I interviewed THOMAS HAMPSON!!😱 Baritone to Baritone (Mozart, Longevity, High Gs)

[@RapidCycling07-p5v]

Awesome video! Thank you for sharing! 👏👏👏😁

[@johnnyderby2]

As a 22-year-old baritone, THANK YOU for this interview! It's fantastic to hear from a baritone who has as long and storied a career as Hampson does. He's so well-versed and thoughtful on the vital subjects of vocal developments and longevity.

[@boundary2580]

This is actually a fantastic interview for students and young artists!

[@Walkybg]

Wonderful, I really needed that talk in my life right now. Thank you, legends!

[@rmdbourg]

Thank you! That was an outstanding interview, it would be really cool if you continue this theme with other famous baritones…next up Bryn Terfel😀🤞

[@paulmichaelstoia]

I loved his view on Don Giovanni being an awful person, yet acknowledge the need for his story to be known as a service to educate the public on the serious moral, sociopathic issues of our day. “I am not concerned whether it’s 30 people or 3000 people, that is not why I sing” - words of a true artist and very inspiring for a younger artist like myself

[@MichaelSeguraBaritone]

Wonderfully insightful! Thank you for the interview, both of you!

[@jjmboston5832]

Great interview. Remember hearing Mr. Hampson for his first MET broadcast. Love the voice. Saw him in concert a number of times too. Intelligent singer and well read. A+ Thanks for the posting.

[@susanvaughan4210]

What a wonderful discussion! Thank you so much for this.

[@emildimank7118]

Thank you so much for this! He is a treasure as a singer and teacher as well. Hope this interview gets a lot of views. You deserve it.

[@raulhermida1933]

Great talk, thank you. It is nice to have such a big brother!

[@retgrimes]

Hearing Tom say “fuck you” is one of the many gems in this bit! Thank you.

[@LucasMeachem1]

😂 baritones unhinged

[@katiegratton2544]

@@LucasMeachem1 #releasethebaritones

[@robertjschroff6307]

It is really awesome! I am really glad this interview has happened. :) I have just listened recently one most sublime and poetic song of Franz Liszt 'Oh! quand je dors' S. 282 ( poem by Victor Hugo ) has sung by Mr Hampson in a most adequate and enjoyable way to listen. I dont know any baritone or even singer that much musically educated, cultured, encyclopaedic and intelligent than Mr Hampson. His effort taken into music education is also mind-blowing! We can feel happy to have him among us. Thanks for the great interview. :)

[@LucasMeachem1]

Absolutely!!

[@robertjschroff6307]

@@LucasMeachem1 and you Lucas, are great as well. Your Figaro ( Rossini ) is absolutely thrilling and I have listened many other things from you too. I’m so curious what else will happen in your career! Regards, Robert 🙂🤚

[@emailvonsour]

Souzay.

[@williamharberts5514]

Great interview with the man who did/does the best Figaro/Largo al Factotum ever (maybe except for Herrman Prey whose Largo was also jaw dropping).

[@Ms1ms03]

This is great! True ,honest speaking… tnx to you both and merry Christmas 🎄😊

[@martinelaurent5690]

Terrific interview! When are you singing in Paris next?

[@jusunggabrielpark]

Thank you for the wonderful interview!🙏

[@henryherzberger8671]

Great interview. As you were discussing D’Provenza Il Mar …. Would love to hear your comments/analysis of John Charles Thomas singing it, together with his singing of the Credo from Othello. He is so effortless and smooth you and viewers might enjoy it.

[@sissi7746]

Mr Hampson, your Scarpia's evil smile is so engaging I'm always thorne between admiration and disgust. That's why you remain for me the very best Scarpia in modern operating world.

[@sw5114]

Would never want to be in a theater showing Tosca, with Hampson as Scarpia. I don’t care how evil he looks. Would be terribly frustrating to the listener.

[@johnblasiak2499]

Nicolai Ghiaurov sings Escamilo the best have a listen, of course Merrill is legendary

[@thehound6126]

What a great interview! I think an awesome idea for you as a content creator would be to critic a performance of some of your followers who also might be amateur singers like my self. Such intelligent conversations!

[@paulmichaelstoia]

Great questions Lucas! I enjoyed the wisdom from a legendary career. I had the same issue as Prince Yamadori in Butterfly 😂”Eat more vegetables than carbohydrates” -> tough life lessons

[@samuelvarghese3320]

Two great baritones together. Would love to hear you two sing together in concert

[@flannerymonaghan-morris4825]

Thomas seems like such a sweetheart!

[@LucasMeachem1]

He is

[@jasminnemcdonald94A]

Thomas Hampson sang the Toreador aria from Carmen? No way!

