Montserrat Caballe: Casta Diva

Rating:
Summary: She deserves so much better!
Review: A better editor perhaps would have helped streamline this extremely extensive biography of Caballe's carreer. It is a chronicle of almost every appearance she ever made, though there is little analytical detail of even her most legendary and important performances. The word that comes to mind is "homogenized" - all the stories and information just seem to run together year after year. More anecdotes, deeper analysis of performances, and cutting of much extraneous text would have made this a better read. There are still some interesting stories, though I did have the feeling throughout that the authors didn't want to include any negative remarks regarding collegues, impressarios, or opera companies unless it was absolutely neccessary. That might be a fair and safe way to write, but it is not very interesting in a carrer retrospective like this. However, better that we have at least this less than perfect document (which, incidentally, has been totally approved and authorized by Caballe herself)than to have nothing at all, since this is really the only biography available about her entire carreer.

Rating:
Summary: It could have been better - but it's all we have.
Review: A better editor perhaps would have helped streamline this extremely extensive biography of Caballe's carreer. It is a chronicle of almost every appearance she ever made, though there is little analytical detail of even her most legendary and important performances. The word that comes to mind is "homogenized" - all the stories and information just seem to run together year after year. More anecdotes, deeper analysis of performances, and cutting of much extraneous text would have made this a better read. There are still some interesting stories, though I did have the feeling throughout that the authors didn't want to include any negative remarks regarding collegues, impressarios, or opera companies unless it was absolutely neccessary. That might be a fair and safe way to write, but it is not very interesting in a carrer retrospective like this. However, better that we have at least this less than perfect document (which, incidentally, has been totally approved and authorized by Caballe herself)than to have nothing at all, since this is really the only biography available about her entire carreer.

Rating:
Summary: She deserves so much better!
Review: I am NOT a die hard Caballe fan but I greatly admire her and respect her. That said, this is a woefully constructed book! Seems like the authors did not even consult her on this at all. Also, the verbage, and nearly all the phrases seem to be written in an over the top and very self gloating way....almost like the author was disecting a thesaurus!
I SO wish she had kept a diary of her performances. We get little information on what she thought of her roles, costumes, directors, conductors and nearly everyone a music monger loves!
Buyer beware. My idea of a well writted biography is the Sutherland book by Norma Major. My favorite autobiography is by Sutherland herself entitled "A Prima Donna's Progress. I may sound like a Sutherland promoter but really......I just like these books. I didn't much care for the way Christa Ludwig's or Gedda's auto's were writted too much. I did like Beverly Sills' quite a bit though (this is hard for me to say because she is my second favorite artist)I do think she sounds rather full of herself.
Just my little old opinion. :)

Rating:
Summary: Montserrat Caballe, thrilling voice and a nice lady.
Review: It is a good book. It's principal interest for me is the information of the musical foundations, her early years as a singer in Basel and Bremen, that Caballe laid which enabled her to become one of the leading sopranos of the post war period. She does, of course, have an instantly recognisable voice, and a very beautiful voice it is, and it is her voice that has given me so very much pleasure since I first heard her as Lucrezia Borgia in London in 1968. The authors and Denny Dayviss will forgive me, but as far as London was concerned all Caballe's best work was in concert performances. The Catarina Cornaro contained some of the finest soprano singing I ever expect to hear in my life time. It really was a case of less is more. I remember a Trovatore Leonore at Covent Garden when I longed to cry out: "For God sake, just keep still and sing." It was a very much a case of confusing movement with action. When Caballe just stood and sang, it was rarely less than perfection. Perfection.

The book is well enough written, and fairly meticulously researched, and the narrative flows in an easy readability, which makes it quite unputdownable.

I do have one or two quibbles about certain aspects of where the authors are coming from, like, for instance, Caballe's legendary sense of humour. Believe me, in her concerts, all that giggling and little asides to the audience could be very wearing. Page 256: It's no good Caballe trying to back track, because she did say she was imitating Schwarzkopf when she [Caballe] sang that fearful little number, "G'scatlzi." I heard her say it, and I've asked others who were present, and they agree. Caballe could be quite taste free at times. Likewise little things where the authors who were not present at certain incidents, like the Covent Garden Traviata, where Madame wore her own costumes [page 170] and the management's ackowledgement of this. The authors think it was a fuss about nothing. I can shut my eyes and see those costumes now, costumes which so hideously inappropriate to the production that they looked like fancy dress. [Watching Caballe pouring stage champagne down her cleavage wasn't much fun either.] It was Covent Garden's habit to acknowledge that a singer brought their own costumes in. I can recall that both Renata Scotto in Butterfly and Joan Sutherland in La sonnambula wore their own costumes and there was a tasteful little line on the crdeits page acknowledging these satorial infringements.

From page 110 onwards through to the end of the narrative the diva ricochets from one operatic cancellation to another, and another, and another. It makes awfully dispiriting reading, as does the endless list of illnesses the diva suffered from. It's odd that when Callas withdrew from Norma after Act 1, in Rome 1958, it effectively ended her career, certainly in Italy. Caballe, on the other hand, cancelled more performances in certain seasons of her career that Callas did in the whole of her career from 1947 to 1960. After reading this book I realise that Caballe simply accepted more engagements that she could feasibly handle.

I'm happy to read on page 115 that John Ardoin is a "Callas expert." Indeed he is. I was less happy to read on page 162 that Stelios Galatopoulos is a "Callas authority." I'm afraid he's anything but. [See reviews of his Maria Callas, Sacred Monster.] I also loathe operas being described as war-horses, whatever does it mean?

