and the form of the larynx differ in the different races of mankind; but with the Tartars, Chinese, &c., the voice of the male is said not to differ so much from that of the female, as in most other races….”128, The Descent of man: And Selection in Relation to Sex (New York: Appleton, 1882), 556. 129 Charles Darwin, The Descent of man: And Selection in Relation to Sex (New York: Appleton, 1882), 556. 128 79 Vocal timbre and pitch, along with muscularity and body hair, are incorporated into normative constructs of masculinity and femininity. But from these basic physical differences, Darwin also associates supposedly psychological differences between the genders, both in terms of emotional disposition and intellectual capacity. Of the genders’ emotional differences, Darwin writes, “Woman seems to differ from man in mental disposition, chiefly in her greater tenderness and less selfishness; and this holds good even with savages.”130 And of the intellectual differences, he writes “The chief distinction in the intellectual powers of the two sexes is shown by man’s attaining to a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than can woman—whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands.”131 Gendered and racial vocality, for Darwin especially, stem from radical physiological and psychological difference. Additionally, a pronounced gender binary was a marker of civilization. As Darwin argues, in non-European races, “the voice of the male is said not to differ so much from that of the female.”132 Therefore policing the boundary between male and female vocalism became an issue for those concerned with vocal hygiene and racial degeneracy. It was part of tautological approach to voice. A well-formed voice was a mark of breeding and physical health, just as learning to use the voice well was believed to improve one’s social standing and physical health. Likewise, falsetto marked an individual as effeminate and a civilization as primitive. Therefore, falsetto had to be discouraged within civilized (western) societies, lest that society devolve. Viewed in this manner, falsetto could be perceived as a genuine threat to the body politic. 130 Darwin, 563. Darwin, 564. 132 Darwin, 556. 131 80 For Darwin and his intellectual milieu, the characteristics of race and gender are measured by average representatives. The notion of a norm and an average only entered the social sciences in the nineteenth century.133 Deviations exist, but the average represents a sort of ideal position, the most representative bearer of truth. Moving beyond the spectrum of difference and instead focusing on the average makes groups appear more differentiated. In the case of voices, some males might have voices of a range equivalent to some females. But considered as an average, the “normal” male voice is observably deeper than the “normal” female voice. As such, the pitch and timbre of the “normal man” becomes an ideal position towards which all men should strive. And falsetto, as the extreme upper limit of a male voice, an ambiguous timbre, could not fit within normative European masculine vocality. Where once the sound of a man singing high might have suggested many things, including the supernatural or the superhuman, now it exclusively signified otherness and abnormality. Beyond broad racial taxonomies, the voice also figured within anthropological reports on individual cultures. Take for example this account of the Aino people published in 1872. Couched within a larger descriptive vignette, the sound of the voice, along with stature, and dress, speaks an essential truth about who and what these people are: The men are usually stout, well-made people, of rather low stature, with very hairy bodies. The hair of the head and beard is commonly allowed free growth, although in some districts many of them follow Japanese fashions in this respect. A well-fed male Aino is not a bad specimen of humanity, but the women are not to be compared with them. They seem to age very soon, and get shriveled up in their features; caused, perhaps, partly by the hard work they undergo… Their proper language is very different from Japanese, having many words ending in consonants, the entire want of which is a peculiarity of the latter language. The 133 For an excellent introduction to the history of the concept of normalcy, see Lennerd Davis, “Introduction: Normality, Power, and Culture,” in The Disability Studies Reader, 4th ed., edited by Lennerd Davis (New York: Routledge, 2013), 1–16. 81 tone of voice of the men is by no means unsonorous, while that of the women is a clear falsetto.134 The explorer, Blakiston, is not interested in Aino musical practice, but the voice reveals something essential. He bears a grudging appreciation of the Aino males, whom he dubs “not a bad specimen of humanity” and whose voices are “by no means unsonorous.” Their voices, obviously, are not fully resonant and well-modulated like a European voice, but they are not dubbed “noisy.” The relative civilization of the Aino grants them a quasi-musicality. Their voices produce tone, if a faulty one, rather than noise. The Aino female’s “falsetto,” on the other hand is a vague, if common assessment of feminine vocality, signifying simply a high pitch and an un-masculine timbre. Anthropological accounts often use the term “falsetto” to casually describe women’s voices, but never when describing the male members of relatively “civilized races.” A report on Uruguayan Gauchos from 1882 praises their skill as horsemen, their exceptional eyesight, and their ability as trackers. Unlike more isolated groups, the Gauchos were a racially diverse group with varied features resulting from Spanish colonization. However, the author, intent on defining their group identity by common features relies partly vocal character to do so: With all their diversity of origin there is a certain general resemblance among the Gauchos due to their mode of life, which marks them off as a strongly characterized variety of humanity. Although revealed mainly in moral qualities, it may be observed in some physical aspects also. Thus their figure is erect, with the shoulders well thrown back, and there is often a marked hollow in the loins— characteristics due no doubt to their firm seat on horseback and frequent swinging of the lasso and bolas. The voice is also as a rule deep and husky, and the laugh harsh and guttural among the men, while the women are very apt to speak in a shrill falsetto.135 134 T. Blakiston, “A Journey in Yezo,” The Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 42 (1872): 80–1. David Christison, “The Gauchos of San Jorge, Central Uruguay,” The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland 11 (1882): 34–52; 36–37 135 82 The male Gaucho’s voice—deep, husky, and guttural—reinforces the author’s impression of their character. They are outdoorsman, physically fit and capable. As such their voice shows a masculine depth. However, so far away from civilization and western influences, the Gaucho’s voice lacks the refinement of a European larynx: it manly but bordering on the primitive. And while “falsetto” seems a common enough description of a female voice, their shrillness also suggests their distance from the rounded resonance of civilization. Although both the Aino and the Gaucho are vocally “othered,” they are still treated as semi-civilized. Male and female voices are distinct. Falsetto only occurs in female voices, and the male voices are granted a quasi-musicality. A rough calculus emerges from these accounts. The more exotic and the more primitive a people, the more their voices must diverge from western norms. If they look different, and if their climate is different, then so too must their voices be different, and therefore inferior. A rare report dedicated exclusively to musical practice describes the Andamanese voice in unusual detail, and more technical musical terminology.136 However, although the detail is exceptional, it still relies on the now common tropes of racial vocal timbre. M.V. Portman, the author, describes the male voice as possessing “medium loudness, rather rough, and steady, growing deeper and fuller” until middle age, after which it becomes “rough, husky, and tuneless.”137 Boys’ voices are described as “clear and not unpleasant,” where women possessed “clear” voices, but suffered from “bad intonation.”138 Portman notes without surprise that “falsetto is common among both sexes,” but is thoroughly confounded by the fact that the tribe’s vocal production is as a whole “quite smooth and round, and entirely free from nasal intonation.” 136 The Andaman Islands are situated between India and Myanmar in the Bay of Bengal M. V. Portman, “Andamanese Music, with Notes on Oriental Music and Musical Instruments,” The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 20/2 (1888): 181–218, 183. 138 Portman, “Andamanese Music,” 183. 137 83 Falsetto, as a vocal fault, is to be expected from a “primitive” people, but the fact that “their general ‘timbre’ is not as nasal as that of the more civilized Oriental races” is anomalous. Vocal defect should, according to the tacit logic at play, be in proportion to their “primitiveness.” In other words, the exotic other is not entitled to a Western sense of musicality. The further they are from European culture and climate, the thinking suggests, the closer their voices should be to noise. But, the author continues: The usual compass of the voice in both sexes is about an octave. The man's is generally from C–c, though I have met men who can sing from B flat–e. Women generally sing from G–g. The prevailing male voice is barytone. The prevailing female voice is contralto. All the notes of the women are distinctly head and not chest notes.139 Where in the previous examples, the accounts of voice were couched within much larger account of the culture and of an individual’s travel among different peoples, this one focuses on the musical aspects. Of course, using the term “barytone” and “contralto” fails to account for whether or not the Andamanese have any such vocal classification system. But these voice-type designations are indicative of a globally taxonomic form of thinking. One could have just as easily said that men had relatively low voices. But here the notion of “barytone” and “contralto” is as much a category of identity as “Oriental races,” and that where the voice type designations perhaps tell us something about the average range of an Andamanese voice of either sex, so too does the discussion of “their general ‘timbre.’” One can almost pick up on a sense of relief when Portman notes the use of falsetto in both genders. In a way, the Andamanese falsetto serves to insulate idealized notions of civilized western vocality. At this point, falsetto was thought of as an effeminate register, proper to 139 Portman, “Andamanese Music,” 183. 84 women, possible in men, but when used in the male voice, it was perceived as a physical approximation of a fundamentally female range. It did not simply sound like a woman’s voice. According to physiologists, like Behnke and Browne, the falsetto register approximated the female throat. The male throat was in danger of becoming female. As such, using falsetto undermined the binary construction of gender that undergirded Victorian society, and which they viewed as a mark of civilization. If the Andamanese possessed rich, well-modulated voices without the qualifying presence of falsetto, it would have threatened the underlying colonialist logic of the anthropological endeavor, suggesting that the Andamanese were either people who should be allowed to live their lives as they saw fit, or that racial hierarchies were fundamentally flawed. Today, the disciplines of phrenology and physiognomy are scorned as racist pseudoscience. And yet the idea of racial vocality persists to this day in various forms, perhaps because of the very epistemological flexibility I have described above. As I have shown, the notion of an indexical voice—or the idea that once can hear the contours of race, gender, and class—stems from the nineteenth century intersection of music taste and scientific endeavor. Within this context, falsetto, once cultivated and prized in performance, became a blanket term for effeminacy, disease, and racial otherness. It was systematically excluded from normative masculine vocality. And so, it is no wonder that the emergence of falsetto-based countertenors met with such scorn and resistance. 85 CHAPTER 2 ‘Tis Nature’s Voice: Alfred Deller, The Countertenor Voice, and English Masculinity In 1937, Alfred Deller was not a countertenor. He did not sing any differently than he did later in life, but he called himself an alto. “Alto” and “countertenor” were, at that time, used interchangeably as terms for men singing in falsetto, though the latter term was considered more antiquated and was therefore rarely used. And to add a further distinction, women singing in the same register were referred to as “contraltos.” In calling himself an alto, Deller simply fell into line with common practice. The distinction between the two terms, though, came to matter a great deal a few years later, especially to Deller. But in 1937, Deller sang in a church choir, like many other male falsettists, and had the occasional solo gig, especially in and around his native Kent. His career, and the ensuing countertenor revival, would not take off for another few years.1 However, that same year, at a meeting of the Royal Musical Association, John Hough presented a paper on the history of the countertenor voice. Purcell figured prominently, as did Bach and Handel. At the end of his paper he addressed “The Modern Question,” and thus illustrated the state of countertenor singing in the years just before Deller rose to prominence. “The question of altos in the modern English Church music is a very troubled one,” Hough writes, It must not be overlooked that most alto singers are self-trained, a fact that easily explains away the cruder type of voice which attempts to complete the harmony at the risk of much thoughtless and unfair criticism. Few would question the utility 1 For the canonical account of the countertenor revival, see Peter Giles, The History and Technique of the CounterTenor: A Study of the High Male Voice (Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1996). For a revisionist account, see Andrew Parrott, Composers’ Intentions? (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2015); and Simon Ravens, The Supernatural Voice: A History of High Male Singing (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2014). 86 of the alto voice, and given the attention received by other voices, it could lay claim to beauty.2 The modern countertenor was, for Hough, an ill-trained ensemble singer, lurking on the periphery of English musical life. A countertenor himself, the author leaves aside the issue of gender. But following the presentation, musicologist and Purcell specialist J. A. Westrup remarked: One would not naturally assume from hearing modern [1937] counter-tenors that much of the music of Purcell’s period was so virile in quality. Thoroughly manly songs were sung then by counter-tenors. What has happened to the voice in the meantime?3 Westrup neatly sums up the apparent paradox that would follow Deller throughout his career: How could the paragon of musical Englishness write for a voice like that? Two separate issues are at play here. First is the countertenor’s use of falsetto, which so offended Westrup’s sensibilities. As I discussed in the previous chapter, prior to the midnineteenth century, falsetto (sometimes “voce di testa” or “head voice”) was believed to be the natural upper register of all voices, male and female.4 It was to be cultivated and deployed in performance according to the laws of good taste. However, falsetto—that register which so defines the modern countertenor—gradually became pathological: aesthetically undesirable, a marker of disease, effeminacy, and difference.5 2 John Hough, “This Historical Significance of the Counter-Tenor” in Proceedings of the Musical Association 64 (1937–38): 19-20. 3 Hough, “This Historical Significance of the Counter-Tenor,” 22. 4 See Ch. 1, 11–19 for an extended discussion of falsetto. 5 I borrow the term pathological falsetto from Gregory Bloch and his article “The Pathological Voice of GilbertLouis Duprez,” The Cambridge Opera Journal 19/1 (2007): 11-31. Bloch chronicles the period of flux in operatic singing technique when male singers adopted strictly chested high notes. He sets it all against contemporary scientific debates on vocal physiology before the advent of the laryngoscope. 87 Secondly, during the early twentieth century, Purcell’s large scale vocal works—most of which feature the solo countertenor voice—were performed more frequently.6 As I shall show in greater depth below, Purcell’s reputation remained remarkably consistent from his death in 1695 through to the twentieth century: he was prized especially for his vocal music, particularly the way in which he set the English language. He remained a central figure in the English musical canon. Indeed, the English Musical Renaissance was predicated on reviving the period of musical creativity bookended by Dunstable on one end and Purcell on the other. But no matter how important he was, his larger works were rarely performed.7 And so, prior to the twentieth century Purcell revival, the fact that Purcell sang countertenor, and the fact that he wrote extensively for the countertenor voice, could exist peaceably alongside the modern distaste for falsetto.8 Westrup’s incredulity at the modern countertenor’s use of falsetto speaks to a deeper anxiety. Importantly, the musicologist blamed the singers rather than the composer. To Westrup’s ears, and those of most Englishmen around that time, falsetto was an unmanly sound. Westrup, Hough, and their contemporaries were inheritors of a way of attending to the voice, body, and identity in which falsetto had no place. Had he impugned the composer’s rather than singer’s masculinity, then he risked also calling into question the nation’s masculine character. 6 The Purcell revival is an under-researched area. The performance and reception history of Purcell’s music is outlined quite well in Rebecca Herissone, The Ashgate Research Companion to Henry Purcell (London: Routledge, 2012), 303-352. See also Andrew Parrott, “Performing Purcell,” in The Purcell Companion, ed. Michael Burden (London: Amadeus Press, 1995), 385-444. 7 For example, prior to 1945, Purcell was rarely heard on the BBC more than 20 times a year, and when one did hear Purcell, it was typically a single song within a larger vocal recital. All of the program listings published in the Radio Times between 1923-2009 are available online, free to the public as part of the BBC Genome Project. http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk 8 For example, William H. Cummings, in his Grove entry on Purcell, makes note of the fact that he sang “the alto song “‘Tis Nature’s Voice,” explicitly citing the Musical Antiquarian Society edition. But he did not hesitate to describe the composer as “vigorous” and “energetic;” masculine adjectives to be sure. William H. Cummings, “Henry Purcell” in A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, vol. 3, edited by George Grove (London: MacMillan, 1883) 49-51. 88 Whether we think of the “nation” as a discourse, an identity, an idea, or a system of cultural representation, it is primarily discussed, performed, thought of, and represented by men, and in masculinist terms. And not just any men, but men of a specific race and class who function metonymically for the nation. They are, according to literary theorist Praseeda Gopinath, “contiguous with, and representative of, the nation as a whole.”9 Sociologist R.W. Connell’s concept of hegemonic masculinity serves as an apt point of reference for both “man” and “nation.” Hegemonic masculinity is the normative, most honored way of being a man, at any place and time, an ideal against which other masculinities must relate.10 One could counter that women figure prominently in national symbolism—think of Lady Liberty or Mother India. But they are treated as passive symbols, objects of desire, and focal points of nationalist zeal. They are, according to Anne McClintock, “denied any direct relation to national agency.”11 National identity, in theory, expresses unity, a sense of shared identity that emerges from a supposedly common culture. In practice, nationalism often amounts to little more than the institutionalization of gender, racial, and class difference.12 Masculinity and nationalism, therefore, are not simply two constructs operating in parallel across time and culture. Instead, they are consubstantial and co-constitutive.13 They exist in a symbiotic relationship, sustaining and defining one another. 9 Praseeda Gopinath, Scarecrows of Chivalry: English Masculinities after Empire (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2013), 5. 10 R.W. Connell and James Messerschmidt “Hegemonic Masculinity” in Gender and Society 19, No. 6 (Dec. 2005), 836. 11 Anne McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest (London: Routledge, 1995), 354. 12 McClintock, Imperial Leather, 353. 13 Joanne Nagel, “Masculinity and Nationalism: Gender and Sex in the Making of Nations,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 21, No. 2 (1998): 242–269; Anne McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest (London: Routledge, 1995; Patrick F. McDevitt, May the Best Man Win: Sport, Masculinity, and Nationalism in Great Britain and the Empire, 1880-1935 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008); Joan Tumblety, Remaking the Male Body: Masculinity and the Uses of Physical Culture in Interwar and Vichy France (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012). 89 Westrup’s concern serves as an indirect articulation of this principle. More so than the ordinary man on the street, historical figures are expected to conform to society’s masculinist ideals, and the more prominent a place they occupy within the nation’s historical imagination, the more important their manliness became. Purcell was, then as now, a luminary in the English musical pantheon. But the “Englishness” of his musical genius required that both the composer and his music was sufficiently masculine. Therefore, Purcell’s apparent preference for a falsettobased male voice type potentially threatened the masculinist credentials of one of England’s musical greats. Alfred Deller was by no means the only English musician whose masculinity had been questioned.14 Post-Victorian British masculinity was based on athleticism, emotional control, and self-sacrifice. Musical performers were especially vulnerable to critical attacks precisely because they practiced an art often centered on emotional outpour and self-revelation. But the sound of male falsetto singing and its proximity to one of the luminaries of the English classical music canon was especially problematic. Enter Alfred Deller. His career as a countertenor began in the winter of 1943. Michael Tippett had just arrived in Canterbury to hear the first public performance of his motet Plebs Angelica. Sometime before, Joseph Poole, a Precentor at the Cathedral, had written to Tippett asking the composer to come to Canterbury and listen to an exceptional male alto named Alfred Deller, who was then a Lay Clerk at the Cathedral. Tippett agreed, and their meeting marked the beginning of the countertenor revival. Upon hearing Deller sing Purcell’s “Music for a while,” Tippett remarked that, “In a trice the centuries rolled back; for I knew immediately this was the 14 See particularly Christine Baade, Victory Through Harmony: The BBC and Popular Music in World War II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), esp. 82-104. See also Corissa Gould, “Aspiring to Manliness: Edward Elgar and the Pressures of Hegemonic Masculinity,” in Music and Masculinity in Western Musical Practice, ed. Ian Biddle and Kirsten Gibson (Surrey: Ashgate, 2009), 161-182. 90 lost counter-tenor voice which Purcell had known and admired.”15 In his own recollection of that meeting, Alfred Deller recalls: When, eventually, I met with Michael Tippett I was still singing alto and calling myself an alto. He said to me, ‘When you sing for me, I shall give you the old English classical name for your voice, which is countertenor.’ And that is how I became a countertenor.16 In the years leading up to Deller’s discovery, there had been a growing interest in performing, rather than simply venerating, the music of England’s past.17 Tippett in particular was at the vanguard of those interested in performing Purcell’s large scale vocal works, most of which extensively featured the countertenor voice. These parts proved a stumbling block: too low for modern contraltos and too high for modern tenors. When he listened to Deller that winter’s day in 1943, Tippett heard the solution to a very practical performance practice issue. Purcell’s countertenor parts fit Deller’s voice, and unlike other male altos of the day, he was good enough to sing alongside soloists with conventional voice types. Following his “discovery,” Deller gained wider notoriety, first performing at Morley College with Michael Tippett, and later reaching a much wider audience through his frequent radio broadcasts on the new BBC. Beyond Purcell, Tippett and the influential members of his cohort came to believe that the countertenor was the appropriate voice to use for much early music, especially early English music. 15 Michael Tippett, “Purcell rediscovered,” The Manchester Guardian, 4 June 1959. This anecdote is better known in a later variant: “I was at that time wrapped up not only in Purcell, but in the Elizabethans and all the early English school. One of my heroes was Orlando Gibbons, so the first thrill of that visit to Canterbury was to enter the practice room in the choir school, which I found to be almost unchanged since Gibbons himself was there in the sixteenth century. It was in those evocative surroundings that I heard Alfred Deller sing Purcell’s Music for a while. It was not a very good arrangement of it; but for me, in that moment the centuries rolled back.” Quoted in Michael and Mollie Hardwick, Alfred Deller: A Singularity of Voice (New York: Proteus, 1980), 74. I don’t know whether the Hardwick’s interviewed Tippett to get the variant, or modified the earlier published recollection. 16 Michael and Mollie Hardwick, Alfred Deller: A Singularity of Voice (New York: Proteus, 1980), 76. 17 This is an area where much research remains to be done. For a good case study centered on an early English composer, see Suzanne Cole, Thomas Tallis and his Music in Victorian England (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2008); also Harry Haskell, The Early Music Revival: A History (London: Dover, 1996). 91 Deller’s adoption of the title “countertenor” might seem on the surface to be a mere technicality, but it came to define the singer’s identity, to historically validate his vocal practice, and to shield his—and the music’s—masculinity. As I will relate in greater detail later in this chapter, the sound of Alfred Deller’s voice became a marker of national identity in post-war England, largely because of the integral role he played in the Purcell revival, and the exposure his voice received on the BBC, in concert, and on record. As Xin Ting Ch’ng argues, the countertenor voice became a symbol of Britain’s musical past. 18 But unlike the author of that recent dissertation, I do not contend that Alfred Deller normalized male falsetto. His singing, beautiful though it was, did not single-handedly serve to reorient the way Britons attended to the voice, the body, and identity. There was no paradigm shift, and normative vocality remained much as it had been since the latter nineteenth century. Rather, because his voice seemed to solve an intractable issue of performance practice, Britain’s musical institutions taught the public to hear their past in Deller’s voice. To accomplish this task, the countertenor voice had to be carefully framed, and the public had to be equipped with a special set of audile techniques. In theory, the voice type’s historical provenance, reasserted again and again, served to shield the singer’s, the music’s, and the nation’s masculinity. But in practice, listeners were encouraged to adopt a novel, bifurcated way of attending to the countertenor voice. On the one hand, they were assured of Deller’s manliness: his physical vigor, the naturalness of his singing technique, his athletic build, and even his virility. And on the other hand, listeners were encouraged to divorce the sound of Deller’s voice from his body, or in other words, to intentionally render it acousmatic.19 Thus unhinged from its 18 See Xin Ting Ch’ng, “The English Voice of the Mid-Twentieth Century: Ferrier, Deller and Pears” (PhD diss., University of Southampton, 2016). 19 See Brian Kane, Sound Unseen: Acousmatic Sound in Theory and Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), esp. 97-118. Kane details how musical practice often involved rendering sound acousmatic through cultivated 92 sounding body, listeners could fill the gap between sound and source with the voice type’s historical credentials. Falsetto remained “othered,” always compartmentalized and listened to with many caveats, but its alterity became linked with historical distance, rather than effeminacy. The term “discovery” deserves a bit of unpacking. In the colloquial sense, Tippett “discovered” Deller in that he found a previously unknown and talented singer whose voice conveniently fit the music Tippett wanted to perform. But “discovery” also framed Deller’s career and the ensuing countertenor revival as a key rhetorical strategy. His singing was treated like an archeological discovery, an unearthing of some ancient artifact previously thought lost. But Deller was no vocal coelacanth, lurking hidden beneath the waters until Tippett dredged him up. Deller, gifted though he was, sang as others sang, and had been singing for several years. This notion of “discovery” served to distance Deller from the amateurish sound of other cathedral altos. But most importantly, “discovery” served to position Deller’s way of singing in the heyday of England’s musical past rather than in the gender-troubled periphery of the present. DEFINING THE COUNTERTENOR BEFORE DELLER Men have been singing high for centuries, whether aided by surgery, falsetto technique (as Deller did), or simply because of an exceptionally high natural voice. By 1943, Alfred Deller was by no means the only man in England singing predominantly in falsetto, though he was arguably one of the best, and he certainly garnered the most fame. But what was a countertenor, and why did Tippett want one? The history of the countertenor, told and re-told in endless variation, always follows the same basic contours. Countertenors once enjoyed a privileged status, especially in Restoration bodily techniques. In other words, sounds are often made acousmatic willfully throughout music history, even if the word itself has not. 93 England where they found gainful employment on stage, at court, and within the church. Their popularity declined during the eighteenth century, through the nineteenth, and well into the twentieth century, until Alfred Deller brought wider recognition and acceptance of the countertenor.20 But what exactly a countertenor was, and how they produced their voice was a topic of much debate, and indeed it still is. Alfred Deller’s career was made possible by the convergence of two parallel but previously disconnected discourses. First is that of the countertenor itself, which surfaces occasionally on the fringes of musical periodicals and historical texts. Although Deller’s name and voice became inextricably linked with early music, it is during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that scholars and singers set the stage for both the countertenor’s historical importance, and the potential gender-troubling sound of falsetto singing. The second discourse is the nationalist historiography of Henry Purcell. As I will show at greater length below, Purcell was always celebrated as an important English composer, especially for his vocal works. As the twentieth century progressed, however, there was increasing interest in performing all of Purcell’s music and integrating it into a living English musical canon. Practical issues of performance practice arose, especially with regards to the vocal performing forces. But to Tippett, Alfred Deller’s unique talents seemed to solve the previously intractable countertenor problem. And so, countertenors ceased to be marginal practitioners of a vocal art that was deemed either obsolete or effeminate. Writing in 1820, William Knyvett, himself a professional countertenor, was one of the first to discuss his voice type in print. Notably, he defines the countertenor primarily by range, 20 For the canonical account, see Peter Giles, The History and Technique of the Counter-Tenor: A Study of the High Male Voice (Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1996). For a revisionist account, see Andrew Parrott, Composers’ Intentions? (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2015); and Simon Ravens, The Supernatural Voice: A History of High Male Singing (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2014). 94 rather than by timbre, facility, or even mode of production (i.e. modal or falsetto). Although he does make the distinction between “men using the falsette” and “natural countertenors,” he does not treat falsetto pejoratively, nor does he suggest that one method is more masculine than the other. Rather, the author neutrally describes both as coexisting practices of singing. Notably, Knyvett also discusses the historical repertoire associated with the countertenor, especially Handel oratorios, which he sang in concert, but also Purcell. Strikingly absent is any defense or attack of the voice in the gendered terms which become so common later in the century. Instead, Knyvett seems to offer a brief account by a latter-day practitioner of a dying vocal art. Of his voice, he concludes that “the usage has almost passed away, and the range of the counter-tenor is by modern composers very much confined to glees.”21 Towards the end of the nineteenth century, falsetto becomes a gender-troubled register. Mr. D. Baptie, a countertenor writing in defense of his voice to The Musical Times, laments that the editor of a recent collection of glees (long a bastion of high male singing) wishes his work to be sung “by ‘high tenor’ voices, using their ‘thin register,’ and not by ‘the male contralto or countertenor.’”22 Though the editor does not specify why, Baptie makes the implication clear: I have frequently met gentlemen possessed of fine alto voices which they seldom use because they were told that alto was not a man’s part, and that only women should sing it. That being so, these fine natural altos wasted their voices in futile attempts to transform themselves into basses or tenors, which nature had never meant for them. Again, I have met (one or two) women with abnormally low-set voices, for whom even alto seems too high, their best notes being actually tenor range. I see no reason why such women should not sing tenor, and high-voiced men alto, without being sneered at and denounced as unsexing themselves.23 21 William Knyvett, “Preliminary Remarks on Counter-Tenor Singing” in The Quarterly Musical Magazine and Review 2/8 (1820): 469-70. 22 D. Baptie, “On Counter-Tenors” in The Musical Times and Singing Class Circular 20/442 (1879): 661. 23 Baptie, “On Counter-Tenors,” 661. 95 In the intervening years between when Knyvett and Baptie wrote, singing had radically changed.24 As I discuss at length in the previous chapter, falsetto had fallen out of fashion and chested high notes had become the norm. Conductor and music educator John Hullah (1812–1884) supplied all the entries on voice types for the first edition of Grove. In his entry for “Alto,” Hullah seems to adopt a neutral tone: The male voice of the highest pitch, called also counter-tenor, ie Contra, or against the tenor… Later [after the early 17th century] however this compass was extended by bringing into use the third register of the voice, or ‘falsetto,’ a register often strongest with those whose voices are naturally ‘bass.’25 But his true feelings come to the fore in his entry on “Falsetto,” which he described as categorically “forced or non-natural.”26 “The male counter-tenor or alto voice,” he continues Is almost entirely falsetto, and is generally accompanied by imperfect pronunciation, the vowels usually partaking more or less the quality of the Italian u or English oo, on which the falsetto seems to be most easily producible.27 Hullah also wrote about the countertenor from the standpoint of a choral director, educator, and voice teacher who preferred mixed choruses over the all-male choirs found in English cathedrals. Hullah writes: By the limitation of church choirs to men and boys, one, and that perhaps the most beautiful, variety of the human voice is entirely excluded from them - the contralto, for which is substituted the male counter-tenor, which in most cases must be regarded rather as an anomalous, artificial mode of utterance than as a voice in the proper sense of the word.28 The countertenor’s offense was his use of falsetto. Rather than a natural extension of the male voice, falsetto was now heard as an imitation of the feminine; a timbral transgression. The 24 I deal with this topic at greater length in Chapter 1 John Hullah, “Alto” in A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, vol. 1, edited by George Grove (London: Macmillan, 1879), 57-58. Hullah treats the low female voice under the entry on “contralto.” 26 John Hullah, “Falsetto” in A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, vol. 1, edited by George Grove (London: Macmillan, 1879), 501. 27 Hullah, “Falsetto,Hul” 502. 28 Frances Hullah, Life of John Hullah, LL.D. (London: Longman’s & Green, 1886), 71. 25 96 vocally masculine and the feminine were cordoned off from one another, and male singers could only trespass in the no-man’s land of the treble clef with the virile effort of extending the chest voice. High notes were to be di petto or not at all. In this environment, high-voiced men had to stake a particularly strong claim about the way they sang, and the natural way in which they produced it. Writing in 1925, Frank Speakman, a professional countertenor, argues that “the real alto is possessed by the man whose voice as a boy broke or changed at the age of adolescence, and settled down at a pitch higher than is usually the case.”29 A man could sing alto only if nature had placed his voice in that range. Although Knyvett had used the term “natural” to make a neutral distinction between modal and falsetto altos a century prior, “nature” had, by Speakman’s day, become the only option. HENRY PURCELL IN THEORY AND IN PRACTICE This minor discursive thread on high male vocalism would have amounted to little more than a footnote in the history of singing had it not been for the Purcell revival during the first half of the twentieth century.30 Unlike many of his contemporaries, Purcell was never forgotten, and some of his music, at least, continued to be performed. As Rebecca Herissone points out, Purcell, uniquely among his peers, embraced the shift to public, commercial music-making that occurred in England in the latter seventeenth century.31 Purcell published extensively during his lifetime, especially songs and other excerpts from his later theatrical music which would appeal to amateurs. Due to his untimely death at age 36, Frances Purcell, the composer’s widow, published 29 Frank Speakman, “The Alto Voice” in The Musical Times 66/986 (1925): 349. Emphasis added. Unfortunately, almost nothing is known about Speakman beyond this minor article. Tracing the lives and careers of late nineteenth and early twentieth century countertenors is very difficult since they were largely anonymous. 30 Again, this is an under-researched area. The performance and reception history of Purcell’s music is outlined quite well in Rebecca Herissone, The Ashgate Research Companion to Henry Purcell (London: Routledge, 2012), 303352. 31 Herissone, The Ashgate Research Companion to Henry Purcell, 311. 97 five volumes of his work between 1696 and 1698, with the aim of capitalizing on her late husband’s reputation. It must be noted, however, that during the Restoration, publishing did not indicate esteem for the composer, but rather reflected a publisher’s belief that the music would sell.32 The publisher Henry Playford, in his preface to the first volume of the Orpheus Brittanicus (1698), sets the tone for Purcell’s later reputation: The Author’s extraordinary Talent in all sorts of Musick is sufficiently known, but he was especially admir’d for the Vocal, having a peculiar Genius to express the Energy of English Words, whereby he mov’d the Passions of all his Auditors.33 The early publications of Purcell’s works cemented his reputation as a great English composer, and formed the basis of his later reception. Viewed in a certain light, Purcell’s reputation remained remarkably consistent from his death in 1695 until Alfred Deller made his career debut as a countertenor in 1944. The presence of his music in print, his reputation as a composer of vocal music, and his noted ability to set the English language all served as the foundation of his later reception. But these historiographical topoi radically changed in meaning with the passing of time, especially during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Printed collections of music took on importance as nationalist cultural monuments. The epistemology and aesthetics of voice radically altered, especially, as I have already shown, with regards to high male singing. And finally, language became intimately linked with national identity. When Charles Burney and John Hawkins wrote their histories of music in the late eighteenth century, they relied primarily on the available, printed collections of Purcell’s music.34 32 Herissone, The Ashgate Research Companion to Henry Purcell, 310; Also her “Playford, Purcell and the Functions of Music Publishing in Restoration England,” Journal of the American Musicological Society 63 (2010): 243-89. 33 Orpheus Brittanicus, vol. 1 (London: J. Heptinstall and Henry Playford, 1698), iii. 34 For a broad overview of this, see Richard Luckett, “’Or rather our musical Shakspeare’: Charles Burney’s Purcell,” in Music in Eighteenth-Century England: Essays in Memory of Charles Cudworth, edited by Christopher Hogwood and Richard Luckett, 59–78 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983). 98 Echoing Playford’s introduction, Hawkins praises the “excellencies of Purcell in vocal composition.”35 Burney likewise extols Purcell’s vocal works, especially the composer’s expert setting of the English language.36 But, unlike Hawkins, Burney was more concerned with Purcell’s reputation as a national composer.37 Indeed, he argues that Purcell “is as much the pride of an Englishman in Music, as Shakspeare [sic] in productions for the stage, Milton in epic poetry, Lock [sic] in metaphysics, or Sir Isaac Newton in philosophy and mathematics.”38 For Burney, Purcell’s sensitivity to the English language was both a blessing and a curse. One the one hand, it compensated for the “paucity and poverty” of his instrumental compositions and for his music’s lack of “elegance, grace, and refinement” when compared to modern (late 18th century) compositions.39 On the other, Burney argues that Purcell’s vocal compositions, “being solely adapted to English words,” made it “unlikely for their influence to extend beyond the soil that produced them.”40 Although Purcell was nearly a century dead, his music was still being performed during Burney and Hawkins’s lifetime, especially in the theatres and in the cathedrals. To late eighteenth century ears accustomed to graceful symmetry, periodicity, and simple harmonic relationships, Purcell’s highly variable, almost madrigalian sense of musical rhetoric would seem outdated. Those outmoded stylistic elements were deemed superfluous, distractions from the composer’s essential genius. Burney laments that Purcell “built his fame with such perishable materials, that 35 John Hawkins, A General History of the Science and Practice of Music, vol. 4 (London: T. Payne, 1776), 495539, especially 505 and 524. Hawkins suggested that Purcell wrote Dido and Aeneas at age 19 (499). Hawkins, in comparison to Burney, was more interested in sacred compositions, but, like Burney, offered no sustained discussion of Purcell’s activities as a performer, beyond his time as a boy chorister. 36 Charles Burney, A General History of Music, From the Earliest Ages to the Present Period, Vol. 3 (London, 1789), 485-511. It should be noted that the pagination is strange in the first edition. Coverage of Purcell starts on 485, but the page numbers drop suddenly to 479 and then continues normally from there. 37 Burney, A General History of Music, vol. 3, 508-509. 38 Burney, A General History of Music, vol. 3, 485. 39 Burney, A General History of Music, vol. 3, 508-509. 40 Burney, A General History of Music, vol. 3, 508. 99 his worth and works are daily diminishing, while the reputation of our poets and philosophers is increasing by the constant study and use of their production.”41 Genius transcended style, and so for the composer’s late eighteenth century apologists, there was nothing to be gained by reproducing the original performance forces and circumstances. This perhaps accounts for why there is almost no mention of Purcell’s activities as a performer, and why, for all the discussion of language, there is so little concern with singing. The Purcell we read about in Burney and Hawkins seems to reappear, sempiternal, in historical narratives of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He is an English genius, a great composer of vocal music, and uniquely sensitive in his setting of the English language. But the meaning of “Englishness,” both generally and musically, changes radically in the intervening years, even though Purcell was always said to represent and express it. In his introduction to the Musical Antiquarian Society’s 1848 edition of Hail! Bright Cecilia, Edward F. Rimbault provides an account of the work’s original performance circumstances, and in so doing, he draws attention to Purcell’s activities as a countertenor: In a periodical work entitled “The Gentleman’s Journal, or Monthly Miscellany (November 1692), its performance is thus recorded: “In my first Journal I gave you a large account of the Music Feast on St. Cecilia’s Day: so, to avoid repetitions, I shall only tell you that the last was no ways inferior to the former. The following Ode was admirably set to music by Mr. Henry Purcell, and performed twice with universal applause, particularly the second stanza, which was sung with incredible graces by Mr. Purcell himself…” The Editor is in possession of an ancient MS copy of this Ode contemporary with its first performance. It has the names of the singers prefixed to their respective parts … The “high contratenor part” is said in the MS to have been written “for Mr. Howell.” This probably was the part “Mr. Purcell” sang “with incredible graces.”42 41 Burney, A General History of Music, vol. 3, 485. Edward F. Rimbault, “Introduction” for Henry Purcell’s Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day (London: Musical Antiquarian Society, 1848), 1-2. The Musical Antiquarian Society published four collections of Purcell’s music: Dido and Aeneas (1841), Bonduca (1842), King Arthur (1843), and of course Hail! Bright Cecilia (1848). See also Richard Turbet, “The Musical Antiquarian Society, 1840-1848,” Brio 29/1 (1992): 13-20. 42 100 It was at this moment, it seems, that our two discourses touched and began to entangle. However, one should not read too much into Rimbault’s introduction. It is descriptive rather than prescriptive; an account of how the ode was performed, not an argument for how it should be. During the latter nineteenth century, Henry Purcell’s reputation became particularly entangled with the rhetoric English Musical Renaissance. Within the movement—or perhaps more accurately, the discourse centered on the idea of musical Englishness—Purcell became a touchstone for native musical genius. However, what Englishness sounded like, who expressed it best, and how it related to music from other nations shifted constantly. To be proclaimed the “best since Purcell” became a clichéd rite of passage for any English composer worth his salt; just as paying homage to Purcell (in words if not in one’s music) and lamenting the state of English music since his passing became de rigueur for anyone writing about the nation’s musical culture.43 And although the idea of Purcell was ever present in the minds of English musicians, the sound of his music was largely absent from their ears until well into the twentieth century. The fact that Purcell sang alto, and the fact that he wrote so extensively for the high male voice did not cause any problems so long as the music went unperformed.44 As William H. Cummings writes in the preface of the Purcell Society’s first volume in 1878, publishing Purcell’s complete works was “the noblest possible monument to our English master,” which would hopefully “wipe away a national reproach by doing justice to one of whom the nation has abundant reason 43 It is more difficult to find a contemporary writing that lacks a reference to Purcell than it is to find one. However, these few suffice to show the longevity of English Purcell worship. See for example J. A. Fuller Maitland, English Music in the XIX Century (London: Grant Richards, 1902), 127, 137, 186, 199. Also, Ralph Vaughan Williams’s writings are peppered with Purcell references. See his National Music and Other Essays (Oxford: Clarendon, 1996). 44 For example, William H. Cummings, in his Grove entry on Purcell makes note of the fact that he sang “the alto song “‘Tis Nature’s Voice,” explicitly citing the Musical Antiquarian Society edition. But he did not hesitate to describe the composer as “vigorous” and “energetic;” masculine adjectives to be sure. William H. Cummings, “Henry Purcell” in A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, vol. 3, edited by George Grove (London: MacMillan, 1883) 49-51. 101 to be proud.”45 Publishing, therefore, was a national enterprise, and the English had fallen behind other nations, especially Germany, in this respect. The Purcell Society edition, alongside the Musical Antiquarian Society’s and G.E.P. Arkwright’s Old English Edition (1889-1902), was more hagiographical than practical, a curatorial exercise rather than an exhortation to perform.46 Purcell posed a challenge for British historians at the turn of the twentieth century who were intent on incorporating English musical achievement into the Germano-centric, evolutionary narrative of musical progress.47 In writing a history of music from an English perspective, historians had to account for why Purcell failed to produce an enduring compositional school, or why he produced so few largescale musical monuments comparable to the symphonies of Beethoven, the music dramas of Wagner, or the passions of Bach. Purcell’s opera Dido and Aeneas seemed a likely candidate, but its relatively modest proportions and anomalous status as the only “true” (i.e. fully sung) English opera before the Italian “invasion” in the early years of the next century required some interesting historiographic contortions. Purcell created something of a paradox: how should one discuss the evolutionary telos of musical history without impugning Purcell’s genius? These issues had to be explained away, a task for which historians employed a handful of tactics. They blamed his early death. Cummings writes in Grove: “Had his life been prolonged to have witnessed the introduction into England of Italian opera and the early career of Handel, what might not have been expected from him?” Like so many others, Cummings indulges in conjectural “what ifs”—a history in the subjunctive mood. 45 Henry Purcell, The Yorkshire Feast Song, ed. W. H. Cummings under the Supervision of the Purcell Society, The Works of Henry Purcell, vol. 1 (London: Novello, Ewer and co., 1878), 1-2. 46 Charles McGuire’s recently published Music Festivals Database, musicfestivals.org clearly shows the relative paucity of Purcell performances during the nineteenth century, especially later in the century, followed by a radical uptick in the early years of the twentieth, coinciding both with the publication of the Purcell Society’s critical editions and the peak of the so-called “English Musical Renaissance.” 47 Rebecca Herissone, The Ashgate Research Companion to Henry Purcell (London: Routledge, 2012), 343. 102 They blamed his isolation. First published in 1896, C. H. H. Parry’s account of Purcell in The Evolution of the Art of Music set the historiographical tone for the next half century: Almost completely outside the direct course of musical evolution stands the unique and highly individual genius of Purcell. The sources of his artistic generalisations can be traced, as is inevitable even with the most ‘inspired’ of composers; but isolation was entailed by the peculiarly characteristic line he adopted, and the fact that almost all the genuine vitality dropped straight out of English art directly after died; while none of his remarkably English achievements penetrate so far afield as to have any sort of influence upon the course of musical progress on the Continent. … England lay far from the centers of musical activity, and the general course of musical evolution went on in Europe with hardly any reference whatever to his remarkable artistic achievements.48 They blamed time itself. Purcell, like the fortunes of his opera Dido and Aeneas, was “at the mercy of his environment.”49 Writing in an even more explicit vein, Donald Francis Tovey argues in his essay “The Main Stream of Music” from 1938: Our greatest musical genius, Henry Purcell, was born either fifty years too soon or fifty years too late… We can hardly doubt that, if the musical resources of Bach and Handel had been at Purcell’s command, his genius would have had the power to break through the bonds of the Philistines, and in fact I know no other case where musical genius has come into the world so manifestly at the wrong time and place, without having found the opportunity to develop some other art or science more ready for the work of a great mind.50 Gradually, Purcell’s music was performed with increasing frequency. Although historians praised Dido and Aeneas as the first true English opera, it was rarely performed—and it was poorly received—before his tercentenary in 1895. During his tenure at Morley College (19071924) Gustav Holst was an active performer of early music. Holst conducted the English 48 C. H. H. Parry, The Evolution of the Art of Music (London: Kegan Paul, 1896), 142-3. Parry’s history became a standard historical reference for much of the early twentieth century, at least until Paul Henry Lang’s and the Oxford History. However, even in the Oxford History, Parry was responsible for the volume on the seventeenth century, and the general outlines of his account of Purcell were only expanded and enriched. I would argue that the place of Dido and Aeneas within our contemporary music histories is largely the byproduct of late 19th and early 20th century English nationalist historiography. It is a brilliant work, but it is totally anomalous. 49 Gustav Holst, “Henry Purcell” The Dramatic Composer of England,” in The Heritage of Music, ed. Hubert J. Foss, Vol. 1 (London: Oxford University Press, 1927–1951), 51. 50 Donald Francis Tovey, “The Main Stream of Music,” in Essays and Lectures on Music, ed. Hubert J. Foss (London: Oxford University Press, 1949), 336-7. 