Pantechnicon; John Reardon Interview

This is Robert Bailey welcoming you once again to pantechnicon for the next hour we have a rather special treat the singing and speaking voice of John Reardon will be featured. And to begin we'll choose the singing voice of John Reardon since that's the voice that he's made his fame and we're going to listen to Bob's aria from the new recording of Manasses opera the old maid and the thief. So. Ah.

You all you know.

That was Bob's aria from the 90s opera the old maiden the thief sung by John Reardon. John tell us a little bit about this album and how you were involved in this particular. Pretty well interestingly enough overselling has just come out I suppose maybe I shouldn't divulge the deep dark secret that it was made actually in the summer of 1966 in Spoleto Italy at the festival of two worlds which Mr. Menotti. What. More than overseas every summer he creates it. And I happen to be there that summer doing pelé ice in Pele as he made his own and he recorded the old maiden at the Eath and several other things more or less on spec.. To be sold to a given unknown record company at

the time. And this is the final result was taken a long time but I'm glad that it's finally out I think it's a delightful recording of the opera he conducted on this. No it is not George Mr. conducts but he was there of course all the time. The release is on a Mercury Mercury. Well part of the reason that we're so fortunate in having John is. The fact that he's appearing in the NE T opera another opera production coming from Boston. And the one that's now in the process of being videotaped is a Tchaikovsky opera which I believe is going to go under the title of the Queen of Spades right. I believe so I think they've batted around whether to call it peak Dahmer not because it's sometimes known as that. I think I think it's Queen of Spades. And you're doing the role of of Tom's Konski. And very briefly what kind of a role is this.

Well again it's difficult to say because it's a somewhat changed in this version and the television version there was an attempt by the producer and the director to bring this to television. Production more in line with what they thought. Tchaikovsky wanted to do originally with the opera they had letters from strip from Tchaikovsky to his brother who did the libretto who did the libretto and to the producer. Wherever it was produced in St. Petersburg or wherever Leningrad I'm not sure. But in the in the latter various letters he states that he wants to do away with things like the opening park scene where people are wandering around to just introduce the audience to the scenery and the music and the larger choral scene where the Zarina comes in and there are great choruses to her and this seemed to be the custom of the day you know. But he wanted it to be a more intimate story among just the principal characters and a very

but you might say today a psychological drama of Pushkin but was discouraged and finally did the full blown opera that most people see on the stage and as a matter of fact when they see it on the stage they don't even see the whole thing because great cuts are made in it then. But in this TV version it is you might say reduced or rather expanded. In one sense of the word to this Tchaikovsky's original idea of being a really really psychological music drama. And I think comes across tremendously well. Well I think we've learned from the productions that have taken place so far for any tea we began with the. Janacek opera from the house of the dead and continued with my heart's in the Highlands. And then we had an abduction from the seraglio now we're doing this pick dom or the Queen of Spades I think we've learned that it is the psychological opera that most adapts to the intimacy of the television camera. One tends to ask in a situation like this why

were these cuts made was this adaptation made for artistic reasons or was it to get out of the problems of trying to handle a large chorus and no I think no no I don't think it's that I think it's a conscious attempt. This word is booted around an awful lot today but is a conscious attempt to make more relevant to a watching public. In other words you can relate much more to people in situations where they are earnestly talking to each other either plotting or planning or whatever it happens to be in love in hate but on the TV screen which is after all an intimate medium spectacle doesn't really come across very well. The ideas are really so I'm out for a good TV production. Well now Tom ski is he a villain is he a hero. He's not either. He's in a sense he's a protagonist because he tells in an aria near the beginning of the opera. He tells the story or the legend of the Queen of Spades how the

old Countess knows a secret of card gambling knows three cards to pick that will ensure that the player will win always and one doesn't know really whether he's making the story up or whether it's a kind of legend about the old Countess. But Gammon the tenor believes him. And after a series of events which include falling in love or at least seeming to fall in love with the old countesses ward or Denise or whoever again she might be which is not really quite clear who she is either. The young girl. Why he confronts the old Countess and tries to scare the secret out of her hand as he draws a gun as his final scare tactic why she has heart failure and dies and interesting enough in tubs he's Arya he predicts her death because he said the legend goes that the third