[@ransomcoates546]

Rosa Ponselle was completely self-made vocally. As Serafin said, a miracle. Hampson should know this.

[@EuskaltelEuskadi]

Amazing, thank you !! Any chance this will become a series with other singers ?

[@johnblasiak2499]

To be an Opera singer is a mammoth task so many disciplines to master

[@jefolson6989]

True. But to singers the acquisition of those various skulls is the work . The singing is the reward. Long hours of practice, so times with very little improvement. Many give up. Of those who stick with it, a small percentage make it, and its not the most talented who do, but the ones who work the business, network, etc. Lots of good singers in the world you will never hear about. So many variables. In my case I didn't start singing until I was nearly 40. I was successful very quickly, but there was only time for about 12 years before age became apparent . I admire anyone who sings. Hampson is also a opera fan in the way that I am. It takes the place of sports.

[@johnblasiak2499]

@@jefolson6989 yes I often say a singer is an athlete a real singer that is

[@jefolson6989]

@@johnblasiak2499 so true! I can't believe a person can sing when they are 400 lbs, but they did. The only sport other than SUMO where the players are fat.

[@edraith]

Hampson is a peculiar sort of baritone. He has quite big resonators and very good technique and both those things are helping him with a big, powerful and well projected voice that can sing as a lirico-spinto to drammatico sort of baritone. On the other side of the spectrum his vocal folds are, I personally feel, quite high baritone to low baritonal tenor sort of instrument so his voice is more naturally inclined for high baritonal roles (most Verdian roles for baritone are usually quite tenoral in tessitura), and shows easy and powerful high notes even outside your usual operatic baritone expectations: these things have brought too many people uinfairly mocking him as "a tenor, not a real baritone", a form of very stupid and unfair mockery that I usually still hear applied to Leo Nucci for example. Love from Italy.

[@baritoneblazzin1965]

Facts

[@PartimentoFR]

Verdian roles are very high in tessitura, however, they require a very dark voice in order to catch up with the great recordings of the past. It is why young baritones with high notes tend to avoid Verdi when they are not experienced enough. Verdian roles tend to darken the voice.

[@edraith]

Hi, I appreciate your point of view and recognise it is the prevailing one nowadays. It is by all means an invention of post-modern era of Opera and it is philologically totally incorrect when we study and compare what writings (A LOT) we have and what recordings we can trace back sadly no earlier than the Late XIX Century. We can pretty easily state that most great singers from the actual Era of "Alive Opera" (Romantic to Veristic Era, let's not talk about earlier times, it would be too complex) let's say when Verdi was alive and composing up to Puccini (roughly 1830s to 1920s) were mostly singing with a way brighter timbre, a more open less covered voice, way more use of mezza voce, messe di voce, piani and pianissimi, a beautiful chiaroscuro and were not shouting and trying to artificially over-darken their voices like most baritones started doing in the 1970s (up to the point that most of them bark and when we listen to the actual GREAT BARITONES of Late XIX and Early XX Centuries uneducated people will tell you "oh, that's a tenore leggero!!!) Now this statement might be needing some further specification since during the XIX century a lot of different trends happened and in certain decades a lot of tenors were perhaps overusing their voice trying to over-strengthen it on the high notes in order to imitate Duprez but let's not overcomplicate this: we have recordings and statements that can be compared one to another in chain and we can say, as a fact, that a Verdi Baritone IS NOT an especially darker voice than other baritones. Things changed in the Post-Modern Era when productions and recording studios started to look for the Eldorado trying to recreate the feelings from certain especially dark and round voices from the Early XX Century that were especially successfull and beloved (from Caruso, protested in italy since "he's a baritone and a very dark one, he cannot sing as tenor, he'd better sing as bass or baritone" to other great and big round dark voices such as Giulio Neri, Cesare Siepi, Ettore Bastianini and the likes of them): I feel it is extremely unfair to DEMAND from singers to change and DESTROY their voices in order to imitate a few EXCEPTIONAL cases when extremely dark round LOW voices were actually able to have a career singing that high in their range and still keeping their extremely dark velvety tone and carrying it up with that ease. So I prefer the philological approach, id est stating what appears to be the truth when we research deeply into historical facts instead of trying to follow (unhealthy!) myths created by the industry a few decades ago: most baritone roles in Verdi are slightly more akin to a decapitated "Tenore di Mezzo Carattere" than to basso cantabile, not to talk of dark basses with high notes. Love from Italy.