103 premiere of many Bach cantatas, championed the revival of many Elizabethan polyphonists, such as Byrd and Weelkes, and performed a great deal of Purcell, including the first performance of The Fairy Queen since 1697. Writing in memory of the recently deceased Holst, Vaughan Williams expresses the delicate balance members of their generation attempted to strike between historical inspiration and originality: It was to a mind thus familiar, both as student and performer, with all the most modern devices of music that a new field of thought was opened in the lately rediscovered works of Purcell followed by the publication of the masses and motets of Byrd and Dr. Fellowes’s great edition of English madrigalists. These came as a revelation to Holst, as to many other musicians; he quickly imbibed their spirit without abating one jot of his individuality of in any way harking back to a sham archaism.51 The relationship between English composers and Henry Purcell only intensified as the century progressed. Whereas Holst and Vaughan Williams advocated for Purcell through editing and performance, younger composers like Tippett and Britten explicitly cited Purcell as a strong influence on their compositional language. When Michael Tippett took over Holst’s position at Morley in 1940, he continued his predecessor’s agenda of reviving and performing early English music. Writing in 1933, the English historian A. K. Holland neatly sums up the performance practice issues that Tippett and his contemporaries faced: Purcell has had, in the course of time, almost every conceivable bad luck, serving to hinder the performance of his music and the growth of a practical tradition. But this misfortune has lain more heavily upon him than any other. Had he been himself a tenor instead of an alto, we might not have had quite so much of his work pitched in this particular register, though there is no doubt that the male alto, besides being inevitable in cathedral music and particularly in the verse-anthems of the time, was a very popular solo voice in Purcell’s day. Nowadays it is scarcely cultivated outside the sphere of male voice choirs, if we accept the type of falsetto which usually does duty for it in church. ‘Feigned voices,’ as Matthew Locke tells us, were not unknown in Purcell’s day. Yet the male alto (or countertenor) is a real voice and a traditionally English one. Apart from the fact that in color and texture it differs from the contralto, it has, or should have, a compass 51 Ralph Vaughan Williams, “Gustav Host: An Essay and a Note,” in National Music and Other Essays (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), 147. 104 that is at once higher than the tenor and lower than the female alto voice, so that for contraltos much of Purcell’s music lies in an awkward tessitura besides requiring an agility which few contraltos possess.52 In short, Purcell was never forgotten. He remained a benchmark of English musical genius. But as his music moved from the scholarly canon to the performer’s canon, practical issues arose. Judged purely as the composer of the one perfect English opera, Purcell seemed a misfit, and Dido and Aeneas could be performed by traditional, operatic voices. But when one wished to perform the other vocal works, such as the court odes and verse anthems, suddenly the lack of high-quality countertenors became a significant issue. Performed at modern, written pitch, as was the convention of the time, Purcell’s countertenor parts seemed to be written for an entirely different type of voice. They sat too high for even the highest and lightest tenors, and far too low for female contraltos. Historians had of course noted the fact that Purcell was described as a countertenor. But in earlier years, his voice type was incidental, a trivial fact of Purcell’s performing life overshadowed by his identity as a composer. In performance, the countertenor parts presented a major stumbling block that could not be solved through transposition, or a redistribution of parts, as it could be in a cappella music. By the time Deller was discovered in 1943, his voice presented a convenient solution to a persistent issue of performance practice. Performing Purcell in what was believed to be a historically authentic manner was more than an academic concern for musicologists. Historically informed performance practice had become an issue of national identity. Without male falsetto singing, it was believed, the English public could not experience one of its greatest composers. Purcell’s Englishness was beyond dispute, so too was the greatness of his music. But the composer’s apparent preference for a gender-troubled voice was problematic. Neither the beauty 52 A. K. Holland, Henry Purcell, the English Musical Tradition (London: Penguin, 1933), 124-5. 105 nor the utility of Deller’s voice was sufficient. Since Purcell was central to a historical sense of Englishness, Deller’s voice had to be curated in historical terms. Authenticity, then, was the only proper armor. Between 30 July and 27 August 1947, the BBC Overseas Service broadcast a five-part historical overview of English music that neatly distills the nationalist historiographical agenda at mid-century. As a radio program, broadcast on a nationally-funded station for a general audience, this series is unremarkable in scope, detail, and novelty. Rather, it represents a centrist, consensus view of the dominant historical narrative. The distribution of subject matter across the five installments is, in and of itself, quite telling. Two are devoted to the twentieth century, none to the nineteenth, and one focuses on a single composer: Henry Purcell. The first program, and indeed English musical history, begins with the Elizabethans, the “Golden Age,” an “age of great men, and brave deeds and splendour of all kinds.”53 The second installment is devoted entirely to Purcell. In addition to arguing for his “greatness” as composer, this program also takes as its task to ask why “in the country of his birth so little of his music is heard in the concert halls?”54 After appealing to a vague sense of English modesty, the announcer attributes the modern scarcity of Purcell’s music on practical performance issues. First, sloppy singers are to blame: “He is very, very difficult to sing well, and as his music seems to spring from the words and give them more poetry than they ever possessed, he is half-killed already by a singer’s unclean diction.”55 And most importantly, there is the issue of scale. Purcell 53 “English Music 1-The Golden Age,” BBC Overseas Service, radio script (30 July 1947): 1. BBC Written Archives Centre (hereafter WAC), 54 “English Music 2-Purcell,” BBC Overseas Service, radio script (6 August 1947): 2. WAC 55 “English Music 2-Purcell,” 7. 106 “packs a whole world of expression into the most modest resources.”56 In monumentalizing Purcell, we destroy the music: Paradoxically, that [modest scale] is a disadvantage in the modern concert hall…If you re-arrange him for the huge modern symphony orchestra you destroy at once the essential quality of his music. He must be heard in his original settings. His greatest power is felt when he is most restrained. He was a characteristic Englishman.57 Historically-informed performance practice, then, ceases to be an abstract exercise for musicologists. It becomes explicitly conflated with nationalist ideology; vital for recreating, rather than simply memorializing, the sound of the English past.58 FROM ALTO TO COUNTERTENOR Peggy Deller, Alfred’s wife, kept a scrapbook chronicling her husband’s career.59 A few pages in, amidst the press clippings and photographs, there is a little card, on which is typed Michael Tippett’s definition of the countertenor voice: The counter-tenor voice is a male alto voice of what would be regarded now as exceptional range and facility. It was the voice for which Bach wrote the alto solos in his cantatas, and Purcell, who himself sang counter-tenor, gave to it some of his best airs and ensembles. To my ear, it has a peculiarly musical sound, because almost no emotional irrelevancies distract us from the absolutely pure quality of the production. It is like no other sound in music and few other musical sounds are so intrinsically musical.60 This little paragraph told Alfred Deller what he was. It provided both a raison d’etre, and a ward against any future attacks on his masculinity. Both Deller and Tippett referred to it, often 56 “English Music 2-Purcell,” 7. “English Music 2-Purcell,” 7-8. 58 Although Deller had made his debut on the BBC by this point, and was broadcast regularly on the Third Programme, there were no mentions of the countertenor voice in this program. Within a few years, the countertenor voice was heard with increasing frequency on other BBC stations, especially as his concert and recording career took off. 59 Currently in the possession of their son, Mark Deller. 60 Italics added. The text is reproduced verbatim in Michael and Mollie Hardwick, Alfred Deller: A Singularity of Voice (London: Proteus, 1980), 75. 57 107 verbatim, throughout their careers when explaining the voice type.61 It was countertenor dogma. But perhaps more importantly, it sums up the way the English public were taught to listen, and so it deserves a bit of unpacking. The desire to link Deller’s way of singing with Purcell, and Purcell’s place as England’s great composer, should by now be clear. As I shall discuss at greater length below, the connection with Bach is rather more tenuous, but no less essential for the voice type’s sense of historical authenticity and the nation’s sense of musical prestige. But when Tippett writes of “emotional irrelevancies” or of the “pure” quality, what is he praising in Deller’s voice? What did he hear, or perhaps more accurately, what did he not hear that he so prized? Here we get to the crux of the matter, namely, the bifurcated way in which listeners were encouraged to attend to the countertenor voice as at once disembodied and as the product of a normatively masculine body. In the simplest terms, falsetto, for post-Victorian ears, suggested a non-normative body and therefore an abnormal person. In intentionally rendering the voice acousmatic, severing sound from source, listeners could appreciate it as “pure” music devoid of “emotional irrelevancies.” Conversely, the absence of “emotional irrelevancies” speaks to a masculine subject, since emotional reserve is one of the tenets of English masculinity. Even the word “production” can be read both as a workaday musician’s term for technique and as also serve to suggest a laboring body. The countertenor then, in Tippett’s formulation, is at once acousmatic and embodied. It is a sound that both denies its source, while at the same time affirming its natural manliness. But, in order to reach a clearer picture of the singer Deller became, it is helpful to dwell briefly on the singer’s earliest attempts at a career. What emerges is a somewhat different kind of singer, one who belies the fervor with which Deller later clung to the notion of 61 Mark Deller, in discussion with the author, 17 October 2016. 108 the countertenor voice as disembodied and historical. What emerges, also, is a tantalizing glimpse at the singer he might have become. As I have already stated, Alfred Deller was not always a countertenor. Prior to meeting Michael Tippett in 1943, he was an alto.62 Deller did not change the way he sang, but in adopting his new label, he also adopted a new identity founded on historical authenticity rather than novelty. As a historical voice type, Deller managed to develop the solo career that had eluded him in earlier years. But during the early years of his career, it seems that Deller was more willing to embrace the feminine qualities that many perceived in his voice. It would be simplistic to characterize Deller’s early career as a moment of discovery followed by a meteoric rise to fame. Like so many performing artists, his early attempts to build a solo career often came to nothing. As I have already mentioned, Deller’s solo career began in earnest after his meeting with Michael Tippett in 1943, followed by higher profile appearances in London, which led to his long, fruitful association with the BBC. But Alfred Deller had attempted to break into the London market well before the 1940’s. On 10 November 1935, the young singer, then only 23, wrote to the head of the Variety department at the BBC: Dear Sir, I do not intend to waste your time with a long letter, I have enclosed a criticism of a recent concert at the White Rock Pavillion when I was a Soloist with the Hastings Municipal Orchestra. Besides Solo singing - I have had considerable experience of choral and male voice work. If you will grant me an audition, I am confident it will be to our mutual benefit. Yours Truly, Alfred Deller63 62 The terms were interchangeable. See John Hullah, “Alto” in A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, vol. 1, edited by George Grove (London: Macmillan, 1879), 57-58, as well as my discussion of the voice type above. However, “alto” was the more commonly used term during Deller’s early years, with “countertenor” considered a more antiquated label. 63 Alfred Deller to BBC, 10 November 1935, Alfred Deller RCONT 1, WAC. 109 Why he wrote to Variety rather than the Music Department, we can never know for sure.64 Perhaps, as a practical-minded young singer with a unique voice, Deller was trying develop a career based as a musical novelty act. Deller did not limit his repertoire to works written explicitly for countertenor until after meeting consulting with Tippett and his Morley colleagues.65 As a concert singer, works by Handel and Bach figured prominently in his programs, but so too did Mendelssohn, Dvorak, Schubert, and works by other Romantic composers.66 In this regard, the review Deller included with his letter of solicitation is telling. “The sensation of this concert,” wrote the critic, was the appearance of Alfred Deller, the possessor of an alto voice of almost incredible beauty. He astonished the enthusiastic audience in two groups of old English songs by the total absence of effort with which he used his voice, which is capable of infinite light and shade from a rich full tone down to a mere whisper. The critic concluded by asserting that “Mr. Deller’s intonation and articulation are as perfect as the way he produces those silvery tones, unusual enough in a lady, but in a man, phenomenal.”67 Beyond the generously-lavished superlatives, Deller’s choice of review suggests that he aimed to emphasize his uniqueness. The gender-bending novelty of his voice—which, as a countertenor he downplayed—outweighs his choice of repertoire. By 1935, Deller had many 64 When I spoke to Mark Deller, he was at once confounded and fascinated by these previously unknown letters between the BBC and his father. He commented on how odd it was that he wrote to Variety rather than Music. It could have been ignorance, or part of an early, failed attempt to market himself as a novelty. 65 “Almost at their first meeting, Walter Bergmann had offered him two realistic pieces of advice. The first, intended to preserve his uniqueness and make himself less vulnerable to criticism arising from his choice of repertoire during the time it would take him to become established and independent, was to sing only music composed for the countertenor voice.” Hardwick, A Singularity of Voice, 101. 66 Two undated singing competition score sheets, almost certainly from the 1930s, show that Deller sang Schubert lieder as his repertoire of choice. Mark Deller Family Archive. 67 Ibid. Quoting “A Lovely Alto Voice.” Hastings and St. Leonard’s Observer, 30 April 1932. The review, which Deller typed without date, referred to a concert that occurred in 1932. Like many of his earliest performances around Kent, his performance was covered in the Hastings and St. Leonard’s Observer, whose critic was Alan Biggs. Deller received much of his earliest press coverage in the Observer. Biggs is important. Beyond being a critic, he was also the organist and choir director at Deller’s church, as well as his frequent collaborator in concert. Indeed, he was one of Deller’s earliest champions in private, and, as can be seen in the columns of the Observer, in public. 110 other reviews to choose from, many of which were equally complimentary.68 But he chose this one, which drew attention to the potentially gender-troubled nature of his singing, even if it did so in the most complimentary manner. In response to his inquiry, Deller received a firm, if polite rejection. Deller’s failure to secure an audition seemed to be, at least in part, caused by his voice type. Possibly, it can be attributed to poor self-marketing. It is unclear, from his initial correspondence with the BBC, whether Deller was trying to audition as a classical or a popular artist. However, an audition never materialized. In an internal BBC memo dated 25 November, Mr. A. Wynn, head of the Variety department wrote to his counterpart in the Music department about Deller’s audition request, saying “I do not know whether you have any room for an alto. We should not be likely to use him for solo work.”69 There were almost no opportunities for classical countertenors during the 1930s, but there were career opportunities for male singers with very high voices. Although there is no direct evidence that Deller wanted to make a career as a crooner, the circumstantial evidence at least suggests the possibility. Crooners were tremendously popular during the 1930s in both England and America.70 They sang popular, sentimental songs in a soft, high voice, often flipping over into the falsetto register. The sound of their voice attracted fans and repulsed critics, often for the same reasons. Even if Deller did not want to become a crooner, per se, he might have sought to capitalize on the public’s enthusiasm for gender-bending singing. 68 See "Handel at Christ Church." Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 26 December 1931; "Splendid Handel Singing." Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 9 January 1932; "Final Week of Concerts." Bexhill-on-Sea Observer, 23 April 1932; "A Lovely Alto Voice." Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 30 April 1932; "Christ Church Recital." Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 13 August 1932; "A Sunday Musical Diversion." Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 29 July 1933. 69 Mr. A. Wynn to Mr. Woodgate, 25 November 1935, interoffice memo, Alfred Deller RCONT 1, WAC 70 See Christina L. Baade, Victory Through Harmony: The BBC and Popular Music in World War II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 131-158. Emily C. Hoyler, “Broadcasting Englishness” National Music in Interwar BBC Periodicals,” PhD diss. Northwestern University 2016, 216-268. Allison McCracken, Real Men Don’t Sing: Crooning in American Culture (Durham: Duke University Press, 2015). 111 Let us for a moment compare the young Deller to another high male voice performing at around the same time. Frank Ivallo did not have much of a career despite his incredible singing. Almost the only record we have of him comes in the form of a brief featurette, made in 1932 by British Pathé [see Figure 2.1]. “Now for a novelty” reads the opening title card [Figure 2.1a]. Here is Frank Ivallo, pictured in the upper left hand corner and described as “the man with a man’s voice.” The piano begins to play. The next frame makes the gendered implications of the performance we are about to see even more explicit. “Some men,” it reads, “may speak with a woman’s voice, but, we think you will agree, it is absolutely unique for Adam to invade the domain of the high soprano, as Ivallo does” [Figure 2.1b]. Though we see a picture of Ivallo in the introductory frames, it fades away before he begins to sing Carl Bohm’s “Still as the Night.” Voice and body are kept separate at first. FIGURE 2.1: Opening frames from “Frank Ivallo: The Man With A Woman’s Voice” (14 April 1932) British Pathé, Canister PSP 732 A. Opening Frame 112 Figure 2.1: cont’d B. Second Frame C. Ivallo’s first appearance on camera Then, half way through the first phrase, we see him as well as hear him (Figure 2.1c). Voice and body seem joined, but they do not readily mix. He stands in the center of the frame, smartly 113 dressed in a tuxedo, left hand on his hip. He seems to be in a well-appointed salon. We see the back end of a piano just at the edge of the frame to assure us of its presence, alongside the column, potted palms, and the leather chairs set in the murky foreground. Ivallo remains front and center. The camera cuts away from Ivallo as he takes a breath for his second entrance, and we are given a few frames of respite. First we hear his voice against images of a sky, then waves lapping up against a pebbly beach, and finally a windmill. With his body out of the picture, we can enjoy the voice as pure sound. But our reprieve might simply be intended to keep us from growing too used to this strangely dysintegrated voice. And then, in the final few bars Ivallo interpolates a soprano high C. It is not written, and it does not fit the neutrally sentimental text of the song. There is an ossia included in the 1913 Simrock publication, but it only includes a high F in the penultimate bar, and then resolves down to a B and C in the staff.71 The final high note is a very singerly gesture, designed to draw attention to the singer, and to his exceptional facility in a range that he should not possess. In some ways, we can think of Ivallo as the anti-Deller. The song Ivallo sings, “Still as the night,” is everything Deller explicitly sought to avoid starting in the 1940s. It is Romantic, German, light, and sentimental. It traffics whole-heartedly in the “emotional irrelevancies” of which Tippett believed the countertenor voice to be incapable. Obviously, the two singers sound different. Ivallo’s voice bears all the hallmarks of early twentieth-century bel canto technique. He employs a constant vibrato, he luxuriates in his high notes where Deller backs away from them, and he moves between the notes in a way Deller never would. Ivallo, like most classicallytrained singers, sings with legato, which for a singer means filling in the intervallic space between pitches. It is more akin to portamento, when a string player slides between two pitches 71 Carl Bohm “Still wie die Nacht / Still as the Night” Op. 326 No. 27 (Leipzig: Simrock, 1913). 114 using the same finger on the same string, than striking keys on a keyboard instrument. The precise execution of legato varies with time and repertoire, but it is invariably present in mainstream operatic vocalism. In contrast, Deller moves between pitches almost instrumentally and largely eschews vibrato, an approach no doubt attributable to his background as primarily a choral singer. But it would be naïve to suggest that Ivallo’s voice is feminine and that Deller’s is not simply because of their vocal styles. The difference is in the framing. For each singer, we are given a radically different set of audile techniques, or, ways of listening and meaning-making. We are invited, even encouraged to hear in Ivallo’s voice the grain of a woman’s body. The music serves as a vehicle for the voice, or more accurately, the novelty of the voice. In contradistinction, Deller’s countertenor was later presented as a grain-less voice, a conduit for the music. But in the 1930s, the two singers were not so different. If in Ivallo we can see everything Deller would come to reject, we can also see the Alfred Deller that could have been. Perhaps he even had Ivallo in mind when he wrote to the BBC, if we can read as much into the review he enclosed with his letter. And perhaps, also, the BBC rejected Deller, not because they reserved a special prejudice against male altos, but because they were categorically wary of any singers who ventured out of the narrow confines of normative masculine vocality. The BBC was particularly concerned with what it deemed “effeminate” singing, especially from crooners, as is evidenced by the many interdepartmental memos that circulated on the subject.72 Crooners were deemed “odious,” and their sound was “emasculated and sickly,” especially when they used falsetto.73 The BBC held crooners in such low regard that they banned 72 See BBC WAC R34/382 Censorship of Programmes Crooning, 1934-1943. BBC WAC R34/382 Censorship of Programmes Crooning, 1934-1943. See March 24 1936, May 28 1941, May 4 1943. 73 115 even the use of the word “crooner” from the airwaves in 1941. Arthur Bliss, a member of the BBC’s Music Programme Advisory Panel, hoped to completely ban “the unpleasant girl crooner and the distasteful euneuchs [sic].”74 Undeterred, Alfred Deller tried yet again to obtain an audition in May of 1938. He received an even more emphatic rejection. The BBC wrote: Dear Sir, In reply to your letter of 18th May, we very much regret that we have so very few opportunities of using male altos in our programs that we are afraid no useful purpose could by served by our arranging an audition for you.75 After this rejection Deller had no more contact with the BBC until 1945. His regional concertizing continued despite the outbreak of World War II, and in 1940 he took up a Lay Clerkship at Canterbury Cathedral. It seemed that he would continue his modest, if steady, career trajectory as a cathedral musician until he met Michael Tippett in 1943 and was invited to perform at Morley College in London. MORLEY COLLEGE The concerts at Morley College were a beacon of musical collaboration and performance in the war-torn London. The Morley concerts took place in the intimate Holst Room, and they were remarkable both for their intriguing repertoire and for the caliber of performers they drew upon. 76 Unlike the large London music schools—the Royal College of Music, the Guildhall, and the Royal Academy of Music—Morley was an adult education college catering to the working classes. The school focused on enrichment rather than professional conservatory training. Due to 74 BBC WAC R27/245/1, Music Policy General, BBC Music Policy drafts, “The Bliss Manifesto” 1942, 16. Letter from BBC to Alfred Deller, 24 May 1938, Alfred Deller RCONT 1, WAC. 76 The rest of the school was destroyed in 1940 during the Blitz. After the attack, only the Library and the Holst Room remained. For example, Peter Pears was on the voice faculty and he often appeared in concert with Benjamin Britten. 75 116 the size and skill of the student body, large symphonic works were neither necessary nor entirely feasible. Operating outside of the conservatory system, music directors could afford to explore more obscure and esoteric repertoires, and professors often performed alongside their students. The repertoire of the Morley concerts was noteworthy.77 Most concerts featured choral works. Michael Tippett, in keeping with his predecessor Gustav Holst, ventured into lesserknown repertoire of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. He lavished special attention upon Byrd, Weelkes, Tallis, Schütz, Gibbons. But above all he favored Purcell. Although more standard composers like Bach and Handel appeared on Morley programs, works from the nineteenth century rarely did. Tippett excluded Romantic works for aesthetic reasons, I am sure, but also due to space and personnel limitations. Had he tried to mount a late Romantic symphonic work in the Holst Room, there would have been no room for the audience. Around the time he met Alfred Deller, Michael Tippett gave a lecture on Music at Morley College that offers a rich account of musical activity during the war: The destruction of the main building of the College in October 1941, as well as the loss for many reasons of the majority of the music school, created a new situation in that it became necessary to build up anew the work of the whole department. The first thing we did was to reform and train a choir in the English tradition of choral music. A short while later we had the good fortune to find an enthusiast who was also an expert figured bass player - Walter Bergmann - which gave us an opportunity of performing Purcell and Bach cantatas. Our performance of the Purcell Ode on St. Cecilia’s Day (1692) brought from “The Times” an article entitled “The Way to a Revival,” suggesting that the exploration of this field should be one of our main functions. In the 1942-43 session we decided to experiment with a series of monthly concerts in the small Holst Memorial Music Room at the College. The programs for this series varied from a recital from the works of Orlando Gibbons by the College Choir and outside professional instrumentalists, to the first London performance of Stravinsky’s “Dumbarton Oaks” concert with Walter Goehr conducting. 77 See Morley College Archive (hereafter MOR) Folder 316 “Concert Programmes: 1940–1950.” 117 By 1943 the policy of concentrating on a really first class a cappella choir had succeeded so well that we found ourselves undertake [sic.], for instance, concerts at short notice for the French National Committee, at the Wigmore Hall, and for the National Gallery Committee; and by the end of the session the choir had a repertoire which included Monteverde [sic] madrigals in Italian, Bach cantatas in German, Ravel and Debussy in French, and Purcell in English.78 As Tippett stated, the Morley concerts prominently featured works by Purcell, along with other English composers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Looking at the programs, one gets a sense of why Tippett was so glad to discover Deller’s voice. Indeed, the Purcell Revival that the Times recognized in its 1941 article would probably have lurched to a halt had Tippett not found a countertenor.79 It is interesting to speculate what would have happened had Tippett stumbled upon another talented male falsettist before meeting Deller, or what would have happened had Deller’s early advocate, the Canterbury Precentor Joseph Poole, not written that letter of support. Surely there were other singers of at least comparable skill. Regardless, Deller’s voice offered Tippett a solution to his problem, if not the only one. The countertenor issue was not so conspicuous when Morley put on a fully-staged production of Dido and Aeneas 1942. But Dido didn’t need reviving, and it conveniently didn’t require a countertenor. Tippett seemed to have only imperfect solutions before finding Deller, such as programming Purcell vocal works that only required chorus, or perhaps two solo sopranos.80 It seems that Tippett used choristers singing in unison to fill the solo parts in a 1941 performance of The Ode for St. Cecilia [1692]. The work requires six soloists, but the program 78 Michael Tippett, “Music at Morley College,” MOR (undated lecture). Written probably during 1943-44. Referred to events of 43 as the past, but also to the war as still ongoing. 79 “Purcell’s Odes: A Way to A Revival,” The Times 28 November 1941, 6. 80 The 18 July 1942 concert features the Ode on the Death of Queen Mart (1695, which uses two solo sopranos. In the second half of the program they performed Bach’s “Christ Lag in Todesbanden, and did not mention who sang the solos, suggesting that he used choristers, either in a solo or unison capacity. We see a similar strategy for the 13 March 1943 Concert featuring the The Virgin’s Expostulation (1 soprano and accompaniment), Dido’s Lament and the following chorus, and “Welcome to all Pleasures” from the Cantata for St. Cecilia’s Day, of which the verses were sung by the chorus. “Recital Concert,” London, Morley College, 18 July 1942. MOR Folder 316: “Concert Programmes: 1940–1950.” 118 lists none.81 Morley programs never named the choral personnel, but did note when external solo voices were featured. The ad hoc nature of the solo assignments could be attributed to an understandable lack of resources during wartime. During 1943 and 1944, Tippett occasionally engaged a solo (female) contralto to perform the larger Purcell vocal works.82 But once he had a countertenor at his disposal, he always used one. Alfred Deller began performing with Michael Tippett in 1944 and sang regularly at Morley throughout the 1940s, with less frequent appearances in the 1950s. Their first concert together took place on 21 October 1944 (Figure 2.2).83 Clearly excited about the new voice at his disposal, Tippett used Deller extensively throughout the program. Of that first concert, the critic from the Times writes: Morley College music under Michael Tippett’s direction pursues a line of its own, which is in keeping with its past tradition under Holst. The vital tradition was manifested in Saturday’s program at the college in two respects—original search and research into the byways of English music, and the generous selections of Purcell. … The verse anthem ‘My Beloved Spake’ was given with a true contratenor singing the part of that voice, of which Purcell made frequent use.84 Mr. Alfred Deller, of Canterbury, in the anthem and in an air [‘Music for a While’], made familiar by Dr. Wittaker as “Music shall proclaim” but sung in its original pitch, showed by the purity of the voice and of the style how it was that 81 Concert program for 22 November 1941, MOR Folder 316: “Concert Programmes: 1940–1950.” The other works on the concert were madrigals by Weelkes and Willbye, as well as a set of unspecified English songs, sung by Esther Salaman. 82 On 18 March 1943, Morley gave a concert at the National Gallery. The first half consisted of madrigals by Gibbons, Morley, Dowland, Weelkes, Willbye. The second half began with Three Part Songs by Debussy, closing with the Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day (1692), with contralto Rita Harris singing the countertenor line. Rita Harris again took the solo countertenor part in a February 19 1944 concert in “My Beloved Spake,” among a number of other Purcell anthems, verse anthems, and theater music. MOR Folder 316: “Concert Programmes: 1940–1950.” 83 The Verse Anthem “O Sing unto the Lord” calls for two countertenors, but only Deller is listed as a potential soloist in that range. According to a letter, the second countertenor was a versatile singer drawn from the choir: Beyond being an interesting story, this further supports my belief that when soloists were used but not named in the program, they were drawn from the ranks of the choir. See Antony Hopkins to Peter Giles, 19 November 1991, quoted in Giles, The History and Technique of the Countertenor, 137. 84 It is impossible to know whether this comment comes as the result of program notes, which do not survive, the critic’s previous knowledge of the voice type and its possible association with Purcell, or, as I suspect, because Deller’s voice was contextualized historically by either Tippett or another member of the Morley staff. 119 the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries came to attach so much value on the high male voice.85 Deller’s voice opened a whole new repertoire to Tippett. In this, Deller’s voice solved the previously intractable countertenor problem, and he lent the whole venture a sense of historical authenticity. FIGURE 2.2: Morley College Concert Program for 21 October 1944, Alfred Deller’s first concert, Morley College Archive. 85 “Concert at Morley College: The Contratenor Voice.” The Times, 24 October 1944. MOR Folder 316: “Concert Programmes: 1940–1950.” 120 Deller appeared again with Michael Tippett on 31 December 1944 (Figure 2.3), this time in a fundraising concert for Morley at the Friends House.86 In addition to works by Bach, Tippett, and Buxtehude, Deller’s newly-found voice was featured in Purcell’s Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day (1692). Walter Bergmann, then on the Morley staff as a musicologist and professor of basso continuo, drew special attention to the countertenor in his program notes: The performance of Purcell’s last and greatest ode on St. Cecilia’s day tries to follow as close as possible the original performance in 1692 (when Purcell himself sang one of the counter-tenor parts “with incredible graces”)...The chorus “Soul of the world,” the tune “Thou tunes this world” and the duet “In vain the amorous flute” (with the beautiful introduction for recorders) belong beside all the other treasures in this ode to the highspots in English music.87 But Morley’s aspirations to historical authenticity during their wartime concerts were always tempered by practicality. For example, they often used a piano rather than a harpsichord when performing in a larger space. Even with the addition of Deller, compromises had to be made in the distribution of solo material. In the Friends House concert, Deller clearly sang the main countertenor line in the Ode, especially the air “Tis Nature’s Voice.” But it is unclear what happened in the seventh movement, “With That Sublime Celestial Lay,” which requires two countertenors. In addition to the anonymous singers of the Morley Choir, six soloists participated in the 31 December concert: two sopranos (Margaret Ritchie and Alison Purves), two tenors (Sidney Horwood and Peter Pears), a baritone (Jani Strasser), and Alfred Deller singing countertenor. 86 Friends House was built in 1926, and is located in central London. In addition to housing the central offices for British Quakers, it also served, and continue to serve, as a flexible event space for hire. 87 Bergman notes in the program notes, “Owing to the present conditions only the organ as continuo instrument had to be substituted by the piano, the harpsichord being too weak for a big hall.” Walter Bergman, Program notes for “Ode on St. Cecilia’s Day (1692) for 21 December 1944 concert, Friends House, MOR Folder 316: “Concert Programmes: 1950–1950.” 121 FIGURE 2.3: Morley College Friends House Concert Program for 31 December 1944, Morley College Archive The program notes seem to suggest that Alfred Deller sang the alto solos in the Bach even though Walter Bergmann, usually quite careful in this regard, labeled them “contralto” solos, whereas he specified “counter-tenor” in the Purcell. But what happened in the alto duet in the Purcell? Did he use Horwood, a tenor, on the second part, or did he instead use an unnamed male alto from the Morley choir, as he must have done in previous concerts, including the 21 October concert? A letter from Antony Hopkins, later a composer and well-known broadcaster with the BBC Third Programme, sheds some light on the latter practice: The discovery of Deller’s voice and interpretive talent was a godsend to Tippett. Deller was frequently involved in the concerts, either in a group of solos or taking the arias in some choral work. 122 On one such occasion the program was supposed to include an elaborate duet for two countertenors, which the particular title now escapes me. I had something of a freak voice (I once sang ‘One Fine Day’ on stage at Sadler’s Wells only a semitone down!) and could sing alto, tenor or bass as required. I was duly enlisted to sing the second part with Deller, and we had great fun doing it.88 It is possible that Hopkins refers to Deller’s first concert on 21 October 1944, which featured the Gibbons verse anthem “O Sing unto the Lord” as well as Purcell’s “My Beloved Spake.” In both works, Tippett must have drawn from the ranks of the choir because there is neither a tenor nor a second countertenor named among the soloists. We run into a similar problem in the 31 December performance of the Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day. Once he found a countertenor, Tippett seemed to always use one to perform Purcell, except in moments, such as the duets, when a single countertenor simply would not suffice. . Beyond Purcell, Deller was employed to sing works by other composers who make up the core of the modern countertenor repertoire, especially Bach and Handel. To a certain extent, this was a practical matter. Deller, as a professional chorister, was a talented and experienced performer of older repertoire, and was particularly well-suited to the technical demands. But there was also another agenda, related to a sense of English musical identity. Though primarily promoted as an English voice, the voice necessary to properly perform Purcell—indeed, Purcell was a countertenor—the countertenor took on an aura authenticity that extended outwards across the entire spectrum of early music. But the association between the countertenor voice with Bach and Handel was more than a matter of chance or convenience. We see the association made time and again by English music historians of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries intent on demonstrating Purcell’s greatness. Purcell, Handel, and Bach are all lumped under the term 88 Letter from Antony Hopkins to Peter Giles, 15 November 1991, quoted in Peter Giles, The History and Technique of the Counter-Tenor: A Study of the Male High Voice Family (Scholar Press: Aldershot 1994), 137. 123 “baroque.” Bach and Handel were universally esteemed as “great” baroque composers. Very often, historians would argue that Purcell was also “great” because his music demonstrated a similar level of compositional mastery and complexity, which was often demonstrated by directly comparing Purcell’s compositions with those of Handel and Bach.89 We see this same strategy in the literature on the historical nature of the countertenor, especially John Houghs’s 1937 paper I discussed earlier. However, in the case of Handel and Bach, the argument for countertenors is much more tenuous. Though Handel certainly used countertenors as soloists in some English oratorios, he of course also used castrati and female contraltos. The Bach association with countertenors was further tenuous. Contemporary English historians invariably cited Weimar court documents listing falsettists among the court singers.90 Of course this ignores Bach’s Leipzig vocal practice, which, according even to contemporary Bach scholarship widely circulating in England at the time, relied on unchanged or mid-change boy altos rather than adult males using a cultivated falsetto register. The questions is not whether, at some point, Bach and Handel used falsettists. It seems clear that they did. But associating the Dellerian countertenor voice as the primary and authentic realization of all alto lines in Handel and Bach speaks to a desire by English performers and scholars to present Deller, his way of singing, and the very idea of the English countertenor, as an authentic, wide-spread historical practice which was essential to the recreation of early music generally. Furthermore, the Purcell-Bach-Handel connections also suggest that English historians sought to associate Purcell, and thus English genius and musical creativity, alongside Bach and Handel. 89 See for example Charles Villiers Stanford and Cecil Forsyth, A History of Music (New York: MacMillan, 1918), 221. 90 See Hough, “The Historical Significance of the Counter-Tenor,” 16–18. 124 Authenticity and practicality aside, Deller’s voice presented an obstacle for audiences. “I decided to address the audience,” Tippett recalled later in life, I told them I was very pleased to present Alfred Deller, the possessor of this remarkable countertenor voice, and that I was pleased to hear from him that he was already training his two sons to sing, too. It seemed to do the trick. There were no murmurs when he started to sing, and he proved a great success.91 Tippett directly takes on the issue of Deller’s masculinity, and literally the singer’s virility which was so brought into question when listening to him sing. Deller’s early collaborations with Michael Tippett provided the up and coming singer with invaluable exposure to the London scene, and particularly to individuals with hiring power. Indeed, Deller made his early career as a Purcell specialist. He did sing other, closely related repertoire. But, in consultation with Walter Bergmann, Deller only performed music which he believed to be written for the countertenor voice.92 Through his collaborations with Tippett, Deller narrowly defined the countertenor voice, and indeed his identity as a performer, along strict historical lines. Almost exclusively, Deller limited his repertoire to music he and his collaborators believed to be written for a falsetto-based countertenor. And it was armed with a sense of historical authenticity that Deller could repel the frequent attacks on his voice. THE BBC Alfred Deller’s collaborations with Michael Tippett provided the young countertenor with a sense of artistic identity and the exposure he needed to develop a career. It was surely through his performances at Morley that Deller initially came to the attention to the BBC as a Purcell specialist for a broadcast of the Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day on 22 November 1945. And it 91 92 Undated recollection quoted in A Singularity of Voice, 97. Hardwick, A Singularity of Voice, 101. 125 was either because of his Purcell broadcast, or his frequent appearances at Morley that Steuart Wilson, music chair of the Arts Council, recommended Deller for the initial broadcast of the BBC Third Programme.93 Since its founding in 1922, the BBC actively reflected, projected, and influenced English cultural identity. As an organization, the BBC was always keenly aware of its national role. It engaged in a constant negotiation between what the nation wanted to hear and what the BBC believed it should hear, as can been seen in both the private, inter-departmental communications and the quasi-public discourse of BBC periodicals.94 Prior to the World War II, the BBC, under the direction of John Reith, employed a mixed programming strategy.95 Reith, a largely selfeducated man from a working-class background, saw the BBC’s mission as one of social, moral, and educational uplift for members of all classes. He believed that creating separate channels, divided along the lines of class and “brow” would only serve to reinforce class divisions, thus defeating the ethos of inclusiveness Reith sought to cultivate. During the inter-war years, the BBC broadcast a wide variety of music on two networks, from the popular to the more esoteric classical repertoires. The structure of the BBC changed radically during and after World War II.96 William Haley, who became Director-General in 1944, reversed the Reithian policy of mixed 93 Hardwick, A Singularity of Voice, 100. For a general overview of the BBC as an institution, see Asa Briggs, The BBC: The First Fifty Years (Oxford: Oxford, 1986); Thomas Hajkowski, The BBC and National Identity in Britain, 1922-1953 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2011). On the Third Programme specifically, see Humphrey Carpenter, The Envy of the World: Fifty Years of the BBC Third Programme and Radio 3, 1946-1996 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1996). With regards to music, see Emily Hoyler, “Broadcasting Englishness: National Music in Interwar BBC Periodicals,” (PhD diss., Northwestern University, 2016); Jennifer Doctor, The BBC and Ultra-Modern Music, 1922-1936: Shaping a Nation’s Tastes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000); Christina Baade, Victory Through Harmony: The BBC and Popular Music in World War II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 95 John Reith was the first general manager of the BBC in 1922, then managing director in 1923, and then DirectorGeneral from 1927-1938. 96 During the war, the BBC closed regional broadcasting networks, creating a unified Home service, ceased television broadcasting, and accepted increased government oversight. Thomas Hajkowski, BBC and National Identity in Britain, 1922-53, 11. 94 126 programming. Of his guiding philosophy, Haley writes, “I have always believed … that every civilized nation, culturally and educationally, is a pyramid with a lamentably broad base and a lamentably narrow tip.” To this end, he devised the three-tiered broadcasting scheme. The Light Programme would “cover the lower third of the pyramid,” the Home Service would take over middle, and the Third Programme would “take everything up to the tip.”97 Haley believed that dividing programming in this manner would be the best way to “nourish and encourage” the best virtues of English character, which, in his own words, encompassed “virility, a sense of endeavor, [and] courage.”98 Although it did not broadcast until 1946, something like the Third Programme was envisaged since the earliest days of the BBC. In 1924, only two years after its first broadcast, the idea came up in a board meeting for a separate channel for “highbrow education and better class material.”99 In a 1930 BBC board meeting, J. C. Stobart, head of the BBC’s Education Department suggested creating the “Minerva Programme” which focused on middle brow repertoire of “melodious” classical music, famous plays, and discussion. He suggested a further station, the “Venus Programme,” which could broadcast the most experimental, esoteric, and avant-garde material from across the arts.100 Once the three-tiered scheme became policy, the Music Department of the Third Programme took as its mission to broadcast “all the music worth hearing.” Musical programming was a central concern for the Third Programme, both in terms of the level of performance the Third sought maintain, but also the breadth of cultural exposure it sought engender. Inter- 97 Quoted in Carpenter, The Envy of the World, 9. Wellington, December 31, 1945 BBC WAC R34/420 quoted in Hajkowski, The BBC and National Identity in Britain, 1. 99 Carpenter, The Envy of the World, 3. 100 Quoted in Carpenter, The Envy of the World, 5. 98 127 departmental memos from the period leading up to the first broadcast show that the music department wished to make a “complete survey of the repertoire,” and that they were willing to plan such an endeavor years in advance. 101 Historical authenticity, the presentation of lesser-known works, and high performance standards were emphasized in equal measure. To this end, the Third engaged prominent musicologists to develop and present programs on air. Denis Stevens, a musicologist who joined the BBC staff in 1949 recalls: The nature of the organization and its duty to the nation demanded the highest standards of taste, and these were summed up in the famous phrase of Lord Reith, the first Director General: ‘We know exactly what British listeners want, and by Heaven they are not going to get it.’ It was precisely this attitude that led to the creation of the Third Programme, and its somewhat elitist and esoteric appeal to a limited audience.102 Timing was one of the notable features of the Third Programme. Unlike the other two main frequencies, the Third Programme did not limit its broadcasts to pre-portioned blocks of time, which had previously made programming larger, more complex musical and dramatic works especially difficult. Instead the Programming Committee, made up of semi-autonomous program builders, would develop their programs and hash out the timings in meeting. That is not to say that timing issues didn’t occur, but the explicit policy was to fit the timings to the work rather than the other way around. “When a piece of music came to an end, the sound and the thought were allowed to die away before the back-announcement began,” Stevens remembers, “Sonic wallpaper did not exist.”103 101 “My own inclination” R27/500/1 31 October 1946. “Obviously you will plan repeats of new work, and are arranging for rarely heard music to be heard again… We should want ‘live’ repeat performances but on occasion we would take recorded repeats rather than miss a second performance … Don’t worry about not getting in all the works which you want performed in the Third Programme since we are prepared to plan over a period of three years if necessary.” See also “Music in the Third Programme’ R34/602 25 November 1946. 102 Denis Stevens, “Performance Practice Issues on the BBC Third Programme,” in Performance Practice Review 2, No. 1 (Spring, 1989): 73-81, at 76. 103 Stevens, “Performance Practice Issues on the BBC Third Programme,” 76. 128 The Third Programme first broadcast at 6 p.m. on Sunday September 29, 1946. It began with a 45-minute program entitled “How to Listen,” which included seven minutes of unscheduled silence. Then came a reading from Henry James, and then a performance of the Goldberg Variations played on the harpsichord by Lucille Wallace. Though by no means completely new, the harpsichord was still something of a novelty to the broader listening public, and both the repertoire and the choice of instrument speak to the cultural register at which the Third Programme aimed. Then at 7:30-8:00 came the opening address, a “Reflection on World Affairs,” offered by Field Marshall J.C. Smuts, then Prime Minister of South Africa. Winston Churchill had been the desired speaker, but was unable to participate due to ill health. Finally, at 8 pm the inaugural concert began, played by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, led by Adrian Boult, and broadcast from the Maida Vale Orchestral studio. It was an all-English program, a veritable performance of the national canon. The concert opened with the Festival Overture, newly commissioned for the broadcast from the thirty-two-year-old Benjamin Britten.104 Then came Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks, which was the only work written by a composer born outside England, although Handel arguably had the most influence on English musical life. Purcell’s Ode, Come Ye Sons of Art, concluded the first half. The Ode featured two countertenors among the soloists: Alfred Deller and Charles Whitehead.105 The critic from the Times wrote, “It was a revelation to hear the familiar [countertenor] duet ‘Sound the Trumpet’ sung by voices of this unfamiliar timbre.”106 Following an interval talk about the Third Programme by Sir William Haley, the second half of the concert continued with Vaughan 104 Britten eventually withdrew the composition. It was eventually published as Occasional Overture, but Donald Mitchell, Britten’s publisher later in life, conjectured that insufficient rehearsal and Boult’s conducting were to blame for the poor reception. Carpenter, Envy of the World, 30. 105 Whitehead was a Vicar Choral at St. Paul’s. Alfred Deller also took up a position as Vicar Choral at St. Paul’s London in January of 1947, and he would remain there until 1962, when his busy career necessitated the use of deputies on an almost weekly basis. 106 “It is impossible,” The Times, 30 September 1946. 129 Williams’s Serenade to Music, Bliss’s Music for Strings, and concluded with Parry’s Blest Pair of Sirens. Alfred Deller’s inclusion in the initial broadcast of the Third Programme is symbolically important. The opening orchestral concert performed the English classical musical canon. In a single concert, it surveyed the great names of English music. The Third Programme, either intentionally or inadvertently, incorporated the sound of the countertenor voice into the idea of the English past. Though perceptions were certainly not shifted overnight, the Third Programme normalized the sound of the countertenor, incorporating it into sonic constructions of English musical identity, if perhaps a narrowly male, upper-middle class notion of it. According to the first Listener Research Report on the Third Programme, the channel’s target demographic, in practice if not in theory, was predominantly older men from the uppermiddle class. The report states that “30% of the upper middle class, as compared with only 4% of the working class, declared that the Third Programme was attractive to them… The proportion of men who found it very attractive was half as great again … as among women.” The Third “appealed to the older more than the younger half of the population,” yet “the numerical preponderance of the working class in the population is so great that … about one in three working class listeners.”107 Third Programme Listeners— the high-brow, the politically and institutionally traditional, the patriarchal—were paradoxically the most receptive to the potentially subversive sound of countertenor voice, perhaps because of the way in which it could be heard as a relic of a traditional past; a vestige of a grand history when the cultural output of British institutions were at their zenith. 107 “A Listener Report…The Third Programme” 3 February 1947, quoted in Carpenter, Envy of the World, 49. 130 Though the listening demographics of the Third Programme might seem at first to hinder the countertenor, the channel’s ethos of choosing quality, challenging programming actually helped their acceptance. Arguably, just about everyone in mid-century England had a passing familiarity with falsetto to one degree or another, and those familiar with the English cathedral choir tradition even more so. But the Third Programme was intentionally not geared towards easy listening or accessibility. Listeners tuned in to attentively listen, and when they listened to music, they were intent to undertake the labor of decoding a wide array of musical meanings. As such, they grew accustomed to a wide variety of unfamiliar forms, instruments, idioms, and timbres. Their desire for musical taste, for an appreciation of traditional high culture, ironically made them receptive to the potentially gender-troubling of male falsetto. The desire to understand made listeners open to the careful and persistent framing which arose around Deller’s voice. An overview of a typical day’s programming helps put this ethos of careful, attentive listening in context. Take for example Wednesday 15 October 1947.108 Aside from the fact that Alfred Deller could be heard that day, there is nothing exceptional about it. Rather, it illustrates the range one could expect if they tuned in to listen. At 18:00, the station came on air with a program of Bach’s English Suites played on harpsichord, which was then still considered a rather esoteric instrument. At 18:35 there was a lecture on cartoon film in the history of cinema. Then at 19:00, there was an hour of Schubert lieder and piano duets. At 20:00 there was a lecture on life in Paris and the provinces. Twenty minutes later, there was a program of contemporary chamber music by unspecified composers, although the program did list a soprano, a piano, and a 108 http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/schedules/third/1947-10-15. All listings for all programs on all stations, dating back to the very first one, are available to all via the BBC Genome Project. For anyone researching the BBC, it is a tremendous resource. 