Earthy Singing, Sensuous Voices: Timbre and orthodoxies of beautiful singing in operatic early recordings (1900-1940)

Evaluating timbre in the early recordings of singers can be crucial for understanding the evolution of performing practices. Indeed, several researches across ethnomusicology, popular music studies, and voice studies have shown how vocal performers use timbre as a potent signifier for subjectivity, while listeners locate performers’ identities through vocal colour. In this chapter, we focus on timbre to identify the new orthodoxies of ‘beautiful’ singing developed during the first half of the 20th century, as testified by early recordings made both by sopranos and tenors. We call on concepts and tools developed within timbre studies, the attentive reading of late nineteenth-century vocal treatises and our own expert understanding of singing in order to frame our attempts to define which timbres were preferred at crucial portions of the vocal range, and for which reason(s). Barbara Gentili (pp. 78-82) explores the creation of the verismo soprano through selected recordings of Eugenia Burzio and Emma Carelli, two prominent prime donne of early twentieth-century Italy. Progressively abandoning the ‘pure’ vocal sound of bel canto these singers developed a novel system for blending the vocal registers that lent a fuller and darker quality to their voice, allowing them to embody the compelling sensuality of the new verismo characters. Daniele Palma (pp. 82-87) focuses on tenors, by considering significative examples from Bellini’s Norma, Verdi’s Otello and Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci. The analysis of recordings through the lenses of timbre allows to highlight the different steps in the process of codification of the tenore di forza in the first half of the 20th century. Furthermore, it shows how timbre became a contested territory between this progressive codification and the search for vocal individuality and artistic recognisability by preeminent interpreters.