Random Play: Sing like you’re winning
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This is an old story but the comment that Hayley is good at popera is interesting. I think she is very much underated and her achievements overseas are not known to or published much in New Zealand.
But one problem with Dame Kiri's comments and most of the discussion here and elsewhere is that Hayley doesn't, under any reasonalble definition, qualify as popera at all. Paul Potts is popera, Katherine Jenkins is popera, Il divo is popera. Popera is surely a singer whose repetoire is predominently opera songs sung in a popular fashion although usually in an operatic style or semi-operatic style.
Most purist critics call Hayley and her ilk, such as Sissel, "easy listening" and reserve the popera term for the sort of singers I mentioned above. She is described in the preview of the Capitol Fourth extravaganza in which she is taking part and will break a certain other NZ singers record for the biggest audience a New Zealander has sung to (not bad for a fake) as: "Clarion-voiced ballad chanteuse Hayley Westenra from New Zealand and American Idol winner Taylor Hicks perform, as do Broadway tenor Brian Stokes Mitchell and crossover soprano Harolyn Blackwell."
Interesting that Blackwell is described as "crossover" and Hayley as a ballad chanteuse.
Well, it's common sense. Hayley is a warbler of easy listening ballads who has done a little crossover. She has actually sung fewer arias than Nana Mouskouri and many other pop singers. Crossover has been around for years there is nothing new about it, and singers of Hayley's ilk - easy listening balladeers - tend to last well.
It is difficult to escape the notion that Dame Kiri is incensed by Hayley's success. There is no doubt that her Ladyship, if not everyone else, is convinced she is a great artist, and Hayley was a very naughty girl to steal what the Great Lady had publicly announced was what she had come to see as her "signature tune" (Pokarekare Ana). That someone of Hayley's class should make it her own signature tune after Her Ladyship had announced ownership is damned bad form, really. On that basis alone she deserves a mighty blast from above.
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This is an old story but the comment that Hayley is good at popera is interesting. I think she is very much underated and her achievements overseas are not known to or published much in New Zealand.
But one problem with Dame Kiri's comments and most of the discussion here and elsewhere is that Hayley doesn't, under any reasonalble definition, qualify as popera at all. Paul Potts is popera, Katherine Jenkins is popera, Il divo is popera. Popera is surely a singer whose repetoire is predominently opera songs sung in a popular fashion although usually in an operatic style or semi-operatic style.
Most purist critics call Hayley and her ilk, such as Sissel, "easy listening" and reserve the popera term for the sort of singers I mentioned above. She is described in the preview of the Capitol Fourth extravaganza in which she is taking part and will break a certain other NZ singers record for the biggest audience a New Zealander has sung to (not bad for a fake) as: "Clarion-voiced ballad chanteuse Hayley Westenra from New Zealand and American Idol winner Taylor Hicks perform, as do Broadway tenor Brian Stokes Mitchell and crossover soprano Harolyn Blackwell."
Interesting that Blackwell is described as "crossover" and Hayley as a ballad chanteuse.
Well, it's common sense. Hayley is a warbler of easy listening ballads who has done a little crossover. She has actually sung fewer arias than Nana Mouskouri and many other pop singers. Crossover has been around for years there is nothing new about it, and singers of Hayley's ilk - easy listening balladeers - tend to last well.
It is difficult to escape the notion that Dame Kiri is incensed by Hayley's success. There is no doubt that her Ladyship, if not everyone else, is convinced she is a great artist, and Hayley was a very naughty girl to steal what the Great Lady had publicly announced was what she had come to see as her "signature tune" (Pokarekare Ana). That someone of Hayley's class should make it her own signature tune after Her Ladyship had announced ownership is damned bad form, really. On that basis alone she deserves a mighty blast from above.
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Kiri is not only on the same album as Elizabeth Marvelly but she is on at least five and possibly more albums that Hayley is also on.
Westenra's achievements, as I mentioned, go largely unnoticed in New Zealand.
There is a series of best of Classical or number 1 classical or so on. Kiri and Hayley have been on all of them from 2004 to 2007. Hayley is on the 2008 one but Kiri has been dropped, and Will Martin comes in!
This is what Gray Bartlett was going on about, although he didn't put it clearly, or wasn't well reported.
Check on Amazon:
The Classical Album 2005
CD1
Hayley Westenra Never Say Goodbye
Kiri Te Kanawa The Nuns' Chorus
CD2
Hayley Westenra River of Dreams
(Hayley 2 - Kiri 1)The Number 1 Classical Album 2006
CD1
Hayley Westenra O Mio Babbino Caro
Kiri Te Kanawa Viss d'ArteThe Classical Album 2007
Hayley Westenra The Water is Wide
Kiri Te Kanawa Ave MariaThen there is the "Ultimate Voices CD" recently released.