131 woodwind quintet among the performers. At 21:00 there was a program devoted to a new translation of Cervantes’s play Numancia in the form of a lecture with dramatized excerpts. Finally, at 22:00 there was an installment in a series of Purcell concerts on which Deller performed that was devoted to Odes and string anthems. While the programming was not necessarily alienating in its esotericism, it certainly was not “easy listening.” Prior to the initial broadcast of the Third Programme (29 September), Deller wrote to the BBC, emphatically embracing his new vocal identity: Dear Mr. Wynn, I much prefer to be known as a Counter-Tenor and not as an Alto (need I tell you why!) and would be most grateful if this could be made clear in any printed programme or announcement.109 While Deller was labeled a “counter-tenor” in the programs for his Morley concerts, he was labelled an “alto,” along with Charles Whitehead, in the Radio Times entry for his first BBC broadcast.110 The distinction mattered to Deller. He sought to differentiate himself from the amorphous term “alto,” which functioned as a catch all term for high male singing. Through the label “countertenor,” Deller styled himself as an authentically English voice with an immaculate historical pedigree. Deller garnered praise for his concert performances, but nothing furthered his early career more than his broadcasts on the BBC, and especially on the Third Programme. Where a concert can live on in memory and in print, the radio, by sheer virtue of repetition, conditioned the British ear to accept the countertenor voice as part of their English sound world. Prior to the Third Programme, Purcell was acknowledged as a figurehead of the English musical canon, but one could only rarely hear his music, especially on the radio. From its founding in 1923 through 109 110 Letter from Alfred Deller to Mr. Wynn, 2 September 1946 “Alfred Deller” WAC RCONT 1. “Ode on St. Cecilia’s Day,” Radio Times 1155 (1945): 18. 132 the end of 1945, Purcell was rarely heard on the BBC more than 20 times a year, and when one did hear Purcell, it was typically a single song within a larger vocal recital.111 Once the Third Programme started to broadcast, the public’s exposure to Purcell, and a whole range of early English music, radically increased. And when they listened to Purcell, Blow, Byrd, or Dowland, chances were that they heard Alfred Deller. But learning to listen to the countertenor voice—learning to attend to the claimed historicity of the voice while quelling the queer potential of falsetto singing—required more than simple, passive exposure. Certainly, hearing the countertenor as a solo voice on the radio did much to pique the public’s interest. But the BBC presented Deller’s voice, repeatedly and explicitly, as a historical voice type. On numerous occasions, the BBC created programs that featured Deller’s voice, often explicitly taking up the issue of the countertenor’s historical provenance. Again, Michael Tippett provided Deller with the exposure he needed. In 1947, Tippett presented two multi-part talks on Henry Purcell—one series on “Purcell and the English Tradition” and the other on “Purcell and the Elizabethans”—in which he frequently called on Alfred Deller to illustrate musical examples. In the first of these programs, entitled “The Singing of the English Language,” Tippett began the broadcast with “Music for a While,” sung by Alfred Deller and accompanied by Walter Bergmann on harpsichord. Tippett prefaced the recording, saying: The air is for the counter-tenor. This is a man’s falsetto voice in the alto register. It was the chief professional voice of Purcell’s day, capable of great agility, purity and expressiveness.112 111 All of the program listings published in the Radio Times between 1923-2009 are available online, free to the public as part of the BBC Genome Project. http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk 112 Michael Tippett, “’Purcell and the English Tradition’ 1. The Singing of the English Language,” Microfilm of unpublished radio script, BBC WAC, 5 April 1947, 1. 133 It is a simple statement, but significant. Tippett, in this moment, confirmed the nature of the countertenor voice that had been presented to English ears on the radio and in the choir stalls, but which was up for debate in the scholarly community.113 But, importantly, Tippett aligns a historical notion of what the countertenor was with the current practice of falsetto singing. And in utilizing Deller’s voice so frequently, Tippett conditioned the British ear to associate the idea of a Purcellian countertenor with Alfred Deller’s voice. In Tippett’s Purcell programs, we can see the clear intersection of performance practice and national identity. The name of the series alone— “Purcell and the English Tradition”— speaks to a nationalist argument. So, too, does the first episode, “The Singing of the English Language.” Of course, Purcell’s setting of the English language is central to the composer’s reputation and reception. But it takes on a new shade of meaning in this setting. After introducing the listener to the countertenor voice, Tippett compares Purcell to Handel: I don’t think we have realised just how much that sort of Handelian usage has harmed our proper sense of the language. We take it for granted because we have heard it from our cradles. I must admit that my own ear, so used now to Dowland and Purcell, receives a jar – a jolt – which can make me remember that Handel was an Englishman by adoption, not by birth and tradition. Now Purcell never does the like. However long he may vocalise on the strong vowel of the trochee, he never ends a weak vowel on the strong musical beat, but lets the weak vowel always fall the other side.114 The link between language and national identity is nothing new, especially in musical discourse. But Tippett argues that one must learn to listen before one can hear one’s national heritage. And just as there is a right (Purcellian) and a wrong (Handelian) way to set the English language, there is a right and a wrong way to perform English music. The English language, properly set 113 Contemporary scholarship convincing argues that Purcell’s countertenors did not necessarily sing in falsetto. I address this issue in greater depth at the end of this chapter. 114 Michael Tippett, “’Purcell and the English Tradition’ 1. The Singing of the English Language,” BBC WAC (Microfilm of unpublished radio script, broadcast 5 April 1947 10:30-11), 2. 134 by Purcell, must also be properly sung by a countertenor. And so Tippett implicitly suggests that a specific voice, the countertenor, as much as a style or an instrument, bears the weight of both authenticity and national identity. Deller’s reputation as a historically English voice type was firmly entrenched by the mid1950s, as can be seen in two radio profiles made for the Home Service. It is important to note the station. Deller made his early career singing on Third Programme broadcasts, which catered to a high-brow audience. But increasingly, his voice could be heard on the middle of the road Home Service, and even periodically on the explicitly populist Light Service. Music Magazine was a biweekly radio program—a “fortnightly review,” as it was described by the BBC— which aired at 11 pm on the BBC Home Service, beginning on 21 May 1944. It aimed to entertain and educate a generalist audience interested in classical music. Like any review format, each program featured varied material from several contributors. A typical program would often review recent records, and feature a few brief, informative profiles on a performer, composer, or concept, sometimes organized around an overarching theme. As the title suggests, it is like a magazine for an educated but non-specialist audience, not unlike the current iteration of Music Magazine, which, since 1992, has been an actual, print publication. Deller was featured twice on the program, once in 1955 and once in 1956, though his records were played and reviewed at regular intervals. The first profile was about the countertenor voice. It represents a summation of the public and scholarly view of the voice type, tailored for a lay audience. Although nominally about the countertenor voice and its historical origins, the catalyst for the broadcast was that all-too-common experience of hearing the countertenor and not being able to fit the voice into a body. The announcer introduces the program: 135 A little while ago I had a letter from a listener who had been intrigued by the counter-tenor voice of Alfred Deller, and who wanted to know what his speaking voice was like, and what was a counter-tenor anyway. Well, it may surprise some of you to know that our great composer, Henry Purcell, was famous in his own day for his counter-tenor singing, so I’ll introduce this talk by Mollie Sands, for which Alfred Deller, accompanied by Charles Spinks, has recorded some of the illustrations, with a few bars from a song by Purcell.115 The vocal-somatic dissonance at play here inverts the challenge posed by a live countertenor. In his early Morley performances, audiences first saw Deller’s body and then heard him sing. Tippett’s normalizing strategy, in that case, was to reassure the audience of Deller’s conventional masculinity, of his literal and figurative virility. On the radio, Deller’s voice presents a different challenge. Listening acousmatically, the anonymous listener—we don’t know who, or even if they were real—searches for a body to fit the voice. He constructs a vocalic body, but remains apparently frustrated, since the sound, beautiful though it may be, fails to index a person. The 1955 program is largely biographical. It offers a history of the voice type, but that history is conflated with Deller’s own. In between framing remarks by the announcer, Deller offers a brief explanation of what the voice type is and how he learned to become one. The program has the feel of an interview, even though it was totally scripted and pre-recorded. In this program, one can observe the palpable tension between the categories of “the natural” and “the historical.” Deller needs to lay claim to both in order to establish his validity, his right to perform these works from the English past. Claiming the historical is simplest, in rhetorical terms. Masculinity, however, is a bit harder to achieve. The profile begins by recounting the experience of a modern listener hearing the countertenor for the first time: Mollie Sands: It is just ten years since Alfred Deller’s voice was first heard on the air, singing that same song by Purcell. For many people – possibly the majority – 115 Mollie Sands, “Music Magazine ,” Home Service, BBC WAC (microfilm of radio script, broadcast 1 May 1955, 1. 136 it was their first experience of hearing a counter tenor male alto in a solo, except perhaps in a Cathedral or Church choir. It was a new and exciting experience, which some found immediately enthralling, and others (it must be admitted) slightly disconcerting.116 Sands then proceeds to “naturalize” the countertenor, to fit the alien sound into normative constructs of gendered singing. The voice had the detachment and absence of personal emotion which the ear usually associates with a boy soprano, and yet it had a masculine strength. It was unlike a tenor, and it had none of the emotional overtones of a female alto. It was, in fact, like nothing but itself. Judged purely on its merits, it was a most musical sound. Since that broadcast ten years ago, we have got used to the special quality of the counter tenor voice, and almost come to expect it in music of the 17th and 18th centuries. The counter tenor has been rescued from comparative obscurity, and it is not likely to disappear again from chamber music concerts.117 In my transcription, I include excised material, crossed out by hand. The BBC radio scripts often present these sorts of editorial interventions, usually minor grammatical alterations and the like. But in the case of the 1955 broadcast, the revisions speak to an uncertainty about the countertenor, and how to best present the notion of Alfred Deller’s body, expressed here in the coded terms of “emotional content.” One can contrast the countertenor with the female alto, and that voice’s “emotional overtones,” but it becomes problematic when one dissociates him from the virility of the modern tenor. If the countertenor is also unlike the tenor, is he then neither feminine nor masculine? Indeed, the script originally called for a comparison to the boy soprano and the “absence of personal emotion,” but that seemed to problematize the countertenor’s masculinity. ndeed, closer examination would reveal the paradox on which the countertenor’s reputation rested, that one had to simultaneously reaffirm the body’s masculinity while at the 116 Mollie Sands, “Music Magazine ,” Home Service, BBC WAC (microfilm of radio script, broadcast 1 May 1955, 1. 117 Mollie Sands, “Music Magazine ,” Home Service, BBC WAC (microfilm of radio script, broadcast 1 May 1955, 1-2. 137 same time denying the voice’s material source. As with other forms of self-contradictory belief, the easiest route, in this program at least, seemed to be willfully ignoring the issue. Though similar in many respects, the 1956 Music Magazine profile of Alfred Deller deals with the voice/body issue slightly differently. First, Cedric Wallis, the contributor, draws a parallel between countertenor voice and the use of antiquated instruments in historical performance practice: I think one of the most interesting things in music to-day is the performance of the works of the old masters on the instruments for which they were written. We get from the harpsichord, the lute, the viola da gamba, and so on, an atmosphere and an authenticity that modern instruments, for all their superiority in tone and technical accomplishment, cannot give us. And amongst the restorers of ancient rights is a singer, Alfred Deller, who has brought the counter-tenor voice out of comparative obscurity of the cathedral choir, and restored put it back to its rightful place in the music that was written for it.118 Authenticity, then, is an immanent property of the sounding body, embedded in material reality. The gamba does not sound like the cello because they are morphologically dissimilar. This much seems to make common sense. But with voices, the distinction between types is much more fluid. For the sake of argument, Wallis glosses over that distinction. The countertenor may seem sonically alien, but that is the distance of history, rather than a violation of cultural norms. If we take a historically relativist view of vocal aesthetics, that suffices so long as one can prove that Deller’s vocal practice was indeed authentic. But historicity must be balanced against the gendered listening practices of modern ears: You might think that was the voice of a small, rather delicate-looking person, but Alfred Deller is tall and spare, and now that he has grown a small beard, appropriately Elizabethan in appearance, - and his speaking voice, by the way, is a pleasant light baritone.119 118 Cedric Wallis, “Music Magazine,” Home Service, BBC WAC (microfilm of radio script, broadcast 9 December 1956), 1. 119 Cedric Wallis, “Music Magazine,” Home Service, BBC WAC (microfilm of radio script, broadcast 9 December 1956), 2. Unlike the 1955 profile, which featured Deller speaking at length, the 1956 program on countertenors featured his singing voice. 138 The announcer could not be much more explicit. Rather than “delicate” (a coded word with feminine connotations), Deller possesses a beard, and is “tall and spare” (markers of conventional masculinity). Aside from these interesting editorial marks, of which there are many in this script, we find the now familiar rhetoric used to rationalize the countertenor. First, we are reminded of Purcell’s activities as a countertenor, and then assured of the “naturalness” of the voice and Deller’s approach to it. And then he reiterates the claim the authentic performance of Handel, Bach, and Purcell requires the use of a countertenor. Deller sang much more than just Purcell and Dowland, though the Third Programme certainly capitalized on the aura of historical authenticity he had acquired as a Purcell specialist. The BBC employed Deller to sing a wide variety of repertoire, and in so doing they inculcated British ears to associate the sound of a countertenor voice with early music. The History in Sound of European Music (HSEM) was an enormous, multi-year endeavor by the Third Programme, spear-headed by Gerald Abraham, in which experts presented various periods or topics in a chronological survey of music history, with excerpts illustrated by performers in the most authentic manner possible.120 During 1949, Deller appeared on six installments of the HSEM: the episodes on seventeenth century Venetian opera, early German opera, seventeenth century French opera, English Church music, English oratorio, and an episode devoted to Baroque vocal ornamentation.121 Sadly, neither scripts nor recordings survive; broadcast listings in Radio Times are all that remain. 120 For an account of how broadcasts were assembled from the perspective of a former program builder, see Denis Stevens, “Performance Practice Issues on the BBC Third Programme,” in Performance Practice Review 2/1 (Spring, 1989): 73-81. 121 A History in Sound of European Music." Radio Times 1339 (1949): 25. "A History in Sound of European Music." Radio Times 1342 (1949): 39. "A History in Sound of European Music." Radio Times 1344 (1949): 39. "A History in Sound of European Music." Radio Times 1350 (1949): 39. "A History in Sound of European Music." Radio Times 1356 (1949): 43. "A History in Sound of European Music." Radio Times 1360 (1949): 43. 139 However, these broadcasts by the Third Programme represent some of the general public’s first exposure to much early music. They defined for a generation what early music sounded like, and quite frequently, they included Alfred Deller. And Deller was more than just a solo singer. He was frequently hired to sing a wide variety polyphonic repertoire in one-voiceper-part ensembles, especially after he founded the Deller Consort in 1950. The Third Programme also adapted and broadcast medieval morality plays, many of which included Deller.122 Other music was often included, but in an otherwise spoken drama, Deller’s was the only singing voice. He could also be heard in many radio adaptions of Shakespeare plays in which he sang lute songs.123 Deller became part of the sonic tapestry used to evoke a sense of the past, usually the English past, but sometimes as a generic evocation of antiquity. This is not to say to say that the HSEM, the Shakespeare plays, or the medieval morality plays were part a concerted effort on the part of the BBC Third Programme to indoctrinate the British ear to accept the countertenor as a marker of the distant past. No evidence exists to suggest as much. If one tuned into the radio during that period and listened to early vocal music, they often heard a different sort of singer. For ensemble work, the BBC often relied on choral musicians, many of whom either came up through or still sang in a cathedral choir.124 Within this set of singers, the countertenor stood out as unique. The countertenor voice had been positioned explicitly as a Purcellian voice, and an English voice. But this repeated exposure to the countertenor in all early 122 "Robert Harris in the Cornish play of 'The Ascension,'" Radio Times 1336 (1949): 23. It was rebroadcast in 1951. He also performed in an adaptation of “Everyman” see "World Theatre," Radio Times 23 March (1951): 14. 123 "Marjorie Wesbury, Alfred Deller, and the Dolmetsch Consort of Viols in 'Shakespeare and his Musicians.'" Radio Times 1313 (1948): 17. "Stephen Murray and Laidman Browne with Claire Bloom in 'Measure for Measure.'" Radio Times 1440 (1951): 37. "Cymbeline." Radio Times 1467 (1951): 21. "Measure for Measure." Radio Times 1480 (1952): 35. 124 Deller himself maintained just such a position until around 1960. After his time at Canterbury, he took up a position at St. Paul’s, London around 1947. These positions were not full time, though they offered a steady income to gigging musicians. They were also very flexible with regards to external work, so long as a “deputy” (substitute) singer could be found and one gave sufficient notice. These cathedral musicians were also attractive to the BBC since they could perform with very little rehearsal, time being the most precious commodity. 140 vocal music, in conjunction with the curated exposure I have discussed above, engendered a way of hearing the countertenor as an early music voice more broadly. What started as a practical hiring practice, in my estimation, morphed into a relatively stable association, such that in instances like the Shakespeare adaptations, one could use the voice type as a convenient, broadly understood signifier of “pastness” Alfred Deller found professional purchase as a Purcell specialist. It was as a Purcellian countertenor that he made his concert debut in London with Tippett, and it was likewise as a Purcellian that he made his entree onto the airwaves. In his debut recording, Deller did not sing Purcell, but rather 16th century Lute song. However, his identity as a performer was, and remained, indelibly linked with English composers of the 16th and 17th centuries. By the ubiquity of his voice, Alfred Deller defined for a generation what countertenors could and should sound like, and what they could sing. And it was the BBC that taught the broader English public how to listen to his voice, to attend to the claimed historicity of the countertenor all the while quelling the queer potential of falsetto singing. THE FESTIVAL OF BRITAIN AND BEYOND The Festival of Britain—which took place across five months during the Summer of 1951, primarily in London, but with sites across Britain—was intended to represent and inspire a sense of recovery and national vitality in the wake another World War.125 Exhibits across the country promoted the vitality of British science, technology, industry, and the arts. Britain 125 See Mary Banham and Bevis Hillier, A Tonic to the Nation: The Festival of Britain 1951 (London: Thames & Hudson, 1976); Harriet Atkinson, The Festival of Britain: A Land and its People (New York: I. B. Tauris, 2012). Regarding music, see Nathaniel G. Lew, Tonic to the Nation: Making English Music in the Festival of Britain (London: Routledge, 2017); for a compilation of Times reviews of the Festival, see Musical Britain 1951, compiled by the Music Critic of The Times (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951). 141 underwent a tremendous political and cultural re-alignment between the end of World War II and the Festival of Britain (1951). The newly elected Labour Government took as its mission a more direct involvement in the lives of the populace, as is evident from the creation of the welfare state. In matters of culture, also, the government took a more active role in cultivating and presenting an official account of British culture. “Good” culture, in Labour Britain, was equated with highbrow taste. The cultural capital once enjoyed by the upper classes was now the right of the masses, and so, in keeping with the ethos of redistribution, high art was made available to the masses, whether they wanted it or not.126 Led by the Arts Council and supplemented by the BBC—which had since 1927 been a non-commercial, Crown-chartered organization—the Festival of Britain represented the most exhaustive and encyclopedic performance of Post-War British musical identity. The Arts Council was founded in 1940, during the Second World War, as the “Council for the Encouragement of Music and Entertainment” with the purpose of promoting and maintaining British culture.127 It was granted a Royal Charter in August of 1946 as the “Arts Council of Great Britain,” and was chaired, albeit briefly, by John Maynard Keynes. Although his tenure was cut short by his untimely death that same year, Keynes established the Council’s power and relative autonomy by ensuring both a remarkably high funding level—especially considering the dire situation of the British economy—and that the Council would report directly to the Treasury, rather than to the Minister of Education or Culture. Though officially sanctioned, the Arts Council was structurally 126 Alan Sinfield. “The Government, the People, and the Festival,” in Labour’s Promised Land: Culture and Society in Labour Britain, 1945-1951, edited by Jim Fryth, 181-196 (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1995), esp. 183-184. 127 For an overview, see Eric Walter White, Arts Council of Great Britain (London: Davis-Poynter, 1975). 142 insulated from the rest of the government; Keynes had effectively created a firewall between the British Arts policy and the government.128 The Arts Council served a curatorial role with regards to music. It was, in the words of Nathaniel Lew, the “framer and policer of canons,” with the power to “acknowledge, define, and broaden the mainstream of British concert repertory.”129 The Arts Council could grant exposure to some composers, deny it to others, and further institutionalize the pre-war consensus on the narrative of the English Musical Renaissance. Not unlike the Third Programme, the Arts Council espoused a “top-down” approach to programming. Elitist by nature—even limited by its charter to the “fine arts exclusively”—the Arts Council was not so much concerned with what the public wanted to hear, but was rather intent on presenting “English music in its historical breadth;” engendering the production of new concert and operatic repertories within the narrow, institutionalized definitions of English national style.130 Although the Festival of Britain set out to present an exhaustive profile of contemporary British culture, it was also intent on predicating its efforts on a sense of historical continuity. Very often, the Festival of Britain seems intently modernist in its aesthetic. And in many respects it was. Industrial innovation, scientific progress, modern architecture, visual art, and music all took center stage. But if we accept that the Arts Council took as its mission the “curatorial role” as the “Framer and Policer of Canons,” it is important to also consider the historical narrative of English music it constructed and performed as part of the Festival. Indeed, the modern music, the commissions, and the canonization of more recent figures from the (twentieth century) English 128 The early history of both CEMA and the Arts Council are contentious issues. The early histories were written largely by partisans, and much modern scholarship is highly critical. The Annual Reports of the Arts Council provide a good picture of the inner workings of the organization, just as White’s Arts Council of Great Britain contains a good account of the early development of the organization. 129 Nathaniel G. Lew, Tonic to the Nation: Making English Music in the Festival of Britain (London: Routledge, 2017), 53. 130 Lew, Tonic to the Nation, 9-13. 143 musical Renaissance figured prominently in the festival programs. But their position as figureheads and innovators required a historical ground, a narrative in which to place themselves, one that had been told in various guises throughout the twentieth century of as a tale of stalled and suppressed indigenous talent, reinvigorated by modern practitioners. In this light, the English Musical Renaissance, which the Festival sought to enshrine, had no currency without first emphasizing the vibrancy of the past. Vaughan Williams, Elgar, and Britten had no validity without folk song, Purcell, and the Elizabethans. With this in mind, it does well to focus instead on the Festival’s presentation of English musical history; to note how, at critical junctures during the London Season of the Arts (part of the Festival of Britain) the countertenor voice, and specifically Alfred Deller’s voice, was presented as an essential component of the England’s historical sound world. In addition to the hundreds of stand-alone concerts, there were three special multi-concert series, which were given special prominence as center pieces in the display of English music. As a group, they represented a historical overview of English music, performed for the English public. Each series presented one concert per week on a designated night at one of London’s most prominent venues. On Mondays at Wigmore Hall, there was a historical overview of English song. On Tuesdays at the Victoria and Albert Museum was the series devoted entirely to the music of Henry Purcell. And on Wednesdays, also at Wigmore, there was a series on “Other English Composers” from 1300 to 1750. Notably, Alfred Deller was featured prominently in all three of these series, especially in the Purcell series. For the Purcell series, the Arts Council, in collaboration with the Purcell Society, produced a lavish, 93-page program booklet, which featured illustrations, historical images, annotations on the individual works, and, most importantly, extended essays by leading Purcell experts on various aspects of the composer’s life, times, and music (Figure 2.4). 144 The Festival represents a remarkable change in fortune for the music of Henry Purcell. Purcell was by no means the most performed composer during the festival. Vaughan Williams received that honor, and Handel was, as always, popular and heavily represented. But Purcell enjoyed a pride of place, not simply as a revered figure from the past, but as a performed composer. It was no longer enough to simply assert his greatness; that historical greatness had to be performed on the concert stage. Purcell, England’s great composer of vocal music, had to be sung. And for that to happen, Alfred Deller, as the de facto reigning countertenor, was heard as the canonical, historical English voice.131 FIGURE 2.4: Program booklet for the Eight Concerts of Henry Purcell’s Music put on as part of the Festival of Britain (1951), which featured essays by prominent Purcell scholars and performers. Underneath Purcell’s portrait is a brief overview of the composer’s life, as well as the dates of his famous contemporaries in British culture broadly, and musical history specifically. 131 Deller appeared on five of the eight Purcell concerts. He did not perform on the third and fourth, which did not require solo countertenor singing. He also did not sing on the eighth concert, which contained only choral repertoire and no solo singing. 145 “We all pay lip service to Henry Purcell,” writes Ralph Vaughan Williams in his forward to the contributed essays, “but what do we really know of him?” He then puts the efforts of the Purcell Society into an explicitly nationalist context. Unlike countries on the continent that produced critical editions of their great composers at state expense, England was only just publishing the complete works of Purcell. And that effort was “carried on by the devotion of a few experts who gave their scanty leisure to the work.”132 “In this country,” Vaughan Williams argues, “we have too long allowed one of the greatest geniuses of music to languish unwept, unhonoured and almost unsung.133 A rhetorical flourish, to be sure, but “unsung” takes on a more literal dimension with respect to Purcell. “Singing” here refers in part to the Epic, to the Saga, to the practice of preserving heroes in the collective memory through song. “Singing” taps into a nostalgic construction of the past, an idealized space of cultural memory and transmission. The “folk” was transmitted through song and through voice. Vaughan Williams and his associates found inspiration in English folk song, collected in the fields and taverns of the English countryside. English music, the English national style, was based on song, whether sung by a material voice, or sublimated into the grammar of a national musical language. So, too, with Purcell. The great composer, himself a countertenor, was primarily a composer of vocal music. Publishing monumentalizes the composer. But before Deller, before the re-emergence of countertenor singing, Purcell was by necessity left unsung. John Denison, Music Director of the Arts Council, writes in his essay of the more practical side of the Purcell revival. He attributes the contemporary revival of Purcell’s music 132 Ralph Vaughan Williams, “Forward,” Eight Concerts of Henry Purcell’s Music (London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1951), 7. 133 Ralph Vaughan Williams, “Forward,” Eight Concerts of Henry Purcell’s Music (London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1951), 7. 146 directly to the BBC Third Programme and the “small group of distinguished musicians” who allowed one to hear “with regularity, a repertoire more truly representative of Purcell’s achievement.”134 As he goes on to say, this series omitted Purcell’s most famous dramatic works—especially Dido and Aeneas, but also Fairy Queen and The Tempest—which were, at one point, the only works that ever received performance. The concert series was an effort to survey and canonize Purcell, an ephemeral monument to English music. Though neither Denison nor Vaughan Williams make a reference to any single performer, Alfred Deller’s position as a pre-eminent Purcellian was cemented by the prominence he and his voice type were given in the concert series. In his essay on “Purcell and the Singer’s Art,” Norman Platt, a professional bass-baritone who frequently collaborated with Deller at the BBC, speaks to Purcell’s skill as a performer and composer for the voice. Purcell, writes Platt, “understood the human voice as few English composers have done,” not only because of his skill as a countertenor—as evidenced by the oftcited account of how Purcell sang “Tis Nature’s Voice” from the Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day with “incredible graces”—but also because of his “peculiar genius to express the energy of English words.”135 Platt was by no means unique in asserting Purcell’s skillful setting of the English language. To a certain extent, Platt simply reiterates one of the most common tropes of Purcellian historiography. But he refines the concept of by linking it to specific voice types and individual singers: One final word on the sort of voices for which Purcell wrote. The pre-eminence of the tenor among male voices does not hold in the case of Purcell; indeed it is the 134 John Denison, “Performances of Henry Purcell’s Music…” Eight Concerts of Henry Purcell’s Music (London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1951), 6. It is important to note that these concerts featured those very singers to which Denison referred. All were regular performers on the BBC Third Programme, especially in early solo and consort music. 135 Norman Platt, “Purcell and the Singer’s Art.” Eight Concerts of Henry Purcell’s Music (London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1951), 25. 147 countertenor and bass who usually get preferential treatment. The use of the countertenor voice, essential for the true realization of Purcell’s intentions in many words, was for a long time a stumbling block, but this gap in the vocal armory is now being attended to, at least in this country.”136 Deller appeared on five of the eight concerts. Vocal music was featured in all eight to varying degrees. Two concerts featured solo voices, but did not call for countertenor; and the final concert featured only choral music. But if there was a solo countertenor part, Deller sang it. If there were two, he was given the first part, with the most solo material. His voice and voice type enjoyed special prominence, as both the selection of repertoire and the essays make clear. The essays instructed one how to listen to a countertenor, and reassured one of the voice’s English provenance. The concerts gave one the experience of hearing the countertenor, an opportunity to put the audile techniques into practice. Alfred Deller’s voice had at this point become part of the English soundscape, a living relic invested with authenticity and national importance. The first concert is indicative of Deller’s place within the post-war British construction of the Purcellian sound world. It featured a broad sampling of Purcell’s lesser-known works: the Suite from King Arthur, Sonatas for Violin and Harpsichord, the Masque in Dioclesian, the Chacony, and a selection of solo songs featuring the soprano Margaret Ritchie and Alfred Deller. For Ritchie’s selections, the notes only explain the structure or text of the works, but for Deller’s contributions, the voice itself was the main interest: The counter-tenor voice, by which these songs are to be sung, was perhaps the most admired voice of Purcell’s period. It is the highest male voice natural produced, possessing great flexibility and particularly suited to deliver the many “graces” which Purcell wrote for it.137 136 Platt, 28-9. Michael Tippett makes many similar points in his essay “Purcell and the English Language,” 46-49, which drew directly on the material he developed for the 1947 BBC broadcast on the same subject. He explicitly notes this fact in a footnote, in which he thanks the BBC for access to his earlier materials, which presumably included the radio scripts. 137 Eight Concerts of Henry Purcell’s Music, 55. 148 In summary, the countertenor voice—as much as any art work, composer, building, or other cultural expression—was on display at the Festival of Britain in 1951. But due to the relatively recent “rediscovery” of the voice type, its historical and national provenance had to be asserted at every turn. And so the public was instructed—as it had been by Tippett at Morley, and on the BBC—that the countertenor was instrumental in reviving and performing Purcell’s music. Purcell’s genius, his national genius as a composer, was in his approach to the voice and his sensitivity to language, which could in turn, only be realized through an authentic manner of singing employed by the authentic voice types. But Deller was more than simply the sound of Henry Purcell. More broadly, his voice came to be heard as a marker of the English past. Take for example the other concert series during the Festival of Britain. On the English Song series, he appeared on the fourth of six concerts. Rather like the narrative of the English Musical Renaissance, there was an emphasis on music of the distant past—represented here in equal parts by folk song (presented in arrangements by prominent composers) and music of the 16th and 17th centuries, especially Elizabethan lute song—and music of the twentieth century “Renaissance.” Overwhelmingly, the repertoire consisted of pre-war composers, such as Ralph Vaughan Williams, Holst, Butterworth, Ireland, and Moeran, with the more modern iteration of British music represented by Britten. Two of the concerts featured a substantial selection of lute song, and their differences are telling. The first concert was a recital by Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, performed entirely on piano (See Figure 2.5). The opening set of the first half was entirely comprised of Elizabethan Lute composers, especially Dowland, but also Campion, Rosseter and Jones. The set was followed by songs from the twentieth century, including a cycle by Tippett, and selections by Bridge, Holst, Vaughan Williams, and, of course, Britten. I do not mean to suggest that the tenor 149 voice could not be associated with authentic performance, but that the first concert was more in line with traditional, chronological recital practice. FIGURE 2.5: Program for English Song Series Concert, first concert. London Season of the Arts Programme, 44. In contrast, the fourth concert featured larger works and more singers (See Figure 2.6). In addition to Alfred Deller, the singers Heddle Nash and Henry Cummings also participated. Deller was separate from the rest of the recital. He only performed works written (he believed) for countertenor, and he performed them with lute, played by his long-time collaborator, Desmond Dupré. His was an intentionally authentic performance of the past. And that past was sonically separate, just as it was temporally separate. The past sounded different, marked by the alien timbre of the countertenor voice and the soft intimacy of the lute. 150 FIGURE 2.6: Program for English Song Series, fourth concert. London Season of the Arts Programme, 45. By no means was this a single instance. Repeatedly, Alfred Deller, as the preeminent countertenor, was presented as a sonic signifier of “past-ness,” especially within individual concerts and concert series that purported to survey English musical history. In the Fall of 1954, Deller took part in the Centre de Documentation de Musique Internationale festival in Paris. This was the second iteration of the festival, the first of which occurred in Cologne.138 The festivals featured a series of concerts, each devoted to the music of a single country, in which was presented both folk and art music, ancient and modern. Deller provided the entire English concert, which was given at the Salle Gaveau. The first half consisted of seventeenth and eighteenth century English music, and the second half featured a song cycle by Lennox Berkeley, “Four Poems of St. Teresa d’Avila.” (1947).139 The countertenor had become an English cultural export. 138 A Paris Correspondent. “Modern Music.” The Times, 16 November 1954. Curiously, this work violates Deller’s normally strict policy of performing works only written for countertenor. This cycle was written in 1947 for contralto, specifically Kathleen Ferrier, and string orchestra. There is every 139 151 In the summer of 1955, Deller took part in another series of concerts put on by the Arts Council. Again, the Arts Council presented a series of concerts surveying the English Song literature. The concerts took place at Wigmore Hall on consecutive Mondays, beginning on 26 May. In contrast to the Festival of Britain series, the 1955 concerts attempted to offer a more systematic survey of literature, though it was not strictly chronological. For example, the first concert was devoted entirely to the songs of Ralph Vaughan Williams. The second concert was devoted to “The Variety of Influences on English Song,” The third, fourth, and sixth concerts were the most explicitly chronological, and were devoted to poets and composers from the sixteenth through the seventeenth, the seventeenth through the eighteenth, and the nineteenth through the twentieth centuries, respectively. The fifth concert was a rather catch all program devoted to non-British poets set by British composers. The Third Concert in the series is notable in the way it presents the countertenor voice (Figure 2.7). The concert was devoted specifically to sixteenth and seventeenth century poets, set by both historical and more contemporary English composers. In addition to Deller, the program featured the tenor Alexander Young, the baritone Bruce Boyce, Gerald Moore and Edmund Rubbra on piano, The Aeolian String Quartet, and Desmond Dupré on Lute. All music by sixteenth and seventeenth century composers was sung by Deller, in what was believed to be the “authentic” manner. All lute songs were performed on lute and sung by countertenor. In this case, the lute song set included a representative sample of Dowland, Rosseter, and Parsons. Likewise, the consort songs of Byrd and Corkine were performed also by Deller, accompanied by the Aeolian string quartet. The piano seemed to be the conspicuously modern instrument, just as the tenor and baritone were modern voices. The baritone and tenor—Heddle Nash and Henry indication that he did indeed sing it, but perhaps the antiquated nature of the poetry sufficed. Much more focus is given to the novel sound of Deller’s voice and his performance of ancient repertoire. 152 Cummings—took over singing the late nineteenth and twentieth century settings, which in this case featured works by Denis Browne, a selection of ‘English Lyrics’ on poetry of Shakespeare by Parry, and a Diptych by Edmund Rubbra on two Sonnets by William Alabaster (1567-1640). FIGURE 2.7: Six Concerts of English Song, Third Concert Program. 9 June 1955, Wigmore Hall 153 FIGURE 2.7: cont’d. During that same summer, Deller was invited to give two performances in Oxford for the International Congress of Musicology. Again, we see the countertenor voice curated as a museum object, a relic from the past. Where twenty years earlier countertenors were thought to be largely extinct, now Deller’s voice was institutionally validated and critically lauded. He was 154 an object of national pride, displayed by the English for their European counterparts. A correspondent with the Manchester Guardian noted, with no small amount of smugness, how the German delegates had such little exposure to the countertenor voice since it had “vanished completely” from the continent. Then, “After getting over the first mild shock which comes to all who have to reconcile for the first time Mr. Deller’s quite unetherial person with the high fluting notes,” Deller received an enthusiastic reception which “is normally won only by popular pianists from enthusiastic ‘prommers.’”140 The incongruity between Deller’s voice and body never went away. Modern listeners, even those accustomed to the voice type, still experience it when they see and hear a countertenor. But by the mid-1950s, it was only a “mild shock” rather than an insurmountable obstacle. The Manchester Guardian correspondent’s smugness comes from the fact that he and his countrymen knew how to listen to a countertenor, and the Germans did not. The English knew how to separate sound from source, and the “fluting notes” did not necessarily impugn the singer’s, or the music’s, masculinity. Their casual familiarity with the voice type did not occur overnight. It was a learned habit, a way of listening instilled through years of carefully curated exposure to Deller’s voice in concert, on record, and on the radio. Perhaps more than any other voice, form, or instrument, the countertenor, and by extension Alfred Deller was an essential component of the authentic performance of England’s musical past. To this day, early music is unimaginable without countertenors. It is the sound of the past, and marker of authenticity, even when countertenors sing music that was not necessarily written for them. So much so, that Richard Taruskin calls it “the very emblem of Early Music.”141 140 Our Special Correspondent, “Musical Congress at Oxford,” The Manchester Guardian, 4 July 1955. Richard Taruskin, Text and Act: Essays on Music and Performance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), 165. 141 155 However, authenticity is a fickle thing. Although there was relatively little published on the matter in the first years of Deller’s career, starting in the latter 1950s, some scholars sought to distance Purcell’s countertenors from what they perceived to be the unmanly taint of falsetto.142 Their arguments mirrored Victorian tirades against falsetto, though often in more oblique terms, and usually under auspices of historical authenticity. Contemporary scholarship quite convincingly argues that Purcell’s countertenors did not necessarily sing in falsetto due to a significantly lower performing pitch. They probably did not sound like Alfred Deller.143 Ironically, the weight of historical proof could not displace the falsetto-based countertenor’s preeminence. Historians today may argue at conferences or in print, but a singer today referring to themselves as a countertenor would have to stake a very strong claim, and face considerable professional hurdles, if they did not sing predominantly in falsetto. This makes Deller’s story all the more compelling. The desire to “recover” this lost voice from England’s musical past led to the creation of a new regime of hearing. Because one singer seemed to solve an intractable performance practice issue, England’s elite musical institutions re-educated English ears; to teach them to hear their past in Deller’s voice, and to insulate the masculine national character from the unsettling sound of falsetto singing. 142 See for example B. Forsyte Wright, “The Alto and Countertenor Voices,” The Musical Times 100, No. 1401 (November 1959): 593–594. 143 See Andrew Parrott, “Performing Purcell,” in The Purcell Companion, ed. Michael Burden (London: Amadeus Press, 1995), 385-444; Simon Ravens, The Supernatural Voice: A History of High Male Singing (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2014), 130-143; Olive Baldwin and Thelma Wilson, “Henry Purcell’s Countertenors and Tenors,” in Der Countertenor: die männliche Falsettstimme vom Mittlealter zur Gegenwart, ed. Corinna Herr and Arnold Jacobshagen (Mainz: Schott, 2012), 79-98. 156 CHAPTER 3 Klaus Nomi and the Dysintegrated Voice I think of it, in a way, like making pastries, desserts. …Uh, and I like to use certain good ingredients, and mix up these ingredients, and I form a new desert. And I top it with cream. I’m using many different elements, such as opera, and rock, and new wave, and disco, and whatever is available, and whatever is dear to me.1 In the fall of 1978, a flyer went up around New York’s East Village. It was a casting call for the New Wave Vaudeville, and it advertised for the following acts: Emotional Cripples, 4 Egyptian Slaves, Robot/Monsters, Glamour Girls, Cretins, Nazis, 1 Piano Player, Dada/Futurists, Strippers, Song, dance, Comedy, & Carnival Acts, B-Girl Hostesses, and Other Bizarre Talents (FIGURE 3.1).2 FIGURE 3.1: Casting Call for New Wave Vaudeville (1978) 1 “Klaus Nomi on NYC 10 O’Clock News,” YouTube Video, Filmed in New York City ca. 1981, 16 Feburary 2008, 1:27, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-hn9jraQKM. 2 The Nomi Song, directed by Andrew Horn (New York: Palm Pictures, 2005), DVD, 6:52. This documentary is one of the best sources dedicated to Klaus Nomi. Horn knew Nomi, and even worked with him on Charles Ludlam’s camp remake of Wagner’s Ring (1977). 157 In the late 1970s, the East Village was filled with a diverse assortment of young, experimentally-minded artists who had flocked—like generations of bohemians before them—to whichever corner of the city had the cheapest rent. Many people sensed something in the air, an inchoate groundswell of creativity. But there were few outlets for the emergent scene. Or, as one participant recollects, “Nothing was going on…It seemed like all these kids were hanging around waiting for something to happen.”3 The New Wave Vaudeville was the “something” they were all waiting for. A group of young artists devised the show, including Amos Poe, the punk film director; Tom Scully, a recent art school graduate; and David McDermott, a painter and all-around eccentric. Later, they brought on Ann Magnuson, a former theater student from West Virginia, to direct. Inspired by a book on Tony Pastor, the king of vaudeville, the group decided to revive the “vaudeville spirit of the old East Village.”4 One member of the cohort recalls, “We got a lot of strange responses [to the flyer]. Just about anyone could be in it, as long as their act was under five minutes.”5 They put their show on at the Irving Plaza, a defunct Polish veterans club at the corner of 15th Street and Irving Place. It was a squat, unimpressive building, but it appealed for a few reasons. Like East Village rent in those days, it was cheap. Also, it had become a hub of the punk scene under the unlikely aegis of the superintendent from the nearby Polish national church. He was an older gentleman who did not get the music, but he thought the punks were better behaved than anyone else in the area. 3 Steven Hager, Art After Midnight: The East Village Scene (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1986) 26. Hager presents an important first-hand account of the scene. Steven Hager is an Illinois-born journalist who moved to New York in the early 70s, where he became a prominent critic of the city’s countercultural scene. He wrote for the New York Daily News, with important pieces on countercultures for the Village Voice. He is particularly known as an early chronicler of the Bronx hip hop scene, as well as the club-centered artistic scene on the Lower East Side. 4 Hager, Art After Midnight, 26. 5 Hager, Art After Midnight, 26. 158 David McDermott served as the emcee and starred in the opening act. It was on an “Egyptian theme,” which the artist described as an explicit attempt to cash in on the Met Museum’s King Tut exhibit.6 Like most East Village scenesters, McDermott was a transplant with art school credentials. After finishing school, McDermott moved to SoHo and began posing as a wealthy art patron. Then he moved the East Side, where he developed a persona as a woman named Edith from the 1930s living in a tenement slum.7 He later progressed to an allencompassing Victorian fantasy, going about town in antique garb, furnishing his apartment with antiques, and spurning modern conveniences such as electricity. After making his way through the glam rock scene in the mid 1970’s, McDermott found his way to CBGB, the city’s original punk club.8 As I shall discuss at greater length below, clubs served as cultural anchors for the neighborhood, as well as an incubator for many artistic collaborations, which were in turn put on in clubs, or were themselves clubs. But back to the New Wave Vaudeville. At 8pm, the soundtrack from the film The Egyptian (1954) blared over the speakers. McDermott emerged, seated on an old sedan chair-turned-litter carried by four loin-clothed “slaves.” He was bedecked in full regalia, including scepters, tap shoes (despite a complete lack of dance training), and a mantle of chiclets (Figure 3.2). He warbled “King of the Nile,” a campsteeped tune written specially for the occasion.9 This was merely the first of over thirty acts to perform at the New Wave Vaudeville, and by no means the strangest. In addition to the “metro novelties” listed in the flyer, there was also a lounge singer, a dog that howled the blues, and a band that “played” on foam rubber guitars that popped out of attaché cases. 6 Hager, Art After Midnight, 22. Hager, Art After Midnight, 24. 8 CBGB was founded in 1973 in the east Village, and it only closed in 2006. See Tamar Brazis, ed., CBGB & OMFUG: Thirty Years from the Home of Underground Rock (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2005); and Roman Kozak, This Ain’t No Disco: The Story of CBGB (Boston: Faber and Faber, 1988). 9 Hoffman later performed with Klaus Nomi, and wrote his hit song “Total Eclipse.” McDermott, in keeping with his Victorian fantasy, refused to use electronic amplification for his number, despite the large, noisy crowd. 7 159 FIGURE 3.2: David McDermott rehearsing the opening number for the New Wave Vaudeville (1978) And then there was Klaus Nomi (Figure 3.3). It began with a flash and the sound of recorded thunder. A fog machine kicked into life. Classic Sci-fi sound effects ensued as Nomi emerged from backstage to a backdrop of pops, clicks, and electronic dissonance. He lurched into position like a space robot from the 1950’s B-movie; joints rigid, arms at right angles. He wore skin-tight pants, a black shirt, and a clear plastic cape. His dark hair was slicked back to accentuate a dramatic widow’s peak, and his eyes were set off with makeup that seemed halfway between kabuki and drag queen. 160 FIGURE 3.3: Klaus Nomi backstage at the New Wave Vaudeville (1978) If the show had stopped at that moment, right before he sang, and someone asked the audience what he was about to sing, they probably would have guessed something hokey about the tribulations of being a space alien, or chanting “Klaatu barada nikto” in a robotic monotone, but certainly not opera. Goof was the order of the evening, after all. But then the strings started pulsing, lush and romantic, and Nomi sang Delilah’s aria “mon cœur s'ouvre à ta voix” from Saint-Saën’s Samson and Delilah. It did not make sense: the voice, the body, the clothes, the gesture, the sound effects. Nothing fit, but it did so gloriously. 