Countermelody

Another episode of Christmas music! The first part is a continuation of the previous All-Tenor Holiday Extravaganza. We hear from Luther Saxon, Roland Hayes, James Melton, Brian Sullivan, Richard Crooks, Raoul Jobin, Jussi Björling, Richard Verreau, Fritz Wunderlich, Rudolf Schock, René Kollo, John McCormack, Peter Schreier, and Mel Tormé (with an assist from Judy herself!) And for those who have ambivalent feelings about this holiday, the final third of the program foregrounds six of my most favoritest Depressing Christmas Pop Songs, sung by Eileen Farrell, Rita Gardner, Joni Mitchell, Edith Piaf, Judy Garland and (in memory of Marie Fredriksson), Roxette. A line from Judy’s song “After the Holidays” (words and music by the late John Meyer) provides the inspiration for the episode title: “I know it’s hard, but try.” Countermelody is the podcast devoted to the glory and the power of the human voice raised in song. Singer and vocal aficionado Daniel Gundlach explores great singers of the past and present focusing in particular on those who are less well-remembered today than they should be. Daniel’s lifetime in music as a professional countertenor, pianist, vocal coach, voice teacher, and author yields an exciting array of anecdotes, impressions, and “inside stories.” At Countermelody’s core is the celebration of great singers of all stripes, their instruments, and the connection they make to the words they sing. By clicking on the following link (https://linktr.ee/CountermelodyPodcast) you can find the dedicated Countermelody website which contains additional content including artist photos and episode setlists. The link will also take you to Countermelody’s Patreon page, where you can pledge your monthly or yearly support at whatever level you can afford.

This week I present two episodes featuring Christmas music which I originally produced six years ago, in the earliest days of Countermelody. Both episodes zero in on tenors; I’ll be republishing them both this week. This first episode features a panoply of superb tenors (including Georges Thill, Richard Lewis, Roland Hayes, Tino Rossi, Franco Corelli, Ernst Haefliger, Richard Tauber, Charles Holland, Karl Erb, and Matthew Swensen) in repertoire ranging across the spectrum (Handel, Adam, Gounod, Bach, Berlin, and traditional Weihnachtsmusik), with some surprises along the way. The episode concludes with a brief musical tribute to Dalton Baldwin, Gérard Souzay’s partner and collaborator, who had just died on 12 December 2019 at the age of 87 as this episode was first going to press. Countermelody is a podcast devoted to the glory and the power of the human voice raised in song. Singer and vocal aficionado Daniel Gundlach explores great singers of the past and present focusing in particular on those who are less well-remembered today than they should be. Daniel’s lifetime in music as a professional countertenor, pianist, vocal coach, voice teacher, and author yields an exciting array of anecdotes, impressions, and “inside stories.” At Countermelody’s core is the celebration of great singers of all stripes, their instruments, and the connection they make to the words they sing. By clicking on the following link (https://linktr.ee/CountermelodyPodcast) you can find the dedicated Countermelody website which contains additional content including artist photos and episode setlists. The link will also take you to Countermelody’s Patreon page, where you can pledge your monthly or yearly support at whatever level you can afford.

Today, December 19, would have been my late mother’s 90th birthday. These past three months since her death have been so emotionally draining for me, and would have been even without the shitshow that the world has become in that time. On the other hand, I have been able to appreciate more fully the complicated bond that she and I shared. At the time of her death, I did two memorial tributes to “Jane’s Divas” and today, in honor of her birthday, I present a singer that we both adored, the Dutch doyenne of art song, Elly Ameling. And because I’ve offered so many Elly Ameling episodes already on Countermelody, I thought it completely fitting to celebrate our beloved Elly in the repertoire in which she had virtually no peer: the Lieder of Franz Schubert. I’ve chosen a setlist of some of my favorite Schubert songs, in performances ranging over nearly 30 years of Ameling’s career. And leave it to me, there are more than a few surprises to be encountered herein! Countermelody is a podcast devoted to the glory and the power of the human voice raised in song. Singer and vocal aficionado Daniel Gundlach explores great singers of the past and present focusing in particular on those who are less well-remembered today than they should be. Daniel’s lifetime in music as a professional countertenor, pianist, vocal coach, voice teacher, and author yields an exciting array of anecdotes, impressions, and “inside stories.” At Countermelody’s core is the celebration of great singers of all stripes, their instruments, and the connection they make to the words they sing. By clicking on the following link (https://linktr.ee/CountermelodyPodcast) you can find the dedicated Countermelody website which contains additional content including artist photos and episode setlists. The link will also take you to Countermelody’s Patreon page, where you can pledge your monthly or yearly support at whatever level you can afford.