01-luciano_pavarotti-o_sole_mio
02-russell_watson-nella_fantasia
03-katherine_jenkins-time_to_say_goodbye
04-jonas_kaufmann-e_lucevan_le_stelle
05-hayley_westenra-o_mio_babbino_caro
06-renee_fleming-one_fine_day
07-vittorio_grigolo-maria
08-placido_domingo-be_my_love
09-sarah_brightman-pie_jesu
10-jose_carreras-core_ngrato
11-joan_sutherland-barcarolle
12-anna_netrebko-mesicku_na_nebi_hlubokem
13-angela_gheorghiu-ebben_ne_andro_lontana
14-roberto_alagna-your_tiny_hand_is_frozen
15-lisa_gerrard-now_we_are_free
16-montserrat_caballe-vissi_darte
17-juan_diego_florez-una_furtiva_lagrima
18-kiri_te_kanawa-bailero
19-bryn_terfel-il_mio_cuore_va
20-luciano_pavarotti-nessun_dormalNot featuring Kiri, but no doubt made with her approval is EMI's "The New Classical Generation".
It is a Mini-CD with just five tracks, and I wonder if we should be pleased that two New Zealanders feature or reject it as a fake record.
Along with Boy Band Blake, Jonathan Ansell, and the violinist David Garret, it features Hayley and Will Martin.
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Kiri is not only on the same album as Elizabeth Marvelly but she is on at least five and possibly more albums that Hayley is also on.
Westenra's achievements, as I mentioned, go largely unnoticed in New Zealand.
There is a series of best of Classical or number 1 classical or so on. Kiri and Hayley have been on all of them from 2004 to 2007. Hayley is on the 2008 one but Kiri has been dropped, and Will Martin comes in!
This is what Gray Bartlett was going on about, although he didn't put it clearly, or wasn't well reported.
Check on Amazon:
The Classical Album 2005
CD1
Hayley Westenra Never Say Goodbye
Kiri Te Kanawa The Nuns' Chorus
CD2
Hayley Westenra River of Dreams
(Hayley 2 - Kiri 1)The Number 1 Classical Album 2006
CD1
Hayley Westenra O Mio Babbino Caro
Kiri Te Kanawa Viss d'ArteThe Classical Album 2007
Hayley Westenra The Water is Wide
Kiri Te Kanawa Ave MariaThen there is the "Ultimate Voices CD" recently released.
01-luciano_pavarotti-o_sole_mio
02-russell_watson-nella_fantasia
03-katherine_jenkins-time_to_say_goodbye
04-jonas_kaufmann-e_lucevan_le_stelle
05-hayley_westenra-o_mio_babbino_caro
06-renee_fleming-one_fine_day
07-vittorio_grigolo-maria
08-placido_domingo-be_my_love
09-sarah_brightman-pie_jesu
10-jose_carreras-core_ngrato
11-joan_sutherland-barcarolle
12-anna_netrebko-mesicku_na_nebi_hlubokem
13-angela_gheorghiu-ebben_ne_andro_lontana
14-roberto_alagna-your_tiny_hand_is_frozen
15-lisa_gerrard-now_we_are_free
16-montserrat_caballe-vissi_darte
17-juan_diego_florez-una_furtiva_lagrima
18-kiri_te_kanawa-bailero
19-bryn_terfel-il_mio_cuore_va
20-luciano_pavarotti-nessun_dormalNot featuring Kiri, but no doubt made with her approval is EMI's "The New Classical Generation".
It is a Mini-CD with just five tracks, and I wonder if we should be pleased that two New Zealanders feature or reject it as a fake record.
Along with Boy Band Blake, Jonathan Ansell, and the violinist David Garret, it features Hayley and Will Martin.
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Very sorry about the double posting. I think I know what may be causing it.
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The silly comment about Westenra having much to be modest about, needs some explanation. What has she got to be modest about in particular? Million selling records, being in enormous demand for concerts? Or does she not sing as prescribed by the rules of some archaic form of Italian vocalism.
At 21 she has a CV in the Imdb that is on a par with Dame Snooty's. She has featured on the soundtrack of 6 movies (the Imdb is a bit out of date) and at least three TV shows, and featured in a couple, although just as as singer without dialogue (not genuinely as an actress in my opinion, although listed as such).
Dame Snooty has featured on seven soundtracks in the great 40 years she goes on about.
Whether one likes her style of singing or not, let's give credit where it is due. At what she does best she is world-class. On YouTube the hits on her versions of Shenadoah, Danny Boy, Down to the River, and one or two others are increasing and the comments estatic - "Best version I've ever heard", is one of the milder comments. A dissenting view was - "she's just like many great singers, nothing special".
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