161 WHAT IS THAT? It almost does not matter when or where you first encountered Klaus Nomi. Whether it was last night on YouTube or somewhere in the East Village during the late 1970s and early 1980s, you remember it. Journalist Alan Platt describes his own first experience: I had no idea who he was. I remember I was on West Fourth Street and I suddenly saw this wacky little character, just among the crowd. And you know, you talk about stopping traffic and it was that kind of effect. And it was amazing, everybody just stopped and turned, and it was like “What the fuck is that?!” … People said “What is that?” not “Who is that?”10 This is the point in the chapter when the author normally suggests that they (and only they) possess the hermeneutic key that will unlock what it all really meant. There is no such key with Nomi, nor is there a single meaning. Everything about Nomi—his voice, his appearance, and his gestures—was marvelously strange, spectacularly de-centered. When one tries to decipher precisely what or who Klaus Nomi was, they come away with a bizarre set of seemingly disparate elements, a laundry list of awkwardly hyphenated adjectives. Here are a few of my favorites: …the hypnotic diva in full-on tuxedo-from-mars regalia11 Nomi's white pancake makeup, black bee-stung lips, alarmingly sculpted coiffure, and severely, albeit hilariously, geometric outfits suggested a constructivist Pierrot or a Weimar android or perhaps an imploded, one-person version of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.12 He would sing opera and pop songs in an unearthly, womanly falsetto while performing elaborate, proto-break-dancing robot maneuvers with his arms. And unlike many of the early ironists he performed with, he was so honest and sincere about it that everyone was left speechless.13 10 Andrew Horn, The Nomi Song (Palm Pictures, DVD 3110, 2005). Alison M. Gingeras, David Rimanelli, Matthew Higgs, Lynne Cooke, et al., "13 Critics and Curators Look at the Year in Art," Artforum International 43, No. 4 (Dec., 2004): 151152. 12 J. Hoberman, "A Wistful Celebration of an Era-Defining Diva: 'The Nomi Song,'" The Village Voice 50, No. 5, Feb 2-8 2005, C54. 13 John Hodgman, "Antony Finds His Voice," New York Times Magazine, 4 Sept 2005, 24. 11 162 Diva, alien, cartoon, Kabuki robot—all descriptors for a man whose trained countertenor was so Callas-like that naïve viewers often thought he was lipsynching. With painted Cabaret lips, Ed Grimley topknot, Star Trek garb, and herky-jerky arm gestures, Nomi synthesized Weimar cabaret, '60s pop (notably Lou Christie's "Lightning Strikes," the remake for which he's probably most remembered), '80s new wave rock, and classic German opera into a spooky, compelling, oh-so-gay mélange.14 Klaus Nomi's out-of-this-world look—an androgynous amalgam of intergalactic wanderer and dejected punk clown.15 Each description is right, after a fashion, but none of them are definitive. As I said, there is no hidden, underlying unity of style, technique, or reference with Klaus Nomi. The persona is fractal, a dysintegrated mélange. However, I argue that Klaus Nomi emerged from a sensibility that was both queer and postmodernist (terms I shall unpack shortly). Furthermore, I argue that Klaus Nomi’s radical indeterminacy—apparently frustrating journalists attempting to describe him—was the source of his broader appeal throughout his all-too-brief career. His act “works” on multiple levels in that it speaks to the distinct yet overlapping scenes Nomi inhabited and that I will explore in this chapter: the New York gay scene, the East Village club scene, and new wave pop. In the last chapter, I discussed the way in which the English musical establishment went to great lengths to naturalize Alfred Deller’s use of falsetto because of the way in which countertenors tied into a sense of historical English musical identity. They had a difficult time reintegrating falsetto into normative vocality, and then only in very specific circumstances, of course, such as the historically-informed performance of English music. As I have already argued, falsetto has been systematically excluded from all notions of normative vocality and expressions of masculine vocal subjectivity since the latter nineteenth century. The audile 14 15 Michele Kort, "Klaus and Effect," The Advocate 932, 15 Feb 2005, 56. Armand Limnander, "Alien Status," New York Times Magazine, Fall 2006, 96. 163 techniques that arose around Deller’s voice specifically, and the idea of the countertenor voice more generally, served to insulate the sound of falsetto from a potentially queer reading. Britons adopted a bifurcated listening practice. They learned to divorce the sound of the countertenor’s voice from his body, to attend to the vocal sound as a historical relic, all while attending to the normative masculinity of the singer. In short, Deller’s use of falsetto was un-queered through careful, repeated compartmentalization. In a way, the story I wish to tell about Klaus Nomi inverts the one I told about Alfred Deller. Like all labels, “countertenor” fits Klaus only imperfectly. But it sufficiently expresses the fact that he based his singing voice around a well-developed, classically-inflected falsetto. Where Deller’s identity as a performer and as a man were carefully circumscribed within the traditional mainstream, Klaus Nomi used falsetto to construct a performing persona that was clearly queer, camp-steeped, and self-consciously artificial. If, as Andrew Parker and Eve Kofkosky Sedgwick argue, identities are performed ‘iteratively, through complex citational practices,” then Nomi’s references are all over the map.16 His performing persona, which admittedly bled into his day-to-day self, refuses to be pinned down. Nomi sang both pop and opera, but he was not a cross-over artist. The notion of classical cross-over suggests an attempt at synthesis, best exemplified today by “popera” stars such as Jackie Evancho and Andrea Boccelli and groups like “Il Divo.” I do not evoke their names to discount their work or their fans, many of whom find tremendous pleasure and meaning in listening to such music. Instead, I wish to draw a distinction between the mode of engagement and the aesthetic priorities at play. “Popera,” love it or hate it, relies upon accessible fusion of 16 Andrew Parker and Eve Koskofsky Sedgwick, “Introduction: Performativity and Performance,” in Performativity and Performance (New York: Routledge, 1995), 2. 164 both pop and opera musical tropes.17 Nomi’s use of pop and opera is intentionally fractured. The expressive gestures and vocal style of one rubs up against the other, vying for hermeneutic priority. As I shall show below, Nomi used conventional ways of singing, looking, and moving, but he juxtaposed a dizzying array of conventions and references to create a bricolage performing identity. The term “bricolage” refers to something—such as a work, a belief set, or an identity—created from diverse, seemingly disparate elements. Bricolage reappears throughout cultural studies as an apt framing metaphor for postmodernist texts, works of art, and ways of thinking.18 If we try to understand Nomi’s persona as a work of art in the traditional sense, we are left baffled. In Nomi’s performance, the conventions and gestures lost their internal logic. In other words, there is no hidden unity or singular meaning. As artist Susanne K. Frantz writes, “If pastiche, re-contextualization, and the interweaving of high and low, past and present, are hallmarks of postmodernism, then Klaus Nomi was its poster boy.”19 While it is certainly a prevalent technique within postmodernist art, bricolage also serves as a potent metaphor for the way in which the Klaus Nomi character emerged around 1978. It is an assemblage of strange of objects—images, sounds, movements— 17 “Popera” has been used by decades in opera criticism, mostly as a derogatory term for (what the critics deem to be) overly commercialized, often pop-inflected opera. The phenomenon has received relatively little sustained scholarly attention. See Jennifer Rebecca Jenkins, “‘Who Will Buy?’: An Examination of Historical and Contemporary Practices of Operatic Patronage in Twentieth Century America,” (PhD diss., Northwestern University, 2003), esp. 346–382. 18 See Claude Levi-Strauss, The Savage Mind (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966), 17–35. Structural anthropologist Levi-Strauss uses the term to characterize the mythopoetic processes of indigenous populations, but it was adapted by later thinkers on post war culture, such as Jacques Derrida “Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences,” in Writing and Difference, translated by Alan Bass (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1978); Dick Hebdige, Subculture: the Meaning of Style (New York: Routledge, 1979), esp. 102–106; Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, trans. Robert Hurley, Mark Seem, and Helen R. Lane (London: Continuum, 2004), 7–8. 19 Susanne K. Franz, “Klaus Nomi: Astral Countertenor Voice of the New Wave,” in Postmodernism: Style and Subversion, 1970-1990, edited by Glenn Adamson, Jane Pavitt, and Paola Antonelli (London: V&A Publishing, 2011), 197. 165 found along the path of a strange and unique life. Likewise, the scenes I shall explore do not necessarily contain one another, but, at least in a few cases, they did overlap. Of course, postmodernism can be viewed through many interpretive prisms. Here, I wish to consider it in a more general sense, as a term to describe the aesthetic sensibility shared by many artists in the latter half of the twentieth century. But as the word’s prefix suggests, postmodernism must be understood relationally alongside modernism. Cultural theorist Andreas Huyssen writes: Modernization…had to be traversed. There was a vision of emerging on the other side. The modern was a world scale drama played out on the European and American stage, with mythic modern man as its hero and with modern art as a driving force.20 Modernists believed that history had a telos, that there was an end goal towards which culture progressed. The human subject was viewed as a monad; a stable, unified singularity capable of expressing unique thoughts and feelings. Consequently, modernist artistic culture centered on the author’s authentic genius and the work’s capacity to express a meaning. And to ensure that modernist art was not co-opted by the market or other ideological forces, modernist critics like Clement Greenberg and Theodor Adorno advocated for a radical separation of high art from mass consumer culture, which Huyssen aptly termed the “Great Divide.”21 Postmodernism cannot so much be defined as a style or a particular credo, though certain characteristic attitudes (such as irony, irreverence, and playfulness) and techniques (such as parody, pastiche, and bricolage) emerged. Rather, postmodernist thought can be characterized by a blanket distrust of master narratives and the principle of underlying unity.22 Or, another way to 20 Andreas Huyssen, After the Great Divide Modernism, Mass Culture, and Postmodernism (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986), 217. 21 Huyssen, After the Great Divide, viii–x. 22 In this respect, I treat postmodernity in the same way M. King Adkins does in New Wave: Image is Everything (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), esp. 11-13. 166 think of postmodernity would be as a reaction to modernism’s broken promises, when the hope for a gleaming utopia gave way to stagnant economies, seemingly endless war (cold and otherwise), and the looming threat of nuclear annihilation. What sort of art does one make in such an environment? Art critic and philosopher Arthur Danto characterizes it as an “age of pluralism” in which artists are: liberated from the burden of history, [and] were free to make art in whatever way they wished, for any purpose they wish, or for no purpose at all. That is the mark of contemporary art, and small wonder, in contrast with modernism, there is no such as contemporary style.23 The artist’s “liberation” from history should not be read as blanket ahistoricism. Rather it is a historically-embedded sensibility in which the artist self-consciously rejects the principles of stylistic unity, aesthetic hierarchy, and diachronic progression, resulting in a thoroughly “synthetic” art. “Synthetic” is a good word because it encapsulates both postmodernist artists’ tendency to combine and remake, but also their rejection of the “natural” as a governing principle. Like much art of the period, Klaus Nomi’s kaleidoscopic persona challenges traditional modes of interpretation. However, Fredric Jameson neatly characterizes this difficulty in his reading of artist Nam June Paik’s work.24 Paik became known for interspersing televisions, playing loops of images or short clips, amidst lush vegetation. A traditional viewer would probably feel bewildered by the crazy variety, or perhaps try to focus on a single screen. But, Jameson writes: The postmodernist viewer, however, is called upon to do the impossible, namely, to see all the screens at once, in their radical and random difference; such a viewer is asked to follow the evolutionary mutation of David Bowie in The Man Who Fell to Earth (who watches fifty-seven television screens simultaneously) and to rise somehow to a level at which the vivid perception of radical difference is in 23 24 Arthur Danto, After the End of Art (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), 15. Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (New York: Verso, 1992), 31. 167 and of itself a new mode of grasping what used to be called relationship: something for which the word collage is still only a very feeble name.25 So, too, with Nomi. Klaus Nomi was also queer. In the simplest sense, Klaus Nomi was a gay man, a part of the gay scene, and his performance art and its aesthetic sensibility draws heavily on various aspects of gay male culture. Nomi’s art was also queer in the critical sense. “Queer” or “to queer” implies a way of thinking, doing, and creating that looks sideways at the status quo. Queer theory emerges from, and addresses the concerns of, marginalized and oppressed groups, especially members of the LGBTQ+ community. “Queering” messes with, rearranges, and critiques the categories of mainstream (heteronormative) society, especially, but not exclusively, identity and time. As I shall show below, Klaus Nomi draws on queer culture, but he also queers notions of vocal identity and temporality. Within the context of my larger project—which explores how falsetto operates within the historically-contingent relationship between voice, body, and identity—I am interested in how Nomi’s voice and persona don’t fit, and how, along with other like-minded artists, this dysintegration disrupts the privileged link between the voice, body, and notions of authenticity. Admittedly, there is much more at play with Nomi than his voice. His mode of gesture, his appearance, and indeed every other component of his performance art deserves attention and deeper study. But his voice stands out, both in its beauty, and also the skill with which Nomi deploys to construct his performing self. Unlike Deller, Nomi’s falsetto is meant to ring false, its artifice raised to a central conceit. Finally, for all the exclamations of strangeness, it is easy to assume that Klaus Nomi was regarded as some kind of freak show. But this would be to critically misread the spirit in which 25 Jameson, Postmodernism, 31. 168 (most of) these statements were made. As I shall show, the Nomi character is a unique manifestation of a shared aesthetic sensibility. And even though he was greeted with exclamations of “Holy shit?!?!” and “What is that?!” by the audience when he took the stage at the New Wave Vaudeville, those outbursts were not necessarily motivated by disgust or contempt, as Žarko Cvejić suggests, nor should we interpret Nomi’s indeterminacy as a failed political strategy.26 Rather, in their voices at the New Wave Vaudeville, I hear the wide-eyed excitement of a child opening up a huge, unexpected present. Klaus Nomi was strange, to be sure, but his strangeness was welcome. His audience(s) got him, and this chapter is about why. OPERA QUEEN Klaus Nomi was born Klaus Sperber in 1944 in Bavaria. Raised by a single mother, he grew up listening to Elvis and Maria Callas, whom he later described as his “spiritual parents.”27 In the late 1960s, he moved to Berlin where he worked in the front of house of the Deutsche Oper Berlin. After hours, he would entertain his coworkers with his spot-on Maria Callas impression. He was also a fixture of the gay cabaret scene. In 1972, Sperber moved to New York, settled in the East Village and found work as a pastry chef at the World Trade Center. 26 Žarko Cvejić took just such an approach in his recent article "Do You Nomi?": Klaus Nomi and the Politics of (Non)identification." Women and Music: A Journal of Gender and Culture 13, no. 1 (2009): 66-75. Cvejić’s reading stems from a critical lack of understanding of the scene’s historically embedded aesthetic sensibility, only exacerbated by cherry-picking a few reviews from disparate sources (such as the British publication “Melody Maker”) and ignoring the local press. Though he aptly notes that “Nomi used neither his baritone nor his soprano voice more than the other, so it was not easy to tell which voice was a put-on and which was the "real" Nomi,” (7071) he ultimately argues that this universally inspired “disbelief, unease, and disgust” [72] and therefore that Nomi’s “refusal to identify with at least some of its [society’s] norms” constitutes a failed political strategy. Ultimately, his slip-shod, over-generalized reading ignores also the positive role Nomi’s art has played for precisely those who feel alienated from mainstream society. Likewise, the author’s regressive insistence on binary identification risks invalidating the experiences and identities of many gender-fluid and non-binary individuals. 27 “Klaus Nomi TF1 Report – French TV, 1981,” YouTube Video, 2 May 2008, 1:04, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1xKNmfxiE0. 169 In 1976, Sperber took a few voice lessons with voice coach Ira Siff, who later became known as Vera Galupe-Borszch, prima donna of the drag opera company La Gran Scena. Siff can nowadays be heard as a commentator for the Met Opera Broadcasts.28 Siff describes meeting Nomi, “I’d seen him [Nomi] around opera events in New York that only die-hard opera queens would go to.”29 Sperber did not have any pretensions of pop-stardom when he approached Siff for lessons. Although he always sang, Klaus did so mostly for his own enjoyment, or in the company of close friends. But he figured that he had a better than average voice, and that he might be able to make some extra money singing professionally. He had no career aspirations beyond a paid church job.30 Even though he knew about it, Siff did little to develop his student’s falsetto. Siff recalls: At that time, there was no interest in men singing in high voices; the countertenor revival hadn’t begun…So I advised him to concentrate on his tenor and forget the soprano, because no one would take him seriously. Fortunately, he didn’t listen to my advice!31 It is tempting to view Siff’s reluctance to train Nomi’s head voice as short-sighted. But at the time, there were almost no professional opportunities for male falsettists. Falsetto was not widely-accepted within classical male vocalism, even as late as the 1978. By the late 1970s, countertenors were a more established phenomenon in England and in certain parts of Europe, thanks in no small part to Alfred Deller and his successors Paul Esswood and James Bowman. But in the US, they were much rarer. A very few made a career, mostly in the sphere of early music and in Episcopal church choirs. 28 “Biography,” Ira Siff, last modified 2012, accessed 1 September 2017, http://www.irasiff.com/ira_siff/Biography.html. 29 Rupert Smith, “Klaus Nomi,” Attitude 1, No. 3 (July 1994). 30 Ira Siff, e-mail to author, 8 June 2017. 31 Smith, “Klaus Nomi.” 170 In many ways, Siff’s interest in opera, and in his own falsetto voice, mirrors Nomi’s trajectory. Siff was introduced to opera in high school by a friend, who brought over a recording of Joan Sutherland singing Lucia. Soon after, they go standing room tickets to see Sutherland and Richard Tucker at the Met. This was Sutherland’s debut season at the Met, and she was an exciting international star on the rise. Siff recalls, “I was blown away, and became and addict,” not only of Sutherland’s voice but of the art form as a whole.” Shortly after, Siff received Sutherland’s 2 LP set, “The Art of the Prima Donna.” He recalls: I knew nothing about singing opera, or foreign languages, etc. I was a visual arts student, headed to Cooper Union. But I found I could imitate Sutherland's high voice, and did so when I was alone in my parents' house. My opera house was their finished basement in Brooklyn.32 But despite his exceptional falsetto, Siff made his early singing career as a tenor. Tenor was a professionally viable voice type, one that could pay the bills. Flipping into falsetto was something one did at home, in the secluded safety of your parent’s basement, when one pretended to be Joan Sutherland, or perhaps maybe even with friends at the club. Klaus Nomi was a bit more public with his falsetto, but again he did it as a joke, to entertain his friends after work. No matter how good it was or how natural it felt, falsetto was just not something one did seriously. There had to be some sort of distance. One could venture into head voice, but it either had to be private (like Siff) or critically distanced through humor (like Nomi). Nomi and Siff’s fascination with the art form follows all the basic patterns of opera queendom—a subset of gay male diva worship— that Wayne Koestenbaum describes in his book, “The Queen’s Throat.” Paul Robinson offers this summary of the phenomenon: “Opera queen” denotes a particular kind of devotion to opera, one not only excessive but also involving a fetishization of opera. That is, the opera queen, like the erotic fetishist, is devoted not to opera in general — to opera as an artistic whole (what Wagner called ‘drama through music’) — but to specific aspects of 32 Ira Siff, e-mail to author, 8 June 2017. 171 opera. Above all, opera queens are voice fetishists, preoccupied almost exclusively with operatic singing, as opposed to such other aspects of opera as its musical organization, its dramatic logic, even its stagecraft or scenery. In their response to opera, they hone in on particular vocal moments — a single aria or even a single phrase — which are abstracted from the larger musical and dramatic context and listened to over and over.33 Although the opera queen is often painted as a solitary figure—a figure home alone, listening to the beloved voice, and mulling over that same phrase again and again—he is also part of a scene. I have used the term “scene” already, but it deserves a bit of explanation. The idea of “scene” escapes the binary logic of culture/subculture.34 “Scene” captures the messy fluidity of lived experience, including that of Klaus Nomi. The notion of “subculture” presumes that society at large shares a single set of values (culture) from which a subculture deviates. One belongs to one or the other. Scenes have their own values and sensibilities, but participants regularly “put on and take off the scene identity.”35 Scenes can be, but are not necessarily, bound to a single place and time. For example, the East Village club scene was, since it was closely bound to a single cluster of locations during the span of a few years. Scenes can also be translocal. These tend to spring up around certain types of music, such as opera, and scene members interact through the exchange of recordings and related literature, though they are not necessarily bound to a single locality. Opera queendom is clearly a translocal scene, an affective community characterized by a characteristic type of music and mode of fandom.36 33 Paul Robinson, “The Opera Queen: A Voice from the Closet,” Cambridge Opera Journal 6, No. 3 (November 1994): 285. For a critical history of the term “queen,” see Mark Thompson, “Children of Paradise: A Brief History of Queens,” in Gay Spirit: Myth and Meaning, ed. Mark Thompson (New York: St. Martin’s Press), 49–68. 34 Journalists began to characterize alternative and marginal ways of life as “scenes” during the 1940s. The media continues to be important in the recognition and management of scenes to this day. The notion of “scene” entered the scholarly discourse as an anti-essentialist alternative to the term “subculture” in the early 1990s Richard A. Peterson and Andy Bennett, “Introducing Music Scenes,” in Music Scenes: Local, Translocal, and Virtual, ed. Andy Bennett and Richard A. Peterson (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2004): 1-15., esp. 3. 35 Peterson and Bennett, “Introducing Music Scenes,” 3. 36 Peterson and Bennett, “Introducing Music Scenes,” 8-10. 172 Of course, not all gay men are opera fans, nor are all opera fans gay men. Indeed, there is a tradition of lesbian opera fandom.37 Nor are all opera goers necessarily queer. But opera queens shared a unique sonic sensibility, a way of attending to the voice, most often through the medium of the record. The record offers one a chance to commune with a beloved voice, reverently played and replayed. Koestenbaum writes: A voice is like a dress; playing a record is sonic drag. I’m not the voice’s source, but I absorb the voice through my ears, and because I play the record—an act of will—it seems I am masquerading as that voice.38 In many respects, Nomi and Joey Arias’s friendship grew out of a shared love for the singing voice, and followed similar patterns of fandom and enjoyment. The only major difference is that Arias’s diva was Billy Holiday. Arias describes their meeting in 1975: He was Klaus Sperber then, opera singer and pastry chef. …We started hanging out-drinking coffee and baking cookies, talking about music and art. I'd play jazz and rock records and he'd play opera. We were best friends.39 But Nomi breached one of the cardinal tenets of opera queendom. He went public, broadcasting his diva worship beyond the safe enclaves of like-minded fans, and even beyond the gay community. Rare among the numberless legions of lip synchers, guitar heroes, morning commute idols, and shower divas, Nomi was really good. In fact, all three were. Siff founded his drag opera company a few years later and brought his Sutherland impression, once relegated to his parents’ basement, to the public stage. Arias, after years of actively disliking drag, took up the art form at Andy Warhol’s suggestion and became the pre-eminent Billy Holiday impersonator. 37 See Terry Castle, The Apparitional Lesbian: Female Homosexuality and Modern Culture (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), esp. “In Praise of Brigitte Fassbaender” 200-238. 38 Wayne Koestenbaum, The Queen’s Throat: Opera, Homosexuality, and the Mystery of Desire (New York: Poseidon Press, 1993), 49. 39 L. D. Beghtol. “A Day in the Afterlife.” The Village Voice, 16 January 2008. 173 For Koestenbaum, sonic drag is a metaphor for the listening experience. But in his New Wave Vaudeville performance, Nomi masqueraded in a more literal sense. I argue that Nomi was not merely singing Saint-Saëns. He was singing Callas singing Saint-Saëns. If you put the two together—Nomi’s performance in 1978 alongside Callas’s 1961 studio recording of that same aria—the similarities are uncanny. Of course, there are some small differences, but he gets remarkably close. The timing is there, the slight delays and anticipations, the very sensuous act of pronouncing the words, savoring the toothsome feel of consonant melding into vowel. That, and the legato. For an opera singer, legato means more than just “smooth.” The term refers to the way in which a singer fills in the space in between notes to create an unbroken ribbon of sound. Legato can signify many things. In a general sense, it is a distinctive feature of operatic style. Legato is also unique: the stamp of an individual voice in a particular performance. In short, it is a mark of presence. Whose presence, then, was marked at the New Wave Vaudeville? It is entirely feasible to suppose that there were others in the audience that night familiar enough with Callas’s voice to get the reference. Many probably were not, though they almost certainly understood that they were hearing “opera.” But why is another question entirely. Klaus Nomi did not look remotely like Callas, or any woman, or even a human being for that matter. In an interview, many years after the fact, the photographer Anthony Scibelli describes how he was struck by Nomi’s “level of androgyny, not just the androgyny of sexuality, but the androgyny of whether you’re human or not!”40 On one level, Klaus Nomi stood out because he sang so beautifully, producing such a lovely sound from an unlikely body in an unlikely context. But, I argue, it was the dysintegration 40 Andrew Horn, The Nomi Song. 174 of body, voice, and identity that created the greatest impact. Prior to each performance, David McDermott would have to come out and reassure the audience that Klaus Nomi was actually singing, and that they were not watching a lip synching performance.41 The quality of his singing, the incongruous way his voice matched Callas’s, could have led many to believe that they were listening to a recording and watching a very strange lip synching performance. But had Nomi been lip synching, he probably would have been very well-received, though less a sensation than he proved to be. For members of the gay community, and those present familiar with gay performance culture, lip synching was an essential part of drag culture. McDermott’s announcement, then, also speaks to the fact that Nomi’s liveness was an unexpected subversion of drag convention, one Nomi set up the second the audience heard the orchestral introduction. Although I argue that Klaus Nomi was not a drag queen in the traditional sense, he drew heavily on the conventions of drag. Had he been lip synching, Nomi’s performance would be more legible as drag. Like all other art forms, drag conventions vary enormously depending on the contingencies of time and place.42 But 1978 New York, drag was predominantly a lip synching art. The post-war era was particularly hard on drag performance. During the 1960s, drag was technically illegal even in New York and San Francisco. Clubs began using canned rather than live musicians in response to increased expenses and a dwindling clientele. Lip synching emerged and quickly became the norm, to the chagrin of older female impersonators who viewed the practice as amateurish.43 Drag queens, during Nomi’s day at least, tended to assume female personae, often a pop culture diva drawn from the gay pantheon—such as 41 Kristian Hoffman notes this in an interview in Andrew Horn, The Nomi Song, 10:15. For an overview of drag history in the United States, see Laurence Senelick, The Changing Room: Sex, Drag and Theatre (New York: Routledge, 2000), 377–408; For a classic anthropological account of female impersonation that focuses on the period a few years before Nomi, see Esther Newton, Mother Camp: Female Impersonators in America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979). 43 Senelick, The Changing Room, 382–384. 42 175 Tellulah Bankhead, Elizabeth Taylor, or Judy Garland—and lip synch. “It’s a tribal thing,” John Epperson (“Lipsinka”) quips. “The Irish dance jigs, Native Americans do tribal dances, and gay men get in drag and lip synch.”44 But drag queens’ repertoire was not necessarily pop. It could even, rarely, encompass opera. John Kelly, a renowned drag queen, recalls his own operatic drag debut at the Anvil Club in the late 1970s: I lip-synched the “Habanera” from Carmen. There was a chorus of cigarette girls in the back. Frederick Nunley was one, along with two German guys. I knew I had “arrived” somewhere because one of the reigning queens of the Anvil, Ruby Rims, gave me a dollar tip. After that, Tanya and I would perform a lot of places. I started lip-synching opera and playing with the speeds of the recordings.45 However, even within the drag world, Kelly’s performance was out of the ordinary, though still well within the realm of comprehensibility.46 Leaving aside his appearance for the time being, Klaus Nomi’s appropriation of Maria Callas’s voice can be read as drag, or at least drawing on its conventions. In a way, Nomi’s singing hearkens back to a much earlier age of female impersonation, where producing rather than miming the voice was the norm. The operatic voice he used, at least in his debut performance, was undeniably read as female. Prior to the mainstream emergence of classical countertenors on the operatic stage, classical vocalism operated on a strict sonic gender binary. Paul Robinson writes: Operatic singing is uniquely gendered. That is, operatic vocalizing has the effect of exaggerating the difference between male and female sounds and thus provides us with a heightened sense of sexual dimorphism or gender dualism…. In a world where gender differences have been systematically questioned and in which the 44 “New Feminine Mystique,” New York Magazine 28, No. 28 (17 July 1995) 28–29. Nakas Kestutis and Brian Butternick, “We Started a Nightclub: Building the Pyramid,” PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art 37, No. 3 (2015): 36 46 The Pyramid Club became an important site in the emergence of a more politically oriented, avant garde form of drag. It was also important in launching the careers of Lipsinka, RuPaul, and Joey Arias. See Kestutis and Butternick, “We Started a Nightclub,” 22–45. 45 176 assertion of a categorical distinction between the sexes is the subject of heavy critical fire, opera represents a kind of atavism…in its radically gendered vocalism.47 The extreme artifice of the operatic voice lends itself to this sort of critique of gender identity, and Nomi’s performance can be interpreted as such. But even this interpretation falls short. I believe that he is simultaneously offering the listener multiple levels. There is the general notion of the gendered voice, the more specific level of the operatic voice, and the radically local level of Maria Callas’s voice. The voice both is his and it is not. In a sense, he possesses it. He owned and listened to Callas’s albums, and they were clearly dear. Likewise, he borrows the inflections and timbre of her voice. And yet he produces the voice physically: it is the sound of another’s body, reproduced bodily. Furthermore, in drawing upon drag conventions, Nomi sets up the expectation of lip synching, further distancing the voice you hear from the body you see. In effect, he queers a queer art form, rendering it strange and unfamiliar even to its practitioners by taking contemporary drag’s voice/body gap to a new extreme, somewhat ironically, by physically producing his voice. The very multivalence of his performance destabilizes the work of identification. And while this indeterminacy opens up room for critique, it also makes room for fun, which his performance clearly was. Vocal identity exists in the realm of the aesthetic—it is a matter of style and therefore contingent and mutable. His appearance only complicates matters. Aspects of his look suggest drag—such as the makeup and the nails—but not exclusively. The character could be male, it could be female, it could be androgynous, and it could be an alien or a robot. All are possible, but none are certain. Regardless, there was no way to fit the voice into the body. Had he sung that way and been dressed in stereotypically masculine garb, or even in traditional drag, it would have made more 47 Paul Robinson, “The Opera Queen: A Voice from the Closet,” 289. 177 sense since it would have relied upon the artful juxtaposition of opposites: male garb, female voice; or, male body, female persona. Rather, Klaus Nomi’s genderfuckery operates on a much subtler level: he juxtaposed a hyper-gendered, hyper-individualized voice with a radically indeterminate body.48 Ultimately, Callas’s voice is just one of many found objects—along with Mickey Mouse, a love of puppets, sci-fi magazines, Bauhaus design concepts, and American pop music—that he used to construct a bricolage identity. The incongruity between voice, body, and persona is the source of interest. Or, put another way, it is the disjunction of the various elements, rather than what the elements themselves mean, that creates the impact. EAST VILLAGE SCENE Klaus Nomi’s relation to gay culture helps to contextualize his attachment to operatic singing generally, and Callas’s voice particularly. However, in performance, his opera queendom is rather overshadowed by the overt strangeness of his persona. Unfortunately, we catch only fleeting glimpses of Klaus Nomi as he transitioned from quirky ex-pat opera fan to fully-fledged new wave alien diva. The Klaus Nomi character obviously could not exist without Klaus Sperber’s individual talents and life experiences. But neither could it have emerged without the broader context of the East Village scene. When he emerged on stage in 1978 at the New Wave Vaudeville, he did not subvert or shift any paradigm. Rather he fit marvelously within the emergent East Village art scene and its shared aesthetic sensibility. Particularly, his constructed 48 Bettina Schlüter, “Alien Voice Transformations: Klaus Nomi’s Appearance on the Scene of New York’s Subculture,” in New York, New York! ed. Sabine Sielke (Frankfurt: Peter Lang GmbH, Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften, 2015), 151. See also Žarko Cvejić. ""Do You Nomi?": Klaus Nomi and the Politics of (Non)identification," 70-71. 178 persona and unique mode of pop performance art were deeply rooted in the scene’s rich club culture. The East Village scene of the late 1970s and early 1980s exists in the art world’s collective memory as a pure yet fleeting burst of creativity that perfectly captured the spirit of the times before ending abruptly. In this way, the scene mirrors Nomi’s career both in its shocking originality and its tragic brevity. In a New York Times review of a 2004 retrospective exhibition, critic Roberta Smith writes: Like the SoHo of the 70's, the East Village of the 80's is one of the art world's Camelots. For the moment, at least, it represents the ''good 80's,'' the version of that moneyed, oversexed decade that it is all right to like. …The East Village scene had indigenous spontaneity on its side. It was a grass-roots phenomenon with home-grown young dealers operating out of grungy storefront galleries, a cast of larger-than-life personalities (not all of whom were artists), tons of performance-oriented talent untainted by the market, and more than its share of tragedy.49 As this passage illustrates, many, especially the city’s critics, regarded the scene with a nostalgic longing for some impossible aesthetic purity. Ironically, these same critics who drew attention to the East Village were the first to accuse artists of “selling-out” when they responded to the newfound demand for their work.50 Perhaps even more than the “grungy storefront galleries,” the New Wave Vaudeville stands out in the collective memory as an unadulterated collective enunciation of scene’s artistic identity. For Nomi in particular, it had that “star is born” quality, a story of native talent being “discovered” in its uncorrupted state. Nomi’s debut performance had all the elements that later came to characterize the scene’s charm, the DIY post-punk ethos, the irreverent treatment of mass culture, the goofy subversion of conventions, and the Warholian pop 49 Roberta Smith, "Looking Back at the Flurry on the Far Side," New York Times, 10 December 2004. In his account of Nomi, Hager rather cattily writes, “As his self-importance increased, Nomi began alienating many of his former friends. He dissolved his group and hired a professional band to back him. His first album was released in 1981, and it sold poorly.” Art After Midnight, 37. 50 179 art sensibility. But where for the critics, the “grunginess” of the storefronts served as a marker of post-industrial authenticity, whereas for the occupants of the scene, the dilapidation served as a precondition for its existence. As its neighbor SOHO did a decade or so earlier, the East Village gradually transitioned from an economically depressed, high-crime corner of the city to a tight-knit creative community. As with so many bohemian enclaves, cheap rent often convinced artists to move in. SOHO serves as a useful point of comparison and contrast. For example, during the nineteenth century, SOHO was a hub of the textile and lighting industry, gradually declining during the twentieth until it was known for its sweatshops.51 In the 1960s and 1970s, artists began moving into the large vacant industrial spaces and converting them into lofts. Once they opened galleries, amenities and the inexorable tread of gentrification continued until the artists themselves, all except for the most successful, were displaced. While the artistic zeitgeist might have moved a few blocks from SOHO in the 1970s to the East Village in the 1980s, there were some striking differences, cultural and physical, between the two. When an East Village scenester later opined (in retrospect) that there was “nothing going on” before the New Wave Vaudeville, they were only half correct.52 The East Village, though economically depressed, was no empty, post-industrial wasteland. The neighborhood had a long history of both experimental creativity and cultural diversity. It was a well-established first stop for immigrants, especially Polish and Ukranian, whose cultural institutions served as a base of operations for the later art scene. Likewise, there was already a diverse collection of creative 51 See Charles R. Simpson, SoHo: The Artist in the City (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981); Richard Kostelanetz, SoHo: The Rise and Fall of an Artists’ Colony (New York: Routledge, 2003). 52 Hager, Art After Midnight, 26. 180 types who made the neighborhood home, notably many Beat poets, including Allen Ginsburg.53 A collection of shops and galleries on East 10th Street served as the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. The neighborhood also housed The Umbra Workshop, an AfricanAmerican writers’ group that focused on civil rights and artistic experimentation.54 There was a great deal of art and a diverse culture, but there was relatively little that appealed to the group that came to define the neighborhood at the turn of the 1980s. There were few places to perform publicly, few places to create art, and few places to meet with like-minded individuals. Eventually, clubs filled all these needs. But this newer generation of East Villagers, many of whom were current or ex art school students, had a shared background that helps contextualize their approach to art and life. Most grew up in the middle-class suburbs. They were baby boomers, raised on television, beach movies, and bad Sci-fi flicks. They grew up on the promises of post-war prosperity, only to find them hollow in the wake of Vietnam and stagflation, which explains both their disenchantment with mainstream society and their ambivalent obsession with mass culture. Even within this group, Nomi stands out as different. He was older than most and came from post-war Germany rather than American suburbia. But his tastes were similar, and his persona—rooted in pop culture, artifice, and theatricality—found a receptive audience with this group. The physical spaces of the East Village also affected emergent scene’s artistic identity. Unlike SOHO, with its soaring, open lofts, the East Village consisted mostly of cramped tenements. Lofts served as important points of contact for the formal and informal exchange of 53 See Heather Pamela Green, “Space Invaders?: Artists in the East Village, 1977–1983,” (Phd diss., Stanford University, 2009), 7–21. 54 Green, “Space Invaders?” 17–19. 181 ideas, goods, and money within the SOHO scene.55 Galleries also emerged as important points of exchange, as they did later in the East Village, but clubs were arguably more important. In addition to their obvious recreational uses, clubs were central to East Village scene life. People met in clubs, collaborated in clubs, concocted new project in clubs, and very often, they put on their art in clubs. Again, low rent served as an important precondition. The area emerged as an important epicenter for the punk scene during the 1970s because of two clubs: Max’s Kansas City and CBGB OMFUG. As Hilly Kristal, founder of the latter club, explains: When there was a recession in the 1970s, it was really easy for them [different types of artists] to overlap because rents were really low…Always an overlapping of creativity, for many years. I think many artists are musicians and vice versa. I think many artists are musicians and vice versa. Patti Smith is both a musician and a poet. Ginsberg was always in here [CBGBs] performing. It’s a natural state and always has been.56 Of course, clubs were the bedrock of New York’s artistic scene well before East Village scene emerged. The club scene was fluid and ever-changing, with participants regularly frequenting multiple spots. Art centered in the clubs. People met in clubs, interacted in clubs, performed in clubs, and saw others perform in clubs. Marvin Taylor describes the artistic climate: Artists worked in multiple media, and collaborated, criticized, supported, and valued each other’s works in a way that was unprecedented…Rarely has there been such a condensed and diverse group of artists in one place at one time, all sharing many of the same assumptions about how to make art.57 Max’s Kansas City and CBGB & OMFUG served as important early oases in 1970s East Village, but they followed a more traditional club format, with bands performing a set of songs 55 Sharon Zukin, Loft Living: Culture and Capital in Urban Change (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1989), 113-117. 56 Quoted in Elizabeth M. Currid, “The ‘New’ New York Scene: Why Fashion, Art and Music Happen in New York City,” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2006), 148-149. 57 Marvin J. Taylor, ed., The Downtown Book: The New York Art Scene, 1974-1984 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004). Quoted in Lawrence, Life and Death, 4-5. 182 on stage for an audience. Although each was unique, later clubs ventured more into performance art, to varying degrees. The scene acquired its distinctive flavor in 1978 when the Mudd Club opened.58 Georgia native Steve Mass (b. 1942) made his way to New York in the late 1970s and burrowed into the city’s underground art scene.59 The Mudd Club became known for its innovative DJ culture and radical variety, but especially for its monthly immersive parties. Drawing aesthetic inspiration from Jack Smith and the Fluxus happenings of the 1960s, the party organizers—Mass and a cohort of art school graduates—deliberately challenged notions about commerce and art, all with a wacky, youthful irreverence that came to characterize the whole East Village scene.60 For example, there was the “Joan Crawford ‘Mommie’s Dearest’ Mother’s Day Celebration,” which featured a 1950’s kitchen installation and a large cake with a bound and gagged baby doll tied to a Styrofoam bed post.61 But the most famous was the “Rock ‘n’ Roll Funeral Ball Extravaganza.” There was a mock funeral procession for the dead rock stars Mama Cass, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Elvis Presley, and Sid Vicious, who were all ‘laid to rest’ in tableau vivant recreations of their death scenes: pseudo-Joplin had a syringe in her arm, and Mama Cass’s shrine featured the plate of ham sandwiches on which she supposedly choked to death. The music was intentionally diverse. New wave luminaries the B-52s and the Talking Heads appeared frequently, but Mass also hired Laurie Anderson, Judas Priest, and Mary Wells, the “Queen of Motown.” Andy Warhol and William Burroughs were regulars, in addition to the whole generation of artists that emerged from the club. As Tim Lawrence puts it, “it operated as both a scene unto itself and also a scene generator, or a place where it was possible to make 58 Lawrence, Life and Death on the New York Dance Floor, 12. Bernard Gendron, Between Montmartre and the Mudd Club: Popular Music and the Avant-Garde (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002); Simon Reynolds, Rip it Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978-1984 (New York: Penguin, 2006), esp. 266-267, and 278-279. 60 Jack Smith, the pioneering performance artist and filmmaker who pioneered a “wacky, beatnick, drag-queen esthetic that glorified B-movies.” Hager, Art After Midnight, 47-48. 61 Lawrence, Life and Death on the New York Dance Floor, 18 59 183 connections and begin collaborations.62 These parties, such as those I have described at the Mudd Club, serve as important articulations of the scene’s shared aesthetic sensibility, especially the irreverence, the delight and camp and kitsch, the references to pop culture. But they also should be considered as important artistic expressions in and of themselves. Not surprisingly, historians of this place and time tend to focus on stable, easily commodified aesthetic objects such as paintings or records, which can be displayed, critiqued, and purchased. Like Kristen Galvin, I prefer to see these parties as part of a unique performance art tradition that emerged within this scene.63 Writing in 1985, filmmaker and photographer Uzi Parnes captures the fleeting nature of these events when he details the pop performance scene: Call it Pop Performance, Dada Cabaret, New Vaudeville, entertaining Performance Art, or just plain Burlesque, it is a performance phenomenon that has taken root in the clubs of New York's East Village. Its style relates closely to performance art in the '70s, but differs in that the new performers in the East Village have rejected minimalism and a structural emphasis and have returned to a focus on content. Their work comments on popular culture through parody; it evolved from the Pop Art movement in the '60s. Fittingly, it was spawned in clubs like the Pyramid Cocktail Lounge, where entertainment is what the customers want. Yet, in spite of its entertainment value, Pop Performance is a self-conscious art form by a generation of artists nurtured on television and mass media.64 Klaus Nomi presents a similar challenge, for if we consider him purely on a visual or musical level, we miss the richly varied experience of his performance art. Pop performance varied depending on the artist and the venue. For example, John Sex (John McLaughlin) writes that Club 57 was the ‘Pop’ place, where you took from everything. It wasn’t like we were creating new characters or atmosphere. We were stealing from radio, TV, everything. The New 62 Lawrence, Life and Death on the New York Dance Floor, 22-23. Kristen Galvin, “The Art of Parties: Downtown New York Cultural Scenes, 1978-1983,” (PhD diss., University of California, Irvine, 2015). Galvin calls them “art-parties” which she frames as both forms of creative placemaking and queer worldmaking. 64 Uzi Parnes, "Pop Performance in East Village Clubs," The Drama Review: TDR 29, No. 1 (1985): 5 63 184 Wave scene was involved in digging up old trash, unique old garbage that people had thrown away, and redoing it.65 One important way in which this group’s postmodernist sensibility manifested was in their collective interest in constructed personae. In part, we can view it as an artistic pose, a work of ongoing performance art in which the socially-contingent nature of persona was continually highlighted. But there was also an underlying sense of unease, an escapist impulse born out of an understandable sense of nihilism. Carmel Johnson-Schmidt, an early regular at the Mudd Club who later owned an East Village boutique, offers a glimpse into that world: There seemed to be a definite fear of the future. People gave up on planning things. It was all for that moment, that night. …A lot of down drugs were being used—heroine, Quaaludes. You could wear the grubbiest thing, but you had to style it. There was a definite dislike of anything unstyled. The fifties were popular because they were cleaner, more defined. I think we were attracted to the geometric shape of the fifties clothes…By the summer of 1979, you created a character every time you went out.66 John Sex, who lived on the same block, describes his initial impression of Klaus Nomi: I’d seen London punks, but he was so much older and wore so much makeup. He was also into spikes and leather. I didn’t know how he had the nerve to walk down the street.67 Katy Kattelman, another baker by day, club animal by night, recalls: I met Klaus at an uptown disco…He was wearing a beret and a woman’s jacket from the forties. I’d never seen anyone quite like him. He was so shy and quiet. We both had two different lives, a straight day job and a real nutty night life. We started going to Max’s [Kansas City] and CBGB together.68 The looks changed: they ranged from punk leather, to 1940s women’s attire, to vinyl space tuxedos, but they were all donned in accordance with the scene’s shared fascination with intensely stylized personae. 65 Parnes, “Pop Performance in East Village Clubs,” 9. Hager, Art After Midnight, 51. 67 Hager, Art After Midnight, 69. 68 Hager, Art After Midnight, 2. 66 185 Following his breakout success at the New Wave Vaudeville, Klaus Nomi began to make a name for himself performing around club scene. He began in his own East Village haunts (Mudd Club, Danceteria, etc.), but he began to perform further afield as his fame grew, drawing ever-larger crowds. His aria, "Mon coeur s'ouvre à ta voix,” remained a calling card. Beyond his shows in clubs, he also appeared on TV Party (1978–1982), a public access cable show hosted by Glen O’Brien.69 And although it was not actually a club, TV Party can be viewed as an extension of the club scene. Born in 1947, O’Brien was a fixture of New York’s cultural underground from his very earliest days. After studying film at Columbia, he became a member of Andy Warhol’s Factory. From 1971–1974, he was the first editor of Interview magazine, and was later a prominent music critic covering the punk scene. Chris Stein, co-founder of the band Blondie, served as the show’s co-host, and punk film director Amos Poe operated the camera. O’Brien loosely based the show on Hugh Hefner’s Playboy After Dark (1969-1970), which like its earlier incarnation, Playboy’s Penthouse (1959-1960), offered the viewers access to a stylized Penthouse party, hosted by Hefner, with interviews and musical performances. Where Hefner offered everyday Americans a brief glimpse into a more glamorous universe populated by celebrities and playmates, TV Party offered New Yorkers an unvarnished glimpse of the apartment party they probably were not cool enough to be invited to. The opening of the first episode serves as a perfect case in point. The camera blurs into focus, alighting on three cheap empty chairs in front of an unremarkable backdrop. A blurry arm appears in the extreme foreground. We hear muttering and the arm’s owner tweaks the camera, 69 There are two documentaries dedicated to TV Party. Danny Vinik, TV Party, 2005, and a Vice TV documentary. Both films contain wonderful film clips from the roughly 20 surviving shows, plus interviews. Beyond that there is a dissertation Brad Stiffler, “TV Party, New Wave Theatre, and Subcultural Television in the 1970s and 1980s,” (PhD diss., University of Minnesota, 2016). 186 zooming in and out, as we hear voices off camera. A theme song begins and credits flash past, out of focus and at irregular intervals. We then seem a small gathering, every one with a drink in hand, and a few dancing awkwardly. These seem like real people, and the camera is merely your way to access this hip hang out. It does not seem to be a party such as one would see on TV, everyone well-spaced and elegantly quaffed, and that is intentional. Glenn O’Brien appears, dancing aimlessly with limp arms and a crooked bow tie. When the music ends, he raises the microphone to his lips (rather too close) and says, “Welcome to TV Party, the TV show that is a party, but which could be a political party.” Like the club scene, the interactions on TV Party were brief, fleeting, intense and disorienting. Drug use, often on-camera, was almost constant. At the peak of fame, audience members were welcome, unannounced, to hang out on camera if they could find the studio. The cameraman often delighted in disorienting the viewer, flipping back and forth between angles with seizure-inducing rapidity. The clumsily-mediated quality is apparent, even cultivated. And I think that the sense of playful artificiality is part of the appeal, just like the campy, DIY quality of much of the art of this period. When Klaus Nomi appeared on TV Party on January 8 1979, he joined an illustrious, still-growing list of artists—including Jean-Michel Basquiat, David Byrne, and Debbie Harry— who had appeared on the show. In addition to performing his now-famous aria, Klaus Nomi also made a lime tart live on air. It was a goofy post punk version of a late-night cooking show (Figure 3.4). 