The wild, wonderful world of opera

Editor’s note: Classical music of any kind often feels boring and inaccessible—but not with Narendra Kusnur. He offers an accessible and fun guide to Western classical music—which has shaped movie soundtracks and top 40 hits alike. 

This month’s guide takes us into the flamboyant world of opera singers—which extends far beyond the revered Three Tenors. Even better, he offers a delightful sampling of their pop music collabs—with the likes of JLo, James Brown, and Bryan Adams. As always, we’ve put all the music referenced in the article in a YouTube playlist for you to enjoy.

Written by: Narendra Kusnur has been a music journalist for over 40 years—including a decade-long stint covering the beat at the Mid-Day newspaper. He currently writes for The Hindu, Free Press Journal, Hindustan Times, and Rolling Stone India—besides the in-house magazines of prestigious institutions—such as NCPA and Shanmukhananda Hall.

A significant musical event took place in Mumbai in September. For the first time since its launch in 1993, the famous Operalia competition was held in South Asia, when the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA) hosted the Grand Finale. The competition, which selects the best new voices in operatic music, is the brainchild of Spanish tenor Placido Domingo, who visited Mumbai.

Music lovers recognise 83-year-old Domingo as one of the Three Tenors, along with Luciano Pavarotti of Italy and Jose Carreras, also of Spain. Their 1990 album ‘Carreras Domingo Pavarotti In Concert’, conducted by Mumbai-born Zubin Mehta, is the best selling Western classical record of all time, with 10 million units sold by the Decca label. The same trio joined Mehta to release ‘The Three Tenors In Concert’ in 1994, selling eight million units for Atlantic Records.

While staying true to their art, all three singers have played a small but significant role in pop culture, either through collaborations or by singing popular songs. The idea was to attract newer audiences to opera. Before we get into what a tenor means and some examples, let’s hear two familiar tunes presented by The Three Tenors—‘O Sole Mio’ and ‘Nessun Dorna’.

The first piece, ‘O Sole Mio’, is a Neapolitan song, which means that it originated in Naples, Italy. The title translates to ‘My Sunshine’. In fact, Elvis Presley says his hit ‘It’s Now Or Never’ is inspired by this song, as seen in the video below. 

‘Nessun Dorma’ is a song from the final act of Giacomo Puccini’s opera ‘Turandot’. For a popular touch, let’s hear a version by the great American soul singer Aretha Franklin (who, being a woman, isn’t a tenor, though the song was written with a tenor in mind).

What exactly is a tenor?

Quite simply, the tenor is the second highest male voice after the countertenor. One theory is that the tenor is the highest chest voice, as the countertenor is not natural, and uses false notes. To understand the difference, let’s watch the video of Polish countertenor Jakub Josef Orlinski from Antonio Vivaldi’s ‘Il Giustino’:

This one’s of Peruvian tenor Jian Diego Florez in Giuseppe Verdi’s ‘La Traviata’.

The name ‘tenor’ comes from the Latin word ‘tenere’ which means ‘to hold’, and tenors are said to hold down the melody and drive the song. In a vocal orchestral setting, the tenor is comparable to a trumpet. In opera, tenors have several sub-categories, ranging from the softer sound of the tenore buffo, common in comedies, to warm and bright ‘lyric tenors’ to the heavy sound of the ‘heldentenor’, used in heroic roles or tragedies. Male adult voices are categorised as tenors, but young men with breaking or developing voices are not considered.

More than just ‘Three’

Besides the Three Tenors, other well-known tenors are Enrico Caruso, Beniamino Gigli and Andrea Bocelli of Italy, Danish-American singer Lauritz Melchior, Jon Vickers of Canada, and Jussi Bjorling and Nikolai Gedda of Sweden. In fact, Caruso was the first gramophone star to sell more than a million copies with his 1907 recording of ‘Vesti La Glubba’ from the opera ‘Pagliacchi’ by Ruggero Leoncavallo. Here’s the track.

While we have stuck to opera singers, there are many in the rock and pop world—who because of their high notes—have been called tenors. Examples would include Freddie Mercury of Queen, Chester Benington of Linkin Park, Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden, Bono of U2, and Michael Jackson. Classical purists have questioned their status as tenors. Let’s call them singers with a high full-chested voice. 

