Toti dal Monte

A short article on Toti dal Monte from Wikipedia just to familiarize yourself with her importance in opera history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toti_Dal_Monte

I already always associated Toti dal Monte's name with "best Butterfly" of the pre-war era, but I had never heard her sing the role. While scrounging around at the Carnegie Library, I discovered a 1939 recording with Dal Monte as Cio Cio San and Beniamino Gigli as Pinkerton. Af first, I was really quite appalled at what I was listening to. After this first listen, I characterized her as nasal, and all that, but I thought "okay, I will be open-minded and I will examine what she is doing."

Toti dal Monte uses what is called the voce infantile or childlike voice that many Butterfly employed to sing Butterfly. After all, Cio Cio San is fifteen, and Toti was 46 when she made this recording! That is the beauty of opera. I hate when people say "oh, well how can I possibly believe that this middle-aged woman is an innocent, Japanese teenager?" Well, it is the singer's job to convince you and Toti dal Monte does that.

Compare Toti dal Monte's singing of the role to say, Patricia Racette's. Racette sounds like she is a divorced, middle aged housewife in white-face make up and a kimono. Sure! She "sings" the music, she "acts," but it is so disconnected from the music and the character. She's younger, slimmer than Toti dal Monte was - but she doesn't convince me.

My problem with the digitalization of opera is that, while it makes it more 'accessible' (I guess that's the argument), it turns opera into a visual rather than aural art. We are distracted from the music, the story, and the basic human emotion. The singers themselves seem to think "oh, well, I have to ACT it, I have to be a REAL actor," (whatever that means) and they fail to realize where the acting in opera comes from. It must ALWAYS come from the music. Every decision that the opera actor needs to make is influenced by the music. Every decision that the opera director makes needs to be influenced by the music.

Of course, one must sing with one's voice. One must also have the necessary and rigorous technical training, and the knowledge of how one's own personal voice works in order to color it to any character. That is why Toti dal Monte, Scotto, Callas, and to some degree Tebaldi and Albanese, are successful as Butterly. They use the voce infantile when it is appropriate (before Butterly becomes a woman after the 2nd act) and then make a change in their voice when there is a change in the character. Now, THAT is acting.

When listening to Toti dal Monte please don't assume that it MUST sound a certain way because it is Puccini. Butterfly needs to be sung by a lyric soprano or larger, it is true, but that does not mean she needs to lack dynamics, finesse, innocence, and dramatic/musical nuance.

For example, notice how different Toti's color is in the aria "Che tua madre dovra." Butterfly is now a woman in this. The voice is almost entirely different than we heard in the Act I duet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObbsZ8RhbeA&feature=related

And here is our friend Patricia Racette - singing the music, emoting in a generic sort of way, but what character is she supposed to be portraying? How do you believe that a middle-aged, white lesbian is a 15 year old Japanese Geisha?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Bror-r0Wfw