187 FIGURE 3.4: TV Party 8 January 1979 a. Klaus Nomi smirks knowingly at the camera b. Klaus Nomi explains his lime tart next to Glen O’Brien (right) Klaus then delivers the kind worn out intro-line that could only be read ironically by his audience, “Ok, everyone ready for something sweet? I am making something sour: it’s a lime tart.”70 Everyone is smiling with how campy the whole thing was. Klaus keeps glancing over at the camera with a smirk. But when he cooks, there is obvious care and skill. By modern “food 70 “Klaus Nomi Shows off his Pastries on TV Party (1979),” YouTube Video, 10 February 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCbvM63_TcU. 188 porn” standards, the desserts look a bit drab on-camera, but they are still clearly intricately made and probably delicious. This might seem like a trivial detail, but this brief vignette captures, in my view, the way Klaus Nomi made art, and how that art fit into the East Village sensibility. Everything was framed ironically and treated irreverently. But it was the patterns and forms of life that were mocked, not the desire to express, nor the skill. The pleasure, though, was real. TENSION AND POP VOCALITY Klaus Nomi’s career began to develop in earnest. Under the music direction of Kristian Hoffman, they developed the “Nomi Show,” turning his one-off act into a whole production. Klaus Nomi further developed his persona as a space alien from a more glamorous galaxy sent to sing earth pop. Painter Kenny Scharf and Joey Arias appeared in the early days as on stage as back-up dancers, at one point dressed up with blue-painted faces and enormous shoulder pads, all under a suffocating layer of plastic wrap. The Nomi family—as he called the back-up dancers— was an ever-changing lineup of friends drawn from the downtown club scene, included the artists Jean Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring, and apparently at one point, Madonna.71 The Nomi Show developed a distinctive musical repertoire comprised of a few key elements. First, there were the classical numbers. The Saint-Saëns aria remained a calling card. But there were also Purcell arias, such as the “Cold Song” from King Arthur and “Dido’s Lament.” Like the Saint-Saëns, Nomi sang them, as written, with classical technique. But unlike the Saint-Saëns, which he always did with a pre-recorded orchestra, other classical pieces were performed in a synthesizer arrangement. Then there were the covers, which spanned a wide 71 Rupert Smith, “Klaus Nomi,” Attitude 1, No. 3 (July 1994). 189 gamut from Chubby Checker to Lou Christie. Finally, there were the original songs, all by Kristian Hoffmann, such as “The Nomi Song” and “Total Eclipse.” In every instance, the songs were chosen to highlight the distinction between the various registers of his voice. There is no attempt, except in the operatic selections, to blend between the registers. I am not suggesting that he could not blend them, but rather that he did not intentionally. Rather like the synthesizer stars who came to define New Wave, Nomi’s act hinged on a sense of artificiality. Of course, he produced his voice through technique rather than technological supplementation. But although they were produced by a body, the voices Nomi used were not meant to suggest a single cohesive vocal subject. In so doing, he highlights the constructed, performative quality of his persona, rather than investing it with a sense of authenticity. The voice-centricity of Nomi’s act is by no means unique. Much of the appeal of popular music lies in the fans’ attraction to vocal timbre. Many call this the “grain of the voice,” after Barthes.72 It is the sound of the body, the impression of material presence. In this context, I argue that grain does not exist in a vacuum. Rather, grain is relational. Grain emerges in the listening. As such it is highly individual, as well as genre specific. What might suggest grain to one might not to another, just as certain expressive gestures might imply an emotionally resonant vocal presence in one stylistic context, and not in another. This is what Mitchell Morris writes about when he hears that combination of melancholy and girl-next-door wholesomeness in Karen Carpenter’s velvety voice,73 or what Wayne Koestenbaum means when he recounts his sensual 72 Roland Barthes, “The Grain of the Voice,” in Image-Music-Text, Trans. Stephen Heath (New York: Hill and Wang, 1978), 179-189. 73 Mitchell Morris, The Persistence of Sentiment: Display and Feeling in Popular Music of the 1970s (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013), esp. Ch. 5. 190 delight in the diva’s high notes.74 Put another way, it is not the words—or at least not only the words—but rather the individual engagement between the fan and the sound of the voice. The song “Lightning Strikes” serves as a good example of how Nomi used registral disjunction (Table 3.1). Consider Lou Christie’s original version. It follows a standard formula. Very close miking foregrounds Lou Christie’s voice, creating that intensely mediated yet strangely naturalized sound that puts the voice under a magnifying glass. The verse begins in a husky, quasi-spoken manner in Christie’s middle of the register. In the bridge, it gradually becomes more lyrical. The tessitura climbs on the words “I can’t stop, I can’t stop,” and there is a crescendo as he moves towards the chorus. Finally, when the chorus begins, Christie breaks into a wailing pop falsetto reminiscent of the Beach Boys. Nomi begins just as speech-like, but his version it utterly unlike Christie’s husky pillow talk. Rather than trying to hide it, Nomi highlights his German accent with ultra-crisp diction, ruthlessly clipping his words and lengthening his sibilants. During the more lyrical section on “When a boy loves a girl,” Nomi maintains the same level of precision in a tenor range, eschewing the teenage angst-ridden little sobs and whines Christie employs. Nomi seems presentational rather than confessional. And finally, in the chorus he breaks into an operatic falsetto. In Christie’s version, the movement from verse to chorus builds in emotional intensity, and his switch into falsetto suggests a voice pushed to emotional extremes. In Nomi’s version, it sounds like he alternates between three utterly distinct vocal pre-sets. Christie’s delivery falls well within the dominant mode of pop and rock singing. To generalize, pop singing relies on emotional authenticity, conveyed by the impression of natural expression and individuality. We can root it historically in the blues tradition, running from the 74 Koestenbaum, The Queen’s Throat, 42. 191 tight-throated Robert Johnson, through Elvis, to the lead rock vocalists of the 1960s and 1970s such as Mick Jagger and Robert Plant.75 Jacob Smith uses the term “rasp” to describe this pervasive mode of vocalism. “Rasp,” he argues, originally signified the materiality of an African American body, and later (once the white artists adopted the technique), it came to imply “the revelation of inner truth or cathartic release.”76 While I agree that rasp is an apt term to describe a particular subset of pop vocalism, it falls short when we move beyond the narrow confines of that genre. TABLE 3.1: “Lightning Strikes” lyrics, verse 1. [4-bar INTRO] (Verse) Listen to me, baby, you gotta understand You're old enough to know the makings of a man Listen to me, baby, it's hard to settle down Am I asking too much for you to stick around Quasi-spoken Every boy wants a girl He can trust to the very end Baby, that's you Won't you wait but 'til then More lyrical (Bridge) When I see lips beggin' to be kissed I can't stop I can't stop myself Building intensity, rising tessitura (Chorus) Lightning is striking again Lightning is striking again Falsetto 75 Richard Middleton, “Rock Singing,” In The Cambridge Companion to Singing, edited by John Potter (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 30-31. 76 Jacob Smith, Vocal Tracks: Performance and Sound Media (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008), 115164, esp. 162 192 As I have already shown at length, male falsetto was largely excluded from operatic male vocality around the year 1980. However, pop music’s relationship with male falsetto is much more ambivalent. As I have already discussed, crooners enjoyed tremendous popularity singing high, and often in falsetto, though to the consternation of many who saw the vocal practice as effeminate.77 Later solo artists, such as Marvin Gaye, and groups like the Beach Boys and the Bee-Gees, made heavy use of falsetto and were celebrated for it. Simon Frith argues that the sound of pop falsetto is typically limited to the specific expressive realm of seduction and intimacy.78 Firth writes that for: Soul-inflected singers in particular…a high voice means not effeminacy (man as woman) but a ladies’ man, and we now take it for granted that a male voice will move up a pitch to register more intense feeling, [and] that the more strained the note, the more sincere the singer.79 This notion of strain deserves further development because it speaks to the differing sounds and expressive conventions surrounding falsetto, especially in pop contexts. I suggest that we think of the voice in terms of “tension.” Tension refers to the way the voice is produced, the sonic traces of bodily labor, and the way in which the singer strains against the confines of their voice. I contend that rasp only contends tension in genres where it is read as grain. With tension, there is exertion, or at least the impression of it, and an exciting physicality that conveys immediacy and suggests presence through bodily resistance. Tension comes into play especially when a singer goes into a higher register. And like grain, tension can be implied by certain genre-specific gestures and timbres. 77 Allison McCracken, Real Men Don’t Sing: Crooning in American Culture (Durham: Duke University Press, 2015). 78 Simon Frith, Performing Rites: On the Value of Popular Music (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996), 195. 79 Firth, Performing Rites, 195. 193 In contrast with classical falsetto—which is often heard as ethereal or disembodied—I believe that tension is an essential feature of pop falsetto. Listening to someone like Marvin Gaye, there is no question that the singer is a man, so the erotic charge does not necessarily come from any sort of vocal androgyny. Many of the most famous soul ballads sit in the treacherous gap between the chest and head voice. It is the place where, if one is singing, you start to feel your throat tighten and you need to either push or make some physical adjustment to make a higher note emerge. In pop, it engenders that lump-in-the-throat feeling that you get when you are trying to express yourself but almost lose control. Classical singers call this area the passaggio, and it is where, since the late nineteenth century, singers have learned a depressed larynx technique to negotiate the break and carry the chest voice up. Where classical singing uses a technique to overcome the break, pop singing uses the break as a site of expressive tension in and of itself. The higher notes for the pop singer are then an act of will, a physical push past the break out of some emotional imperative. And so, when the singer pushes the chest voice higher, the strain evident in their voice. Tension does not necessarily imply rasp. I suggest that much of the appeal of latenineteenth century opera comes from tension, especially from tenors. I do not mean bad technique, but rather the impression of physical intensity. Those high notes do not just flow out. They take work, and their expressivity stems from the impression of super-human effort. It is no surprise, then, that the impression of vocal tension has become such a stock gesture across generic boundaries. Expectations of timbre and style vary radically between genres, and in pop especially, between individual singers. But tension, as an expressive device, is an essential part of the appeal of vocal music. 194 But how does the voice make us feel? As I argue throughout this dissertation, bodies are historically and culturally contingent. The sensory data might exist a priori, but the way in which we parse it and assign meaning is enculturated. Western vocal music draws upon these ways of having a body—the quotidian vocal gestures and speech patterns—and presents them to the listener in a highly stylized way. In a general sense, it is analogous to the sympathetic little kicks and punches we feel ourselves performing when we watch a fight scene, or the way we feel ourselves throw or catch a ball when we watch the game. We personally might not be able to perform a flying roundhouse kick while jumping over a car, or throw a football fifty yards with perfect aim, or lift three times our bodyweight above our heads, but the motions are close enough to our everyday patterns of movement that we understand and create meaning from them. In her wonderful essay on “carnal musicology,” Elisabeth Le Guin explores Boccherini’s oeuvre through “cello and bow thinking,” which offers a hermeneutic framework grounded in the lived experience of the performing musical body.80 She describes the act of perusing a score as one of “anticipatory kinesthesia,” where one imagines the actions that are about to take.81 Listening differs from playing or singing only in the sequence of events. Riffing on Le Guin, we can think of listening as a form of “reactive kinesthesia.” Instead of imagining what our body will or might do, such as when a cellist looks over a score, one imagines what another did and what it might feel like in our own bodies. Wayne Koestenbaum offers an elegant account of the intensely embodied experience of listening to a voice: A Singer’s voice sets up vibrations and resonances in the listener’s body … Straight socialization makes queer people discard their bodies; listening restores queer embodiment, if only for the duration of a phrase. Forceful displays of 80 Elisabeth Le Guin, Boccherini’s Body: An Essay in Carnal Musicology (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005), esp. 14-37 81 Le Guin, Boccherini’s Body, 18. 195 singing insist that the diva has a body and so do you because your heartbeat shifts in uncanny affinity with her ascent.82 Koestenbaum suggests the fundamental ambivalence of the listening experience. First, whether we call it “reactive kinesthesia” or an “uncanny affinity,” listening involves an intensely embodied response that goes well beyond parsing sonic structures for a hidden meaning. Listening is (or can be) sensual, not just intellectual. But furthermore, Koestenbaum points to the specificity of listening praxis. One’s engagement with sound depends on enculturated responses and on personal experience. Koestenbaum finds affirmation and the space for a (pre-Stonewall) queer embodiment in his experience of the diva’s voice. And, while I argue that the idea of tension offers us a useful hermeneutic tool when thinking about voices across generic boundaries, the perception of tension relies on a certain level of insularity. In other words, a musical gesture has expressive weight when heard within a cohesive stylistic context. Both the gruff strain of Kurt Cobain’s voice and the soaring heroism of Jonas Kaufmann’s suggest masculine emotional outpour to their fans, but the musical means each uses would not make sense in the other’s context. Imagine a fan’s reaction if they had heard a clarion high C emerge from Cobain’s lips, or if Kaufmann suddenly adopted the rocker’s raspy strain. Such an event would strike the listener as odd, concerning, or at least incongruous. Though it is a bit absurd to contemplate, this hypothetical moment of borrowing illustrates the way in which Nomi rapidly juxtaposed vocal styles and gestures to eliminate any sense of tension or any intelligible vocal subject. Nomi’s voice lacks tension for a few reasons. First, he juxtaposes registers and styles, so the gestures he employs lose a sense of stylistic coherence. Likewise, he also makes no effort to blend his registers. Rather it sounds as if he has multiple voices at his disposal, creating a sense 82 Koestenbaum, The Queen’s Throat, 42. 196 of distance between the enunciating body and the text. When I use the term “blend,” I use it to describe various conventional ways of moving between the various registers. This method is much more standardized in classical vocalism, but it is no less important to pop singing. For example, a classical countertenor typically tries to create a smooth transition from one register to the other so that the listener cannot perceive a switch, unless it is intended to be heard for special effect. This is in keeping with the aesthetic of vocal homogeneity across the entire range of the voice that permeates classical singing. In contrast, pop music often exploits “the break” as an emotionally expressive site, where the physical tension of the singer’s throat conveys the emotional intensity of the song. However, both styles rely on consistency for effect. Although Klaus clearly produces his voice, his range of vocalisms, combined with his comportment and appearance, shatter the illusion of a naturally cohesive, authentic persona. Of course, pop personas are constructed, just as the vocal gestures most artists employ to convey emotional immediacy are rehearsed and fine-tuned to create a specific effect. But however selfaware we might be, we buy into the fiction when we listen. What Nomi, and many like-minded contemporaries, did was to self-consciously point out the cracks in the façade. In fact, Nomi was just one of several artists who problematized the cohesiveness of their performing persona by emphasizing a voice body disjunction. Although there are certainly many others, Laurie Anderson serves as an apt point of comparison. She was also active in the downtown scene, though her performances tended to take place in galleries rather than in clubs. “O Superman,” Anderson’s 1981 surprise pop hit, serves to illustrate a similar sense of disjunction between voice and body. In both Anderson’s and Nomi’s performance, every physical gesture, facial expression, seems carefully-calculated to disrupt the impression of a natural cohesion. Both achieve a sort of visual androgyny, though through different means. Anderson has 197 short hair and often dresses in male clothing juxtaposed with lipstick and eyeliner, albeit very subtle makeup for the early ‘80s. Whereas Nomi creates a sense of disjunction by vacillating between vocal registers and timbres, Anderson achieves an analogous effect through her use of a vocoder. In her music video, there is a clear play between using the voice as an instrument, with her pulsing vocalizations in her “natural” timbre, and then her clearly altered, digitized voice. When she begins “singing,” Anderson looks directly into the camera (Figure 3.5). In fact, both Nomi and Anderson employ similar wide-eyed deer in the headlights stares. Both use stiff gestures, often creating stark angles with the joints. Anderson’s lyrics likewise refuse a sense of individual expression. They seem drawn from the stock phrases of a phone conversation, such as: “Hi. I'm not home right now. But if you want to leave a message, just start talking at the sound of the tone.” There are of course many possible meanings to this song: subtle references to the Tao De Ching, the Iran-contra affair, and, as Susan McClary suggests, possibly more than one Massenet opera.83 Whatever their meaning might be, in performance the words do not express the thoughts and feelings of an individual consciousness, but rather seem to be a strange assemblage of words and gestures that happen to take the form of a pop song. Both Nomi and Anderson use their voice, appearance, and gestures to present intentionally fractured, artificial performing identities. I am not suggesting that one influenced the other, but rather that they both share an approach, and that they relied particularly on the disjunction of voice and body in their art. And this sensibility extended well beyond the East Village art scene at the turn of the ’80s. It was shared by a wide range of groups active at the time who are loosely categorized under the term “New Wave.” 83 McClary, Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, & Sexuality (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1991), 132–147. 198 FIGURE 3.5: Laurie Anderson and Klaus Nomi’s “deer-in-the-headlights” blank stare 199 NEW WAVE Today, the term “New Wave” refers to pop around the turn of ‘80s. It is a synth-drenched sound world populated by bands like Devo, the Talking Heads, and the B-52s. Despite the aesthetic differences, New Wave is intimately linked to punk. In fact, the term “New Wave” was coined in 1976 by the manager of the Sex Pistols, Malcolm McLaren, in reference to the band’s style. He later settled on “punk” because it sounded more aggressive.84 Journalists such as Caroline Coon began using the term “New Wave” to describe the bands developing alongside punk bands, moving in the same circles and drawing on the same energy, but who sported a different sound and a different look.85 Both punk and New Wave can be viewed as reactions against mainstream rock’s perceived pretensions of authenticity and artistry. But there were marked differences between the two. Both punk and New Wave agreed that rock authenticity was a myth, and that rock’s expressive gestures were calculated rather than spontaneous. Their reactions differed, however. Punk bellowed for anarchy. New wave played dress up. Or, as M. King Adkins puts it, The argument new wave made was simple: if image always wins in the end, celebrate the image without any pretense to meaning. Privilege the ‘signs’ of the culture - the clothes, the cars, the house - let those signs play amongst themselves, and to hell with what they might mean.86 Although many New Wave artists can be said to have shared a style, more importantly, they all shared a certain sensibility. With this in mind, I think of the synthesizer both as a defining feature of the New Wave sound world and as an overarching metaphor for New 84 For McClaren’s use of the term, see Craig Bromberg, The Wicked Ways of Malcolm McLaren (New York: Harper & Row, 1989), 65; John Savage, England’s Dreaming: Anarchy, Sex Pistols, Punk Rock, and Beyond (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992), 159. For the early usages of the term “new wave,” see Gendron, Between Montmartre and the Mudd Club, 271-72. 85 Quoted in Adkins, New Wave: Image is Everything, 8. 86 Adkins. New Wave: Image is Everything, 25. 200 Wave’s—and specifically Klaus Nomi’s—fascination with surfaces, signs, and artificiality. I am not saying that using a synthesizer makes a group New Wave. Rather, New Wave artists’ exploration of constructed personae and artificiality drew many artists to the synthesizer. It is, I argue, the same approach that led Klaus Nomi and Laurie Anderson to denaturalize their voices. Compare the synthesizer to the classic image of the lead guitar. The guitar was a central expressive tool in a musical culture where passionate skill and energetic effort equaled bodily authenticity, much in the same way vocal rasp or tension suggested emotional immediacy and presence. The lead guitar was the not-so-subtly-phallic instrument of masculine virtuosic display.87 In stark contrast, there is synthesizer. New Wavers were not the first to use the synthesizer, but they were unique in their approach to it. Many synth players and synth-centered groups (like Tubeway Army, Devo, and Soft Cell) opted for simple, repetitive melodies that could often be played with one or two fingers, blank faces, and robotic poses that, Theo Cateforis argues, “stressed the mechanized work of the synthesizer’s machinery rather than the transcendent work of the virtuosic musician.”88 Synth group did this in a few ways. First was avoiding basic expressive musical gestures that were common in rock keyboardists in the 1970s, like vibrato and pitch bending. Second was a preference for sounds that were obviously electronic rather than “natural.” Synthesizers appealed to New Wavers particularly because they were synthetic. Take for example the ARP Omni synthesizers as a case in point. When they were released, ARP touted their supposedly natural, symphonic qualities (Figure 3.6). However, in a 87 Theodore Cateforis, Are We Not New Wave?: Modern Pop at the Turn of the 1980s (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2011), 152-53. 88 Cateforis, Are We Not New Wave?, 153. 201 1980 profile for Contemporary Keyboard, one New Wave synth player explicitly praised it for its artificial string qualities.”89 FIGURE 3.6: 1980 advertisement for ARP Omni Keyboard Beyond the instruments themselves, many New Wave artists were interested in exploring the constructed nature of persona. Some groups, such as Devo, explored quasi-robotic personae, or adopted gestures and costumes that intentionally de-individualized the members of the band. Adam Ant, under the tutelage of former tutelage of former Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren, adopted a whole host of interchangeable personas—such as a pirate, an English dandy, and a native American. Adam Ant never truly inhabited the characters, but instead offered the audience many overlapping images separated from their underlying meaning. Similarly, in many 89 Cateforis, Are We Not New Wave?, 161-62. 202 of his pre-1980 shows, Klaus Nomi would perform with copies of himself. He would dance with a small person dressed up in his characteristic tuxedo, hair, and makeup; who in turn carried around and danced with a little Nomi doll. Copies of copies of a bricolage original. Voice, gesture, garb, instrumental virtuosity: all are traditional sites of meaning-making that in pop contexts suggest individuality, presence, and expressivity. New Wave artists explored all these facets in a highly self-reflexive manner, but they were neither the first nor the only popular sub-genre to explore artificiality and persona. Glam, and especially David Bowie, is an important precursor of both punk and New Wave. In fact, most New Wave groups had roots in either punk or glam. Many glam musicians—like Gary Glitter, Marc Bolan, and Alice Cooper— presented obviously constructed personae. But no matter how fake they seemed, most presented a single, coherent character. And because of the consistently, it was easier to imagine that that persona might somehow express the performer’s authentic self.90 In contrast, Bowie refused to inhabit a single character, and subsequently he often came under criticism from those “invested in rock’s ideology of authenticity” in a way most of his fellow glammers did not.91 Beyond this shared approach, there is a much more direct link between Bowie and Nomi. Following a 1979 performance of the Nomi family at the Mudd Club, Nomi spotted David Bowie in the audience. Nomi was a big fan, so he made his way over and got past Bowie’s security staff. They got to talking, and Bowie invited Nomi and Joey Arias to be backup singers for an upcoming appearance on Saturday Night Live. The SNL appearance led to a record deal with RCA. Although a big break, it was a mixed blessing. The record executives insisted that 90 Philip Auslander, Performing Glam Rock: Gender and Theatricality in Pop (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2006), 112. 91 Auslander, Performing Glam Rock, 112. 203 Nomi replace his ad hoc backup group with battle-tested session musicians, which he—to the chagrin of many friends—did without hesitation. CAMP AND QUEER WORLD-MAKING Shortly after signing, Nomi recorded his first, eponymous record. And after a quick tour, he came back to record his second album. Meanwhile, Nomi became particularly popular in Europe, so RCA spent a lot of money publicizing his tour of France and Germany. He did many interviews and performances, a few of which offer tantalizing insight into the Nomi character. Like many performers, Nomi is coy about issues of influence and origin, especially his name and image. But when it came to his theatricality and the boundary between fantasy and reality, he always spoke candidly. Here is a brief excerpt from a 1982 interview on French television: Interviewer: Why this clown-like, cold make-up? Klaus: I don't think it's clown-like, I don't think it's cold. It's very theatrical, very intense. It's an unnatural make-up, made for the stage. It's like a doll or a cartoon. You see it once and never forget it. Interviewer: Why are you hiding behind this make-up? Klaus : I'm not really hiding, I'm showing out, because the way I am, it's hard to look like a normal person. You know, in the streets, when I was a kid, people always said I looked strange, and it made me feel very unhappy. And all of a sudden I go on stage, and people like me for that; but as soon as I'm outside, I feel like I have to hide, because people laugh at me, because of the way I look. Now I'm using this look, it works for me, I even exaggerate it. I used to hide my large forehead, but now I'm selling it. Interviewer : How do you… work your voice? Klaus : I think I do have my own technique, because I've been disappointed by teachers, maybe because I didn't meet the good one. I don't like to depend on 204 teachers anyway. So, I'm walking on my own way, and I try to be as natural as I can. I think it's the only way to be yourself.92 For Nomi, the term “showing out” is most likely the unidiomatic usage of a non-native speaker rather than a declaration of queer identity.93 However, it is impossible to miss his references— thinly veiled as an allusion to his appearance—to the sense exclusion he experienced throughout his life. He frames his on-stage persona as a survival strategy, or at least a way to find acceptance. No one would deny the strong vein of camp running through Nomi’s output. Indeed, camp permeates much of New Wave pop, particularly the B-52s.94 His theatricality, artifice, and visual and musical references seem at times like an homage to Sontag and Isherwood’s canonical lists of camp tropes, from opera to Marlene Dietrich.95 As for camp distinctions, like Isherwood’s “high” and “low,” or Sontag’s “deliberate” and “naïve,” it seems clear that Nomi’s campiness was intentional and highly self-aware. But while he makes use of certain tropes that are legible as camp, I believe that it is more important to trace his attitude towards camp, and the productive tension between artifice and authenticity that permeates camp generally and Nomi’s work specifically. Like any sensibility, camp is hard to define. It has its roots in gay male subculture and is often characterized with words such as “artifice” and “theatricality,” words also used to describe Klaus Nomi. But not everything theatrical or artificial is camp, just as a tiffany lamp or a Bellini opera is not necessarily camp. Indeed, this rigid distinction between what is and what is not camp 92 “Klaus Nomi 1982 Interview,” YouTube Video, 3 May 2008, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ4__PGjFQI. Klaus Nomi did not speak French well, so his interviews (such as the one above) were usually in English, except in Germany, where he spoke his native language. 94 Cateforis, Are We Not New Wave?, 95–122. 95 The bibliography for camp is extensive. Rather than reproducing it here, I suggest Fabio Cleto, Camp: Queer Aesthetics and the Performing Subject (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), 1-51. Cleto’s introduction offers a tremendous summary of the discourse, the most important excerpts of which are reproduced later in the book. 93 205 remains one of the most consistent critiques of Susan Sontag’s famous 1964 essay, “Notes on Camp.”96 Playwright, director, and actor Charles Ludlam—with whom Klaus Nomi briefly collaborated in 1977—sees camp as a mode of perception that arose among oppressed gay men: Camp had a homosexual usage that came from a special view of things. Proust explains it very clearly. In the C. K. Scott-Moncrieff translation, Remembrance of Things Past, there’s a long section where Proust describes camp as an outsider’s view of things other people take totally for granted. Because of the inversion, everything that everyone else has taken for granted isn’t true for you. Suddenly things become funny because you’re seeing it as through a mirror, a reverse image. Camp became a sly or secret sense of humor that could only exist to a group that had been through something together; in this case, the gay world. … What’s wrong with that [Susan Sontag’s Notes on Camp] is camp ceases to be an attitude toward something and loses all its relativity. It nails it to the wall and makes it very literal. Therefore something becomes definitely camp which is absurd.97 It is a way of perceiving, and ultimately finding joy in the world that stems from a shared sense of rejection. The roles others unknowingly perform, the rules others follow, seem not to fit. The drama of daily life seems more like a low-budget sitcom, and camp offers members of the community the means to laugh at its theatricality. Or, as Jodie Taylor puts it: Camp uses irony, parody and to a lesser extent pastiche to negotiate the conditions of dominant morality and its imposed subordination. And, with an acute sense of style, camp blatantly undermines authenticity by performing with a strong sense of exaggerated theatricality.98 While this or that thing or concept might not be inherently camp, there are certainly camp tropes, or at least certain objects that lend themselves frequently to a camp treatment. Likewise, camp clearly serves as a potent means of critiquing dominant categories of being, like morality or gender. Theatricality and artifice are always present in camp performance. 96 See Fabio Cleto, Camp: Queer Aesthetics and the Performing Subject (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), 53–65 97 Charles Ludlam, “Camp,” in Scourge of Human Folly: The Essays and Opinions of Charles Ludlam, ed. Steven Samuels (New York: Theatre Communications Group, 1992), 225-226 98 Jodie Taylor, Playing it Queer: Popular Music, Identity and Queer World-Making (Bern: Peter Lang, 2012), 71. 206 In Klaus Nomi’s work, there is a palpable tension between the artificiality of camp performance and the genuine desire to express something authentic, all with a communitarian ethos. Camp’s inauthenticity and artificiality, therefore, are not necessarily all-encompassing. Klaus Nomi consistently uses camp as a critical tool to present a fractured, dysintegrated persona. Though his performances are expressive, the songs he sings and the ways he sings them do not express, or project, the thoughts and feelings of a unified performing subject. But while the persona and the performance might be inauthentic, his relationship to his art, and the way he perceived his art in relation to others was genuine. In his 1954 novel, The World in the Evening, Charles Isherwood captures this approach to art in a conversation between the characters Charles (a gay man) and Stephen. Charles explains to Stephen: You can’t camp about something you don’t take seriously. You’re not making fun of it; your making fun out of it. You’re expressing what’s basically serious to you in terms of fun and artifice and elegance.99 From these interviews, we can view Nomi’s performance within the context of queer world making. For minority communities, the here and now can seem a dismal place of exclusion, derision, and a perpetual less-than status. Queer world making, often negotiated in the realm of the aesthetic, is a utopian strain of thought that allows such communities, especially queer ones, the way to imagine and bring into being a better tomorrow. With typical eloquence, Jose Esteban Muñoz writes: We must strive, in the face of the here and now’s totalizing rendering of reality, to think and feel a then and there. Some will say that all we have are the pleasures of this moment, but we must never settle for that minimal transport; we must dream and enact new and better pleasures, other ways of being in the world, and ultimately new worlds … Often we can glimpse the worlds proposed and promised by queerness in the realm of the aesthetic. The aesthetic, especially the queer aesthetic, frequently contains blueprints and schemata of a forward- 99 Christopher Isherwood, The World in the Evening (Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 1999), 125. 207 dawning futurity. Both the ornamental and the quotidian can contain a map of the utopia that is queerness.100 Even Nomi’s approach to temporality can be interpreted as part of a utopian imagination. The juxtaposition of historical periods and styles is indeed a characteristically postmodern maneuver, but Nomi’s fractal melding of past, present, and future are marked as queer. The descriptions I offered at the beginning of the chapter are littered with references that resonate with a gay subject: Weimar, cabaret, opera, 1950s and 1960s pop, Marlene Dietrich. Even the quasi-alien persona is marked as queer, both because it is marked as an outsider, but also because it imagines a future that is more fabulous and glamorous than the present.101 Klaus Nomi never used terms like “queer world-making” or “gay” in any of his public utterances, at least those that survive from his interviews with the mainstream media. But in his interviews, Nomi consistently expressed both his sense of profound difference and alienation from mainstream society. Furthermore, he saw his art as a way of imagining a sort of utopian space so that the here and now could be more bearable. Later in that same 1982 interview, Nomi expresses a desire to use his art as a means of creating an alternative reality, or at least imagining its possibility: Interviewer: Are you touched by modern life issues, or do you live in your own world, in your own character? Klaus: I feel threatened, and sometimes it makes me angry because I can't do anything about that, there's just too many issues. But in a way, I think my work is meant to get people out of that. Interviewer : I read that you wanted to be a magical character. 100 José Esteban Muñoz, Cruising Utopia: The There and Then of Queer Futurity (New York: New York University Press, 2009), 1. See also Angela Jones, ed., A Critical Inquiry into Queer Utopias (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). 101 Andrew Horne’s The Nomi Song positions him in precisely this way. The movie opens with snippets from 1950s Sci-Fi B movies, with Nomi emerging as the visitor from a more fabulous galaxy. Past and present are melded together into something different and more inclusive. 208 Klaus: Well I think it's a nice to be a little magical. Today we need this. All that we can read in fairy tales or books, I think somewhere it's all around us. But nowadays we can think that this magic has been killed, and I try to make it survive as long as possible.102 This “magic,” which could be alternately read as theatricality, serves as a buffer against the cruelties of life. In this, Nomi’s words mirror those of Sara Ahmed, who writes that this strain of queer utopianism is less about creating a blueprint for the future than it is about creating a livable present. Ahmed writes: We need to think more about the relationship between the queer struggle for a bearable life and aspirational hopes for a good life. Maybe the point is that it is hard to struggle without aspirations, and aspirations are hard to have without giving them some form. We could remember that the Latin root of the word aspiration means “to breathe.” I think the struggle for a bearable life is the struggle for queers to have spaces to breathe…with breath comes imagination. With breath comes possibility. If queer politics is about freedom, it might simply mean the freedom to breathe.103 And, we might add, the freedom to produce a voice that refuses the unifying logic of vocal normativity. Through his voice, Nomi expresses the fundamental ambivalence of both postmodernist art and camp. Both take heightened theatricality and artificiality as their modus operandi, but not as their end. For Nomi, at least, they seem ironically to serve as the means of authentic self-expression, even if the persona is patently artificial, and as a means of creating a sense of community. Rather, the imaginative artifice points to the possibility of a reality better than the one he inhabited. COLD GENIUS During his European tours, Nomi complained of constant exhaustion. He was losing weight and had sores all over his skin. He was dying of AIDS. In late 1982, in what would be his 102 103 “Klaus Nomi 1982 Interview,” YouTube Video, 3 May 2008, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ4__PGjFQI. Sara Ahmed, The Promise of Happiness (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010), 120. 209 final major performance, Klaus appeared at Eberhard Schoener’s “Classic Rock Night” in Munich. He performed “Cold Genius” from Purcell’s 1691 opera King Arthur, which he had recorded recently for his third album, Encore! There were a few differences from his normal performance, though. There was a full orchestra. And rather than his stylized tuxedo, he appeared in Elizabethan garb. Apparently, he chose that costume because the neck ruff covered his worsening sores (Figure 3.7).104 FIGURE 3.7: Klaus Nomi performing at Classic Rock Night in Munich (1982) His stiff movements, while in character, were not an act. In retrospect, his choice of song gives an unwanted poignancy to the performance, especially the last line. Dryden’s text reads: What Power art thou who from below Hast made me rise unwillingly and slow From beds of everlasting snow? 104 Rupert Smith, “Klaus Nomi,” Attitude 1/3 (July 1994). 210 See'st thou not how stiff and wondrous old, Far unfit to bear the bitter cold, I can scarcely move or draw my breath? Let me, let me freeze again to death. He was hospitalized when he returned home to New York. In April 1983, his friends put on a benefit concert at the club Danceteria in 1983 to help him with the mounting hospital bills.105 He died later that year, earning him the sad honor of being one of the first celebrity casualties of the AIDs epidemic. He died on the brink of stardom, a truly original voice silenced by a horrible epidemic. His death did not spark any public outpouring of grief, only a few press notices.106 After death, he became a cult icon, a minor but permanent figure of the queer creative pantheon, an inspiration for eccentric artists, and an unlikely influence on a wide range of performers and artists. Singers ranging from the eccentric Lady Gaga to the conspicuously straight-laced countertenor Andreas Scholl cite Nomi as an influence.107 He became an emblem for many, a potent symbol of inspiration and remembrance. During the AIDs crisis, his name was evoked time and again as an early entry in the ever-growing litany celebrity deaths.108 He has been featured in a number exhibits, some of which were dedicated to a place (the East 105 "Talent & Venues: Activities," Billboard 95, No. 18 (30 April 1983): 43. He received a one-line notice in "Lifelines," Billboard 96, No. 35 (27 August 1983): 50. He was referred to as a “new music performing artist.” 107 Cortney Harding. "The Lady is a Champ." Billboard 121, No. 32 (15 August 2009): 14-16; Scholl’s Purcell album was largely dedicated to Nomi, particularly the inclusion of the Cold Song (written for baritone) and Dido’s Lament (written for a woman). Vivien Schweitzer. "Purcell: Songs, Arias." New York Times, 6 February 2011. 108 There are a number of example, of which these are only a few. Jim Fouratt. "Silence=Death." Spin 4, No. 6 (1 September 1988): 33; David Rolland. "Community Voices." Gay Community News 16, No. 28 (29 Jan-4 Feb 1989): 4; Sharon Bernstein. "Specter of AIDS tempers groupies' rock scene." Chicago Tribune, 4 March 1992; Steve Hochman. "AIDS and Rock: Sound of Silence." Rolling Stone 629 (30 April 1992): 15. 106 211 Village),109 some to a movement (postmodernism)110, and some of which were dedicated to him alone.111 There are too many works of art and moments of influence to document here. There is no single strain of Nomi reception: he means many things to many people. One of the earliest examples of Nomi-inspired art is one of the strangest. Massachusetts artist Pat Keck specializes in painted wooden sculpture, and has been inspired by a life-long interest in puppets, ghosts, automata, and “anything theatrical.”112 Keck recalls: I first heard Klaus’s cover of Lightning Strikes on the radio in 1981 and (after I had peeled myself off the ceiling) went running out to buy anything I could find by him. When I saw the album cover I was even more smitten because he looked like one of my pieces. I joined the fan club and went to see the movie “Urrrgh!: a Music War” just to see a clip of him performing and was again blown away by the theatricality of his performance and the robotic way he moved which was reminiscent of automata.113 After hearing of his death, Keck created an effigy for Klaus Nomi, with the text of the “Cold Song” written around the border. The sculpture is “brought to life” by a pedal, which causes the sculpted version of Nomi to bolt upright and open his eyes, and then gradually lay back down to rest (Figure 3.8).114 For Keck, as a self-affirmed “weirdo” who lives a quasi-hermetic life dedicated to her art, Klaus Nomi provided a sense of inspiration and affirmation: 109 Roberta Smith. "Looking Back at the Flurry on the Far Side." New York Times, 10 December 2004. The Victoria and Albert Museum put on an exhibit entitled “Postmodernism: Style and Subversion, 1970-1990. In a review of the exhibit Tanya Harrod writes: The hyper-reality of Postmodernism, privileging surface over substance, emerges still more powerfully in a haunting section saturated with moving images. Laurie Anderson performing ‘O Superman’ in her apartment; the legendary Klaus Nomi singing ‘Lightning Strikes’; Ono Kazoo dancing the bird scene in Admiring La Argentina’ the Michael Clark Company in Leigh Bowery costumes; and an elegant selection of music videos all suggest that Postmodernism’s evanescent charms were often most convincingly deployed as performance.” In “Postmodernism: London and Rovereto." The Burlington Magazine 153, no. 1305 (2011): 835. 111 From 14 September through 24 November 2013, the Neuer Achener Kunstverein put on an extensive Klaus Nomi exhibit, featuring interviews, original sources, and new, Nomi-inspired art works. http://www.neueraachenerkunstverein.de/content/2013/ausstellungen/2013/?lang=en 112 Pat Keck, e-mail to author, 13 June 2017 113 Pat Keck, e-mail to author, 13 June 2017 114 For a review of her 1985 show that debuted “Cold Genius,” see Kimberly French, "Pat Keck's World of Upside Down," The Globe, 1 June 1985. 110 212 I think he resonates and will continue to because he was a complete original. There was never anyone remotely like him and never will be. I think he appeals to anyone who feels at the fringes of society and he sets an example for being true to yourself. There are some performers who put on an act of being weird, but he was genuinely weird and that's why those of us who are weird love him. That plus his music is unimaginably beautiful.115 FIGURE 3.8 “Cold Genius” by Pat Keck (1984) The interplay of signs, surfaces, sounds, and gestures all point to a sensibility—one shared by many artists around the turn of the 1980s—that prized artificiality. Klaus Nomi used his voice to create a sense of disjunction, to radically denaturalize the link between voice and body, and between persona and authentic expression. But, as I have argued, we must distinguish between aesthetic sensibility and meaning. Although his act refuses a single interpretation, and hinges on an unnatural persona, I believe that he expressed a very real desire to entertain and, at least for a moment, make the world a little bit nicer. Or, as artist LD Beghtol recently put it in 115 Pat Keck, e-mail to author, 13 June 2017 213 The Village Voice: “The Nomi Show was camp without being condescending and insider without being obnoxious. It was endlessly engaging. And then it was over.”116 116 Beghtol, “A Day in the Afterlife.” 214 CHAPTER 4 Hearing the Body: Countertenors on the Operatic Stage What do you do with a voice that does not seem to fit its body? As I have already demonstrated, since the nineteenth century, falsetto has been systematically excluded from normative vocality. Even though all men can produce and develop it, falsetto remains marked as “other.” If not taboo, its use is always contained within carefully prescribed boundaries of cultural context and historical style. Consequently, male falsettists have had to stake a particularly strong claim about their voice. Let us now turn to the issue of the countertenor more generally, and the way countertenor bodies are represented on the operatic stage. As I will relate below, the theater relies on a stereotyped relationship between the voice, the body, and the character portrayed.1 Opera especially relies on vocal quality for characterization. As any opera-goer or singer knows, certain types of characters are expected to have certain types of voices. And regardless of how “artificial” (i.e. divorced from everyday speech patterns) operatic singing since the midnineteenth century might seem, its artificiality only serves to heighten and stylize the distinctions between “masculine” and “feminine” vocality.2 Of course, there is the tradition of “pants roles,” but there are expectations regarding the singer’s gender and the sorts of sounds that emerge from their body. Opera is filled with instances of gender subversion, both sonic and situational, to the delight of audiences both contemporary and historical. Audience reactions obviously depend 1 See Catherine Clément, “Through Voices, History,” in Siren Songs: Representations of Gender and Sexuality in Opera, ed. Mary Ann Smart (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000), 17-28. Though ironically she mentions history in her title, Clément comes to a similar view of character type, but through the ahistorical mode of psychoanalysis. 2 For an overview, see Freya Jarman-Ivens, “Pitch Fever: The Castrato, the Tenor, and the Question of Masculinity in Nineteenth-Century Opera,” in Masculinity in Opera: Gender, History, and New Musicology, Ed. Philip Purvis (New York: Routledge, 2013), 51-66. 215 upon the contingencies of time, place, work, production, and a listener’s individual experience.3 But on the contemporary operatic stage, countertenors are never “normal,” never “ordinary.” Because their voices do not “fit” their body, countertenors seem to defy the modern logic of vocal gender, and present something of a challenge to the representational tropes of character type. As such they occupy a strange place in the operatic world. Countertenors are largely absent from the standard operatic repertoire, as it has been performed by repertory opera companies since the latter nineteenth century. When countertenors first appeared the late twentieth century, their roles fell into three basic categories. First, and perhaps most obvious, countertenors started to perform roles written for castrati. The interest in historically-informed performance effectively ended the practice of transposing those parts for lower male voices, but to this day countertenors still compete with lower-voiced women who perform en travesti.4 Second, some countertenors make a career performing “pants” roles, or roles originally written for women who often portray young men, such as Cherubino in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro.5 This is the most controversial avenue a countertenor can take since there is no historical argument for the use of such a voice. It is instead a novel directorial choice rather than a standard practice. Finally, there are modern roles written especially for the countertenor voice. This third category will be the focus of this chapter. This chapter examines conventions, those deeply-held assumptions that govern our perceptions and yet flicker at the edge of conscious thought. I am interested in the conventions of 3 Roger Freitas, “The Eroticism of Emasculation: Confronting the Baroque Body of the Castrato,” The Journal of Musicology 20/2 (2003): 196-249. Freitas offers a nuanced reading of listener’s approach to gendered vocality in early modern Italy. See also Naomi André, Voicing Gender: Castrati, Travesti, and the Second Woman in EarlyNineteenth-Century Opera (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2006). 4 Arguments can be made for either choice, and period and modern companies alike opt for both, though the period ensembles tend to go with countertenors because they retain an aura of historicity I explore in chapter 2. 5 Another, rather more controversial casting choice is to have a countertenor play Octavian in Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier, though this is rarer. 216 operatic representation, the ways in which voices, bodies, and characters are expected to relate. I shall interrogate the way countertenors both do and do not fit, the way countertenors seem to at once problematize and reinforce standard notions of characterization. I shall also trace the way countertenors became conventional. Since 1960, there have been several roles written especially for the countertenor voice.6 For all their individuality and variation, I argue that composers never casually create a role for a countertenor. Countertenor voices do not recede effortlessly into the sounding body, and so they are always marked as somehow different. Unlike a traditional male voice type—such as a tenor, baritone, or bass—the countertenor’s special voice/body disjunction is always integral to the character they are asked to play. In other words, there is always some sort of agenda. Almost regardless of their style—be it conservatively tonal or avant garde—composers rarely subvert the conventions of operatic characterization that have been in place since the nineteenth century. And so, when presented with a voice that does not fit its body, these composers tend to create roles that hinge on alterity in one form or another. I identify three broad, often overlapping representational strategies at play in modern countertenor roles. The earliest and most pervasive is the use of countertenors for the portrayal of supernatural characters, such as angels, fairies, spirits, gods, and demons. Then there is the use of the countertenor as a synthetic or disembodied voice. As I shall demonstrate, many composers tend to align the countertenor voice with a marked harmonic area or instrumental timbre. Often this served to mark the character’s alterity as well as augmenting the perceived strangeness of the 6 I define “role” somewhat loosely. Not all the works I discuss are purely operas. I define a “role” using two criteria. A role is a musical work in which a singer (or singers) utters the words of a single character or singular consciousness, rather than the expression of a crowd or the abstract declaration of poetry by one or multiple voices. I also consider it an operatic role if the work is commonly, but not exclusively, staged. For an exhaustive survey of the countertenor repertoire up through the year 2000, see Steven Rickards, Twentieth-Century Countertenor Repertoire: A Guide (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2008). 