I'm less indulgent about Caballe's size, weight problem, etc., etc., than the authors. It's possible to be slim and beautiful and have a great voice with superb musicianship. [Yes, I do mean Raina Kabaivanska - the world's most under-rated soprano.]

All in all, this is a good book, and it does bring back wonderful memories. You won't hear Caballe's like again.

Rating:
Summary: An impressive study of an amazing artist
Review: Maria Callas is quoted in this book as advising Caballe that "When you stop arousing controversy, Montserrat, go home. Until then, let the cat fight the dogs". Probably the Spanish soprano didn't need Callas' advice in this regard, but in any event, like all great artists, she has aroused great passion and divided opinion. Few, however, who know anything about the art of great singing, would deny her place as one of the greats of the 20th Century. My admiration for her is based, first and foremost, on the artistry: her's was one of the most beautiful voices, but rarely did she just rely on this fact. Rather, she would time and again find the very centre of a character through imaginative phrasing and peerless use of colour and shading. Vocal acuity was also a notable feature of her art - one that critics more and more are recognising when they return to her recordings and find within them levels of artistry that they took somewhat for granted in the past.

For such an important singer, we have waited a long time for a biography. It might have been expected that she, like most singers, would have received a 'pop' version of a book, one that skated over the surface and which, once read,would be left to languish on the shelf pining for a more detailed and serious treatment to come along by someone with an historical perspective in which to place the artist's contribution to the great lyric tradition. What is impressive, however, is that the Spanish soprano has been fortunate to receive a worthy treatment in this, the very first major book about her.

In my opinion (and in the views of the several friends I have leant it to), Pullen and Taylor's biography manages to be both entertaining and packed with important detail. From all this emerges an engaging portait of Caballe both as as an artist and as a private woman. This achievement should not be under-estimated given the problems of dealing with a living person and one who, in common with all major artists, undoubtedly has a vulnerable ego to protect. I have superficially enjoyed many of the portraits about other living singers - Tebaldi, Domingo, Bartoli, Te Kanawa, to name but a few - but this book serves as an historical document: it provides the detail that is necessary for the book to become a work of reference, and it is also written in a lively and knowledgeable style, so that it can be enjoyed in its own right as an highly entertaining read. Because of the density of detail, it's possible to take the book down from the shelves and dip into it to discover facts and anecdotes that have been forgotten since the last read. And the authors' observations in the extensive critical discography that concludes the book reveal them to be perceptive connoisseurs of the lyric art of singing. They assess Caballe's greatness without blindly singing her praises for everything she does.

I would unhesitatatingly recommend this book, which I have read in the German and English editions.

Rating:
Summary: An impressive study of an amazing artist
Review: Maria Callas is quoted in this book as advising Caballe that "When you stop arousing controversy, Montserrat, go home. Until then, let the cat fight the dogs". Probably the Spanish soprano didn't need Callas' advice in this regard, but in any event, like all great artists, she has aroused great passion and divided opinion. Few, however, who know anything about the art of great singing, would deny her place as one of the greats of the 20th Century. My admiration for her is based, first and foremost, on the artistry: her's was one of the most beautiful voices, but rarely did she just rely on this fact. Rather, she would time and again find the very centre of a character through imaginative phrasing and peerless use of colour and shading. Vocal acuity was also a notable feature of her art - one that critics more and more are recognising when they return to her recordings and find within them levels of artistry that they took somewhat for granted in the past.

For such an important singer, we have waited a long time for a biography. It might have been expected that she, like most singers, would have received a 'pop' version of a book, one that skated over the surface and which, once read,would be left to languish on the shelf pining for a more detailed and serious treatment to come along by someone with an historical perspective in which to place the artist's contribution to the great lyric tradition. What is impressive, however, is that the Spanish soprano has been fortunate to receive a worthy treatment in this, the very first major book about her.

In my opinion (and in the views of the several friends I have leant it to), Pullen and Taylor's biography manages to be both entertaining and packed with important detail. From all this emerges an engaging portait of Caballe both as as an artist and as a private woman. This achievement should not be under-estimated given the problems of dealing with a living person and one who, in common with all major artists, undoubtedly has a vulnerable ego to protect. I have superficially enjoyed many of the portraits about other living singers - Tebaldi, Domingo, Bartoli, Te Kanawa, to name but a few - but this book serves as an historical document: it provides the detail that is necessary for the book to become a work of reference, and it is also written in a lively and knowledgeable style, so that it can be enjoyed in its own right as an highly entertaining read. Because of the density of detail, it's possible to take the book down from the shelves and dip into it to discover facts and anecdotes that have been forgotten since the last read. And the authors' observations in the extensive critical discography that concludes the book reveal them to be perceptive connoisseurs of the lyric art of singing. They assess Caballe's greatness without blindly singing her praises for everything she does.

I would unhesitatatingly recommend this book, which I have read in the German and English editions.

Rating:
Summary: This effort isn't worthy of Caballe!
Review: The authors of this book are worshipful, but that's about all. What a disappointment, especially as it's the only extant full-length biography of one of the colossal singers of the twentieth century. The first third of the book concerns itself with Caballe's beginnings, and for the most part is interesting enough, at least to the hopelessly seduced fan, but it soon becomes a week by week itinerary diary of the most mundane kind. Madame sang such and such at this place, caught a plane to such and where, sang this and that at such and such opera house....on and on. Only occasionally is there even an apparent flash of genuine interest on the part of the authors. A writer of conscience could certainly create a worthy biography of Montserrat Caballe, after all, her body of work is the stuff of legends, but this half-cooked effort really demeans the biographer's art. The elements of abiding interest surrounding Caballe, the voice itself, her miraculously docile character, among a number of other standout elements are treated shabbily in this book. A useful complete discography is appended at the end.