[@PartimentoFR]

@@edraith thank you for this very interesting answer, I tend to agree with you, I enjoy listening to De Luca or to Battistini in Verdi operas. They had a very clear voice, and used a lot of messa Voce. I am myself a baritone student, and I struggle a lot with my technique partly because I started in a French conservatory that made me darken my voice and sound like a bass, making me lowering the soft palate and lose head resonance.

[@liedersanger1]

He deals with us at the end of the interview.

[@richardfallon5507]

does anyone know how the apple shot was done so realistically in Guillaume Tell.??

[@michaelboldischar]

This video is great! I'm also a baritone who is struggling to find the right "sound" when playing with other instruments (guitar and piano). Most songs are written for tenors. If I bring the instruments way down in pitch for baritone singing, it sounds a bit muddy. I'm not sure how a baritone like Johnny Cash did it. Maybe he moved the instruments up in pitch and sang low? Any tips on how to make a baritone sound amazing with other instruments?

[@edraith]

He is very wise and he's speaking facts, especially talking about the sad state of the world of Opera and the way it exploits young singers (or old decayed rotting stars) to create fake Stars for the Millions of Multitudes to hear: but I'd rather hear a GOOD SINGER singing in a small house than certain nowadays ""stars"" shouting and acting funny in great concerts and recordings...

[@jefolson6989]

Hampson has sort of " grown into" his personality. When younger he was the male Jessye Norman. The put on accent and pompous attitude have calmed down a bit. Collegues used to say Tom never passed a mirror without stopping to admire his image. I met him early on when he did a concert Don Giovanni at the Ravinia Festival. Heck of a nice man, even with the grand opera demeanor. Great interview.

[@Michael-mh4vr]

You have to remember opera and fine arts are full of pretentious people non singers also....so it's hard to be down to earth. Besides Norman had great talent...she could wear a crown....

[@jefolson6989]

@@Michael-mh4vr true, but in Norman's case , it was as if she was a parody of the stereotypical diva. Hampson started pompous and has slowly become more accessible. In my life in the arts, I've been surprised at how down to earth and " normal" singers are, as compared to actors ( at all levels) . I saw a bass and a baritone playing cards and watching football backstage. Actors rarely do that. ( stage actors I mean. ) they have no small talk. Conversations are about onstage mishaps. But in the case of Hampson and Normal its the dialect cobbled together from who knows where. They have invented their own . But they were good at it and it worked in a way for them. So they weren't superficial but phoney to their very bones.

[@alligatoruno6975]

Potato cam Thomas looking nice😁👍

[@nicolasloschner8118]

Great talk, two amazing artists !! Can someone write here the names of the tenors Thomas referred to at the end ? Thanks

[@keenhyland]

Piotr Beczała and Joseph Calleja

[@caninbar]

"Keeping his vocal shit together!" LOL

[@edraith]

Wow

[@lsmall2469]

Thank yoi

[@bradycall1889]

I want to know, how to you get scuro in your voice while also keeping a good tonal quality?

[@angusmcrandy]

Sam Ramey sang Falstaff when he was 27.

[@edraith]

I also feel Hampson is kinda right in the idea that most baritone roles (not all of them but most) in Giuseppe Verdi are in fact slightly more akin to a Rossinian Secondo Tenore/Tenore di Mezzo Carattere/Baritenore or how the heck you wanna name that sort of voice (Pirro in Ermione) being decapitated of the highest notes than similar to previous basso cantabile voices. There is this NONSENSE invented somewhere on the Internet that "the Verdian Baritone is a low dark baritone voice, lower and darker than most". This nonsense eventually needs to be dispelled, man. When we read an actual score we realise Verdi wrote some of his baritone roles sometimes as high as tenor scores (I'm talking about tessitura, not about vocal range)! Main difference with the tenor would be that the baritone instead of going for laser-beam high notes would solve his lines and phrases and dramatic tensions mostly on the middle register and sometimes even on the low register (mostly C3 to A2 anyway, so no lower than a "Tenore di Mezzo Carattere" or Baritenore or Secondo Tenore or Haute-Taille from Rossini era...) But certain Verdi roles for baritone are constantly SINGING in a tessitura written like B3 to F#4 or C#4 to G4 and the likes: then they don't go higher than that but are still singing HELLISHLY HIGH for a "low voice". If we look at certain parts from Trovatore, Traviata, Rigoletto, Don Carlo we see the Baritone tessitura can actually be as high as certain tenor roles, the score is basically very similar to Don Ottavio in Mozart's Don Giovanni. That kind of tessitura was clearly NOT meant to be sung by a Basso Profondo with an incredibly easy and high top like Bastianini was (he was great but we cannot expect every baritone to sound like a Basso Profondo, especially not on the whole range), that's meant to be sung (and we actually have a few recordings from late XIX Century...) by baritonal tenors or high baritones.

