DeMented

Sometimes singers find more in an operatic role than even the composer could have imagined. Soprano Wilhelmine Schröder-Devrient "inspired Wagner to implement his impossible dream of a titanic ritual-theatre when she was playing Beethoven's Leonore." Great operatic roles inspire great divas, and they in turn, inspire audiences. What opera fan does not secretly want to tear up the Covent Garden stage with a flamboyant Carmen, or stun a La Scala audience with Elvira's taxing "Qui la voce" mad scene in "I Puritani"? Speaking of mad scenes, there are many truly demented roles in opera: Lady Macbeth, Médée, Azucena, and of course, Lucia of the blood-stained dagger and nightgown. Even basses and tenors go crazy now and then (I'm thinking of Assur in Rossini's "Semiramide" and Qin Shi Huang in Tan Dun's "The First Emperor"). However, "Demented" is about great divas--from Nellie Melba to Maria Callas (this book was published in 1984)--so we'll ignore the divos for the length of this review. Ethan Mordden culls the merely competent sopranos (and the occasional mezzo) from the operatic flock, and concentrates his energy, wit, and impressive learning on the greatest of the prima donnas. These are the ladies who could take to the stage and hold it against Hurricane Katrina. They have the voice, the musicianship, the temperament, and the commitment to their roles that keep audiences not merely entertained, but enthralled. Some readers may disagree with Mordden's emphasis on Maria Callas, but I don't think anyone could argue with his overall choices. He is not merely writing a survey or a set of biographies, but attempting to explain the innermost nature of great divas, and why we are attracted to them. It's not just the music. Sometimes it's the melodrama both on and off of the stage. When a great Brünnhilde dies, so do the onlooking gods. This author is a pleasure to read, and "Demented" is packed with witty anecdotes about the divas, their stage directors, maestros, and impresarios. One of Mordden's dictums for divas is "Demented devours" which is the ultimate fate of many great singers in this book. Their talent devoured them. Like this book, their penultimate chapter is "Fall" and their ultimate chapter is "Immortality."

This 1984 book was written by a man who is a chronicler of and gadfly to the New York musical theater, both in its operatic and Broadway aspects. Its subject is the largest of the larger than life ladies of opera, the prima donna. Opera was invented as a scholarly and aristocratic diversion late in the Sixteenth Century. Its first stars, castrated male sopranos and altos in many cases, emerged early in the Eighteenth Century. And from that date, every succeeding historian and critic has unreservedly yearned for the good old days while deploring the current fallen state of singing and artistic integrity. This book is traditional in all senses of the word. It tells of a glorious past when singers had real training and dedication, before the clumsy practitioners of verismo style sold art for a mess of pottage in the form shoddy vocal thrills. As far as the distant past is concerned, the coverage of the book might best be regarded as spotty. The great castrato Farinelli makes in into the text (but not into the index.) The feuds of Handel's battling prima donnas are granted an allusion. Knees are dutifully bent before the altars of Maria Malibran, Nellie Melba, and Lotte Lehmann, but once blazing names, such as Patti, Nordica, and Tetrazzini are sicklied o'er with the pale hue of expedience. Morddern's view is that of a dedicated season ticket holder at the Metropolitan Opera. He has some acquaintance with other opera companies that may be reached by day-trip from Manhattan. He knows of Chicago and has heard rumors of San Francisco. He has read a couple of books about Europe. From internal evidence, largely his casual dismissal of Maria Caniglia, Zinka Milanov and Kirsten Flagstad, the goddesses of years straddling World War II, as old hat, I deduce that Morddern became passionate about Metopera around 1960. The essential period he covers is the latter portion of the reign the Emperor Bing the Merciless. His true goddesses are the ladies who replaced those moldy older divas: Callas, Tebaldi and Sutherland. His passion is for the Italian wing of opera, especially the bel canto works of Donizetti and Bellini. He is willing to welcome some of Verdi--La Traviata, yes, certainly, but Falstaff, pish, a mere ensemble piece unworthy of a prima donna. Richard Strauss is an island not far from the main. Farther away are continents called Mozart and Wagner, but only some of their tallest mountain peaks, Don Giovanni and Lohengrin, say, hold interest for Morddern. The book is packed with facts, lore and opinions. The facts (Callas and di Stefano formed a famous soprano-tenor duo) are generally reliable. The lore (Maria Callas overcame enormous obstacles to become a fabulous diva for a brief, shining moment before falling into high tragedy) sets out truths for the lover of opera that achieve a higher level than mere mechanical fidelity to dreary actuality. The opinions are generally of a crackpot nature, that is to say his half-baked no