217 voice’s timbre. Some composers took this trend further, creating a synthetic voice. By “synthetic” I mean combined with another voice or some sort of technology. A synthetic voice is not the same as a chorus. It is a polyvocal timbral assemblage that expresses the thoughts and feelings of a single consciousness, rather than the shared sentiment of a group. Finally, a third trend has been the use of countertenors to portray explicitly “othered” characters, who are set apart in some way other than being magical or divine. There are in fact many contemporary roles for countertenor, too many to explore comprehensively with any depth. Although I shall bring many more into the discussion, this chapter will focus on a very few works that have entered the standard operatic repertoire. Two operas by Benjamin Britten—A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1960) and Death in Venice (1973)—deserve extended discussion. They are among the first operas to feature a countertenor (in the case of Midsummer Night’s Dream, the first), and despite some initial critical turbulence, they have entered the standard repertoire in a way few newer operas have. As I will discuss in greater depth, Britten drew on culturally-conditioned ways of attending to the countertenor’s seemingly mismatched voice and body. And the novel representational strategies Britten developed when staging his countertenors proved influential for later composers and later works. The other two works I will discuss at length were written by the American composers Philip Glass and John Adams. Both works draw on already established representational strategies developed by Britten and other composers whom I will discuss in turn. But they also represent important reconfigurations of the now recognizable countertenor character type. In Akhnaten (1983), Glass utilizes male falsetto to convey an “otherness” that is not supernatural. Likewise, Adams’s opera-oratorio El Niño (2000) extends an already-established tradition of combining the countertenor voice with other voices, instruments, and technologies to create what I term a 218 “synthetic voice.” Furthermore, I argue that El Niño marks the historical moment when countertenors became mainstream. As I shall show, perhaps the most remarkable thing about Adams’s treatment of the countertenors it how ordinary it seemed to critics and audiences. A note on nationality: however historically tenuous the current practice of countertenor singing might be, modern-day falsetto-dominant countertenors are inextricably linked with English cultural identity. It is no surprise, then, that English composers were the first, and remain the most prolific group to create operatic roles for the voice type. But it would be wrong to assume that operatic countertenor roles are purely an English, or even an Anglo-American phenomenon. Especially as the twentieth century waned, the world of opera became increasingly transnational. Top houses drew (and continue to draw) on the same small pool of stars, the same conductors, often share productions, and have a very similar repertoire. Both Akhnaten and El Niño serve as perfect examples of this increasing internationalism. Akhnaten was commissioned by and premiered at the Stuttgart Staattstheater with an international cast. El Niño was cocommissioned by the Theatre du Châtelet in Paris (where it was also premiered), the San Francisco Symphony, the Barbican Centre in London, the BBC, and the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. But before I explore these representational strategies (i.e. supernatural, othered, and synthetic), which at once go against and reinforce the logic of theater, I shall offer some historical context for the practice of stock characterization. TYPE AND STEREOTYPE The theater relies on stereotypes. Almost every theatrical tradition—Eastern or Western, ancient or modern—utilizes stock characters.7 Both situations and characters tend to be drawn, 7 Marvin Carlson, The Haunted Stage: The Theatre as Memory Machine (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003), 52-95. 219 time and again, from a limited collection of old favorites. And when they are not, they are the exception rather than the rule. In part, stock characters and situations help the audience, then as now, quickly make sense of the fictive world created before them. As I will show, the stock characterization we observe on the operatic stage emerged out repertory theatrical companies. Some “types,” like the scheming servants or soubrettes, seem to transcend national tradition and are easily observable today. Others, like the fops and rakes of the English Restoration theater, faded from use. In each case, there is a productive tension between individual authorial agency, institutional structure, and the broad cultural understanding of human character. The Commedia dell’Arte tradition, which flourished from about 1550–1750, is cited by most scholars as the wellspring of both modern acting and opera. 8 Notably, it featured a set of stock characters since its earliest days. The characters fell into a few character types: the ‘old men’ (Vecchi) whose intentions were frustrated by the lovers (Innamorati) and the scheming servants (Servi). These types were not simply an abstraction, developed after the fact to describe a set of works. Rather, the types served as a jumping off point for the action, which was largely improvised, save for the broadest outlines of plot and blocking. Indeed, the types in commedia dell’arte were further depersonalized by the masks they wore, subsuming the actors’ individuality into their borrowed persona. There has always been a close relationship between musical and spoken theatre. Very often, we can see stock character types from one tradition borrowed directly by another. Commedia dell’Arte is intimately linked with the emergence of early Italian opera, though the precise nature of that link has been reexamined extensively in recent years.9 Eighteenth and early nineteenth century Italian comic opera is filled with 8 For a general resource, see Judith Chaffee and Oliver Crick, editors, The Routledge Companion to Commedia dell’Arte (London: Taylor and Francis, 2014). 9 The classic article on this subject, which informs much of the general information disseminated in music history surveys is Nino Pirrotta, “’Commedia dell’Arte’ and Opera,” The Musical Quarterly 41, No. 3 (July 1955): 305-324. 220 characters and situations drawn directly from the commedia tradition. Pergolesi’s La Serva Padrona and Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro are emblematic of this trend. More broadly, the basso buffo can be viewed as the operatic incarnation of the Commedia’s Vecchi (old man) character types. Codified at the end of the seventeenth century, the French emplois system was much more rigidly-defined than the stock characters of the Commedia dell’Arte.10 The term “emplois” refers to both the system of role codification and the roles themselves (See Table 4.1). Unlike its earlier Italian counterpart, French drama was fully scripted. Furthermore, the emplois system is notable both for the rigidity of its classifications, and for its influence on other acting traditions. In fact, the emplois were enshrined in law.11 Poaching a role outside of one’s category was not only distasteful, but illegal. An actor made a career within a given emplois, taking all the roles within its purview in any given show. The system arose as a practical way of subdividing the labor within a stable acting company, and as a means to ensure, with the minimum number of staff, that each type of role would be covered, regardless of the work to be performed. It simplified other personnel issues as well. When an actor left the company, the company would simply search for another actor of the same emplois and continue productions with minimal disruption. Rosalind Kerr, The Rise of the Diva on the Sixteenth-Century Commedia dell’Arte Stage (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2015) and Emily Willbourne, Seventeenth-Century Opera and the Sound of the Commedia dell’Arte (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2016) represent important contemporary contributions. 10 Marvin Carlson, The Haunted Stage, 55; Virginia Scott, Women on the Stage in Early Modern France: 1540-1750 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 209-215. 11 Napoleon, in the famous “Decree of Moscow” (1812), drew up rules to govern the Comédie Française, and devoted to the “Distribution of Emplois.” 221 TABLE 4.1: French Emplois as listed for the Comédie Française in Arthur Pougin’s Dictionnaire Historique et Pittoresque du Théâtre (1885).12 Male: Premier rôles Jeunes premiers Fort jeunes premiers Secondes amoureux Grand raisonneur Pères nobles Seconds pères Pères non chantats financiers manteaux grimes paysans comiques Rôles de convenance Female: Premier rôles Grandes coquettes Jeunes premières Jeune amoureuses Secondes amoureuses Troisième amoureuses Mères noble ingénuités Soubrettes or utilités Though boundaries between emplois were rigid, the distinctions could be quite subtle, as can be seen by Arthur Pougin’s definitions of ingénuités and Soubrettes in his 1885 Dictionnaire Historique et Pittoresque du Théâtre. He describes the former as “a very young woman in love, whose passion has barely opened to the emotions and accents of passion, and who retains the purest candor and innocence,” where the latter is a “young, comic woman, frank, vivacious, and gay.”13 Both appearance and the sound of the voice were essential aspects of characterization. Hyppolyte Clairon, an actress who portrayed premières at the Comédie-Français from 1743 to 12 Arthur Pougin, Dictionnaire historique et pittoresque du théâtre et des arts qui s'y rattachent. Poétique, musique, danse, pantomime, décor, costume, machinerie, acrobatisme (Paris: Firmin-Didot, 1885). Quoted in Carlson, The Haunted Stage, 55. 13 Carlson, The Haunted Stage, 55. 222 1766, offers wonderful descriptions of the male emplois.14 For example, the male premières, who plays heroes and princes, should be taller than average, neither fat nor too thin: fatness is ignoble on stage and thinness looks petty. He must be well-built and have no noticeable defects, must appear strong and elegant. If he is handsome, so much the better, provided his beauty is male; delicate features would be a defect.15 Likewise, a père noble, who was called upon to play kings, was supposed be “majestic in size, have a venerable face, and an imposing sound, but a voice that can be both pleasant and severe.”16 Descriptions such as these should not be taken at face value as definitive articulations of a historical practice. Clairon’s account, like Saint-Albine’s treatise, represents an idealized description, offered in hindsight. However, they do speak to the fact that a culturally-understood relationship between voice, body, and character existed, even if it was contested. Naturally, the qualities of actors’ voices were of greater consequence within L’Académie royale de musique, which was founded by Jean-Baptiste Lully in 1671.17 Like the spoken theater, L’Académie was a repertory company organized around types (Table 4.2).18 Body type and acting ability were prime considerations, but so too was range and timbre. For male singers, vocal qualities were less intimately linked with the characters they portrayed. Often though, tenors (hautes-contre) played the hero, baritones (tailles) played furies and comic characters, and bass-baritones (basses-tailles) often played kings and tyrants. For instance, the Journal encyclopédique states that tenors should be given “brilliant and expressive” roles, where bass- 14 Hippolyte Clairon, Mémoire de Mlle Clairon actrice du Théâtre-Françaus, écrit par alle-même, ed. François Andrieux (Paris: Ponthieu, 1822; Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1968). Discussed in Virginia Scott, Women on the Stage in Early Modern France: 1540-1750 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 210-214. 15 Quoted in Scott, Women on the Stage in Early Modern France, 211. 16 Scott, Women on the Stage in Early Modern France, 211. Consequently, this description almost exactly matches the descriptions for the Heldenbariton of the German Fach system, who was called upon to play gods and kings. 17 The recent critical edition of Rameau arias provides exceptional background on each of the voice types and their changing history over the late seventeenth and through the eighteenth centuries. See for example Jean-Phillipe Rameau, Airs d’opéra: basse-taille, BA 9198 (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 2016), 21. 18 The number of soloists gradually increased with time, from fourteen soloists in 1713 up to thirty-five in 1778 223 baritones are more apt at portraying “nobility and majesty,” but there were so many exceptions that no firm rule can be said to exist.19 In contrast, female roles were determined much more by character type than by range, vocal quality was still important. TABLE 4.2: “Range or pitch of all voices,” in Louis-Joseph Francoer, Diapason general de tous les instruments à vent, trans. Benjamin Narvey (Paris: Deslauriers, 1772), 72.20 19 Journal encyclopédique (Bouillon: de l’Imprimerie du journal), vol. 1, part 2 (January 1769), 293. Quoted in Sylvie Bouissou, Benoît Dratwicki, and Julien Dubruque, editors, “Introduction,” in Jean-Phillipe Rameau, Airs d’opéra: basse-taille, 13. 20 Jean-Phillipe Rameau, Airs d’opéra: basse-taille, 21. 224 The British theater was likewise populated by character types. Stock companies have existed since the Elizabethan age. A type was known as a “business,” and the rough division of labor within the Elizabethan theater was little changed three centuries later. Certain types came and went, as did the acting styles. For example, the Restoration stage saw a flourishing of the fop and rake character types. Although the division between types was not legislated as it was in France, British actors tended to stay within their categories. The rise of melodrama, which was the dominant form of theater during the nineteenth century, only cemented this centuries-long tradition.21 Viewed within this context, the modern fach system of operatic voice classification is entirely in keeping with the centuries-old divisions found within repertory theater companies.22 Like the system of L’Académie royale de musique, the fach system is a hybrid system, combining the now-familiar pattern of dividing the labor within the company according to character type with the musically specific requirement of voice type. The notion of fach thus encompasses both a set of musical parameters—especially range, tessitura, and vocal weight—as well as a character type. The subdivisions of the soprano voice (see Table 4.3) serve to illustrate this hybrid nature. Sopranos are classified as much by the type of characters they portray (for example, the “soubrette,” a character type seen in many theatrical traditions) as by what they can do musically (for example the “coloratura soprano”). Though the fach system is specific to 21 Michael R. Booth, Theatre in the Victorian Age (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991) esp. 125-130. See also Peter Brooks, “Body and Voice in Melodrama and Opera.” In Siren Songs: Representations of Gender and Sexuality in Opera, ed. Mary Ann Smart (Princeton: Princeton, 2000),118-134. 22 Rudolf Kloiber, Wulf Konold, and Robert Maschika, Handbuch der Oper, 13th edition (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 2011); Though Kloiber remains the standard, authoritative description of the German fach system, there is also a secondary literature aimed at English-speaking singers looking to start a European opera career, particularly Pearl Yeadon McGinnis, The Opera Singer’s Career Guide: Understanding the European Fach System, edited by Martha McGinnis Willis (Landham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2010); Philip Shepard What the Fach?! The Definitive Guide for Opera Singers Auditioning and Working in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, 2nd edition, edited by Sarah Kristine Schäfer (Kansas City: What the FACH Press, 2010); Richard Boldrey, Guide to Operatic Roles and Arias (Redmond, WA: Caldwell Publishing, 1994). 225 German houses, it is central to the way in which all classical vocalists are taught, pursue a career, and conceive of themselves. Of course, the interpretation of fach categorization varies tremendously, between individuals, institutions, countries, houses, and teachers, but the discourse is pervasive. TABLE 4.3: German Fach divisions for the soprano voice, after Kloiber, with English/Italianate equivalents Soprano Soubrette Lyrischer Koloratursopran Dramatischer Koloratursopran Lyrischer Sopran Jugendlich-dramatischer Sopran Dramatischer Sopran Charaktersopran Hochdramatischer Sopran (English/Italianate equivalent) Soubrette Lyric Coloratura Soprano Dramatic Coloratura Soprano Lyric Soprano Lirico Spinto Soprano Spinto Soprano “ Dramatic/Heroic Soprano Although the specific relationship between voice, body, and character type changes over time, and varies by nationality and theatrical tradition, in each case, there is a carefully defined, culturally understood set of relationships. As such, it is easy to discern the challenge countertenors pose to an opera-going public. Their voices fail to adhere to the standard representational logic of modern operatic theater. “I SEE YOU, AND I HEAR YOUR VOICE” General audiences only began to see and hear countertenors outside the cathedral choir stalls with any regularity starting in the late 1940s. As I have already discussed, the English public learned to accept male falsetto only for the historically-informed performance of old English music and other closely related repertoire. The countertenor was a voice from the past, and that notion of historical distance made it acceptable. In these specific contexts, it became 226 plausible to listen to the countertenor voice as disembodied, or as “purely musical,” to use a frequently uttered phrase. It is likewise important to note that the early normalization campaign took place largely on the radio. One was more likely than not to hear countertenors without seeing them, getting the listener used to the novel sound without being confronted with a body. And when one saw a solo countertenor, it was almost always in the context of a concert format where acting was not involved. Even in works like Handel oratorios in which the soloists portrayed individuals in a narrative drama, the lack of staging forestalled the representational issues that were to come. But the fraught relationship between voice and body remained. The general concert-going public could be said to have a broad familiarity with the voice type, but they did not expect to see one on stage acting the part. Benjamin Britten wrote the first operatic roles for the countertenor voice. In his whole operatic output, there are only two, one major (Oberon in Midsummer Night’s Dream) and one relatively minor (The Voice of Apollo in Death in Venice). Even within the fantastical and artificial realm of opera, countertenors are marked as strange, and Britten was surely aware of this when he created his countertenor roles. Rather than downplaying it, Britten capitalized upon the voice’s strangeness, making the perceived disjunction between voice and body a central aspect of each character. As England’s most prominent post-war composer—doubly so for his operas—the roles he created had a profound influence on later composers and the way in which they wrote for the countertenor. In addition to their primacy, Britten’s operas quickly entered the operatic canon, thus standardizing the representational logic one finds in most subsequent countertenor roles. Since countertenor voices do not seem to “fit” their bodies, they, since Britten, have been cast as characters marked as un- or super-natural. Despite his utilization of a strange voice type, Britten did not upend the logic of theatrical representation. Rather, he 227 extended it. As in all aspects of his musico-dramatic output, Britten deftly uses conventions— conventional characterization, conventional harmonic idioms, etc.—to his own ends, manipulating them in novel ways, but never completely doing away with them. So too with his operatic characters. The countertenor’s “unnatural” vocality serves as a marker for unnatural, supernatural, and “othered” characters. Alongside Britten’s broad approach to voice type and characterization, there is also the issue of falsetto. Although he only wrote two operatic roles for the countertenor, which I shall discuss in greater detail, Britten makes frequent use of the male falsetto register throughout his operatic output. Most of Britten’s major operatic roles were written with specific voices in mind. Especially later in his career, Britten wrote to exploit the individual colors of each singer’s voice. In many instances, Britten notates the use of falsetto, but in others, especially in passages written for Peter Pears, I argue that the use of falsetto is implicitly understood, as evidenced by the many analogous passages which are performed in a like manner on the many recordings made by the singer. The uses to which Britten puts falsetto—the affects he wishes to convey—vary tremendously, even within a single opera. But falsetto always means something in Britten. In this regard, Britten’s treatment of the voice resembles his approach to orchestral color: refined, intentional, and carefully-calculated for dramatic effect. Sometimes Britten uses falsetto for comedic effect, often as a form of ridiculous female vocal impersonation. But just as often, Britten uses the register as a vehicle of emotional intensity, exploiting the register’s timbral ambiguity to dramatic ends. Although he did not write his first operatic role for the countertenor until 1960, Britten had a long familiarity with the voice type. Indeed, he had composed for the voice type, in a choral context at least, since his youth. But, as with many of his major operatic roles, it was his 228 familiarity with a specific singer, in this case Alfred Deller, that led Britten to cast a countertenor in an opera. Deller, Britten, and Pears all moved in the same elite London musical circles. All three shared a passion for early music, especially Purcell, so their meeting was all but inevitable. Deller was the pre-eminent Purcellian countertenor. Britten, a lifelong enthusiast, edited and arranged many of Purcell’s works.23 And Pears was frequently in demand as a concert soloist, especially for early music. Both Pears and Deller performed frequently with Michael Tippett at Morley College starting in the mid-1940s.24 Likewise, both were frequently hired by the BBC. Although they surely had met many times before, all three appeared on the same concert in the summer of 1949, where they performed Britten’s cantata St. Nicolas (with Pears singing the title role) and Purcell’s “Bell Anthem.”25 Beginning in 1951, when he sang in a performance of Handel’s Jephte, Deller became a regular at Britten and Pears’s beloved Aldeburgh Festival.26 And so, when Britten created the role of Oberon for Deller in 1960, it was the culmination of years of collaboration. Britten knew Deller and his voice well. When Benjamin Britten set out to write an opera based on Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream in 1959 he was regarded as England’s greatest operatic composer, as well as one of the nation’s most popular. The new opera was intended to celebrate the 1960 reopening of the Jubilee Hall in Aldeburgh—the main operatic venue for Britten and Pears’s Aldeburgh Music Festival—after a much-needed period of renovation. As in the play, the numerous characters are 23 For a complete list of his arrangements and realizations, see Jennifer Doctor, Judith Legrove, Paul Banks, and Philip Brett, “Britten, (Edward) Benjamin,” in Grove Music Online. 24 The first evidence of the tenor and countertenor’s collaboration was a concert on 31 December 1944 at the Friend’s House in which they both appeared as soloists. See Chapter 2 for an extended discussion of Deller’s work with Tippett at Morley. 25 "Opera and Ballet." Times, 18 June 1949. 26 The Aldeburgh Festival was founded in 1948 and continues to this day. It was originally intended to give something of a summer respite for the English Opera Group so that they had a place to perform that was closer to home. It has since turned into a major international festival. 229 divided into three main groups: the young lovers (Demetrius, Hermia, Lysander, and Helena), the fairies (Oberon, Tytania, and Puck, plus some minor fairies), and the “mechanicals” (Bottom, Quince, Flute, Snug, Snout, and Starveling). In many respects, Britten and Pears’s libretto is a faithful adaptation of Shakespeare’s play. Unlike many of their other adaptations of literature into libretti, Britten and Pears treated Shakespeare’s language as sacrosanct.27 Of course, due to the constraints of the medium, they had to radically compress the play, but the lines they kept were left, almost without exception, intact. Britten and Pears kept the most of Shakespeare’s characters, excising only the minor roles of Egeus (Hermia’s father) and Philostrate (Theseus’s master of ceremonies). But at the broader level they made a rather significant change. Shakespeare’s play is bookended by scenes in the human world of Athens. Britten’s version opens in the fairy realm. Though dominated by comedy and romance, the plot is driven by magic, which only complicates the young Athenians’ already messy romantic entanglements. Overshadowing Theseus’s wedding celebration is the supernatural argument between Oberon and Tytania over the mysterious Indian boy, which Britten further highlights by excising the opening scenes in Athens. In consequence, Theseus and Hippolyta are rendered rather wooden characters who appear only late in the opera. Indeed, the human world only seems to serve as a platform for the rustics’ performance of their play. Though he was always something of a mastermind, Oberon comes to the fore in Britten’s adaptation as the primary agent of change and the driving force behind the drama. 27 For the best, most detailed account, see Mervyn Cooke, “Britten and Shakespeare: Dramatic and Musical Cohesion in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream,’” Music & Letters 74, No. 2 (1993): 246–268; see also William H. Godsalve, Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Making an Opera from Shakespeare’s Comedy (London: Associated University Presses, 1995); Daniel Albright, Musicking Shakespeare: A Conflict of Theatres (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2007): 265–296. 230 Britten’s adaptation can be said to be about many things, romance and magic chief among them. But in addition to these more obvious elements, A Midsummer Night’s Dream is an opera about opera. Britten created an operatic pastiche, self-consciously imitating, parodying, and subverting operatic conventions for a variety of dramatic effects. Like his use of falsetto, Britten’s approach to operatic convention is highly ambivalent, sometimes taking the form of an homage and at other times devolving into camp humor.28 In a rare exception to his usual practice, Britten did not create a leading role for his partner Peter Pears in Midsummer Night’s Dream. He gave him the plum comedic role of Flute/Thisby, and wrote for his favorite tenor a hilariously campy drag scene in the final play within a play, in which Thisby sings a parody of the mad scene from Lucia di Lammermoor (which I shall discuss at greater length below). But for Oberon, the main protagonist, he planned to use a countertenor from the start.29 Read in this light, Britten’s use of the countertenor voice for Oberon makes significantly more sense. Oberon inverts the theater’s traditional representational logic of patriarchal authority. In other words, using a countertenor becomes musico-dramatically effective precisely because the voice is “wrong.” Interpretations of Britten’s Midsummer Night’s Dream have traditionally glossed over Oberon. Many scholars note the strangeness of Britten’s choice, others see it as a type of archaism in keeping with the Shakespearean topic, but fail to go beyond simple observation and explain how it works within the context of the work.30 And others, like Philip 28 Claire Seymour, The Operas of Benjamin Britten: Expression and Evasion (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2004), 226. 29 Notably, in the 1967 Decca recording, Pears took over the traditional tenor/lead role of Lysander (originally sung by George Maran) and the tenor Robert Tear sang Flute/Thisby. Britten thought to give Lysander to Pears and Flute to tenor Hugh Cuenod. Humphrey Carpenter, Benjamin Britten: a Biography (London: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1992), 395. 30 Peter Evans, The Music of Benjamin Britten (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1979). Similar “old guard” Britten scholars cloak the dislike of the potentially queer Oberon character in typically English euphemism, or conspicuously ignore the problem altogether. 231 Brett, hear the use of falsetto as invariably queer.31 The themes of homoeroticism and pederastic desire pervade Britten’s operatic output, and I am convinced that he explores these themes, to a certain extent, through Oberon. But I reject the reading that Britten’s use of falsetto is exclusively, categorically queer. When he created the role of Oberon for Alfred Deller, Britten was building on a relatively stable set of associations surrounding the voice type. It was a voice apart, divorced from the body producing it, and temporally removed from the present. And the voice type’s associations with England’s golden age, including the Elizabethan age, only helped. Listening in concert or on the radio, a countertenor’s unconventional voice might be disconcerting, but it is an abstract problem. The voice presents a different problem on stage. In Midsummer Night’s Dream, Deller’s voice/body disjunction served as a perfect means to invert the traditional operatic authority figure, and it seemed to have been Britten’s intention from the very beginning. Britten wrote to Alfred Deller on 18 August, 1959: [Dear Alfred,] As you may know, we are planning to rebuild our Jubilee Hall here [in Aldeburgh, Suffolk], and with any luck it should be ready for its reopening in the [Aldeburgh] Festival next year. I am planning to write a new opera for this rather grand occasion, and it looks as if the subject will be the Midsummer Night’s Dream (I am keeping this quiet at the moment because journalists are curious animals and seize on this kind of story in a way which is occasionally embarrassing). I wonder how you would react to the idea of playing Oberon in this? It is for a big cast, and each group of people has to be carefully calculated vocally. I see you and hear your voice very clearly in this part, but before I start to write it I should love your reactions…32 31 Philip Brett, “Eros and Orientalism in Britten’s Operas,” in Music and Sexuality in Britten: Selected Essays by Philip Brett, ed. George E. Haggerty (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), 129-153. Brett writes: “If Quint is marked as homosexual and threateningly so by his “oriental” music, then Oberon is similarly designated by his countertenor voice; as Wayne Koestenbaum points out in a recent essay, the association of falsetto with unnaturalness and perversity in the singing manuals of the nineteenth century prefigures the discourse of homosexuality.” (142) 32 Benjamin Britten to Alfred Deller, 18 August 1959, in Letters from a Life: The Selected Letters and Diaries of Benjamin Britten, 1913-1976, ed. Philip Reed and Mervyn Cooke, Vol. 5 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2010), 173. 232 In an undated letter from about that same time, Peter Pears wrote to Deller, adding his own reassurance: We do indeed think you can do it, and more, that you will be triumphantly successful in it –! You can trust Ben, I think, to write you a lovely vocal part. Your height and presence will be absolutely right (– so will your beard!) and the part will probably be a rather static one. I mean you won’t be required to turn cartwheels or climb trees – and it would be wonderful to have you with us.33 Deller responded with hesitant agreement, specifying his vocal range to ensure that Britten wrote a part that played to his strengths.34 Aside from the niceties and the logistical details, we can glean a few things from these two letters. First and foremost, Britten intended from a very early stage to center his new opera around the countertenor voice, rather than crafting the lead to suit Pears’s voice. Both Pears and Britten seemed keen to reassure Deller that he would not be made to look ridiculous. Understandably, Deller was sensitive to such things after a career filled with snide remarks questioning his manhood. Likewise, Deller had no operatic stage experience. The lack was no oversight or fault on Deller’s part since there was no precedent for countertenors singing opera. He had acted in his youth, but for a community theater troupe, so the level of pressure was quite different.35 But most importantly, both Pears and Britten seemed very intent on the effect Deller’s physical presence would make when contrasted with his voice. On the operatic stage, the bass is king. Patriarchal authority is always voiced by those on the lowest end of the spectrum. Fathers, gods, high priests, wise older men: all have deep voices. When Britten wrote a kingly role for a countertenor, I believe that he was knowingly flouting one of the most ingrained customs of operatic characterization. Although a king, Oberon rules 33 Peter Pears to Alfred Deller, ca 18 August 1959, in Letters from a Life, Vol. 5, 174. Alfred Deller to Peter Pears, 4 September 1959, Britten-Pears Library. 35 See Molly and Michael Hardwick, Alfred Deller: A Singularity of Voice (London: Proteus, 1980), 36-37, 45. 34 233 the fairy realm, and so his un- or supernatural voice fits his domain, with all its magic and reversals. In casting a countertenor, Britten draws the audience’s attention to a traditionally masculine body producing an incongruous sound, which in this context marks him as supernaturally other. I argue that the letters make this choice quite apparent. Both Britten and Pears make note of Deller’s appearance: his size, his beard, and his bearing. Deller looked like a figure of masculine authority (Figure 4.1). He was tall, broad shouldered, and he had his beard. Even his age suggested power: by 1960, he was of middle years (48), neither so young as to seem youthful nor so old to appear feeble. FIGURE 4.1: Photo from original production. Alfred Deller on far left with Jennifer Vyvyan as Tytania 234 Britten’s use of the countertenor goes beyond simple incongruity, though that was clearly a part of his decision. As I have already argued, the English public was trained to hear the countertenor voice as a sonic marker of the past, specifically the English past. In many respects, we can view much of the music Britten wrote for Deller as an homage to Purcell, especially Oberon’s aria “Welcome wanderer! …I know a bank,” which seems to be cast in a Purcellian mold.36 Of course, the harmonic idiom and instrumental colors are radically different, but the approach Britten takes to the text resembles Purcell’s manner, particularly in the song “Sweeter than Roses.” I do not suggest that this song by Purcell was necessarily a model, though it could have been, but it serves as an apt point of comparison, especially since Deller recorded the song early in his career.37 As a lifelong enthusiast and Purcell scholar, Britten might have had the song in mind, and Deller’s recording of it specifically. In addition to activities as a conductor, Britten arranged and edited several of Purcell’s vocal works, including a version of “Sweeter than Roses” (1947).38 Both texts—“Sweeter than Roses” and “Welcome wanderer!...I know a bank”— utilize similar poetic devices, with much floral imagery and reference to “sweetness,” so the correspondence might have suggested itself to the composer (Table 4.4). However, it is not so much the influence of a single piece of Purcell’s, but rather the sublimation of a general sense of Purcellian vocal style that I wish to emphasize in Britten’s music for Oberon. 36 Peter Evans calls it a “rich neo-Purcellian declamation over a quasi-continuo accompaniment, an overt tribute to the artistry of Alfred Deller, who created this part.” see his The Music of Benjamin Britten (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1979), 242. 37 Alfred Deller, Purcell: Epithalamium—Sweeter than roses, His Master’s Voice C.4044, 1950, 78. Deller used Tippett’s version of the aria, not Britten’s. As a minor note, the other aria on the record, “Epithalamium,” was excerpted from Purcell’s Fairy Queen, which was based on A Midsummer Night’s Dream. This might have inclined Britten to use “Sweeter than roses” as a model, but the connection is tenuous at best. 38 He drew heavily on the collections Orpheus Brittanicus and Harmonia Sacra. part of a six song collection arranged for medium/high voice and piano that also included the famous “Mad Bess” and “If music be the food of love.” For a full listing of his arrangements, see Jennifer Doctor, Judith Le Grove, Paul Banks, and Philip Brett, “Britten, (Edward) Benjamin,” Grove Music Online, accessed 22 December 2017. 235 TABLE 4.4: Text of “Sweeter than roses” and “Welcome wanderer…I know a bank” “Sweeter than roses” Richard Norton [melismatic quasi-recitative] Sweeter than roses, or cool evening breeze On a warm flowery shore, was the dear kiss, First trembling made me freeze, [more rhythmic, syllabic setting] Then shot like fire all o’er. [triple time, martial topic] What magic has victorious love! For all I touch or see since that dear kiss, I hourly prove, all is love to me. “Welcome wanderer!...I know a bank” Shakespeare Welcome wanderer! Hast thou the flower there? [melismatic quasi-recitative] I know a bank where the wild thyme blows, Where Oxlips and the nodding Violet grows, Quite overcanopied with luscious Woodbine With sweet Musk-roses and Elgantine. [triple meter, slow dance] There sleeps Tytania, sometime of the night, Lull’d in these flowers, with dances and delight: [melismatic quasi-recitative] And there the snake throws her enammel’d skin, Weed wide enough to wrap a Fairy in. incantation And with the juice of this I’ll streak her eyes, And make her full of hateful fantasies… Deller made his career singing a very particular type of music. It was mostly early English music, to be sure, especially that of Purcell and the lutenists. But he was most successful, and most widely regarded for his performances of music that tended towards quiet introspection, and a rhythmically free, rhapsodic quality. We see these very aspects clearly showcased in Oberon’s aria, in addition to some telling Purcellian idioms. Like many songs by Purcell (and seventeenth century vocal music, for that matter), “I know a bank” is composed in small, affectively distinct sections, ranging from highly melismatic, quasi-recitative sections over static harmonies, to more rhythmically active, regularly phrased sections. Even Britten’s treatment of the text mirrors Purcell’s quasi-madrigalian sensibility. The first is the tendency to write expressive, chromatically-inflected melismas on certain choice words (Example 4.1, see Purcell’s setting of “sweeter” and “trembling, compared with Britten’s setting of “violets,” 236 “luscious,” and “sweet”). Likewise, there is the repetition of individual words or small phrases (Ex. 4.1, See Purcell’s setting of “cool” compared to Britten’s setting of “nodding”). EXAMPLE 4.1: Comparing the text setting in Britten’s “I know a bank” to Purcell’s “Sweeter than Roses.” A. Benjamin Britten, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, opening section of Oberon’s aria “I know a bank” 237 EXAMPLE 4.1 Cont’d B. Henry Purcell, “Sweeter than Roses,” arranged by Benjamin Britten 238 In addition to the Purcellian elements, Britten worked many of Deller’s vocal idiosyncrasies into the aria, showcasing them as central expressive devices. As one can hear in his numerous recordings, and as many of his collaborators have noted, Deller sang with a characteristic rhythmic freedom (even in polyphonic works, much to the consternation of many). He also has habit of dimming to the tiniest pianissimo on the high notes of phrases. Britten explicitly notated both “Dellerisms” into his part, especially in his aria, no doubt in attempt to play to the singer’s strengths. But beyond doing homage to a favored composer out of some vague sense of affinity, or writing to showcase a singer’s strength, Britten’s evocation of Purcell serves a broader musicodramatic purpose: it helps to further “other” one of the supernatural characters. Except for Oberon’s music, the operatic conventions on which Britten drew all came from canonic operatic literature of the late eighteenth through the nineteenth centuries. Britten utilized a distinctive palette of orchestral colors to characterize the fairy characters: especially the celesta, harp, muted strings, and harpsichord. The latter instrument, which figured prominently in Oberon’s Act I aria, further lent the music an air of archaism. Each of these factors—the anachronistic reference to an older style, the novel voice type, the strange instrumental timbres—combined to distance the supernatural characters, especially Oberon, from the more ordinary human characters. In another respect, Britten’s use of the countertenor can be viewed as an extension of operatic convention. Supernatural and magical characters often have excessive, extreme, or abnormal voices in some fashion or another. The Queen of the Night is a perfect example, with her stratospheric coloratura. Indeed, Tytania, Oberon’s estranged queen written for a coloratura soprano, is written in exactly this tradition. In typical coloratura fashion, she is frequently called upon to vocalize scales and arpeggios on some variant of an “Ah” vowel, usually paired with a 239 flute (Example 4.2).39 Puck, Oberon’s henchman, is likewise characterized by his voice, or his lack thereof. Again, Britten flouts tradition. Puck is written as a spoken role for an adolescent acrobat. Leonide Massine II, son of the famous dancer and choreographer, created the role just as his voice was breaking. Viewed from within operatic convention, one would typically expect, yet again, to have some sort of low-voiced male portray the sidekick, following the Leporello model. EXAMPLE 4.2: Benjamin Britten, A Midsummer Night’s Dream “Be kind and courteous” Britten’s sense of characterization goes well beyond voice type. As I shall discuss in later in the chapter, he would often mark characters by their key area, a harmonic idiom, or by a characteristic orchestral timbre. I argue that he did likewise with voices, and with equal 39 Curiously, Tytania is the most conventionally supernatural characters, and she is also granted the least agency. 240 sensitivity. In every sense, the supernaturals are marked as such by their voices, which are excessive (Tytania’s), unnatural (Oberon’s), or nonexistent/cracked (Puck’s).40 Theseus, king of Athens, stands in stark contrast to Oberon. Due to the excisions made by Britten and Pears, Theseus only appears in Act 3 just before his own wedding celebrations, which, most importantly, serves as an excuse for the rustics’ play. Theseus seems a wooden character, a caricature of a traditional authority figure, and the music Britten gives him seems only to reinforce this interpretation. Theseus is, almost of necessity, a bass. He and his wife-tobe—Hyppolita, a contralto—are introduced with an extended fanfare that seems to evoke a general sense of Elgarian imperial pomp, though no piece emerges as a definite model. The music and the characters, with their broad declamations in deep voices, are so conventional as to seem funny. They are musically and representationally conservative to the point of absurdity. Indeed, the fanfare frames a whole scene that functions as a meta-conventional operatic joke. The sense of parody intensifies when the mechanicals enter (See Example 4.3). Their prologue begins in rapid-fire homophony that recalls Gilbert and Sullivan patter singing. Their whole scene is framed as “low” and “in poor taste.” But it is expertly “bad.” Their text is poorly set, either ignoring or subverting word stress. The unidiomatic declamation would be less noteworthy were the composer anyone other than Britten, whose reputation as a vocal composer rests largely on his ability to sensitively set the English language according to its characteristic stress and cadence. Then comes a lugubrious cabaletta “Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show” sung by Quince—complete with a |♪
♪♪| accompaniment—followed by Wall/Snout’s exposition of his wall-ness in Sprechstimme. Despite the brief poke at Schoenberg’s 40 Peter Evans also notes the use of boy trebles as fairies, which furthers the theory of setting supernatural characters apart by the voices. He writes” Boys’ voices, a rare sound on opera stages, are the first in a series of ‘supernatural’ vocal colourings to be introduced: Tytania’s coloratura soprano has the most obvious precedent and Oberon’s counter tenor is an imaginative stroke if also a hazardous one.” Evans, The Music of Benjamin Britten, 239. 241 expressionist period, Britten keeps his parodies strictly Italianate bel canto (Rossini/Bellini/Donizetti). He goes through all the tropes. He begins with Pyramus’s manly cantabile “And thou O wall” (Example 4.3a) with its “BOOM-chunk-chunk-chunk” accompaniment in the strings, the woodwinds doubling the melody as the emotion intensifies, and the obligatory (notated) swells on the ascending sixths that sequence ever higher, and never on a word of any significance. Then there is Thisby’s entrance (Example 4.3b), a cantabile with flute obbligato with a very Bellini-esque compound triple meter accompaniment in E-flat, and which Flute/Thisby sings (notated) in many keys, but never E-flat. And then there is Thisby’s “mad scene” (Example 4.3d) which parodies both Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor (recently popularized at Covent Garden) and the Tytania flute/coloratura pairing presented earlier. EXAMPLE 4.3: Parody in Act 3 of Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream A. Pyramus/Bottom’s cantabile aria “And thou O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall” 242 EXAMPLE 4.3, cont’d B. Thisby/Flute’s “out of tune” aria, “O wall full often hast thou heard my moans” 243 EXAMPLE 4.3, cont’d C. Thisby/Flute’s awkward falsetto on “This is old Ninny’s tomb” 244 EXAMPLE 4.3, cont’d d. Thisby/Flute’s “mad scene,” after Lucia di Lammermoor Although falsetto serves as a means of inverting operatic convention with Oberon, Britten uses the register flexibly in a variety of situations. Falsetto likewise appears throughout this scene as an instrument of comedy, such as when Thisby sings “This is old Ninny’s tomb, Where is my love?” (Example 4.3c) always descending from a high G above middle C down to a lower, 245 chest voice pitch. Thisby’s music here is designed to create an awkward registral bump, an inelegant yodel or crack calculated to elicit laughs. This comical effect resurfaces again in Death in Venice, in the Elderly Fop scene. We see a few notational standards that clearly suggest falsetto: the use of a decrescendo or a marked “pp” on the high note of a phrase; the use of a small circle above a note, after the fashion of string harmonics; and the use of the word “falsetto.” But falsetto is not always funny, nor is it always supernatural. However, it is always marked as somehow meaningful in Britten’s vocal works, deployed to some end, even if the precise meaning remains vague. Despite all Britten and Pears’s assurances to the contrary, critical reaction to Deller’s performance ranged from mildly positive to outright hostile.41 It might have been a case of deepseated bias against men using falsetto, but it likewise could have been due to the countertenor’s lack of acting ability coupled with a rather diminutive voice. So shaken was the singer that on 11 June 1960 a very worried Deller wrote to Britten about his concerns: It now seems pretty clear that my inclusion in the Opera does much to prejudice its success with the critics, and this must not be, it is such a wonderful work that it must go forward, so, delete me when you think fit and believe when I say I shall always be grateful for being given such a wonderful opportunity.42 Despite all the negative press, the work quickly entered the repertoire, and almost always with a countertenor in the lead role. But although it was not the last countertenor wrote Britten wrote, it was the last time he had one appear on stage in one of his operas. 41 "A New Midsummer Night's Dream," The Times, 11 June 1960; Colin Mason, "Benjamin Britten's 'Dream,'" The Guardian, 11 June 1960; Peter Hayworth, "Recapturing the Dream," The Observer, 12 June 1960; Shawe-Taylor, Desmond. "Britten's 'Dream' Opera." The Sunday Times, 12 June 1960; Noble, Jeremy. "Critic on the Hearth." The Listener, 30 June 1960. 42 Alfred Deller to Benjamin Britten, 11 June 1960, Britten-Pears Library. 246 “AMBIGUOUS VENICE” In Death in Venice, the composer’s last opera, beauty enchants and then destroys: it leads as far as self-knowledge but does not reach the full distance to salvation.43 In Death in Venice, Britten’s final opera, there is a moment during the “Games of Apollo” (Act I, scene 7) when the chorus converges on a piano E above middle C on the final syllable of the word “Divinity.” The voices blend together, sections and genders indistinguishable. In choral writing, this effect is rather common. In such moments, blend is all important, and to accomplish it, male singers, low ones especially, often flip into falsetto so that their timbres wash together with the higher voices. It is one of the only choral unisons in the whole scene. It happens quickly, and it is not the primary focus of the scene, or even that moment. There is quite a bit going on in addition to the chorus: boys dancing, the disembodied interjections from the Voice of Apollo, all set against the backdrop of Aschenbach’s burgeoning passion for Tadzio. Despite its transience, I argue that this fleeting instant encapsulates several of the key elements of Death in Venice. First, the pitch itself is important. “E” is Aschenbach, the protagonist’s, key area.44 Second is the text. In this moment, the chorus references Phaedrus, a Platonic dialogue about the nature of beauty. In many ways, Death in Venice is about beauty and the artist’s relationship to it. But most importantly for my purposes, there is the sound of that E, and the way in which categories held as inviolably separate—male and female, the different voice types, head and chest voice—merge indistinguishably with their opposites. 43 Philip Brett, “Salvation at Sea: Britten’s Billy Budd,” in Music and Sexuality in Britten, ed. George E. Haggerty (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), 79. Curiously, Philip Brett focuses little on this opera, although he tackles many of the most troublesome issues it presents in other woks. 44 I will discuss pitch symbolism in this and other Britten operas later in this chapter. 247 Throughout Death in Venice—both Britten’s opera and the Thomas Mann novella on which it is based—the action takes place from the protagonist’s, Aschenbach’s, perspective.45 Of course, events occur in the outside world: Aschenbach’s journey to Venice, the plague, Tadzio’s smile, eating strawberries, and ultimately Aschenbach’s death on the beach. But the drama is internal, more so than any of Britten’s other operas. There is no Borough, no Governess, no Roman law, and no military justice against which Aschenbach must struggle.46 There is only himself, set against himself. I argue that it is this very interiority that leads Aschenbach to conceive of these conflicting parts of himself in binary terms: Apollonian/Dionysian, Age/Youth, Intellect/Carnality, and Sight/Sound. In more literal terms, the drama can be read as the fall of an artist, brought down by the temptation of fleshly lust. I interpret these binary pairs as compartments created by the protagonist to control himself from the ambiguity of lived reality, especially his attachment to the boy Tadzio. Indeed, I interpret the opera’s dramatic trajectory as the gradual breakdown of these pairs, the concepts eventually merging with their opposites when confronted with lived experience. Britten’s operatic output can be read as a study in ambiguity and veiled meaning.47 But within Death in Venice, I argue that Britten dramatizes this ambiguity through vocal characterization, especially through falsetto and sotto voce as a sonic marker of destabilization and ambivalence. Just as he characterizes individuals and situations through key areas (Tadzio’s is A, Aschenbach’s is E), musical idiom (Tadzio is characterized by quasi-gamelan music), and instrumental timbre (the “plague” is represented by tuba, Tadzio through pitched percussion), I 45 See Philip Rupprecht, Britten’s Musical Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 245-296. Jane Seymour, The Operas of Benjamin Britten, 228, 300. 47 Paul Kildea, “On Ambiguity in Britten,” in Rethinking Britten, edited by Philip Rupprecht (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 3-19, esp. 17. Kildea calls Death in Venice Britten’s “last, great theatrical ambiguity.” See also Ruth Sara Longobardi, “Reading Between the Lines: An Approach to Musical and Sexual Ambiguities of Death in Venice,” in The Journal of Musicology Vol. 2, No. 3 (Summer 2005): 327-364. Longobardi particularly deals with issues of narrative agency and the ambiguities that arise in something as multimedia as opera. 46 248 argue that Britten also consistently used vocal timbre, especially the ambiguous melding of head and chest voice, to a similar dramatic end. As I shall demonstrate, Britten was attuned to vocal color and wrote to exploit it throughout his careers; especially in his operas, especially in the roles written for Peter Pears, and especially utilizing that ambivalent spot in Pears’s voice that hovered between chest and head voice, which I shall call “falsettish.” Vocal timbre is hard to notate and harder to describe with any clarity. Although instruments vary a great deal, they are much more standardized than voices. A composer can rest assured that a clarinet’s lowest note or the location of a violinist’s natural harmonics will not vary from player to player. Voices are much more variable, and so a sonic effect one singer might achieve in performance might not work in another’s voice, even if the two singers were of the same voice type. And yet I feel justified in latching onto timbre, vocal timbre no less, as an integral part of Britten’s working method and musical conception.48 I do so for several reasons. First, as I shall show, Britten wrote numerous, dramatically central passages for Pears in precisely this register. I believe that Britten utilized this tessitura because of the sound Pears produced, and not, or not necessarily, because of specific pitch symbolism. There are many instances, even in Death in Venice, when Britten uses a pitch or key area symbolically, but timbre, too, is equally important. Furthermore, Britten was particularly attentive to timbre, both in his general approach to orchestration and his specific method of characterization within his operas. Likewise, Britten developed close working relationships with individual singers, which meant that he wrote many roles with specific voices, and vocal colors, in mind. Although he knew well that his operas would be performed by other casts, Britten seemed especially protective of his final opera. He noted in the “Performance and Production Notes” of the 48 Christopher Palmer, “Britten’s Venice Orchestra,” in Benjamin Britten: Death in Venice, ed. Donald Mitchell (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987): 129-153, esp. 143-144. 249 published score that “all those involved in a production should acquaint themselves with this [original Decca] recording,” which suggests, among other things, that he wished to establish the original cast’s approach to vocal characterization as a part of the authentic performance practice of his final opera.49 It is common knowledge among most tenors that the music Britten wrote for Pears can be quite uncomfortable to sing. Pears’s music sits quite high, in the area known as the passaggio, typically in the region of E-flat or E-natural above middle C.50 In addition to its high tessitura, much of his music is very soft. Pears’s music never goes terribly high. His highest notes were, by his own admission and according to the general consensus, rather mediocre. But the music Britten wrote for him often hovered, quietly no less, in this border region between head and chest voice. It was not out of ignorance or composer-ly hubris. There exists ample evidence that Pears had an active hand in shaping the music Britten wrote for him, throughout their long collaboration. And yet we hear on the numerous recordings Pears made that, in these rather high, quiet passages, he would utilize a tone that was neither falsetto nor chest, but rather falsettish. Sotto voce is also an apt term for what he does, but I wish to emphasize the timbral ambivalence, its indeterminacy as to whether it is in one or the other registers. Particularly as he got older, Pears tended to rely more and more on the falsettish sound as his high notes degraded.51 There is tension present in the sound of his voice, as if he is poised on a precipice. I argue that what many would class as a fault, or at least a slightly undesirable sound, Britten and Pears elevated to a 49 Benjamin Britten, “Performance and Production Notes,” in Death in Venice, Op. 88, London: Faber 1979, viii. Christopher Wintle makes a similar point in “The Dye-line Rehearsal Scores for Death in Venice,” in Rethinking Britten, edited by Philip Rupprecht (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 262-286, esp. 263. 