Montserrat Caballe: New Essays in Ethnic American Literatures

When reading this biography I was amazed of the enormous capacity of this singer, you get the impression that sang almost everything, almost every day during her long career - and this in spate of so many serious health problems. The book is filled with interesting details, I just could not stop reading, and immediately bought several more of her records. Highly recommended!

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.

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 h

The above summarises what can be achieved with this volume. A tribute and paean to one of the(or perhaps, THE) greatest sopranos not only of this century but in all history, this is indeed long overdue but once read, is worth every single second of the wait. Chronicling her life story from her childhood in war-torn Spain to her formative years in Basel and Bremen, to the final day when she burst into the international spotlight and thereafter, this book more than serves as a bible for the Caballe fan. Thorough and all-encompassing in its scope, it provides more than just a cursory glance into Caballe's life. However, its ambitious scale does not in any way diminish the value of its "lesser" contents - the intimate moments that are revealed and shared with the readers. This compendium takes on even more weight and profundity especially when Caballe herself read through the entire draft and personally signed every page as authorisation. Filled to the ends and brimming over with more information than one could ever need, this books also scores with its subtle humour laced throughout the book. Discover how true Caballe's sense of humour is with many examples. Appended at the end with a critical biography, in which Caballe had no hand in, the authors air their views and opinions of the recordings made by Caballe, and if I may say so, they are spot on. Why not read this book if you love classical music. Get this book if you love opera. If you love Caballe, then beg, borrow or steal one if you must, by hook or by crook. It will be the only investment that has definite paybacks. A perfect tribute to La Superba, Montserrat Caballe, Prima Donna Assoluta.