one she had told him according to him the story. The secret to her husband years ago and to a lieutenant who served in the current. And you can drive home inclusions about that and then he says but the third one who comes to you asking this secret. Will cause your death. Now now we want to know the way Tomsky tells us to talk only tell you his card playing friend so I say beginning and Garamond the tenor who is a rather conservative man never gambles just stands around watching the game. He overhears it and so he's a very intense man and it seems to make its mark and he's Or rather I I would imagine to begin with a little unbalanced and this kind of goes right into him and he thinks you know here I've been through a very frugal man and he thinks this is his way. Finally I suppose get out of the army and live a little high life for a change. But as I say he does scare the Countess to death and. Never finds the

secret then. However later on and again you don't know whether it's supernatural in this version everything that happens is is a foible of one's thinking of the mind and not the supernatural. A so-called vision of the countess after death comes to him telling him the three cards to bet on. And he does go back again another night to the to his card playing friends that's ever all of his life savings and then doubles it and then doubles that and he wins the first two hands on the cards that the Countess vision is given him but the third hand now in some versions the third hand they need you to believe which is supposed to be the ace that is supposed to when one turns up the queen of spades and one doesn't know whether this is supernatural in this version again it's a slip of his hand as he's ready to play his card. The Ace is next to the Queen of Spades and in his excitement to win the third hand he plays

or rather puts down and the card is not uncovered until later puts down the queen of spades by mistake and thereby loses everything. And. In the stage version he kills himself again in this one he simply this is too much for his mind to bear and he goes mad he goes mad Who does he lose to he loses to Tomsk eco this is now again this is a difference because there is a character deleted Princie Lecky who is deleted from this version entirely and Tomsky takes off some of his characteristics and the last game. I see your Lecky in the other version is a rival to Gavin's love for a lease of a young girl. But the only rival she has in this version is the money. So you're playing a double role. Picking up a little of your That's rock to go. I wish I'd picked up his other aria but well which. Which reminds me of a little fact that I came onto before this interview and that is that your method to view was made in this very opera.

That's right it's an interesting I think an interesting fact to have done an opera which is so little known as this one in three different productions. It was my Met debut in the role of Tom ski and before that. I had done a concert version singing Prince your Lecky in Russian with the concert opera Society New York Times Shermans and that was my first introduction to the opera. Of course I was the first time I done it and incidentally Johnny Terrelle was in that part of production too. She's also in this production as the old council show in action now when the Met production was an English version. Yes it was I believe based. Basically it was a Boris Karloff ski version but as you know when you get into any production of an opera and English very often by the time it reaches the stage or whatever medium it's being done in it's changed a good deal from what you first find you know a lot of hands in the pot you know you end you know the minute you begin to sing something you

find something that comes a little easier than what you find on the page now perhaps if you had found what you thought of on the page in the first place you might end up changing it to what you know what is on the bass you know. It's funny we're talking about your Met debut. Can we back up just a little bit and sort of fill in on your career as it led up to them that could we go so far as to find out how you got interested in singing. Well I never got interested in singing I always had sung even as a child I had a very shrill maybe that's the wrong word. Karen a great caring quality to a boy soprano and later on as my voice changed I went on and sang a great deal but never with the idea of being a singer. If I were going to be any kind of musician it was to have been a pianist because that was what I was trained for as a child which would be I think a very good thing to have in your background cause I do it for anyone yes.

Many singers I know I've studied either violin or trumpet which any musical instrument of course is wonderful. You get great lungs playing a drug that really Wolf you know as a trumpet player you know I didn't know that. But I didn't really think of singing seriously until I was a junior and in college at which time I finally gave up the piano. It gave me I had wanted to do major in composition and was discouraged from that and the voice seemed to be the logical thing to do so. Did you think of opera then. From there we go even then I was only going to teach. I went to a small college in Florida Rollins College in Winter Park and the life there was quite ideal at least to me at the time and even looking back at it now it still seems that way. So I thought oh what a nice thing to do to settle down a lovely campus and teach boys well. Incidentally since then I have taught voice in college. It's not all it's cracked up to be.