To truly mix things up, let’s listen to Freddie Mercury sing a rock song ‘Keep Passing The Open Windows’ for Queen and collaborate with Spanish opera diva Montserrat Caballe—who’s a soprano—one with the highest female voice. 

The second track is called ‘Barcelona’.

Collaborations and covers

Tenors have often done their own versions of popular songs. Nino Rota’s ‘The Godfather’ love theme was remade as an Italian tribute in the song ‘Parla Piu Piano’. Let’s hear the original version, sung by Andy Williams first.

This is an operatic version by German tenor Jonas Kaufmann.

Placido Domingo has sung many popular songs in his own way. In 1981, he collaborated with country-pop star John Denver and others on the album ‘Perhaps Love’, doing opera-influenced versions of hit tunes like ‘Annie’s Song’, and ‘Yesterday’. Though the purists didn’t welcome his experiment, the album made it to the top 20 of the US and UK charts. He also experimented with Latin and Central American forms like tango and mariachi, to expand his repertoire. Check out his version of John Denver’s ‘Annie’s Song’ below:

Here’s the title track of the ‘Perhaps Love’ album.

Pavarotti has collaborated with some leading musicians, too. In live shows, he has appeared with James Brown and Bryan Adams. But the best known example is the 1995 song ‘Miss Sarajevo’ with U2, where he sings the opera part. The song is about a group of women who protest through a beauty pageant during the siege of Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia. Pavarotti’s appearance after three and a half minutes gives a fresh lift to the song. The U2 singer Bono is quoted as having said the Italian was very keen to work with the Irish band, and they thought this song was perfect. Here’s the video.

For his part, Carreras forayed less into popular music, with the exception of the musical ‘West Side Story’ where he worked with composer Leonard Bernstein. This was in 1984, when Bernstein decided to re-record songs from the famous musical in an operatic form, using Carreras and New Zealand soprano Kiri Te Kanawa. It’s a well-known fact that Bernstein was pretty rough with Carreras during the recording, often chiding him for his mistakes. But the end result was widely appreciated. Here’s the studio recording of ‘Maria’ from the musical.

The other tenor

We’ve talked about different tenors so far. In the contemporary world, there is one more singer who has experimented with popular songs. At 66, Andrea Bocelli belongs to the generation after the Three Tenors. Apart from the many operatic arias, the Italian tenor has recorded the Latin American hit ‘Besame Mucho’, Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’, Irving Berlin’s ‘Cheek To Cheek’, Henry Mancini’s ‘Moon River’ and the Elvis Presley-popularised ‘Can’t Help Falling In Love’. Let’s check out ‘Quizas’, Bocelli’s duet with Jennifer Lopez. In case you find the tune familiar, it’s the original Spanish version of the English song titled ‘Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps’.

Those were some pieces sung by different tenors, either in the pure classical form or through covers of popular fare. It’s said a tenor’s voice can shatter glass windows —if that happens after reading this column, this writer is not to be held responsible. 

As always have created a handy playlist of all the tracks mentioned on splainer’s YouTube channel.

PS: If you need a list of all the amazing music shared by Naren:

• ‘O Sole Mio’ by The Three Tenors
• ‘Nessun Dorma’ by The Three Tenors 
• ‘It’s Now Or Never’ by Elvis Presley 
• ‘Nessun Dorma’ by Aretha Franklin 
• An extract from Vivaldi’s ‘Il Giustino’ by Jakob Josef Orlinski 
• An extract from Verdi’s’ La Traviata’ by Jian Diego Florez 
• ‘Vesti La Glubba’ by Enrico Caruso 
• ‘Keep Passing The Open Windows’ by Queen 
• ‘Barcelona’ by Freddie Mercury with Monserrat Caballe 
• The Godfather love theme by Andy Williams 
• ‘Parla Piu Piano’ by Jonas Kauffman 
• ‘Annie’s Song’ by Placido Domingo 
• ‘Perhaps Love’ by Placido Domingo with John Denver 
• ‘Miss Sarajevo’ U2 with Luciano Pavarotti
• ‘Maria’ by Jose Carreras 
• ‘Quizas’ by Andrea Bocelli with Jennifer Lopez
• ‘Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps’ by Doris Day