Divo: Great Tenors, Baritones, and Basses Discuss Their Roles

by Helena Matheopoulos

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060156341
• ISBN13: 9780060156343
• Release Date: January 1986
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Length: 338 Pages
• Weight: 1.55 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Exclusive Interviews with leading male opera singers

"Divo" is a book for opera cognoscenti, singers, and opera singer groupies (I count myself as one of the latter).I suggest starting this book by checking out the interviews of your favorite singers. Then work your way through the interviews in favorite categories of singers, rather than reading "Divo" front to back. I started with Sam Ramey's interview, worked my way through the rest of the basses (Kurt Moll, Nicolai Ghiaurov, and Paata Burchuladze), the bass-baritones, the baritones, and so on up the `fach' through the tenors.There are black-and-white photographs of all of the contributors, most of them publicity stills of the singer in his favorite role(s). Helena Matheopoulos does a good job of combining each subject's biography and career highlights with his opinions on how a particular role should be sung, tips on the best way to practice, advice to singers who are still trying to make that big break into operatic stardom, and so forth."Divo" is not by any means a book of gossipy operatic anecdotes (although there are some light moments). It is a book that "explores the relationship between each singer and some of the roles with which he is identified."Serious business, indeed.If you are searching for something frothier on the subject of opera singers, try "Skeletons from the Opera Closet" by David L. Groover and Cecil C. Conner, Jr. (one of my all-time favorites), or "Opera Anecdotes" by Ethan Mordden.