You prefer the performing. Well I'd like to teach I really do. Getting back then to your Who are some of these people that influenced you into leaving this idyllic life of. Well I suppose it was just a normal course of events. When I got out of school I went out to Aspen Colorado the first summer and studied there with Marshall Saigon. And then in the fall I came to New York to go on studying with him for a while and I had of course to get a job I was living with my my family my grandmother at the time but I just couldn't you know sponge on her forever. So I. Got a church job and got a job in its stock company chorus at the same time. And then things just lead to each other. I had an audition with a New York City Opera the following year I think it was from having been heard in a production of Carmen at this musical stock company and then I went into the New York City Opera

and suddenly I was an opera singer. I notice on this other album from which we're going to be hearing some selections. This is a Serenus recording a solo album with John Reardon singing some contemporary American songs with bliss Hiebert at the piano. On the record a record jacket notes they list you as having studied with Marshall sangat. Yes. And earlier you mentioned the role of Paley ASA and so I wondered if these two had some connection. Well oddly enough they don't because I never considered doing that as a fact I probably hadn't even heard of it. Until long after I had not been studying with Mr Zygier anymore I wish now certainly that I had had the opportunity to benefit from his his great experience in the role. But I did tell you have been identified with several French roles in matter of fact last year with the Metropolitan Opera we heard you in Boston in the Romeo and Juliet. That's right and this year to be doing there in the new production at the Met of

tear gas and a show really looking forward to. Maybe if we get talking too much we should go back and hear a little bit of your singing voice as sampled on this Serenus recording which I believe is a little more recent than the Menotti opera from this album John what do you suggest we hear. Well I tell you one of my favorite composers on the album is Nicholas thought jello as you know is the brother of its legend. And I had a wonderful melodic gift there are two songs that I like particularly as I walked forth and by the way the interesting thing about this album is that the songs are all composed to the verse of very famous English speaking poets except for the Italian song. There you see there's a group of Italian songs but all the English ones are there as I walk forth and leave only the to my sorrows I think are two very lovely songs.

Those were two that I definitely would have included. And once again bliss Hiebert is at the piano so let's hear these two songs by Nicholas photo. It.

Yeah. Yeah

yeah. Those were two songs of Nicholas for giallo settings. As I walked

forth and leave all leave me to my sorrow. Two poems by William Blake sung by John Reardon with bliss Hiebert at the piano. John is joining us for this particular program to talk about various aspects of his career. And a little bit about the NE T opera production in which he's involved at the moment the role of Tomsky in the Queen of Spades of Tchaikovsky. John we were talking about your career leading up to them that. And I think one of the things that one of the dangers of singing at the Metropolitan Opera seems to be. Oh I don't know if we want to refer to it as being stereotyped but so often singers have gone to the mat and been stuck in certain roles and there they are for the rest of their career. This is certainly a danger that you avoided entirely. I can't think of another singer who has. Whose career has already encompassed such a variety of roles not only in terms of dramatic intent but also in terms of just

range you've gone from. Near a tenor to an airbase that sort of thing and repertoire. And let's talk about that a little bit. There have been certain roles that you've been associated with right from the very beginning. I'm thinking first of some of the operas of Carlisle Floyd and in particular. His Weathering Heights or Heights was this role written for you right from the very north America it was and it was you know it was premiered in Santa Fe as a matter of fact and Robert Trey he sang the first. What was his name. I can't remember the character's name. Oh he's cliff he thought of course. Terrible thing forget. No I was given the role simply because I was at the New York City Opera when they were going to do it the following season. There have been some operas However since then that composers have written for me as a matter of fact. I'll be doing the world premiere of Lehigh B's latest opera based on Tennessee Williams summer and smoke next summer in St.

Paul. I think I read about a hand that has been written for me as was his last opera almost written for me. We discovered each other more or less as he was finishing the opera and that of course was not to have a thrill of based on again ism talk again as a month in the country. You do seem to have an affinity for the Russians. Yes these days anyway. Well it must be rather interesting to see how a composer. I understand your voice. Well you know sometimes a composer thinks he understand your voice and he doesn't. I did two operators of Douglas Moore also two world premiers the wings of the dove and then having done the wings of the dove he said he had written the next opera for me which was Carrie Nation. The role of a drunken husband Carrie Nation. And he said I've written this just for you because I know the wings of the dove was a little low. Well apparently she was a little high.