[@_mephisto_pheles_]

by your definition these both men talking bs are verdi baritones. go listen to battistini, he was a lyric baritone. sang everything from rigoletto to don g. and when it comes to longevity he used to sing recitals with 25 arias in his 60s. show me a singer today who could do that in his prime. listen to ruffo, stracciari, danise, granforte. they all sang barbiere and rigoletto. go check what roles sang the very first rodrigo in don carlo. he always sang mephisto in faust, not valentin likewise all other famous baritones of his era. the baritone voice should sing all the baritone roles including escamillo. if it's too low you are a tenor, go develop your high notes instead of living a lie. escamillo was even sang at the met and recorded by mardones - a very low deep bass. go listen and stop talking bs.

[@edraith]

I am very well aware about all those singers I've studied for decades, I am not fully sure I'm correctly understanding your point of view tho. So when looking back we see in certain periods of time we had a greater amount of great singers. Yes. Fact. And? (btw I'm a bass and bass-baritone and my voice bottoms around one octave lower than where battistini's voice bottomed, what does that mean? am I an oktavist? or is perhaps every single person just different and perhaps not everyone must be the greatest of all times in every single aspect of singing?)

[@edraith]

Like, just for the sake of loving to talk about a passion: both Battistini and Bruson had voices that would not resonate as much as you would expect from most "true" baritones when going below E3 just like mine doesn't resonante as you would expect below E2 for a "true" Bass but I can go lower almost indefinitely without resorting to strange techniques and sometimes I can pull off a Bb1 or an A1 too, still I'm not a "true" bass if by Bass you would mean either a Basso Profondo or perhaps an Oktavist CounterBass. And yet I could name lots of famous Basses from XXI and XX Century whose voices wouldn't always be so resonant on the low register as to compare to mine (and I am a no-one, I'm not Cesare Siepi reborn). I could also name at leaste a couple famous Bass-baritones that sound like a high lyric baritone to me. But I'm not here to shame professionists I'm stating this as the reason why I don't love being referred to as a Bass-baritone even if I believe I either am that or a Basso cantante that could anyway sometimes mean the same thing depending on context and timeframe we're in. At the same time those two GREAT baritones, both Bruson and Battistini, had a low register that would bottom around a Bb2 or an A2 (Bruson didn't have a Bb2 in his older age, it was murky, perhaps due some health issue; Battistini would sometimes avoid A2 altogether even when it was written). So what: were they both light lyric tenors? Tenori leggeri corti? Bruson clearly sounded baritonal to me and he had an incredible fraseggio ability, even if most people in Italy respect him as a tenore corto who decided to go baritone since his voice was so full, round, dark and it had a velvety mellow manly resonance in it that could make him pass for a baritone (sometimes even better than say Battistini). Battistini nowadays in the modern lack of taste of this age would sound too bright, too short on the bottom and too not resonant enough on the low register to be a light tenore lirico for most imbecile people who like to call a tenor every baritone who either has high notes or can sing in a mellow mp to ppp voice or is a brighter higher kind of Baritone (like Hampson is imho). On the other hand we had people like Leonard Warren who had a CounterHigh D5, he sang as a tenor too and yet his baritone voice was among the darkest, largest, most powerful and most manly ever without even trying: that's because he was phenomenal and we cannot start calling a tenor whoever has a voice brighter than Warren. Or we could name Cornell MacNeil who was a lower kind of voice with a very large dark sound and had such enormous and easy low notes he could have easily passed for a true Bass (even more than some nowadays famous ones...) but decided to go baritone since his High Notes were incredibly easy and beautiful and he was able to sustain higher tessituras (not everyone might be able to cope with a very high tessitura tho). I've known some real Bassi profondi whose Low Eb2 was so huge it could shake a room and make your whole body tremble and yet they could sing a High B4 and if they tried to sing high baritone roles all of a sudden they sounded too bright... so what? Were they tenori leggeri? Or can we just accept that every voice is peculiar and different? I've known a dramatic baritone whose voice EASILY sung sustained notes from Eb2 to E5 and loved to sing heavy metal, dramatic tenor repertoire and even some higher tenor stuff and yet the dynamics into his voice made it clear that he had a baritone voice. So what, are Alva or Fernando De Lucia pieces of shit since they didn't have an E5? Or can we just accept that every voice is peculiar and different? There's Micheael Spyres who could do a pretty impressive Cesare Siepi impression if in a very small room. He can go roughly C2 to F5. His Low A2 is HUGE live (I know it since I've worked with the guy when he was not famous yet) and easily immense when compared to anything a Battistini or a Bruson could ever have DREAMED to achieve even in the best day of their life. What is he? Baritone? Tenor? Baritenor? Tenore di mezzo carattere? Baritenore lirico-leggero? Tenore mozartiano? A lot of true Basses do not have a Low C2. A lot of true tenors can't go as high as he can. Can we just accept that every voice is peculiar and different? By the way decades of very deeply academically studying anatomy, physics, history of music and of singing, singing itself (opera singing and modern singing) have given me some reason to assume I can have my own insights on the matter and I can have the right to express them after so many tens of thousands of hours of practice and study and discussion with knowledgeable people all around the world! So I believe you shouldn't be calling bullshit on that. We can disagree but what I say comes from decades of very deep academic studying from many hundreds of sources that most Opera-connoissuers will never even bother to start looking for so perhaps start showing some respect for other people's opinions especially when you have no idea how much more than your average Opera singer or Conductor they could have already known decades ago. It always baffles me the completely opposite treatment I get from true scientific researchers and professors who respect me and will sometimes ask me for an insight they belieive might be valuable and the opposite way some guy on the internet will always assume I'm some idiot he can offend at will. Unbelievable.