50 We can see this tendency even in the first song cycle Britten wrote for pears, the Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo (1940) “…and the influence of Pears’s voice can be heard in the frequent use, especially for long notes, of high E, which might be regarded as Pears’s ‘best’ note.” Ralph Woodward, “Music for Voices,” in The Cambridge Companion to Benjamin Britten, ed. Mervyn Cooke (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 263. 51 It is a common problem among singers for their high notes to degrade and for their voice to gradually lower with age. 250 central expressive gesture. That combination of tension and timbral ambiguity becomes, in the context of Britten’s music, a source meaning, though that meaning varies. These falsettish passages tend share a few characteristics. First, they all hover in the region around E-flat above middle C. The pitches often change, but the melodic contour is always very small, and it returns incessantly, magnetically to that region of Pears’s voice. Furthermore, falsettish passages usually occur above a static, sparse orchestration. In part, this is a practical solution, since falsettish singing is not particularly loud. Finally, these passages often, but not always, occur at moments of reflection and indecision. Death in Venice is largely cast in this reflective mode, and perhaps for this reason alone Britten elevated what was previously a single, though useful, tool in his dramatic arsenal to the status of timbral idée fixe. One early, striking example of this dramatically potent falsettish writing occurs in Act I, scene 2 of Britten’s first opera, Peter Grimes (1945), during the aria “Now the Great Bear and Pleiades” (Example 4.4). At this point, Grimes has made it successfully through the murder trial, though he is clearly treated as a pariah. We just saw him shunned on the docks as the community—all save Balstrode and a reluctant Ned Keene—refuses to help him haul in his daily catch. Scene 2 opens in the pub, during a storm. The patrons become rowdily drunk as the weather rages outside. Then Grimes enters, soaking wet and wild-eyed. The crowd shrinks back. Peter, previously curt and combative, sings as if thinking to himself, reflecting on his position in society. 251 EXAMPLE 4.4: “Now the great Bear and Pleiades” from Britten’s Peter Grimes, Act 1 Scene 2 252 This aria hinges on indeterminate stasis. The voice, reiterating its E, acts as a pedal point against which the hushed strings move in slow counterpoint. In a way, the voice acts as a constellation, serving as a fixed, orienting point. But dramatically, in performance, that E hovers precariously between registers, and singing it quietly requires careful balance. The tension we hear—in Pears’s and all subsequent performances—is not bad technique, but rather the impression of fragility, the sense that at any moment this sound could break down. But like all musical signifiers, the meaning of this sound varied by context. Where in Peter Grimes, falsettish singing helped convey the protagonist’s precarious position in society, in his later chamber opera The Turn of the Screw (1954), Britten used it to suggest seduction, mystery, and danger. Most notably, we hear that falsettish register showcased in Quint’s arabesques when he calls Miles (Example 4.5).52 The ghost Quint is heard, offstage, calling quietly to the young boy Miles. Quint’s call is not uniformly soft. It crescendos to a forte, but it begins and returns to that soft, ambivalent sound. Of course, the dramatic situation is radically different from the one I have pointed to in Peter Grimes. But these two moments represent instances of instability, characterized by an unstable register. Where Grimes reflects on his precarious position in society, Quint is himself the destabilize force. 52 Lloyd Whitesell, “Britten’s Dubious Trysts,” The Journal of the American Musicological Society 56, No. 3 (Fall 2003): 647—649 and 658–659; See also Seymour, The Operas of Benjamin Britten, 189–192. 253 EXAMPLE 4.5: Quint’s arabesques in Benjamin Britten, The Turn of the Screw, Scene 8 Likewise, Britten uses this ambivalent register throughout Death in Venice. But he specifically reserved it for moments when Aschenbach was coming to terms with his desire for Tadzio. But before I go into greater detail regarding Aschenbach’s ambivalent vocality, I must first elaborate on the work’s genesis and the way in which specific voices and vocal colors came to figure into it. Britten conceived of an operatic adaptation of Thomas Mann’s novella some time in 1970. From the very beginning, he conceived of the work as a tour de force for Peter Pears and bass-baritone John Shirley Quirk. In a note scribbled down in an Edinburgh hotel in May of 1971, Donald Mitchell, recording Britten’s thoughts, writes: 254 6.) only Two principals, PP as Aschenb. & JS-Q as symbolic figure of death, singing all 6 roles – Hotel Manager, Gondolier, etc., etc.,53 John Shirley-Quirk had been closely associated with Britten since 1964, when he joined the composer’s English Opera Group. He remained a key collaborator to the end of Britten’s life, eclipsed in prominence by Pears only. Unlike the two main roles, the Voice of Apollo, Britten’s second and final countertenor role, was not added until much later in the process. In contrast with the other two, it is quite small, appearing in only two scenes. By 1970, Alfred Deller had largely transitioned to teaching and performing as part of his Deller Consort. James Bowman had since taken over as England’s leading countertenor.54 Like Deller—and many countertenors for that matter—Bowman had a background in the Anglican cathedral choir tradition, and had gradually emerged as a soloist. Bowman came to prominence, and came to Britten’s attention, after being accepted into the English Opera Group in 1967 while still a student, where his first role was Oberon in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The esteem in which Britten held the countertenor is evidenced by Canticle IV: The Journey of the Magi, which the composer wrote for James Bowman, Peter Pears, and John Shirley-Quirk. These are of course the three primary singers for whom Britten composed Death in Venice. Britten had not yet conceived of the Voice of Apollo role, nor had he intended to compose anything in the opera for countertenor when he was writing Canticle IV. But, I argue, Canticle IV served as a laboratory in which Britten teased out the timbral possibilities he 53 Donald Mitchell, “An introduction in the shape of a memoir,” in Benjamin Britten: Death in Venice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 4-5. 54 James Bowman (Born 1941) began singing at Ely Cathedral before joining the New College, Oxford choir, where he also matriculated. In addition to his operatic career—which began with Britten’s English Opera Group and continued through England’s, and later the world’s top opera houses—Bowman was a central figure in the early music movement, particularly through his collaboration with David Munrow’s Early Music Consort, and then with Christopher Hogwood. Bowman has a significantly larger voice than Deller’s and a more engaging stage presence, which helped his career immeasurably. 255 exploited throughout Death in Venice to great dramatic ends. Notably, he explores the inherent ambiguity of the male voice. He does this particularly in the many homophonic sections of Canticle IV. Britten wrote his set of five canticles between 1947 and 1974. They are small chamber works on spiritually reflective, though not necessarily religious texts, scored for one to three solo voices (almost inevitably including Peter Pears) and one or two instruments, often including piano. In Canticle IV, Britten adapted T.S. Eliot’s poem “The Journey of the Magi” and set it for three voices with piano accompaniment. Unlike most Christmas poetry, this text focuses on the magi’s experience rather than on the expectation of the nativity. Weariness and bad weather dominate the imagery rather than babes in mangers. Britten keeps the voices, for the most part, in quiet, closely-voiced homophony. Each line undulates within a small compass of a few pitches, but there is no melodic or harmonic telos, and so it effectively conveys the footsore weariness of those on a long journey (Example 4.6). EXAMPLE 4.6: Britten, Canticle IV, mm. 4-7 256 Heard separately, Shirley-Quirk and Bowman seem to occupy opposing poles on the spectrum of male vocality. Though not the “bassiest” of bass-baritone, John Shirley-Quirk’s voice is deep and richly textured. It has that rumble-in-the-chest, of the body quality that many, myself included, find very satisfying. Bowman’s voice, like that of all countertenors, seems incongruously high. He does not sound “masculine” in the traditional sense, nor does he sound “feminine” in the sense that his timbre bears little resemblance to an operatically trained soprano or mezzo. Bowman’s sound is simply “other.” Yet when the three sing together in Canticle IV, they meld in sound, especially in the quiet sections, and cross over one another’s lines. Britten creates the effect by putting the countertenor very low in his range, the bass-baritone very high in his. And poised between these two poles there is the tenor, again in that falsettish region. On the surface of things, the countertenor and bass-baritone roles in Death in Venice seem to occupy the extreme poles of a binary opposition: the Dionysian bass-baritone, the “embodied” voice represents carnality; the Apollonian countertenor, the “disembodied” voice, represents reason. As I shall discuss below, they play precisely these roles in Act II during the dream sequence, in which they dramatize Aschenbach’s internal struggle with his desires. But that stark polarity exists only in Aschenbach’s mind, in the symbolic realm of his dreams. Out in the “real” world, the division between those two poles, and their representative modes of singing, is much more ambiguous. The idea to use a countertenor in the opera came initially from Pears, and likely because of his experience performing Canticle IV.55 Set against the bass-baritone, a countertenor seemed an effective choice for the Act II dream, in which the conflicting parts of Aschenbach’s psyche struggle for dominance. Unlike Shirley-Quirk’s composite role—which combines many smaller, 55 Myfanwy Piper to Benjamin Britten, 28 January 1972, in Letters from a Life: The Selected Letters of Benjamin Britten 1913-1976, ed. Philip Reed and Mervyn Cooke, Vol. 6 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2012), 493. 257 related characters—the Voice of Apollo has no equivalent in Mann’s novella. The themes of Greek, especially Platonist, philosophy figure heavily in both, but Apollo does not speak in Mann’s novella. When it came to Act I, Scene 7, Britten and his collaborators originally toyed with the idea of using a boy treble for the Voice of Apollo. They enjoyed the ambiguity of the suggestion that Apollo’s voice might also be Tadzio’s. The idea came from Myfanwy Piper (the librettist), as can be seen in a letter she wrote to Britten on 28 January 1972. Piper argues that Mann’s novel might have referred Socrates’s assertion in Phaedrus that: The lover tries to see and to induce in his beloved the attributes of the God [of] which his soul, in its heavenly state - and therefore even more in its mortal star was a devotee i.e. If the lover were a devotee of Mars he would see his love as a warlike character. There is no doubt in my mind that Aschenbach was a devotee of Apollo - that Apollo is the God whom he puts up against Dionysus and that Tadzio also can and does represent Apollo in his mind so that in his distraught state a voice that could be Tadzio’s would be dramatically right if you think we can get away with it.56 However, this casting choice, along with Piper’s idea to have the boys dance naked in the “Games of Apollo,” was set aside.57 But, I argue, the desire for an under-determined voice remained. It was precisely the countertenor voice’s ambiguity that attracted first Pears, then Myfanwy Piper, and then Britten to the idea. Countertenor voices are often defined more by what they are not than what they are: they are not masculine, not feminine, not of the body. It was precisely this timbral ambivalence that led Britten, Pears, and Piper to gravitate towards the countertenor voice. Again, Piper can be credited with the part’s importance in the drama. Following the London premiere of Canticle IV, sung by the original singers (Bowman, Pears, and Shirley-Quirk), Piper wrote to Britten about the possibilities she perceived: 56 57 Myfanwy Piper to Benjamin Britten, 28 January 1972, in Letters from a Life, Vol. 6, 493. Myfanwy Piper to Benjamin Britten, 28 January 1972, in Letters from a Life, Vol. 6, 493. 258 The thrilling quality of the counter-tenor which really does make one’s flesh creep in terror and delight. If we could manage to get the countertenor, in completely different moods, into both the end of Act I and the dream in Act II I think it would be wonderful.58 Importantly, both of countertenor’s scenes take place in a state of altered consciousness. The Act II dream is obviously a product of Aschenbach’s unconscious mind. In contrast, the Act I “Games of Apollo” occur in some liminal space between dreams and reality. For the longest time Britten and his collaborators called this sequence the “Idyll,” suggesting a sort of idealized reverie, rather like a daydream. The games Aschenbach watched occurred, but the commentary—provided by the chorus and the Voice of Apollo—was a product of his imagination. It could be argued, then, that the Voice of Apollo only speaks in Aschenbach’s mind, an interpretation further reinforced by the ethereal quality of the countertenor’s doubly disembodied voice. Although he is named in the program, during The Games of Apollo, it is unclear to whom the countertenor’s voice belongs. Just as Piper suggested in her letter, it is unclear whether it is Tadzio’s voice, or some divine utterance from the great beyond. Both the text and the staging perpetuate a sense of ambiguity. Had they used a boy treble, as originally intended, there would have been no such confusion. But as Piper notes in her letter to Britten, it is precisely the “terror and delight,” that bittersweet ambivalence, both pleasurable and disturbing, that made the voice seem so perfect for the part. When the Voice of Apollo first enters and sings “Now in my praise / They tell again / Olympian tales / Of rivalries,” it could be Tadzio’s voice. Remember that we never hear Tadzio speak, nor does Aschenbach ever interact with him, save for a glance or a wave. Indeed, the whole work seems largely unconcerned with the real boy. Instead, Aschenbach 58 Myfanwy Piper to Benjamin Britten, 28 May 1972, in Letters from a Life, Vol. 6, 493. 259 is primarily fascinated with the idea of the boy, with the idea of a relationship, thus sublimating his physical attraction into the conceptual realm. The disembodied countertenor voice could represent the idea of Tadzio’s voice, idealized by Aschenbach, but somehow divorced from reality of the children’s games. In this way, the specific appeal Piper, Pears, and Britten heard in Bowman’s voice mirrors, I think, Britten’s idea of youthful beauty: at once tempting and a violation of society’s mores. But the ambivalence persists. In the Voice’s second entrance, it sings “He who loves beauty Worships me / Mine is the spell that binds his days.” The choir seems to clarify things when they sing “No boy, but Phoebus of the golden hair.” Both Piper’s libretto and Britten’s music, especially the use of the countertenor, play up this ambiguity. The references to Apollo speak as much to Britten’s life as to the Hellenic themes in Mann’s novella. In Britten’s mind, Apollo was always associated with young male beauty. Britten’s first romantic interest was Karl Hermann “Wulff” Scherchen, the son of German conductor Hermann Scherchen.59 The two met in Italy in 1934 when Britten was twenty and the younger Scherchen only thirteen. They became close in 1939 when Scherchen was brought to England to escape the rise of Nazism. Britten invited the young man to stay with him at his house, and an attachment developed, as evidenced by the vast, yet unpublished correspondence between the two. Scherchen was the dedicatee of the song “Antique” in Britten’s song cycle Les Illuminations (1939-1940), and was also the inspiration for Young Apollo (1939), a work for piano and string quartet commissioned by the Canadian Broadcasting Company. The work is a fanfare in the bright key of A major, rarely moving away from the tonic triad. Both the key, A 59 John Bridcut, Britten’s Children (London: Faber & Faber, 2006): 98–110. 260 major, and the notion of Apollo remained indelibly linked in Britten’s mind and in his music as representations of idealized young male beauty, innocence, and temptation.60 While Britten’s choice of A major for Tadzio/Apollo has obvious autobiographical roots, I believe that Achenbach’s E was chosen for its timbral possibilities.61 Britten frequently uses opposing pitch centers to dramatic ends. For example, B-flat and B-natural in Billy Budd served to characterize repression and freedom respectively.62 However, the A-E relationship is strikingly euphonious. Perhaps one could read it as an inevitable resolution from E to A. But given Britten’s pervasive use of falsetto and falsettish singing throughout the opera, the timbral interpretation seems the more likely. As I have already demonstrated, E above middle C sits precisely at the cusp of chest and head voice. A tenor can sing it either way, and Pears often opted for a vocal approach that seemed to be neither or both. Britten and Pears set up the potential ambiguity from the very beginning of the opera. Shortly after Aschenbach’s first, snaking expression of frustration (“My mind beats on…”), he declares his identity (“I, Aschenbach, famous as a master writer”) loudly on an E, above rumbling strings, timpani, and trumpet fanfare (Example 4.7). 60 For an excellent overview of pitch symbolism in Britten’s operas, see Mervin Cooke, “Be Flat or Be Natural?: Pitch Symbolism in Britten’s Operas,” in Rethinking Britten, edited by Philip Ruphrecht (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013): 102-130, esp. 102. In contrast, Jane Seymour argues that A major refers to “Aschenbach’s Platonic adoration of Tadzio” and that E major represents the protagonists “subversive impulses towards sexual love.” She continues: “Paradoxically the affinity between these two tonal areas is underlined by a dissonance, A-G#.” I feel that this reading both misses the import of Platonic philosophy within the opera, and fails to account for multiple instances in which the dramatic situation does not coincide with this simplistic reading of pitch symbolism. See her The Operas of Benjamin Britten: Expression and Evasion (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2005), 299. 61 Mervin Cooke notes the “tendency of his [Britten’s] more egocentric characters to announce their presence on a monotone E,” citing Grimes, Aschenbach, Rimbault, and Grimes. This does not preclude my timbral interpretation of the pitch, especially in light of its strangely consonant relationship with Tadzio’s A, which goes against Britten’s practice of using competing pitch areas, such as A and E flat, or B and B flat. See his “Be Flat or Be Natural,” 124. 62 Cooke, “Be Flat or Be Natural?” 112-114. 261 EXAMPLE 4.7: Benjamin Britten, Death in Venice, Aschenbach’s opening declaration. A. Act 1, Scene 1 at R3 B. Achenbach’s doubt returns, at R5 262 But his confidence wanes. The orchestral fanfare dissolves into hushed, amorphous burbling, just as his self-assured declarations revert to mulling self-doubt (“my mind beats on…”). And then, as Aschenbach quietly asks “why am I now at a loss?” he returns to that falsettish region around E. Aschenbach defines himself by his discipline, his rigidity, and his accomplishments and he wishes, in his twilight years and with his inspiration waning, a renewed sense of purpose and unambiguous direction. But this pitch area with which we identify Aschenbach,—E and its immediate environs—is established as a point of instability from the very start. Where Aschenbach and Tadzio are characterized by key areas and instrumentation, the bass-baritone Traveler characters are linked together by a recurring motivic cell, as well as by falsetto.63 We hear the first iteration of the characteristic motive from the mysterious Traveler in the Munich graveyard. After he paints Aschenbach a portrait of that mysterious landscape (Example 4.8a) the Traveler instructs the poet: ‘No boundaries hold you, Go, travel to the south.” This quiet, rhythmic instruction at first seems less important than the lugubrious hallucination which kindles “inexplicable longing” in Aschenbach’s heart. Indeed, the music from the Traveler’s first entrance gradually morphs into the “plague” theme, but his later utterances are most characterized by motivic material from his second utterance (he sings “No boundaries…”).64 The bass-baritone’s motive is not so much a precise set of intervals as a general pitch contour and a timbre. In most of its iterations, the motive consists of a few conjunct pitches descending stepwise, often spanning a fourth, followed by a large ascending interval, which can be anything from a sixth to a ninth. Death typically sings his motive quietly, and that 63 I will refer to him as “Death” for several reasons. First, out of convenience, since he plays so many characters, symbolizing so many things. But most importantly, in that early sketch of the opera, Britten referred to the character as “Death/Hermes,” so it is not inappropriate. 64 Peter Evans discusses this motive, which he links to the plague theme in his The Music of Benjamin Britten, 535540. 263 final pitch after the ascent is often in falsetto. Though Britten does not mark Death’s high D flats explicitly as falsetto, at that pitch and dynamic level, the sound hovers somewhere precariously between the two. We hear just such a falsettish timbre from John Shirley-Quirk in the original recording. Like the E natural in Pears’s voice, the D flat for a bass-baritone falls in that nether region of the voice where it can easily be either falsetto or chest. And at a quiet dynamic, the two modes of phonation sound rather like one another. Much lower, and falsetto is either impossible or inaudible. Much higher and soft singing in chest voice is all but impossible, rendering the distinction between the two registers stark. This spot in the voice is the point at which things— concepts, registers, sounds—merge into their opposites. It is an unstable place. Indeed, throughout this opera, Britten plays with the idea of boundaries. We can read Death’s statement as a reference to geographical boundaries between states. But just as Death suggests the notion of boundary by using timbrally liminal sound, so too does he refer boundaries in a more general sense. In many ways, Aschenbach ties his identity and success to such boundaries: the boundaries between “austerity” and “outcast souls,” between youth and age, between himself and the world, and between reason and carnality. But as the opera progresses, these boundaries break down. They are lines on the page, so to speak, convenient abstractions rather than true divisions. I argue that we can link this dissolution throughout the opera to a fundamental change in Aschenbach’s vocalism. Gradually, Aschenbach comes gradually to abandon one mode of singing entirely and take up another one in its place. Aschenbach has several moments of reflection, the so-called “note-book” speech, in which he thinks to himself.65 In the opera, Britten sets these passages as unmeasured recitative over a tonal, piano accompaniment. These are 65 Myfanwy Piper, “The Libretto,” in Benjamin Britten: Death in Venice, ed. Donald Mitchell (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 48-49. 264 moments of abstraction, of pure thought disconnected from experience. As he becomes more embroiled with events in the real world, namely through his infatuation with Tadzio, he ceases to sing in this mode. Likewise, as the opera progresses, Aschenbach adopts an almost entirely falsettish mode of singing. As the boundary between self and other disintegrates, so too the boundary between registers loses distinction and becomes utterly permeable. EXAMPLES 4.8 Death/Traveler’s recurring motive in Britten, Death in Venice A. “Marvels unfold!” and the first instance of Death’s motive on “No boundaries hold you” 265 EXAMPLE 4.8: cont’d b. “Me Casanova?” Elderly Fop’s extravagant falsetto and shared motive c. R57 Hotel manager and the shared motive 266 EXAMPLE 4.8: cont’d d. Hotel Barber with variant of motive, 11 before R200 The most pronounced use of falsetto in a character other than the Voice of Apollo is the Elderly Fop. We encounter him in Act I, scene 2, on the boat to Venice. Aschenbach has not yet met Tadzio, and he remains largely a passive observer of the events in the outside world. There is a group of young men, played by tenors and baritones of the chorus, calling to their girlfriends. The Elderly Fop follows around the young men, attempting but failing to fit in. On the surface, he appears ludicrous. His makeup cannot hide his age, and his frequent recourse to falsetto 267 sounds queer, or at least unnatural. Unlike the Flute/Thisby’s falsetto lament in Midsummer Night’s Dream, there is no self-conscious theatricality on the part of the character, no distancing device of a play within a play to insulate them from a queer reading. The Fop is, especially in Aschenbach’s eyes, a caricature, his self-delusions laid bare for the world to see. He is everything Aschenbach despises precisely because he sees himself—if not as he is but as he could become—in the Fop. Britten emphasizes the divide between the registers by writing bifurcated music for the Fop. Like contrasting colors, the chesty, middle register of the bassbaritone is set against very high falsetto, often around a G or A above middle C. There is no ambiguity here, no question as to whether he is using chest or head voice.66 Everything is “wrong” about the Fop, even his word accent, with the final syllable flipping extravagantly into falsetto. But what does his falsetto mean? This is the first extended passage of pure male falsetto in the opera, and even now its associations are unclear. In one respect, it can be read as a mark of queerness or effeminacy. Even his word accent seems unnatural. For example, the Fop’s first interjection “Me Casanova?” (Example 4.8b) has the voice rising a ninth on the final syllable of “Casanova.” Britten, ever sensitive to syllabic stress, flagrantly violates the rules, catapulting the bass-baritone into what is meant to be heard as a ridiculous register. In most of his interjections, the Fop mirrors the Traveler’s motive (stepwise descending fourth and a large ascending interval), but the ascending interval is further exaggerated effect. His final interjection (Example 4.9) is even more grotesque with his twittering on “pretty little darling” with the jaunty repetitions of the word “darling,” first in a fluty falsetto and then a grotesque leap down into the chest voice. It inverts the pattern in his first 66 Lloyd Whitesell, “Britten’s Dubious Trysts,” 648-649. Whitesell notes “one is struck by the uncanny gap in his voice…the double timbre seems to mark him as a hybrid creature, yoking together oddly matched attributes…” Notably he reads these instances, such as Quint’s arabesques, Oberon’s voice, and the Fop as “overvocalization” which inherently marks them as queer. 268 entrance and the effect seems almost more disturbing. What was mysterious and ambiguous in the Traveler’s voice becomes comical for the Fop. And finally, his falsetto can be read as an impersonation of youth. Each of these themes are played out, though much more ambiguously, in Aschenbach’s voice throughout the drama. EXAMPLE 4.9: Britten, Death in Venice, Elderly Fop singing “pretty little darling, don’t you know” Falsetto is an essential part of the Death character’s timbral identity—a linkage Britten makes between each iteration of the character—but it serves a dual purpose with the Fop. With characters other than the Fop, falsetto can be heard as ambiguous, mysterious, or even a little menacing. But with the Fop, these two registers sound utterly distinct. In a way, they represent the poles which gradually merge into one another. They are, at this early stage of the drama, before Aschenbach becomes entangled in the world outside of his own musings, separate and distinct, categorically exclusive in the way they only can be contemplative realm. 269 Although the Fop only appears in that one early scene, he returns, after a fashion towards the end of the opera. After his dream, and as the plague rages in Venice, Aschenbach goes, to the Barber for a second time. In addition to his normal small talk, the Barber dyes Aschenbach’s hair and puts a little bit of makeup on him to preserve his youth.67 The Barber takes special pains to emphasize the subtlety of his application. The makeup alone recalls the Fop, suggesting that Aschenbach has unwittingly become what he once found so ridiculous.68 But during the application, the Barber frequently breaks into falsetto, recalling the Fop’s own singing (Example 4.10). However, the divide between head and chest voice, so pronounced in the Fop, seems barely noticeable. In part, Britten achieves this by decreasing the intervallic distance. EXAMPLE 4.10: Britten, Death in Venice, Barber holds up the mirror to Aschenbach, breaking into falsetto, at R298 67 Humphrey Carpenter, Benjamin Britten: A Biography (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1992), 554. Carpenter writes: “The Hotel Barber transforms him into a painted queen like the Fop. But intellectually and musically he has, though admission of the real nature of his feelings, come to true understanding of himself, so that—like no other character in a Britten opera—he has regained his innocence.” 68 Seymour, The Operas of Benjamin Britten, 305. 270 Just as the makeup suddenly seems to Aschenbach a natural thing one might apply when a gentleman reaches a certain age, the Barber’s softly crooned falsetto F’s and E-flats suddenly seem like contextually appropriate soft singing, neither absurd nor garish like the Fop. Indeed, Aschenbach hints at his nascent foppery as early as Act I scene 5 after he has spent time watching Tadzio. We see Tadzio’s mother present her son to her friends and, as the stage directions dictate, “he smiles rather self-consciously.” (Example 4.11) Aschenbach remarks “So, my little beauty, you not-ice when you’re not-iced, do you?” And on those syllables, he quietly flips into falsetto, mirroring the Fop’s own vocal patterns. EXAMPLE 4.11 Britten, Death in Venice, R102 “So, my little beauty, you notice when you’re noticed” However, within Aschenbach’s Act II dream, all ambiguity is gone. Britten dramatizes the sense of conflict between opposing forces precisely through the contrast between the bassbaritone and the countertenor’s voices (Example 4.12). In this scene, they serve as binary standins for a much more ambiguous struggle Aschenbach experiences within himself. Just as the text casts the conflict in opposing pairs—experience/contemplation, laws/instinct, 271 rationality/carnality—so, too the voices sound like polar opposites, one the voice of abstract reason, the other the fleshly voice. The musical means by which Britten achieves this effect are quite simple. Apollo begins forte and forceful, but dims as he is overcome by Dionysus’s ever louder, ever higher, ever more insistent voice. Dionysus’s part is carefully written so that there would be absolutely no recourse to falsetto or falsettish singing. Though it begins piano, it does so in the very comfortable middle range of the voice. A gradual increase in dynamic level accompanies the voice’s rising tessitura, necessitating a chestier tone. Indeed, this climactic scene contains the highest (discounting falsettish passages and the Fop scene) and loudest singing for the bass-baritone, so that by the end he is more bellowing than singing. And finally, once Apollo cedes to Dionysus (“I go, I go now…”), the Dionysian hordes enter with wordless whoops on the phonemes “Aa-oo.” However, it would be too simple to suggest, based on this scene alone, that falsetto always signifies Apollonian intellectual detachment and chest voice always signifies Dionysian physicality. Clearly it functions that way in this scene, and it is a useful dramatic tool, skillfully deployed. So, too falsetto suggest queerness and affectation as with the Fop’s scene in Act I. But critically, in both instances, stable, categorical meaning exists only within Aschenbach’s mind. Ultimately, Dionysus’s victory represents the dissolution of boundaries previous held as inviolable. 272 EXAMPLE 4.12: Britten, Death in Venice, “The Dream” 273 I argue that the two dream sequences—the “Games of Apollo” and the “The Dream”— can be read as points of articulation in Aschenbach’s gradually intensifying infatuation with Tadzio and the “real” world. In each, the countertenor voice serves an important symbolic role, first as the highly ambiguous utterance of Tadzio/Apollo in the “Games of Apollo,” and finally as the Apollonian voice of reason opposed to the Dionysian voice of carnality. After each of these episodes, boundaries break down. Britten musically dramatizes this dissolution in two ways. The first is the loss of Aschenbach’s characteristic reflective mode, which Britten set in unmeasured recitative over piano accompaniment.69 Set against Britten’s rich orchestral palette, these moments of introspection seem set apart, almost didactic with their dry, academically tonal piano accompaniment. Though Aschenbach’s introspection is conceptually rich, it seems divorced from its musical surroundings.70 Secondly, as Aschenbach becomes embroiled in the real world, the boundary between head and chest voice becomes permeable. Falsettish singing becomes more and more prominent, until by the final scene it is Aschenbach’s primary mode of singing. The second Phaedrus song is a good example of this (Example 4.13). It is a soft reflective song set almost entirely in the falsettish part of the voice, hovering around the E above middle C, set over hushed string. And where the sound blurs the boundaries between registers, so too Aschenbach reflects on the Phaedrus dialogue and the way in which the knowledge of beauty is only acquired through the senses. Experience and contemplation are fused into a single enterprise. Knowledge, previously disembodied and abstract for Aschenbach becomes inextricably linked with the embodied, sensual experience of the world. 69 See Shersten Johnson, “Piano Recitatives and Late Style in Death in Venice, Op. 88,” in Essays on Benjamin Britten from a Centenary Symposium (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2017), 207-224. 70 These portions were originally set as spoken text. 274 EXAMPLE 4.13: Britten, Death in Venice, Second Phaedrus Song at R308 Even Tadzio’s name becomes a site of instability. In the frenzied conclusion of “The Dream,” the chorus sings ascending wordless moans on the phonemes “Ah” and “Oo,” which at first seem to be nothing more than gasps of pleasure. The ascending sevenths might recall Aschenbach’s exclamation “Eros” at the end of Act I, as well as Tadzio’s name. Specifically, in the two instances when Tadzio is called by his friends or family, he is hailed by off stage by sopranos and altos, set heterophonically (Example 4.14). Though one group uses his name, “Adziu,” the other simply sings the vowels “Ah-oo-ah.”71 Interpreted one way, it is a marvelous depiction of a word becoming indistinct as it wafts across a great distance. But heard another way, this is a further instance in which Britten dramatizes the tension between reason and sensuality. The composer accomplishes by setting a name, something with meaning, against purely vocal sounds which bring pleasure to the ear divorced from any semiotic context. Ultimately, it was beauty that led to Aschenbach’s fall. The tension between mind and body, thought and feeling, between abstraction and experience, encapsulated in the raw materiality of musical sound (Aa-oo) and abstract meaning (the name “Tadziu”), and between head and chest voice, dramatized through that thoroughly ambiguous falsettish sound. 71 Eric Walter White notes this, as well as the similarity to the gondoliers’ cry of “Aou,” in his Benjamin Britten: His Life and Operas, 2nd edition, edited by John Evans (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), 270-271, 275. White also notes that the moaning stems from Mann’s “description of the mad rout yelling a cry ‘with a long-drawn U-sound at the end’” 275 EXAMPLE 4.14: Britten, Death in Venice, “Adziu” heard from a distance at R324 276 VOICING DIFFERENCE: GLASS’S AKHNATEN Philip Glass’s Akhnaten (1983) is different.72 Unlike Britten, Philip Glass did not have a long familiarity with countertenors, nor was he involved with the early music movement in any way. He knew what a countertenor was when he began work on his third opera, but only in the general, abstract sense.73 As an American composer, there was no cultural baggage associated with the countertenor, no historical sense of musical “self” bound up with the voice type. This makes his decision to cast a countertenor in the titular role utterly novel. Ultimately, surprising novelty and difference were at the heart of Glass’s choice of casting. As I will argue in greater detail, Glass cast a countertenor in the lead role precisely to convey a sense of difference. In one sense, all countertenor characters are somehow “othered,” but Akhnaten represents the novel use of the voice type to express difference that is neither supernatural nor unnatural. It is difference qua difference. Akhnaten also differs from his previous two operas. Especially compared to his first, Einstein on the Beach (1976), Akhnaten is a positively conventional work. There is a plot, in the traditional sense. Time proceeds in a linear fashion. Except for the narrator, everyone sings, performing arias, ensembles, and choruses. And although this comparatively traditional approach helped the work’s appeal to audiences, I believe it accounts for the near lack of scholarly treatment.74 72 Many spellings exist for the eighteenth dynasty Egyptian pharaoh’s name. For the sake of simplicity, I will stick with the spelling Philip Glass used in his opera. 73 He had never written for one previously, nor had he been involved in the early music circles. In Philip Glass, Opera on the Beach: Philip Glass on his new world of music theatre (London: Faber and Faber, 1987), 159 He describes meeting with “I had no special problem with writing the music, except for the countertenor part itself. Here I was working with a voice that was unfamiliar to me.” 74 One of the few exceptions is John Richardson, Singing Archaeology: Philip Glass’s Akhnaten (Hanover and London: Weslyan University Press, 1999); Paul John Frandsen, “Philip Glass’s ‘Akhnaten,’” Musical Quarterly 77, No. 2 (1993): 241–267. For an excellent reception history of the opera, see Sasha M. Metcalf, “Institutions and Patrons in American Opera: The Reception of Philip Glass, 1976–1992 (PhD diss., University of California, Santa Barbara, 2015), esp. 203–272. 277 Akhnaten is the final installment in Philip Glass’s “portrait” opera trilogy. In each, Glass explores people whose ideas changed the world. His first opera, Einstein on the Beach (1976) offered a metaphorical, essentially plotless look at the scientist whose discoveries led to the splitting of the atom, and ultimately the nuclear age. The second, Satyagraha (1980) chronicles the life of Mahatma Gandhi. Though non-linear, it explores episodes in Gandhi’s early life, especially his time in South Africa. An early performance of Satyagraha at the Stuttgart Opera proved important for the latter opera. During the summer of 1979, Glass visited Dennis Russel Davies at his summer home for a four-hand play through of the Satyagraha score. At the time, Davies was the incoming music director for the Stuttgart State Opera and was in line to give Glass’s second opera its German premiere.75 At that meeting, the idea for an operatic trilogy was born, although the subject of the third and final installment had yet to be determined. Prior to composing Akhnaten, Glass considered his other two operas separate, distinct works not linked by any grander project. Around this same time, Glass was reading Immanuel Velikovsky’s Oedipus and Akhnaton: Myth and History, in which the author argued that the Oedipus myth could be linked back to the historical figure of Akhnaten. A controversial figure, to say the least, Velikovsky combined psychoanalysis and ancient history to produce a wide range of books that were poorly regarded by the scholarly community but read enthusiastically by the general public.76 Akhnaten was an eighteenth dynasty pharaoh who ruled for seventeen years before he was overthrown and the new regime attempted to erase his name, image, and ideas from public memory. His offense was to abandon the traditional polytheistic religion of Egypt, and order the rest of Egypt to follow suit, for an early form of monotheism centered on the Aten, a sun-associated deity. The 75 76 Glass, Opera on the Beach, 135-137 Richardson, Singing Archaeology, 6–9. 278 historical purge was largely effective until latter nineteenth century when archeologists rediscovered the sight of Akhetaten, the city Akhnaten built to worship Aten. The art of this period marked a significant break with the earlier, formalized style of earlier dynasties. During the Amarna period, which began with Akhnaten’s reign, figures were depicted in a more individual, naturalistic way, which led to even greater interest in Akhnaten because of his unconventional appearance. Akhnaten, and members of his immediate family, were depicted with wide hips, protruding stomachs, elongated skulls, thin arms, and enlarged breasts. Assuming a completely naturalistic approach to representation, many scholars theorized the possible diseases from which Akhnaten might have suffered, ranging from castration to Fröhlich’s syndrome.77 More recent scholars argue that the iconography of Akhnaten is in fact a “visual rendering of theological dogma” in which the Pharaoh is represented as the “god of creation, and hence androgynous, containing both the male and the female creative principle.”78 77 Cyril Aldred, Akhenaten, King of Egypt (London: Thames and Hudson, 1988), 234. John Paul Frandsen, “Philip Glass’s Akhnaten,” Musical Quarterly 77, No. 2 (1993): 248-249. Frandsen is a musically inclined Egyptologist, so he offers unique insight into the subject matter. However, this androgynous representation does not necessarily mean that Akhnaten, at least as he is presented in the opera, is himself androgynous. Despite going on at length about androgyny, Richardson notes that “Glass himself expressed some consternation when I used this term to describe the protagonist in his opera.” John Richardson, Singing Archaeology: Philip Glass’s Akhnaten (Hanover and London: Weslyan University Press, 1999), 145-150, esp. 147. 78 279 FIGURE 4.2: House altar from the early Amarna period depicting Akhnaten, Nefertiti, and Three Daughters, blessed by Aten Despite the strangeness of his appearance, Akhnaten appealed to Glass for the influence of his theological ideas, which many scholars see reflected in the later Abrahamic religions. The subject complemented the other two operas: Einstein changed science, Gandhi changed ethics, and Akhnaten changed religion. In each opera, the main protagonist is depicted as an agent of change rather than a hero, or even a traditional protagonist. Glass refuses to focus on the interiority of his main characters, or to endow them with sympathetic emotional lives with which the audience can identify.79 In fact, they are not even necessarily good people. Despite the richness of Amarna period art and the influence of the cult of Aten, Akhnaten largely failed as a 79 Richardson argues, “If a single factor has stood in the way of Glass’s widespread acceptance in operatic circles, it is precisely his unwillingness (interpreted by some as his inability) to provide clear musical and dramatic signposts regarding the interior (i.e. emotional and experiential) worlds of his characters. He gives his characters voice, but only in very limited senses.” Richardson, Singing Archaeology, 37. 280 ruler. His sweeping changes to the Egyptian religion caused massive upheaval, and towards the end of his reign, Akhnaten withdrew from his public duties as his kingdoms devolved into chaos. However, Akhnaten remains set apart in a way the others do not. Gandhi and Einstein occupy a warm if vague position in the popular imagination. They seem like real people, and sympathetic at that, and so they survive Glass’s abstract treatment little changed. But Akhnaten is different, set apart. The world he inhabited is distant, his customs alien, and his appearance (at least as we understand it) was strange, to say the least. Although one can dimly perceive the shapes of familiar ideas in his religious concepts through the murk of history, even they seem alien. But, I argue, this sense of distance—distance from our modern sensibilities, and the way in which Akhnaten’s ideas set him apart from his own society—was a central aspect Glass’s approach to characterization and dramatic structure.80 Glass makes no attempt to make Ancient Egypt accessible. In fact, he and his collaborators emphasize the distance by relying upon historical texts, set in their original language.81 The libretto was compiled with the help of Shalom Goldman, an expert in near Eastern Ancient languages. He drew on several ancient sources, notably the Egyptian Book of the Dead. Most notably, Akhnaten is cast as a countertenor. Both the sound of his voice and the texts he sings resonate beyond their immediate circumstance. In the most immediate sense, the countertenor voice seems unhinged from his body. A simplistic interpretation would be to link Akhnaten’s strange appearance to his strange voice, and while that might be a small part of it, it rather misses the broader implications of the casting choice. As I shall discuss in greater length below, set against the relentlessly masculine 80 See Richardson, Singing Archaeology, esp. 19-52, esp. 37-38. He argues that Glass’s approach to theatrical representation was influenced by Brecht, Artaud, and South Indiana Kathakali theatre, which he suggests were “part of the general artistic zeitgeist in New York’s Off Off Broadway community in the early 1970s, when Glass was learning his trade” (ibid., 38). While these are viable theories, they are not necessarily pertinent to my argument. 81 This follows the practice he established in his second opera, Satyagraha, which is set in Sanskrit. 281 sound world of the opening scenes, Akhnaten’s first vocal entrance, delayed until act 1 scene 3, seems like a timbral rupture with his immediate sonic environs, just as the sound of his voice seems unhinged from the traditionally masculine body producing it. Though the world of Ancient Egypt and the historical figure of Akhnaten seems irretrievably distant, Glass musically illustrates Akhnaten’s conceptual force by endowing him and his circle with texts, ideas, and vocal sounds that breach the confines of their immediate environment and material bodies, resonating beyond their historical context into the present. To emphasize Akhnaten’s difference, Glass otherwise followed remarkably traditional casting practices. The named characters associated with the old regime all have traditionally masculine voices. Aye, father of Nefertiti and advisor to the old pharaoh (Amenhotep III), is a bass; the representative of the old religion, the Amon High Priest, is a tenor; and Horemhab, the military general and future pharaoh, is a baritone. In contrast, those in Akhnaten’s circle are all high-voiced: his mother, Queen Tye is a soprano, and his wife, Nefertiti, is a contralto/mezzosoprano. In one sense, using male falsetto to illustrate “otherness” simply continues already established casting practices. But unlike those earlier characters, Akhnaten is not supernatural, and the otherness Glass depicts relates neither to Akhnaten’s body nor his identity. Rather, Glass uses the voice/body disjunction to dramatic ends to illustrate the alterity of his ideas. In other words, Glass subverts the conventions of gendered vocality to convey sense of difference that has little or nothing to do with gender or sexuality itself. Indeed, throughout the opera, Glass differentiates between Akhnaten’s group and the rest of Egyptian society by granting the former textual and sonic multivalence. Representatives of the old religion—Aye, the Amon High Priest, and Horemhab—only have relevance within their local environs, their utterances bound to their immediate circumstances. In contrast, everything Akhnaten sings has at least a double meaning. 282 Just as the countertenor voice seems unhinged from the singer’s body, his utterances are replete with multiple meanings. Throughout his discussion of the work, Philip Glass continually emphasizes the importance of ideas to his portrait trilogy. As the composer asserts: the main point for me was that Akhenaten had changed his (and our) world through the force of his ideas and not the force of his arms. This is not to say that Akhenaten was a pacifist, though some have described him that way, probably incorrectly. It is important to remember that in Akhenaten’s day, Egypt was the military power in the world, with all the cruelty and ruthlessness that role required…[but] It was in the realm of ideas and theology, however, that Akhenaten clearly distinguished himself, and it is that legacy of his—not the military force of ancient Egypt—that has come down to us today.82 In this way, Glass’s representational strategy mirrors his musical language. In both instances, the composer utilizes familiar, almost simplistic means to convey complexity. Although his music is dominated by simple triadic harmonies, they do not function tonally. Rather, the familiarity allows the listener to perceive change rather than progression. One chord does not have to move another, necessitated by the rules of harmonic relationship. There is no tonal trajectory, no telos, only change unfolding over a span of time. So, too, with this notion of conceptual force, depicted in Akhnaten through familiar representational strategies radically, yet subtly repurposed. The entire first act is sonically structured to emphasize the sense of disruption created by Akhnaten’s rule. After the Prelude, Act 1 Scene I depicts the funeral of Amenhotep III, Akhnaten’s father. 83 Glass writes in the libretto that this scene represents the historical moment immediately before the Amarna period, or the reign of Akhenaten, and depicts the society in which the reforms of Akhenaten (reforms which appeared so extreme that they can be called revolutionary) took place. 82 83 Glass, Opera on the Beach, 138. Glass, Opera on the Beach, 178. 283 That historical moment is dominated by the old religion, the political elite, and the military: the traditional, male-dominated institutions of power. The sound of the old regime is likewise maledominant. The scene opens with an extended chorus of tenors and basses singing a short text from the Egyptian Book of the Dead in an unwavering open fifth (Example 4.15).84 Aye (a bass), the advisor to the former pharaoh, joins as a solo voice above the tenor and bass choristers, singing text from the same funerary rites. EXAMPLE 4.15: Glass, Akhnaten, Act 1, Scene 1, Male Chorus at R4 Following an orchestral interlude, the full chorus enters singing the same text homophonically with Aye singing a solo over the crowd. Indeed, the opening scenes are starkly ritualistic. There are no personal dialogues, no hints at hidden motivation, and no plot beyond the sequence of a seemingly unchanging ritual transfer of power. The singers appear to be doubly acting: they become their character on stage, and that character likewise fulfills a role carefully prescribed by tradition. Scene 2 deals with the ritual transfer of power. Amenhotep III’s funeral cortege departs Thebes. Akhnaten appears for the first time on stage. His attendants appear and ritually dress him, removing his princely robes and donning his pharaoh’s garb. Notably, he remains mute throughout the scene as the Amon High Priest, Aye, and Horemhab (the general) sing a trio in 84 They sing “Ankh ankh, en mitak / Tuk er heh en heh / arhau en heh” which translates to “Live life, thou shalt not dies / Thou shalt exist for millions of millions of years / For millions of millions of years.” 284 praise of Akhnaten (Example 4.16). Glass states that the “dramatic intent of this moment is to prepare Akhenaten for receiving the double crown.”85 Like the previous scene, the vocal writing is relentlessly motoric and homophonic. EXAMPLE 4.16: Glass, Akhnaten, Act 1, Scene 2 Trio Akhnaten finally sings during Act I Scene 3 (The Window of Appearances). Following an introduction by tubular bells (a new timbre), Akhnaten sings first alone, then joined by his wife, Nefertiti (a contralto/mezzo soprano), and finally by his mother, Queen Tye (a soprano). In a way, the trio during this scene mirrors the earlier trio of the Amon High Priest, Horemhab, and Aye. Their text is equally ritual, a “hymn of acceptance and resolve,” as Glass describes it.86 But there are stark differences. Most obviously, Akhnaten contrasts sonically. Indeed, his delayed entrance was calculated to create such an effect. Glass writes: The attraction for me in using a countertenor for Akhenaten must, by now, be obvious. The effect of hearing a high, beautiful voice coming from the lips of a full-grown man at first can be very startling. In one stroke, Akhenaten would be separated from everyone around him. It was a way of musically and dramatically indicating in the simplest possible way that here was a man unlike any who had come before. I heightened the effect of hearing that first note sung by Akhenaten by delaying his vocal entrance as long as possible…Finally, some thirty five 85 86 Glass, Opera on the Beach, 180. Glass, Opera on the Beach, 182. 285 minutes into Act I, in the….we hear him for the first time as he is joined in duet by Nefertiti, a mezzo soprano. This becomes a trio when his mother, Queen Tye, a soprano, joins them.87 Or, as he writes in his recent memoir, he wanted the audience to be struck when “he finally opens his mouth and the audience hears him, [and] out comes the sound of a mezzo-soprano…I wanted the audience to think, at that moment, Oh my god, who can this be?”88 But the sense of difference extends well beyond the novel voice type. Rather than entering en masse, each character enters individually. The voices seem contrapuntal rather than homophonic. EXAMPLE 4.17: Glass, Akhnaten, Act 1, Scene 3 “Window of Appearances” Trio (third iteration) 87 88 Glass, Opera on the Beach, 156. Philip Glass, Words Without Music: A Memoir (New York and London: Liveright, 2015), 318. 