I tell you four other baritones around I had enough trouble cutting it myself but I have a certain facility to be able to stay up higher than most baritones can for a very long time. I think this was in evidence with that Mourning Becomes Electra Pradelle than that. Now that was originally written for a time that was written for a tenner and basically remained unchanged except for a few Bs and the flats having been deleted and other notes substituted the actual test a tour of the role remained pretty much the same as it had had been originally written incidentally. I was in on the shall we say of the incubation period of that opera because when you know it was one of the Ford Foundation grant operas the Ford Foundation I believe paid for the production at the Metropolitan. And so as each act was completed before the Met finally consented to produce it each act had to be sung at a what you might call a backwards audition in Broadway terms. The Met management and

assorted board of directors and that sort of thing so that when the second I wasn't on the first act when the second act was auditioned I sang the baritone role which Sherill Milnes finally ended up singing with her and she had her of course at that point was still singing Oren. And you ended up with four and I ended up with R and I'll never forget I was in Madison Wisconsin singing Scarpa to Eleanor Steber Tosca on a freezing I think February day. I mean it was about 15 below zero when the phone rang and it was Marvin. David Levy the composer and he said you know I have something to talk to you about I said but he said How would you like to sing Oren. I said well how can I it's a tenor Oh well what if I changed a few notes could you sing it. I said Well yes I'd love to sing and I said why. I said Well I think the man is going to call you know I had already been singing at the Met so it wasn't you know. Look I think the Met will call you soon to tell you that they'd like you to do or they did.

Well I think it's a credit to your versatility as an artist that you know that you've been able to meet all these demands that have been put on you. But it must leave you a little bit nervous at times to wonder you know what people are going to come up with next. I mean one can stretch oneself just so far. When you're singing a bass a baritone type role today and tomorrow someone offered you a very attractive offer to sing something you know on the other end of the scale. Well if you took that literally I can't do it I can't sing very low one day and very high the very next day I can sing brother high one day and quite low the next day. So there is a difference. But no it's basically. Basically a question of training yourself if you have the time. To prepare out either a very high role or a very low role

why it can be done because your voice takes on different characteristics as you work it along certain lines as you work on a higher role. The heaviness drops out of the bottom and you find yourself going up much more easily after a few days or a week or so. If you're singing a role that goes down very low it takes on more weight and it and you find your range actually changes you know it may change from G to f or f sharp in a low roll or low g to say for high end sharp and in a high roll you may not be able to get a good g out at all you my age or or even low B-flat might be the lowest note that you can make any good noise on. But then you may sing a good a high A flat as a result and you had several of those I know in the morning morning because selector Yes. Still there must be an area that sort of is more comfortable for you. Well I prefer to relate. Staying a little on the high

side too a little too much on the low side. I would think that that would be the direction to go just from you know standpoint of finding less competition there and more opportunity for certain kinds of roles. There are lots of lower baritones around it seems to me the high baritones are always a little bit of a premium because they're getting into the tender area. It's true and I find that being able to sing I of course opens up a field in the German operetta field which I've done many of. Particularly the Merry Widow of Les har inflator most of Strauss which I do well. I tell you this year I think I have half of my income is coming from the Merry Widow. Is that right. Practically. It's incredible. I remember throwing the same question at Robert rounds bill when he was here doing the Janacek with you. Asking him how he felt about musical comedy

vs. opera and I'd be curious to hear your comments on this. Well now in what respect you mean for the singer to try to do both or whether one looks down on musical comedy of London you know not from any sort of a musical prejudice just from the standpoint of the performer. Is it difficult. What are the rather hardest part about musical comedy is delivering dialogue eight times a week if you're doing if you're talking about a Broadway show now if it's an isolated engagement or a week say and summer stock it's another story you can manage that. But I know that I have you know I have done musical comedy and for an extended time on Broadway I did one show back 10 years ago that played over a year on Broadway and including the tryouts before the opening New York and the tour after it amounted to over a year and a half. And you find yourself having to be very careful about your dialogue

because being you mean in the long run is harder on your voice and singing. Yes I think I came to this conclusion same conclusion after being in se. Unfortunately on Broadway they don't like you to speak. The way is that it's best to conserve your throat in other words if you speak. Support. Yes there's always something obviously I don't do that. So then you talk in your throat which they love and lose your voice. It's a it's a different kind of demand. How about from just the dramatic part on the dramatic part of it I think is I've always maintained that every singer should at some point and particularly early if possible try to do as much musical comedy as possible because it's a wonderful training ground for an opera singer to loosen himself up on the stage and be able to react in a human manner to what somebody else is saying to him. So often opera singers are like automatons or even worse and think only of facing front and singing and I think I think opera

deserves better treatment than that. House I'd like to play something from there a little right now. Do Cass's is Caza. It's a Columbia recording conducted by Franz alos. Let's hear the selection from Mary why don't get some idea of how John weird sounds on musical comedy stage. All right you want. Hot sauce right. My dearest I'm at my desk. I catch up I want. To take up too much space. I find. No one see just what I do.

