Monday, November 19, 2007

Kaufmann

Maybe I'll become a fanzine for Jonas Kaufmann. There isn't a lot of him on YouTube, but the wave of opinion is that he's as fabulous as I think he is. Someone else also said they think he sounds most like Vickers, but I'm already feeling he sounds like himself. I can't actually think when I have heard a more beautiful tenor voice. More, please. I agree with the comments that say weight is gradually coming into his voice, rather than that he is forcing it to be heavier. His production seems very natural to me.

He's also adorable. Sigh.
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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Greetings From Washington, D. C.!:

I have a Google Alert set for Mr. Jonas Kaufmann, and just moments ago it linked me with your post about him.

As I recently told Miss Tung, a German woman who has a _QUITE_-comprehensive fan site for him (www.jkaufmann.info if you do not already know of it), I having been referred to it by Mr. Kaufmann himself no less, when I had the privilege and pleasure of meeting him on 4 October in Carnegie Hall, I agree with you that he has a voice similar to Mr. Vickers'. Yet I also agree with you that he is sufficiently individual to be distinguished from him! Among its many offerings, that site has two English-Language interviews with him in which, again among other things, he discusses the body/dark-quality in his voice, and that, at the first, he had tried to sound like a usual German tenor instead of allowing his natural qualities to come through. Perhaps the most striking difference between his and Mr. Vickers' is the dark quality in his lower registers at least, and I would guess that, when the right time hopefully comes, he will be able to take on the heavier Wagner roles such as Siegfried and Tristan! I actually became interested in his work by hearing him in another Wagner role, that of Walther in _Die_ _Meistersinger_ as he sang it during the 2006 Edinburgh Festival! Unless I am forgetting someone, he is the finest Walther I have thus far heard, and I would like to acquire a recording of that performance from one of these Internet outlets for non-commercial live recordings if the sound is not _TOO_ bad! He was to have sung Schubert's _Winterreise_ here this past March, but was indisposed, thus my decision to go to New York to hear and meet him last month (he may not have shown his absolute best in that Beethoven _9_ I heard, but my primary reason for going was to meet him and ask how I might best keep up with his career, and there can be _NO_ denying the wisdom of the advice he gave me reference that!).

Hoping that this finds you well, further hoping we both may have _MANY_ pleasures from Mr. Kaufmann's artistry in the coming years, and with best wishes for a good Thanksgiving and thereafter, I am

Respectfully and sincerely,

J. Vaughan

12:19 PM

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