Today I was torn between bringing you an episode with trashy secular holiday songs or taking the high road with the Christmas portion of Paul Hindemith’s Das Marienleben cycle, featuring recordings by Jennie Tourel and Erich Itor Kahn (in the songs) preceded by Lotte Lehmann, reading from the original Rainer Maria Rilke poetry cycle. I chose the high road, and I think that I chose wisely. Neither Lehmann’s nor Tourel’s exceptionally beautiful recordings was ever reissued in any format, and these days it is quite rare to even find a copy of either. I was lucky recently to obtain copies of both and I offer the poems and songs from the first half of the cycle here, supplemented by Irmgard Seefried singing two Hindemith motets on the life of Christ, the versatile British soprano Dorothy Dorow singing a carol text set by Arnold Bax. And for those who would have preferred Holiday Trash, I begin the proceedings with the the iconic “Not on Christmas” sequence from John Waters’s 1974 masterpiece, Female Trouble. In short: something for everyone in this holiday episode! Countermelody is a podcast devoted to the glory and the power of the human voice raised in song. Singer and vocal aficionado Daniel Gundlach explores great singers of the past and present focusing in particular on those who are less well-remembered today than they should be. Daniel’s lifetime in music as a professional countertenor, pianist, vocal coach, voice teacher, and author yields an exciting array of anecdotes, impressions, and “inside stories.” At Countermelody’s core is the celebration of great singers of all stripes, their instruments, and the connection they make to the words they sing. By clicking on the following link (https://linktr.ee/CountermelodyPodcast) you can find the dedicated Countermelody website which contains additional content including artist photos and episode setlists. The link will also take you to Countermelody’s Patreon page, where you can pledge your monthly or yearly support at whatever level you can afford.

Anytime I do an episode on Fritz Wunderlich, the sun breaks through the clouds, emotionally speaking. Possessor of a bright-timbred voice of such exquisite beauty anchored by a profoundly satisfying musical sensibility, he and his legacy inspire rather than sadden me. Today I’ve chosen a duet program, because it allows me to showcase Fritz’s effortless stylistic flexibility, while at the same time highlighting a rainbow of singing partners, some of whom are old favorites, and others of whom might not yet be well-known to my listeners. Today’s treasure-trove of singers includes sopranos Maria Stader, Lucia Popp, Teresa Stratas, Erika Köth, Edith Mathis, Stefania Woytowicz, Pilar Lorengar, Melitta Muszely, Trude Eipperle, Hilde Güden, Anneliese Rothenberger, and Ruth-Margret Pütz; mezzo-soprano Christa Ludwig; and baritones Hermann Prey and Marcel Cordes, among others. Wunderlich and his co-stars sing repertoire ranging from the early Baroque through Janáček, including a particularly generous helping of Italian opera (albeit sung mostly in German), German Singspiel and Viennese operetta. It’s a long episode, so don’t hesitate to divide the episode up into bite-sized segments. No matter how you slice it up, I forecast a blissful response to these clarion tones! Countermelody is a podcast devoted to the glory and the power of the human voice raised in song. Singer and vocal aficionado Daniel Gundlach explores great singers of the past and present focusing in particular on those who are less well-remembered today than they should be. Daniel’s lifetime in music as a professional countertenor, pianist, vocal coach, voice teacher, and author yields an exciting array of anecdotes, impressions, and “inside stories.” At Countermelody’s core is the celebration of great singers of all stripes, their instruments, and the connection they make to the words they sing. By clicking on the following link (https://linktr.ee/CountermelodyPodcast) you can find the dedicated Countermelody website which contains additional content including artist photos and episode setlists. The link will also take you to Countermelody’s Patreon page, where you can pledge your monthly or yearly support at whatever level you can afford.