It was not obvious. To us. Chasing or not doing.

Well that little selection from the Merry Widow with John Reardon and I'm just wondering how much time we've got left John and how to end up this interview. I know you have to get back for a continuation of the taping videotaping of the Tchaikovsky opera. We just got on the subject of voice study briefly. And I'm sure a lot of singers and hopeful performers out there are curious. You know. Is there still room in a professional performers career for continued study or is this something you sort of leave behind. Well I did leave it behind for a long time I went for about

12 years without studying and Fortunately I ran into Margaret Harshaw in Santa Fe about three years ago she was teaching in the apprentice program out there and as you may know she teaches regularly at the University of Indiana and sang for several years and sang of course at night of Holland for I think close to 20 years if not more. And began as a Met So interestingly enough and ended up dramatic soprano. In fact she was singing most of the Wagnerian soprano roles during the war and I discovered that she was a first rate teacher and someone. To whom I could entrust my voice I don't want to sound pompous but your voice is a very precious possession. And you think many many times before you walk into a studio and say Well here it is you know what you want me to do. But I discovered that I knew what to do with it. And so I've been seeing

her when I can which is infrequently but at least happens from time to time over the last three years and I'm more than thrilled at the result. So I would say never stop studying completely. Singer should never do. First of all singers should never depend upon his own ear it's the worst judge of how he's singing. Recordings are a good thing to know what you're doing wrong. But sometimes you don't know how to correct it. So teacher you can trust as it is indispensable I would say. You must of bins there must have been something that sort of in you and in your thinking about your own singing that prepared you for Margaret Harshaw. Well you know that sort of led you to her. Were you looking for something specific or did. I had been thinking about finding a teacher for several years. And so when you do that you generally listen to people that you know and find out who their teachers are. But nothing had really clicked I mean they're certainly good

singers around and there are. Probably a few good teachers certainly a few good teachers not more than a few. But I just had just had met the one that seemed to me to be the right one until I met her Shah. Well looking ahead at the next year which I guess is far enough for us in this particular instance what's coming up for you the rest of the year now. You'll be singing and Vetta at the Metropolitan Opera. You'll be doing some more merry widows. Oh yes next summer in fact next fall over late summer and early fall I do 8 performances of The Merry Widow spread over a month in Toronto following a performance again with Mr. R. Franz allers and company who we do a summer concert version with various orchestras around the country from time to time. Do that at Saratoga Springs. And then a maybe another two performances in Ottawa Canada after the Toronto

but one thing I'm really looking forward to before that is next spring when I do the four baritones from Hoffman out in Vancouver and I've done them before but I've never done them in French and so this is going to be quite quite an experience. So Canada is proving to be a very has a connect It's odd because you know before this year I had never sung over in Canada. I've been to Toronto a couple of times do television show now and then but I've never sung opera. Do you plan to do any concertizing. I do have a recital. Yes with the need of a lead and I hope at least I hope to perhaps give some joint recitals from time to time we are working on one now. The recycle end of it really takes more time than anything else if you if you work up a program and keep it worked up it's awfully good because you have it at your fingertips. But at the same time it's difficult to keep a program

worked up when you keep going off to do new productions and on. And that's something that I don't do an awful lot of and I would like to do more of it. I think it's sort of a self-perpetuating thing in that the more programs you do the more you have prepared the more opportunities will come up. But of course that's sort of a something you have to motivate from the beginning and I suppose it's a lot easier to motivate yourself if you have a specific job offered to you. Yes indeed having the same problem. When we're talking about recitals I think the best way to close out this little conversation John is to return to this Serenus recording and by the way this whole series of records by Serena's has an interesting story I don't know how familiar you are with it. The fact that Mr Capp. Has used it who uses the Serenus recordings to sort of illustrate how the money the music which he publishes should say no.

Yes so I guess it's a I think it's a wonderful idea. He's done some very beautiful beautiful recordings. The publishing company is general music publishing company and the Serenus recordings reproduced. I don't know if he's reproduced everything that he publishes on records but I think this is a you know he's quite got around to it yet. And from the same album let's choose something to end up on perhaps a postcard from Spain. This is a setting of a poem by Richard Hundley by the composer Richard Huntley do you know Mr. Hunter but yes we work together on the songs of his that appear on the on the recording. OK let's hear this blisse Hiebert accompanying John Reardon in a postcard from Spain.