286 Of course, Glass’s minimalist musical idiom is founded on slightly varying repeated blocks of musical material. But, I argue that Glass stylistically distinguishes the male-voice dominated old guard from Akhnaten’s circle by granting the latter group a sense of lyricism and (rhythmic and melodic) contrapuntal independence that mirrors the expressive gestures of common practice tonality. Their text also suggests a sense of difference. Like the previous excerpts from the Book of the Dead, Aknhaten’s trio sings a formulaic hymn of praise. It seems unproblematic, simply the next in a long sequence of ritualistic texts. But it is addressed to a singular deity, to “Oh, One creator of all things /Oh, One maker of all existences…Hail to thee maker of all things / Thou only one.” On the surface, the text of this hymn can be read as a paean to a god within the pantheon. In many ways, it mirrors the hymn to Amon (principal god in the traditional Egyptian pantheon) sung in the earlier scene. But the test also hints at the emergence of the monotheism that would prove so disruptive to Egyptian society. And as we shall see, all Akhnaten’s utterances are marked by similar multivalence. Not only are the members of Akhnaten’s circle—Akhnaten himself, his wife, and mother—timbrally distinct from the male-voice dominated representatives of the old guard, but additionally, their voices seem to disrupt the gendered logic of voice. After the initial “shock” of Akhnaten’s long-delayed entrance, notions of sonic gender are further transgressed, though to a lesser extent, by Nefertiti’s entrance below Akhnaten. Indeed, throughout the trio, Nefertiti remains in her lowest register, often a full octave below her husband, while Queen Tye, a soprano, sings a significantly higher part. Again, Glass subverts casting conventions, but for strictly musical reasons rather than for the purposes of questioning gender norms. Usually, the younger woman is given the higher part, but Nefertiti is a contralto so that her voice would more 287 closely match Akhnaten’s. As Glass writes, “I wanted the voices in the Act II duet between Akhenaten and Nefertiti to be as close as possible to the same range, to create a more intimate effect in their vocal intermingling.”89 TABLE 4.5: Love poem found on royal mummy from the Amarna period, used in Act 2 Scene 2 for the Akhnaten/Nefertiti duet.90 Sensenet neftu nedjem Per em rek Peteri nefruk em menet Ta-I nehet sedjemi Kheruk nedjem en mehit Renpu ha-i em ankh En mertuk Di-ek eni awik kher ka-ek Shesepi su akhi yeme I ashek reni er heh Ben hehif em rek I breathe the sweet breath which comes forth from thy mouth. I behold thy beauty every day. It is my desire that I may be rejuvenated with life through love of thee. Give me thy hands, holding thy spirit, that I may receive it and may live by it. Call thou upon my name unto eternity, and it shall never fail. (English translation by Sir Alan Gardiner) Glass continues the pattern of multivalent texts in the Act 2 Scene 2 love duet. The scene opens softly with two solo celli as the narrator recites a poem (in the audience’s language) to the sun god Aten (Table 4.5).91 It is then recited again, but as a poem to one’s beloved rather than as a prayer to a god. After this dual exposition of the text, the orchestral texture thins out to just violas, a middle-voiced instrument sharing its range with the two singers on stage. Nefertiti takes up the same text, in Ancient Egyptian this time, and is then joined a few beats later by Akhnaten. Glass’s (apparently) sole motivation for casting Nefertiti as a lower female voice was so that in this scene her voice would intermingle indecipherably with Akhnaten’s. The slow declamation of the text, combined with its utterly foreign language, causes the listener to focus on the sound 89 Glass, Opera on the Beach, 156. Glass, Opera on the Beach, 184 91 This text was found on a royal sarcophagus, though probably not Akhnaten’s. It is possible, though highly contested, that Nefertiti herself wrote it. Glass entertains the possibility that she did and it has interesting hermeneutic consequences, as I discuss below. See Glass, Opera on the Beach, 151-152. 90 288 rather than the meaning. One is especially drawn to the prolonged dissonance in the repeated phrase, created when Akhnaten descends stepwise a major third from a high E to a C over Nefertiti’s sustained B natural. In the second repetition of the phrase, a trumpet enters on a piano high G, effectively making the duet a trio. Except for the occasional low E in the rests between vocal entrances, the orchestral texture remains thin, lending a further sense of suspension. This section is the most lyrical in the whole opera, and the most traditionally expressive, with its long, arching phrases and aching dissonances. The dissonances are all set up as such, moving from consonance to dissonance to consonance in a manner familiar to tonally-trained ears, even if not strictly tonal. It is such a conventional operatic love duet (trio, with the trumpet?) as to seem out place. Yes, it is beautiful, but in an opera singularly unconcerned with emotional interiority, it seems anomalous. EXAMPLE 4.18: Glass, Akhnaten Act 2, Scene 2, Trio 289 However, the love duet can be interpreted as yet another example of multivalent utterance by Akhnaten. I do not mean to downplay the passage’s aesthetic appeal. One can enjoy it simply as a beautiful duet, but like the Act 1 trio and Akhnaten’s “Hymn to the Sun” at the end of the Act 2, which I shall discuss shortly, this utterance is doubly unbounded from its immediate context. Linguistically, the text has multiple meanings. It is both spiritual and carnal, religious and romantic. So, too, the sound of the voices come unhinged from their sounding bodies. Obviously, the countertenor voice seems inherently disconnected from the singer’s body, but more locally, the timbral similarities between the female contralto and the countertenor, combined with their intertwining vocal lines makes it hard at times to tell whose voice is whose. The entrance of the trumpet adds a further layer of ambiguity. Played softly and with skill in a middle register, even a modern trumpet comes remarkably close to the sound of a human voice, especially a countertenor or contralto. And so, the separateness of the voices in this duet/quasitrio becomes further obscured, and to great effect. This duet suggests two further parallels. The first is musical. Both situationally and musically, Akhnaten and Nefertiti’s Act 2 duet resembles Nerone and Poppea’s Act 3 duet, “Pur ti mio,” in Claudio Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea. While the episode in Akhnaten happens significantly earlier in the opera, both duets are similarly positioned after a scene of dramatic upheaval. “Pur ti mio” takes place at the end of the opera, after all the death betrayal, following Poppea’s coronation. The Akhnaten-Nefertiti duet takes place after Akhnaten and his forces take over the temple of Amon, expelling the old priests, and instituting their new religion. Perhaps more striking are the musical similarities. Both duets feature a love duet between two voices of the same register, often intertwining and switching positions, over a light, repetitive accompaniment. Of course, Glass’s musical style is almost by definition repetitive, thus 290 distinguishing it from the ground bass structure found in Monteverdi’s opera. But the slowly unfolding vocal lines bear a striking similarity. Both even feature a juicy dissonance on the same notes, B and C. The other possible parallel is the “Song of Solomon,” or “Song of Songs.” Indeed, the whole opera centers on Akhnaten’s theological influence. The “Song of Solomon” is an anomalous canonic text of both the Jewish and Christian traditions for its explicit celebration of sexual love.92 The song takes the form of a dialogue between two lovers, witnessed by a chorus of the “daughters of Jerusalem.” Though the link between the “Song of Solomon” and the Hymn text of the duet is not explicit, the thematic similarities seem obvious, especially considering the later parallel drawn between the “Hymn to the Sun” and Psalm 104. Seen next to one another, these two possible allusions — first to Nerone and Poppea’s duet then to the Song of Solomon— create network of intertextual interpretations that have ramifications well beyond the immediate scene of intimacy. The “Hymn to the Sun” can be thought of as a paired number with the duet with Nefertiti. It can be viewed as similar for a few reasons, first is the multivalence of the text. As I have defined it, multivalence in this work constitutes the use of sounds, characteristics, or textual meanings that have multiple meanings or meanings that resonate beyond their immediate context, by which I mean the dramaturgical context of a specific moment, and also the context of a material sounding body. 92 Although the text is shared by both Judaism and Christianity, its interpretation varies subtly. Both interpret the song allegorically, although in Judaism, it is treated as a metaphor for God’s relationship with Israel, where in Christianity it is interpreted as Jesus’s relationship to the church. 291 TABLE 4.6: Akhnaten’s “Hymn to the Sun” compared to Psalm 104 Akhnaten’s “Hymn to the Sun” (English Translation) Psalm 104 (English Translation, King James Version) Thou dost appear beautiful on the horizon of heaven Oh, living Aten he who was the first to live When thou has risen on the eastern horizon Thou has filled every land with thy beauty Thou art fair, dazzling, high above every land to the very end of all thou has made All the beasts are satisfied with their pasture Trees and plants are verdant Birds fly from their nests, wings spread Flocks skip with their feet All that fly and alight live when thou has arisen Hou manifold is that which thou has made Thou sole God there is no other like thee Thou didst create the earth according to thy will, Being alone, everything on earth which walks and flies on high Thy rays nourish the fields when thou dost rise They live and thrive for thee Thou makest the seasons to nourish all thou hast made The winter to cool them The heat that they may taste thee There is no other that knows thee save thy son, Akhnaten For thou has made him skilled in they plans and thy might Thou dost rise them up for thy son who comes forth from thyself. O Lord, how manifold are Thy works In wisdom has Thou made them all The earth is full of Thy riches Who coverest Thyself with light as with a garment Who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain Thou makest darkness and it is night Wherein all the beast of the forest do creep forth. The first form of multivalence is linguistic. The “Hymn to the Sun” is novel in that it is the only utterance by anyone other than the narrator in the language of the audience, translated according to where the opera is performed. Glass and his librettists made a parallel here quite explicit, directly following Akhnaten’s “Hymn” with a setting of Psalm 104, performed in Hebrew by the chorus, which is strikingly similar. The trumpet, which made their earlier duet a trio, returns with similar prominence. Glass paired Akhnaten’s voice with the trumpet throughout the opera partly as a practical means of marking the character and giving the countertenor a “partner” to share the vocal line from time to 292 time. But where the trumpet added a phantom third voice to the Akhnaten and Nefertiti duet, it fuses directly with Akhnaten’s voice in the hymn. At times he sings in parallel duet with the trumpet, at other time the trumpet crosses over, effectively adding an extra third on top of the countertenor’s range.93 Ultimately, Akhnaten is an opera about ideas rather than the human passions. All three operas in the portrait trilogy depict individuals whose ideas changed the world, and the ideas take precedence over the individuals. The Akhnaten character, though fascinating and strange, is less important than the impact of his ideas. In a way, Glass linked the pharaoh’s physical alterity to his conceptual difference. He decided to use a countertenor, quite explicitly, for its shock value. There was no attempt to normalize or to rationalize. But, as I have argued, the voice should not necessarily be heard as an expression of Akhnaten’s physical difference, but as a sonic means of unmooring the character’s ideas from their immediate context.94 SYNTHETIC VOICE: ADAMS’S EL NIÑO In a 2006 interview in which he reflected on his collaborations with John Adams, Peter Sellars recalled: The beauty of El Niño was John’s discovery of early music—Hildegard and so on—and the unfettered voice, and singers he could write for. …Before, John 93 Glass, Opera on the Beach, 171. However, production design has a tremendous impact on the way one interprets the Akhnaten character and his voice’s meaning, as can be seen in the differing approaches taken in the European and American premieres. The opera premiered in Stuttgart with Paul Esswood playing Akhnaten. In keeping with the work’s focus on ideas, the production was more conceptual and abstract. In particular, Akhnaten was not portrayed as physically deformed, delaying the impact of his strangeness until the vocal entrance. The premiere at Houston Grand Opera six months later took a more verisimilar approach, depicting Akhnaten as he appears in contemporary iconography. Glass writes: He (David) wanted the audience to actually see the physically deformed, weird-looking individually who so totally overturned the world he lived in….In an early scene Akhenaten is being dressed for his coronation and appears absolutely naked on stage. What we actually saw was Christopher (Robson) in the body-suit. [Bob]Israel’s design was complete in every anatomical detail and convincing to such a high degree that many in the audience though they were look at the real Christopher when they saw this poor, misshapen, hermaphrodic Akhenaten.” Opera on the Beach, 164. 94 293 wrote these instrumental structures which the voices fit into, [finding] their place in the puzzle. With El Niño it’s the voice that is leading”95 To many, the composer included, El Niño (2000) is more idiomatically “vocal” work from a compositional perspective.96 But more significantly, the work also marks a significant departure in his approach to characterization and voice, which, I argue, is intimately related to his “discovery of early music.” Notably, El Niño includes a set of three countertenors prominently featured throughout the opera oratorio. They occupy a curiously liminal role, neither purely chorus nor soloist, neither entirely truly three individuals nor a collective. They are strange, treated as different. And yet, for all the press surrounding this work, positive and negative, the countertenors are rarely commented upon beyond passing positive mentions for good singing.97 They always received positive reviews, garnering typical praise for their “disembodied sound,” but they must not have seemed shocking or disconcerting as once they would have. Indeed, this work represents a critical moment of acceptance for countertenors on stage, when both critics and audience members possessed a shared vocabulary and a shared set of expectations for what the countertenor voice signified. In this work, we can see the coalescence of the many representational strategies which emerged around the countertenor voice during the previous four decades, all rolled into one: the countertenor as supernatural, as angelic, as other, as historical, as 95 Thomas May, “Creating Contexts: Peter Sellars on Working with Adams,” in The John Adams Reader: Essential Writings on an American Composer Reader, edited by Thomas May (Pompton Plains, NJ: Amadeus Press, 2006), 246. 96 Alex Ross, “The Harmonist,” in The John Adams Reader: Essential Writings on an American Composer, edited by Thomas May (Pompton Plains, NJ: Amadeus Press, 2006), 42. 97 This might also have to do with their ambiguous role as not quite soloists and not quite chorus. Though the reception has been overwhelmingly positive, except perhaps for Sellars’s staging and use of video, which I shall not discuss here, the work has received little scholarly attention, save only for those who attack its mass appeal, such as Richard Taruskin, who thought it a new age “panderfest.” See his “Sacred Entertainments,” Cambridge Opera Journal 15, No. 2 (July, 2003): 117. Likewise, Kevin O’Connell finds it an “inoffensive confection of the new religiosity.” See his “God-talk,” Musical Times 150 (Autumn, 2009): 103-108. 294 exotic, as disembodied. Or in other words, their oddity had become standardized, incorporated into opera’s broadly-understood representational logic. This work represents the mainstreaming of countertenors, as well as the early music movement more generally. But also, this work treats the countertenors as a synthetic voice, a combined, polyvocal singularity. Though this might seem like a rather new development, it builds on the tradition of marking the countertenor as somehow different by combining a novel voice type with novel timbres. This representational strategy too speaks to the mainstreaming of the voice type, I argue, for its use suggests that the countertenor voice, in and of itself, no longer creates the same shock it once did. By the turn of the millennium, setting the voice apart as strange and different required more extreme musical measures. For all its variety, contemporary operatic treatment of the countertenor voice has been remarkably consistent. Regardless of the dramatic purpose, countertenor roles inevitably hinge on the voice’s tenuous link to its sounding body. As I have already discussed, that “unnatural” disconnection from the male body has often been treated as a marker of the supernatural, as with Oberon in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and other similar roles. But many composers, often working independently of one another, extended this way of listening by further divorcing the countertenor voice from a single sounding body. In Death in Venice, Britten put the countertenor off-stage, completely obscuring the singer. Others followed suit, rendering the voice acousmatic to some otherworldly effect.98 But there is also a tendency to combine the countertenor voice with other voices (often other countertenors), or instruments, or other forms technological mediation that alter or supplement 98 Of course, off-stage voices are not new. For example, the lone soprano voice in Act III of Verdi’s Don Carlo (“Sire! egli e tempo tempo ch’io viva!” ), also the heavenly chorus at the end of Puccini’s Suor Angelica, and the choir of angels in Act V of Gounod’s Faust, the ominous off-stage crowd singing “Peter Grimes” at the conclusion of that opera, etc., 295 the sound of the voice. I shall refer to this phenomenon as a “synthetic voice,” in that one has the utterance of a single “voice” (or consciousness) portrayed by an amalgam of multiple voices or timbres. In other words, it is a voice synthesized from various sounds. While there are relatively few instances of synthetic voices in the literature, they can be viewed as more extreme instances of timbral and instrumental pairing, which is a relatively common practice.99 The countertenor voice elicits such varied, often incredulous reactions precisely because the heard vocalic body does not “match” the seen body, as understood within the representational logic of contemporary opera. But while a lone countertenor seems ambiguously linked to a single body, synthetic voices further blur these boundaries, calling into question whether they belong to a single body at all. They seem to exceed the boundaries of the human, creating instead a networked consciousness, or a sort of hivemind, which is perhaps why synthetic voices are used to represent supernatural characters. In his opera Ice Break (1977), Michael Tippett created one of the first true examples of a countertenor used as a synthetic voice. Unlike the other operas I have discussed, Ice Break has not entered the standard repertoire, although it has been remounted a few times in the intervening years. However, the opera contains a relatively small but noteworthy countertenor part that deserves some comment. Rather than an influence, Tippett serves as an early example of the way in which many composers extended the logic of sonically marking the countertenor’s strangeness through combining it with other novel timbres. In an interlude in Act 3, a psychedelic messenger named Astron appears to a crowd after they all enter a drugged-induced mass hallucination. The Astron character can be viewed as derivative, based on the Voice of Apollo in Britten’s Death in 99 For example, Oberon’s voice is most often paired with harp, celeste, and harpsichord; The Voice of Apollo was most often heard with the gamelan-esque pitched percussion associated with Tadzio; and Akhnaten was paired with a trumpet. 296 Venice. A few of the parallels are conspicuous. Both roles were written for James Bowman, and in fact John Shirley-Quirk was also in the premiere cast. Tippett and Britten were rough contemporaries, both were Purcell enthusiasts, both were pacifists, and both enjoyed a similar level of prestige. The rest of the opera bears absolutely no resemblance to anything Britten did, in plot, choice of text, or musical style. But the countertenor role is conspicuously borrowed from Death in Venice. Both characters (The Voice of Apollo and Astron) are supernatural, and only sing from off-stage. Likewise, both characters appear when their beholders are not fully conscious. Aschenbach is sleeping, and the chorus is in a drugged-induced stupor. Likewise the orchestration is similar, since Tippett uses pitched percussion (glockenspiel, piano, xylophone, and harp) to mark the character’s strangeness. But with Tippett, the strangeness of the countertenor voice is augmented beyond what Britten ever did. EXAMPLE 4.19: Astron’s entrance, Michael Tippett Ice Break (1977), Act 3 297 EXAMPLE 4.19: cont’d Tippett combined the countertenor heterophonically with a mezzo soprano, and put that combination through distortion. Tippett writes in the score: “The double voice should be ‘orchestrated,’ ‘colored,’ i.e. given degrees of strangeness [even slight distortion?] according to the changes of emphasis and meaning, by means of speaking-tube and loud-speaker system or other device, providing the words remain clear.”100 The effect is striking. The two singers are given almost the same part, such that when they vary, it sounds like distortion or phasing, an effect only compounded by the further “distortion” accomplished through technological means. 100 Michael Tippett, The Ice Break: An Opera in Three Acts (London: Schott, 1977), 301. 298 Following the raucous chorus, the orchestra fades away quietly in a series of high, dissonant chords on glockenspiel, bells, and piano. The score notes “as the psychedelic colours reach their greatest intensity, Astron materializes,” although the singers themselves remain offstage. Countertenor and mezzo-soprano begin in unison, which through the distortion has the unsettling effect indeterminately suggesting both one and multiple voices. Then, when Astron delivers its “message” to the assembled crowd, the countertenor sustains a pedal A-flat, from which the mezzo-soprano departs in a brief arabesque, the two voices phasing in and out of synchrony. The musical means are simple, but the effect is striking. Throughout El Niño, the three countertenors fulfill a similar role as a syntheticallyvoiced, supernatural messenger.101 Though their voices, like those of the other soloists, are subtly amplified in performance, they are not purposefully distorted.102 There are other key difference between the Tippett and the Adams. In El Niño, the visions of the supernatural are divine in origin rather than drug-induced. And finally, the countertenors occupy a curiously liminal role, straddling boundary between singular and plural, between soloist and chorus, and between being inside and outside the drama. This ambivalence, which marks a pointed departure from his previous approach to characterization, is in large part due to Adams’s so-called “discovery” of early music. El Niño is John Adams’s Messiah. Like the first part of the Messiah, El Niño recounts the nativity story. Also like Handel did with Messiah, Adams hoped to write a popular work for the 101 The term opera-oratorio is the composer’s and refers to the hybrid nature of the genre, namely the fact that it is performed both staged and in concert version. Adams/Sellars take a similar approach in their “sequel,” The Gospel According to the Other Mary (2013) 102 Mark Swed, “On Top, but Ever the Risk Taker,” Los Angele Times 28 January 2001. Swed writes: “But where Adams would most like to be a pioneer is in the most controversial application of technology—amplification in the concert hall and opera house. He writes for slightly amplified—‘sound enhanced’—singers. He doesn’t care for the grand operatic voice, with its huge and biologically unnatural sound, or all those rolled Rs. …El Niño in San Francisco was more to his liking. The soloists were so subtly enhanced that the amplification was barely noticeable, although the chorus still suffered from the glaring sound from loudspeakers.” 299 Christmas season.103 While it would have been impossible to avoid comparisons between the two works, especially considering the subject matter, the link between the two works has been explicit since the very beginning. In a public lecture John Adams gave a month before the premiere, he remarked, “I love Messiah…I wanted to write a Messiah…[despite a] checkered religious background.”104 Although the libretto, which I shall discuss in greater detail below, follows the traditional nativity story, the work treats birth and motherhood as the central miracle, rather than Jesus’s divinity. El Niño marks a new approach to the libretto within Adams’s oeuvre. In his previous operas, Adams worked with Alice Goodwin. However, the subject matter might have dictated a different approach to the text. Both of Adams’s previous major vocal-dramatic works are hypercontemporary. Nixon in China (1987) was inspired by President Richard Nixon’s 1972 visit to China. Death of Klinghoffer (1991) dramatized the 1985 hijacking of the Achille Lauro by the Palestine Liberation Front and the subsequent death of an elderly Jewish-American passenger named Leon Klinghoffer.105 Both operas depicted events from very recent history, for which there was a tremendous amount of news coverage. In contrast, El Niño depicts events which, although familiar most, are doubly shrouded by temporal distance and by millennia of theological gloss. The libretto, compiled by Peter Sellars, draws on two primary types sources: scriptural and poetic. He draws on the canonical Christian texts—the book of Isaiah, the Gospels of Luke and Matthew, Hildegard of Bingen, and the Book of Haggai—as well later and apocryphal texts, 103 Though the premiere is not yet twenty years past, it has been regularly performed since the premiere and seems to have considerable staying power. 104 Michael Sternberg, Liner Notes from John Adams: El Niño, Deutsches Symphony-Orchester Berlin, conducted by Kent Nagano, Nonesuch, 2001, CD, 14. 105 Peter Sellars actually came up with the scenario for Death of Klinghoffer, even though he was not the librettist. 300 such as excerpts from the gnostic Gospel of Pseudo Matthew, the medieval Wakefield Mystery Plays, and a sermon by Martin Luther. These historico-religious texts serve as the main narrative vehicle, detailing the events of the nativity. In its use of religious texts, Sellars’s libretto mirrors that of Messiah. Messiah is anomalous when considered against Handel’s other English oratorios because of its abstract approach to characterization and narrative. Much more commonly, Handel’s sacred oratorios depict a self-contained biblical episode, most often drawn from the Old Testament. The soloists portray named characters, and the words they sing express the thoughts and feelings of that character, much as in an opera. The chorus alternately provides commentary on the situation and often fulfills the role of “the crowd” of this or that group. In Messiah, the soloists are not named, nor do they fulfill a single role. And although the work roughly covers the span of Jesus’s live, it is more thematic than narrative, as the three parts revolve around the theological implications of his birth, death, and resurrection rather than the events of his life. Although there are some obvious parallels between El Niño and Messiah, it cannot be considered a straightforward re-working of Handel’s oratorio, nor can it be considered purely Handelian in its obvious historicism.106 The scriptural texts in El Niño are interspersed with texts by Latin American poets ranging from the seventeenth through the late twentieth century, but especially Rosario Castellanos.107 I argue that the use of poetic texts more closely resemble the passions and cantatas of J.S. Bach and his German contemporaries.108 The passions in particular 106 “Shake the Heavens” (Part 1, mvt. 9) is an obvious exception. It shares the text (from Haggai) with “Thus saith the Lord” in Handel’s Messiah, and both are for bass voice. And the Adams likewise invokes the baroque “rage” topic with the loud, propulsive orchestration and vocal pyrotechnics. 107 For an extended discussion of the Latin American influence in this work, see Ken Ueno, “John Adams on El Niño and Vernacular Elements,” in The John Adams Reader: Essential Writings on an American Composer, ed. Thomas May (Pompton Plains, NJ: Amadeus Press, 2006), 183-188. 108 Sellars has made a career doing unconventional productions of baroque and classical operas and oratorios. He speaks at length about his deep familiarity with Bach’s passions and cantatas in an extended interview he did regarding his staging of the St. Matthew Passion with the Berlin Philharmonic. Berlin Philharmonic, “Peter Sellars on Bach’s Matthäus-Passion,” YouTube video, Filmed 11 April 2010, Posted 3 April 2012, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e35K2WbW2kQ 301 serve as an apt point of comparison in structure, if not necessarily topic. Like the libretto of El Niño, the passions intersperse scripture with poetry. The scriptural narrative relates the series of events and the poetry offers an interpretive gloss on the events as they happen. There are of course significant differences. In a Bach passion, for instance, the narrative sequence comes from a single gospel, where in El Niño Sellars draws on a wide array of canonical and non-canonical religious texts.109 Sellars’s poetic texts are similarly diverse, but they are predominantly by female Latin American poets, often on the subject of motherhood. Indeed, it is through these poetic interpolations that Adams and Sellars reorient the nativity story towards a universal celebration of birth and motherhood. El Niño also marks a different approach to voice and characterization, which I argue is intimately linked to Adams’s and Sellars’s fascination with early music. Throughout his operas—those written before and after El Niño—Adams has been relatively conservative in his approach to voice types. Younger characters tend to have higher voices, older characters tend to have lower ones. If anything, Adams demonstrates a preference for lower and middle voices. His operas are populated by mezzo-sopranos, contraltos, baritones, and bass-baritones.110 And so, his use of countertenors in his opera-oratorios seems rather anomalous. But viewed within El Niño’s self-conscious historicism, the countertenors can be read as a further nod to the early music movement, which by the year 2000 had become thoroughly mainstream. And as Taruskin puts, the sound of the countertenor is “the very emblem of the early music movement.”111 But the countertenors serve as more than a convenient signifier of musical antiquity. 109 For a good overview, see Daniel R. Melamed, Hearing Bach’s Passions (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), esp. 1-48. 110 For example, Doctor Atomic (2005) is scored for two tenors, three baritones, one bass, and two mezzo sopranos. 111 Richard Taruskin, Text and Act: Essays on Music and Performance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), 165. 302 As I have stated before, the trio of countertenors occupy a curiously liminal role within El Niño, neither soloists nor chorus in the traditional sense. The work is scored for three solo voices—a soprano, a mezzo-soprano, and baritone—the countertenors, and a traditional SATB chorus. Although there is some flexibility, the solo voices tend to express the thoughts and feelings of named individuals. Character assignments are not rigid, though. For example, there are multiple movements containing the direct speech of Mary, and those parts are shared between the two female soloists. These two singers—originally Dawn Upshaw and Lorraine Hunt Lieberson—also have solo poetic arias related to the themes of motherhood but not necessarily from Mary’s perspective. Likewise, the baritone is assigned texts from the perspective of Joseph and Herod. Despite their flexibility by the standards of operatic characterization, Adams’s treatment of the three solo voices still fall within relatively standard practice. Notably, Mary is only ever voiced by a female singer, where Joseph and Herod are only portrayed by a male. Yet again, El Niño seems indebted to Bach. The alternation between direct speech, narration, and poetic gloss, often by the same singer, mirrors the ambivalent approach to characterization we observe in Bach passions. This is especially true of Joshua Rifkin’s onevoice-per-part performance practice that emerged in the 1980s. Sellars was likely familiar with this practice, in which one would observe that the singer performing the “role” of Jesus is also responsible for singing in the choruses and performing the arias. But the countertenors are neither soloists nor choir. Even within the same movement they vacillate between providing commentary, serving a sort of narrator/Evangelist role, and declaiming the direct speech of certain individuals, especially angels. Viewed in this Bachian light, the countertenors seem to occupy a quasi-Evangelist role, although they are not the only ones who narrate. To a lesser degree, the three soloists do as well, 303 but usually in minor instances of self-narration, such as “and Joseph said…” followed by Joseph’s thoughts. There are instances in which the countertenors sing as individuals, but those are rare, and almost necessitated by the text of “The Three Kings” (Part 2, mvt. 5). Most notably, the countertenors take over the supernatural utterances of angels as a sort of synthetic voice. Take for example “Hail Mary, Gracious!” (Part 1, mvt. 2) in which they portray the angel Gabriel in the annunciation. As I have already discussed at length, it had become almost commonplace to use the countertenor voice to portray supernatural characters – angels, fairies, demons, psychedelic hallucinations, etc. But in this movement, the countertenors become a synthetic voice, a strange timbral amalgam of three already strange voices. EXAMPLE 4.20 Adams, El Niño, instances of “synthetic voice” A. Part 1, Mvt. 2 “Hail, Mary, Gracious!” mm. 1–7 304 B. Part 1, Mvt. 8 “Joseph’s Dream,” mm. 19–35 305 As I argue in the previous chapter, much of the voice’s expressive potential comes from the impression of tension, or the traces of bodily labor conveyed through style specific gestures. Klaus Nomi subverted the impression of tension by rapidly juxtaposing vocal idioms so that they lost coherence. Though through very different means, I argue that in this instance Adams subverts the impression of bodily tension. Rather than a single singer juxtaposing idioms, Adams has the three countertenors combine registers. In other words, at any given moment, one can simultaneously hear the countertenor voice in a relatively low register and one in a relatively high register. Likewise, the melodic writing for each voice stays with in a fairly narrow range, often vacillating between a few pitches in the same register. And finally, the close voicing further blurs any distinction between the individuals. Much like in Britten’s Canticle IV, there is no melodic telos and no harmonic telos. But where in the earlier composer’s work this served to express weariness, here it serves to create a composite vocal sound stripped of all markers that would suggest a single sounding body. In addition to being treated as supernatural and synthetic voices, the three countertenors are also “othered,” set apart stylistically as somehow distinct from both the soloists and the chorus. In a way, the musical strategy Adams employs to differentiate his countertenors inverts the one used by Glass in Akhnaten. Where Glass often gave his title character traditionally expressive music as a way of depicting his alterity, Adams denies his countertenors expressivity. To generalize, the countertenors seem to be utilized purely for their strangeness and for their signification of “early music,” but not for their ability to express human feelings with which the audience can identify. El Niño contains several emotionally-charged traditional arias, but the countertenors are not granted the same level of expressivity. In part, this seems related to the role(s) they fulfill. Their texts are predominantly either the direct speech of angels, or the texts 306 serve a purely narrative role. Even when they sing as individuals in the “Three Kings” movement (Part 2, No. 5, text by Ruben Dario), the magi serve as figures from an exotic land come to pay homage to the Christ child. They are exotic, just as “othered” as the angels they portray in other sections. Adams writes for the countertenors in a distinct harmonic idiom which constantly evades tonal expressivity. Tonal consonance occurs, but these moments of harmonic stability are never approached harmonically or contrapuntally in a way that would suggest resolution. The countertenors are often written in closely voiced homophony, their harmonies dominated by sevenths, seconds, and perfect intervals. In moments such as “Joseph’s Dream,” they undertake large leaps in similar motion from dissonance to dissonance. This disjunction serves to disorient the listener. Very often, vocal lines achieve expressivity by the building and release of tension, either harmonic, or as I argued in the previous chapter, vocal. The combination of voices furthers this effect, since the listener can never hone in on a particular voice. It all combines to create a blurring of borders between the individual singers, creating a strange, synthetic sonic entity that exists outside the normal boundaries of voice and body. But perhaps the strangest thing of all is how, after forty years of seeing and hearing countertenors on stage, presented time and again as abnormal and supernatural characters, all this seems utterly ordinary. As I have established, the theater relies on stereotypes, a stock set of characters with a broadly understood set of traits, including voice and appearance. As a voice-centric art form, opera imbues vocal sound with greater importance. And so, the relationship between voice, body, and character type is carefully regimented. At first glance, countertenors seem not to fit within this system. But, since the first modern countertenor role, their non-normative mode of vocalism became a vehicle to present characters who were abnormal, “othered,” queer, magical, 307 inhuman, and superhuman. In this very narrow sense, this continued practice only builds on the nineteenth century pathologization of falsetto I explored in my first chapter. Normative vocality remains “safe,” so to speak, since falsetto remains compartmentalized. The three broad representational strategies—supernatural, othered, and synthetic— emerged gradually alongside the normalization of the countertenor voice. Towards the end of the twentieth century, countertenors lost some of their shock value, and the public’s increasing familiarity with the voice type led to a more nuanced approach to characterization. The countertenor’s alterity remained, but it has been more broadly interpreted. Two very recent examples serve to illustrate this. The first is Oscar (2013), which details the Oscar Wilde’s trials for indecency.112 The title role was written for David Daniels, arguably the most prominent countertenor at the turn of the millennium. A proudly out gay man, Daniels frequently discussed the importance of portraying the persecution the LGBTQ community endured not so long ago, and his voice served as an effective musical means through which to depict Wilde’s alienation from society. Likewise, George Benjamin’s Written on Skin (2012) adapts the story of a troubadour who was brutally murdered by a nobleman after seducing his wife.113 Benjamin casts a countertenor to play The Boy/Angel 1, who does double duty as both the seducing artist and as part of a group of angels (along with a Tenor and a Mezzo) who comment on the action from both inside and outside the narrative frame. In this we see a kaleidoscopic treatment of nearly all the countertenor representational tropes. The countertenor is a supernatural being, an angel. Likewise, the medieval setting draws on the voice’s associations with antiquity. He is further 112 Music and libretto by Theodore Morrison, premiered 27 July 2013 at Santa Fe Opera. For an interview in which David Daniels discusses the work, see also The Santa Fe Opera, “David Daniels, Oscar,” YouTube Video, 7:42 Published 1 April 2013, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErdGIEYgYok. 113 Libretto by Martin Crimp, based on the legend of troubadour Guillaume de Cabestanh. Premiered at the 2012 Aix-en-Provence Festival. 308 othered, both as an outsider and as an artist, but also marked as queer, since in Benjamin’s treatment he seduces both the nobleman and his young wife. The emergence of the synthetic voice managed to recreate the sense of strangeness audiences must have experienced in the early days of the countertenor revival. Since the voice type seems positively normal, if not normative, composers have to increasingly alienate the sound of the voice from the human body through supplementation. But perhaps we have reached the outer limits of this approach, interesting though it may be. Going forward, I am sure these representational strategies will continue since they have proven so effective. In an ironic turn, I believe that the most radical choice a composer could make would be to write an utterly boring role for a countertenor, a character notable only for their extraordinary mundanity. In opera’s world of heightened passions and extraordinary events, nothing would be more shocking than casting a countertenor to play an accountant or store clerk with a passion for cat videos and collecting stamps. 309 CONCLUSION Falsetto is natural, in so far as any form of vocalism is natural. It is learned, but requires no technical supplementation. Nor is it deleterious to one’s health, save for the normal wear and tear of any activity. No one would accuse walking of being either “unnatural” or the symptom of some deep-seated pathology, despite the fact that blisters and fatigue regularly result. And yet falsetto has been treated as the unwanted stepchild of male vocalism for well over a century. But, as I have argued, it is not falsetto’s fault. Falsetto happened to be out of fashion at the critical moment when the bonds between vocal sound and subjectivity were forged. With the emergence of a clinically practical laryngoscope, the living voice came into view. It was interpolated into preexisting taxonomies of difference and subjectivity, never upending them, but latching on parasitically. The laryngoscope did not pin the voice down categorically. Instead, it rendered the voice sufficiently knowable to assign meaning, lending scientific credence to a relationship between voice, body, and identity many had intuited. The voice became just another cog within a totalizing hermeneutics of the body; and just as the shape of the head was believed to suggest something essential about one’s character, so too the voice revealed one’s inner being to knowing ears. But while physiognomy and phrenology have faded away, rightly consigned to the rubbish bin of history as racist pseudo-science, the voice remains a cipher, a key instrument by which we decode others and through which we present ourselves to the world. That “in betweenness” countless scholars note only served to perpetuate our Victorian notions of vocal subjectivity: what and how a voice indexes has changed over time, but the voice’s revelatory powers have only recently come under scrutiny. 310 Countertenors only emerged as important players in the second half of the twentieth century, but when they did, their use of falsetto modestly threatened England’s music-historical sense of self. Mid-century musical Englishness was (and still is) tied to normative English masculinity. Falsetto— that unnatural, unmanly register—had no place in England’s historical soundscape, that is, until Purcell’s large-scale vocal works entered the standard repertoire. Alfred Deller’s falsetto-dominant way of singing seemed to solve the practical performance issues, but the sound of his voice had to be carefully curated, lest it queer both the composer’s and the nation’s traditional masculinity. What emerged was a strangely bifurcated way of attending to the countertenor, in which the voice was intentionally rendered acousmatic, or severed from the body. Considered separately, the voice could be as a sonic relic, the alterity of falsetto partitioned from the sounding body and relegated safely to the past; while at the same time one could be reassured in the conventional masculinity of the singer. Klaus Nomi was something else entirely. The scenes he inhabited—the East Village art scene, gay male opera fandom, and new wave pop—were all positioned outside of the mainstream. He emerged at a time and a place in which many artists questioned truths, master narratives, and notions of authenticity, and in which the boundaries between media, high and low, serious and frivolous were regularly transgressed through creative juxtaposition. Many performing artists brought a self-conscious theatricality to their onstage personas, but Nomi was unique in his use of vocal registration, especially operatic falsetto, to present a fractured, denaturalized stage persona. Nomi’s falsetto was false in the sense of its self-conscious artificiality, and yet it was also an authentic expression of who he was. His performances highlight the fundamental ambivalence of both camp and postmodern art in that, for all their 311 theatricality, exaggeration, and ironic distance, they could engender both real pleasure and an authentic sense of belonging for those who created and enjoyed it. Finally, I examined the strange place countertenors occupy within the representational logic of the operatic stage. The by now well-established association of falsetto with alterity translated into the emergence of a countertenor character type. At first glance, countertenors seem to disrupt the stereotyped relationship between voice, body, and character. But, since the first modern countertenor role, their non-normative mode of vocalism became a vehicle to present characters who were abnormal, “othered,” queer, magical, inhuman, and superhuman. My final chapter is bookended by studies of conventional works, or at least works in which convention play a central role. Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream uses the countertenor as an inversion of the conventional operatic authority figure; where in Adams’s El Niño we see the countertenors treated as utterly conventional despite the novel treatment of their strangely synthetic character. In Glass’s Akhnaten, falsetto serves as a means of expressing difference that has little or nothing to do with gender or the body. And finally, in Britten’s Death in Venice, falsetto and timbrally ambivalent high soft singing, which I term falsettish, serves to illustrate the protagonists progressively destabilized psyche. The link between the voice, the body, and identity is historically and culturally contingent. Like other forms of subjectivity, vocal subjectivity and normative vocality are learned. They are the abstraction of a highly diffuse set of cultural practices acquired and maintained in daily performance. In showing this, I have been a good academic and dismantled something: I have lifted the veil of assumption and revealed a concept’s constructed nature. But what does this do? Where do we go from here? If my job consists only of dispelling myths and pointing to the fabricated nature of our beliefs, then perhaps I have done a good job, but I feel 312 like that approach falls short if we stop. In the end, we simply end up instating a new form of totalizing interpretation, a new absolutism in place of the old. Rather, I hope that I have demonstrated that for all its contingency, vocal subjectivity has a very tangible social reality. While normative vocality, or other forms of vocal identity can be and have been used as a tool of subtle discrimination, it can also be a technology for good. Our voices tell others who we are, and it is necessary to grant others the agency to express what they will with their voice. Consider these two possible cases. Imagine a young child with no voice. I do not mean in the abstract, metaphorical sense, but one who, as the result of some severe birth defect or medical event, cannot produce coherent language. Many such children rely on generic synthetic voices, like the one Steven Hawking has. And even though these voices might work, many feel that they lack individuality. Recently, technology has reached a point where we can create individualized synthetic voices for people who otherwise lack them. In particular, Dr. Rupal Patel, a speech scientist, has been on the vanguard of creating this sort of voice, especially through her VocaliD project. In presenting her work, she articulates precisely the link between voice and subjectivity I have highlighted throughout my dissertation: I think voice matters because it’s so intricately tied to our identity, our culture, our history as an individual, and even where we’ve been and what we like to do. … We haven’t previously thought of a personalized voice as something necessary for people who use a synthetic voice, but each person’s voice is a vital part of who they are.1 1 Kirstie Saltsman, “Voice Matters! Speech Researcher Rupal Patel Builds Personalized Voices for People with Severely Impaired Speech,” Inside NIDCD Newsletter (Spring 2014), accessed 4 December 2017, https://www.nidcd.nih.gov/newsletter/2014/spring/voice-matters-speechresearcher-rupal-patel-builds-personalized-voices-people. 313 I am sure that no scholar would walk into her office and try to convince a patient that this new voice was a waste of time and money because it only serves to perpetuate a historically contingent notion of vocal subjectivity. While, indeed, it is contingent, contingency alone fails to account for the social reality, the lived reality of negotiating the self through the voice. Ari Agha, a genderqueer amateur singer, speaks to precisely this issue: The possibility of a lower voice is exciting, because the pitch of my voice immediately indicates to the world that I am a woman, even though I am not one. I am genderqueer. This means that I am neither a woman or a man. At first glance people may not be totally sure what to make of me, but as soon as I speak they decide that I am a woman based on the pitch of my voice. Constantly being misgendered as a woman is extraordinarily painful and invalidating. I am thrilled at the possibility of having a lower voice, but my decision to start T is not a simple one.…Singing in a choir is when I feel the most alive, the most connected with the core essence of myself, with my fellow musicians, and with the world around me.2 Agha’s account of their own relation between the voice and identity speaks to the stakes involved. Agha expresses the fundamental ambivalence of lived experience: at once the painful invalidation of being vocally misgendered, the tantalizing possibility realizing a truer expression of vocal self, and a keen awareness of the risks involved in pursuing it, especially the very real effects of testosterone on the vocal folds. In a way I have come full circle. I began the dissertation with a discussion of my own vocal privilege that emerged around the time my own vocal folds were drenched in testosterone. But one of the key differences between Agha and myself is the fact that I was granted my vocal privilege automatically, never questioned, never misgendered. I am uncomfortable only in my unmarked invisibility, not in the repeated, 2 Ari Agha, “To T or not to T? — Testosterone and the Transgender Singing Voice,” Medium 11 September 2016, https://medium.com/@ariagha/to-t-or-not-to-t-acbfe6d9a376. There has been a great deal of interest lately in creating an inclusive musical pedagogy for LGBTQ individuals. For a recent summary of the literature, see Charles Beale, “‘A Different Kind of Goose Bump’: Notes Toward an LGBTQ Choral Pedagogy,” in The Oxford Handbook of Choral Pedagogy, ed. Frank Abrahams and Paul D. Head (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017): 363-380. 314 demoralizing experience of being told that I do not sound as I should, or that the “me” you hear is not the “me” I really am. I conclude that vocal privilege, rather than vocal subjectivity, deserves to be dismantled. And I further caution scholars who approach the voice simplistically, even those who perceive falsetto as always already queer or othered. It is a knee-jerk reaction that only serves to reinscribe the very forms of power they rightly seek to critique. Falsetto can be, absolutely and positively, queer, but it does not have to be. All voices are, in a sense, falsetto. 315 BIBLIOGRAPHY ARCHIVES AND SPECIAL COLLECTIONS Britten-Pears Library, Aldeburgh UK BBC Written Archives Centre, Reading UK Deller Family Collection Morley College Archives REFERENCES Adams, Rachel and David Savran. The Masculinity Studies Reader. Malden, Mass: Blackwell, 2002. Adkins, M. King, New Wave: Image is Everything. 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RUGGER Research interests Interests center on the relationship between the voice, the body, and identity in the long twentieth century, especially in England and America; countertenors, especially the relationship between falsetto and masculinity; late-Victorian Voice Culture; post-1945 opera, especially Benjamin Britten; BBC, early music, and post-1945 English musical identity; new wave pop; historically-informed performance practice; sound and voice studies. Education Ph.D. in Musicology, Indiana University Dissertation: “Seeing the Voice, Hearing the Body: Countertenors, Voice Type, and Identity” (Phil Ford, advisor) Doctoral Minor: Voice 2018 (August) M.M. in Music History, Butler University 2011 B.A. in Music with Honors, Butler University 2009 Academic Appointments Lecturer in musicology, Indiana University Jacobs School of Music 2015–2017 Associate Instructor for music history undergraduate sequence, Indiana University Jacobs School of Music 2013–2015 Graduate Assistant in musicology, Indiana University Jacobs School of Music 2012–2013 Graduate Assistant in music history, Butler University 2009–2011 Teaching History of Western Music I, Antiquity-1800 (M401) History of Western Music II, 1800-Present (M402) Proseminar in Music History and Literature (M501) Other Teaching and Mentoring Private voice, violin, and violin teacher 2008–2017 Volunteer and Program Leader, Girls, Inc. Monroe County Tutored after school. Led educational programming for girls aged 5–18, including creative expression, nutrition, civics, fitness, and economics. 2013–2015 Violin and Viola Section Coach, Metropolitan Youth Orchestra, Indianapolis Coached string students in a community orchestra for inner-city youth 2009–2011 Conference Papers and Invited Talks “Countertenors and Early Music Vocality” *Invited talk* Utrecht Early Music Festival, Summer 2019 (upcoming) “Falsetto and Late-Victorian Voice Culture” Midwest Victorian Studies Conference, April 2018 North American British Music Studies Association, July 2018 “Do you Nomi?” Indiana University Musicology Colloquium Series, September 2017 “Alfred Deller, the Countertenor Voice, and English Masculinity.” National Meeting of the American Musicological Society, November 2017 Indiana University Musicology Colloquium Series, January 2017 Midwest Graduate Music Conference, February 2017 Midwest Chapter of the American Musicological Society, April 2017 Historical Performance: Theory, Practice, and Interdisciplinarity, May 2017 “Vaughan Williams, ‘Vaughan Williams,’ and the Historiography of Englishness.” Midwest Chapter of the American Musicological Society, April 2013. “J.S. Bach’s use of the Transverse Flute in Part II of the Christmas Oratorio.” Cambridge Bach Colloquium, March 2013. *Additionally, I am organizing a conference on countertenors with a colleague at Roosevelt University. I will be a keynote speaker, delivering multiple talks to a diverse audience. It will take place during 2019 in Chicago, pending budgetary approval. Publication “’Ambiguous Venice:’ Falsettish singing in Britten’s final opera.” [In Preparation] “Alfred Deller, the Countertenor Voice, and English Masculinity.” [In Preparation] “Eric Saylor, English Pastoral Music: From Arcadia to Utopia, 1900–1955.” Journal of Musicological Research [Forthcoming] “Brian Kane, Sound Unseen: Acousmatic Sound in Theory and Practice.” Journal of Musicological Research 35/1 (2016): 64-66. “Report: Johann Sebastian Bach and his Sons.” Bach Notes 21 (2014): 1-4. Academic Awards Jacobs School of Music Dissertation Year Fellowship, 2017-2018 Jacobs School of Music Doctoral Fellowship, 2011-2015 Butler Summer Institute Fellow, 2007 Vocal Education & Training Voice Teachers and Coaches: Patricia Stiles, Steven Rickards, Robert Harrison, Davis Hart Conductors: David Effron, Dana Marsh, Jeffrey Thomas, Constantine Kitsopoulos, Andrew Megill, Paul Goodwin, Eric Stark, John Butt, Michael Beattie, Scott Allen Jarrett Masterclasses: Jeffrey Thomas, Derek Chester, Josefien Stoppelenberg, Chrstine Brandes, David Gordon, David Newman, Peter Harvey, Andrew Megill, Max van Egmond, Judith Malafronte, William Sharp Young Artist Programs Carmel Bach Festival [Virginia Adams Best Fellow] 2015 American Bach Soloists Academy 2014 and 2015 Competitions Finalist Audrey Rooney (Kentucky Bach Choir) Vocal Competition 2016 Finalist Tafelmusik Vocal Competition 2016 Semi-finalist New York Oratorio Competition 2015