[@emailvonsour]

@@_mephisto_pheles_ Lol Escamillo was too low for Battistini...he didn't record a single Bb in all of his 117 recordings. He did sing it live, but God knows what he did down at the bottom. Contemporaneous reviews confirmed that it was too low for him. So by your logic...Battistini was a tenor?

[@emailvonsour]

@@edraith 1. Battistini never recorded a Bb2. He studiously avoided all notes below C whenever possible, not just some As. In his recordings, only the Si può has a B, and it is pretty much botched. 2. Don't call yourself a bass-baritone. It's a fake, modern invention. If you sing mostly bass rôles, you're a bass. If you sing almost all baritone rôles, you're a baritone. There's no such thing as a bass-baritone. Only a few rôles in standard rep cross over, so I know you aren't only doing crossover roles. If you do Rodrigue or Guillaume Tell or Iago, you're a baritone. If you do Fiesco or Sparafucile, you're a bass. 3. Bruson was awful. Shaky, woofy voice, modern technique, no clarity, way way way overdarkened. Fake sound, like most moderns. 4. Macneil sang too high for his voice and developed a nasty wobble early in his career. 5. Warren's darkness was artificial and woofy. Merrill, from almost the same generation, also overdarkened but still had a much clearer sound. Warren was fuzzy and unsteady. Sounded like he had peanut butter in his mouth, too. 6. Nobody has an E5. Nobody. De Lucia barely even had an A4 by the time he started recording. I'm not sure whether he recorded any Bbs. He must have, right? 7. Spyres and Siepi are both wobbly singers, but Siepi at least had power and core, which Spyres does not. But yes, I agree with the overall point (unlike that psycho you responded to; no idea what his deal was). Most of the best singers ever had unusual ranges. Caruso's C was hit-and-miss, and McCormack lost his top notes by 30. De Lucia was called a baritone too. Battistini, Schlusnus, Ruffo, and Urbano all had garbage low notes. De Segurola and Vanni Marcoux were thin down low. Francesco Albanese never sang above a Bb. Schipa had no high notes, and many like him, though I do not at all. Lemeshev never had a reliable C.

[@caninbar]

I've always admired Hampson but I hated his Verdi arias recording. I don't think his voice is suited to Verdi at all. And he's much better live than on recordings. Anyway, he's clearly very knowledgeable.

[@vitormrmr]

Hampson is a tenor who never developed His high B or C.

[@emailvonsour]

No chance. Listen to him sing popular music, like his Christmas album with Kiri and Alagna. Clearly a low-lying voice.

[@_mephisto_pheles_]

tenor pretending to be a baritone talking bs to another tenor who's also pretending to be a baritone.

[@emailvonsour]

They are clearly both baritones. They aren't tenors just because they sing badly.

[@vicky-yx4dy]

The worst thing about the internet is that people think they don't have to be kind anymore... That's a shame.

[@Michael-mh4vr]

​@@emailvonsourthe host isn't bad. They can't help it their not ruffo

[@youngornitier]

more like Tenor to Tenor 🥴

[@karlschuler]

Lol you’re not funny

[@youngornitier]

@@karlschuler and you're not smart if you thought I was making a joke

[@karlschuler]

@@youngornitier Thomas Hamspon is clearly a baritone so yes I’d assume it’s a joke

[@vitormrmr]

Tenori corti

[@emailvonsour]

@@youngornitier They're not tenors just because they're bad. Their voices clearly sit too low to be tenors.