RIP Jessye Norman

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn) 09/30/2019 at 23:35 • Filed to: None

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Jessye Norman, born in Augusta, Georgia, was o ne of the greatest American operatic sopranos of our generation. Her recording of the Vier Letzte Lieder (Four Last Songs) with Kurt Masur and the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra is absolutely sublime. These songs are the last published  works of German Romantic composer Richard Strauss, a summation of his life and musical language. I know this sort of thing is not everybody’s cup of tea, but it is both an extraordinary piece of music and a legendary performance. I will ask that this recording be played at my funeral.

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > ttyymmnn 09/30/2019 at 23:40

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Thanks for sharing. I'm going to ask for Space Oddity and Blackstar.

phenotyp > ttyymmnn 10/01/2019 at 00:20

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Yeah, man. She is legendary. This is totally my cup of tea. I grew up with this:

My funeral? As long as this is played, I’m good.

ttyymmnn > phenotyp 10/01/2019 at 00:28

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I haven’t listened to this recording in a few years. But whenever I do, I simply stop what I am doing and listen. The opening of In Abendrot is possibly the greatest, most mature, most human passage of music ever written.

Goggles Pizzano > ttyymmnn 10/04/2019 at 12:59

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I’ve been meaning to reply, but kept forgetting. The other day I listened to a radio interview with Jessye Norman recorded last year. In it, she told a story of being a young girl growing up in the south. I found the story to be most insightful into who she was , not as a little girl, but as an adult that both remembered this incident and chose to share it .

At her school there were 2 water fountains, one labelled White and the other labelled Colored. When s he got home she asked her mother about it. She didn’t understand, the water that came out of the fountain labelled Colored was the same color as the wat er that came out of the fountain labelled White.

ttyymmnn > Goggles Pizzano 10/04/2019 at 17:53

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Thanks for sharing that.