Product Details

• Actors: Verrett, Bumbry, Anderson, Robeson, Price
• Directors: Schmidt-Garre, Schroeder
• Format: Classical, Color, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English (PCM Stereo)
• Subtitles: German, Italian, French, Spanish
• Region: All Regions
• Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Arthaus Musik
• DVD Release Date: July 28, 2009
• Run Time: 85 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B002AT462M
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #146,815 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Intriguing documentary about black singers of classical music
set against the background of black emancipation in politics
and society in the US.
Think of today's top operatic voices, and black owners of them are as
likely to come into the list as white ones: Willard White, Jessye Norman
and Kathleen Battle to name only three. We know it wasn't always thus
- Paul Robeson's struggles to be recognised as a great singer, instead of
a black singer, went on for many decades.
But this programme reveals just how hard the journey to acceptance of
America's black singers has been. It opens with one of the greatest voices of
the 20th century: Marian Anderson and a clip of her magnifi cent performance
of Ave Maria. The film offers newsreel footage from her landmark 1939
concert at the Lincoln Memorial, which was held after the Daughters of the
American Revolution denied her access to their Constitution Hall venue.
But the black tradition of classical singing goes back even further: Before
Leontye Price, Jessye Norman and even before Marian Anderson, Sissieretta
Jones was arguably the greatest black performer of 19th century America and
certainly the first great black diva. Sissieretta Jones , the Black Patti, an
allusion to Italian-American primadonna Adelina Patti, performed before four American presidents, mesmerized critics and audiences alike
and was so successful that at one concert in New Jersey 1,000 visitors had to be turned away.
The film Aida's Brothers and Sisters intends to focus the viewer's gaze particularly on the black classic and also on the fascinating
mixed forms that have developed from the confrontation of white and black music in the last hundred years. The encounter with the
powerful personalities of the singers and their music will reveal the humour, the lust for life, and the spiritual depth of black culture,
and will perhaps add a dash of colour to a white fin de siècle culture that is in danger of contracting anaemia.
A fascinating documentary with historical and contemporary film and video records of performances by Leontyne Price, Simon Estes,
Grace Bumbry, Reri Grist and many others.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Aida's Brothers and Sisters: Black Voices in Opera, May 3, 2010

By 

Xavier - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Aida's Brothers and Sisters: Black Voices in Opera (DVD)

Buy this great dvd, I did and am extremely pleased. I bought the videocassette recording before the dvd became available and now have both in my library. You won't regret it!!

The writer (and he/she receives my applause) of this magnificent editorial is unaware of an earlier well known (recorded in history) opera singer whose name was Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield. This diva was born in Natchez, Mississippi 1809; before Sissieretta Jones who was so eloquently written of by the Editor. There were many others, male and female, before and later who didn't receive the deserved recognition in history.

Please read the following about Ms. Greenfield:

The story of the black struggle for a place in the American sun began not with the significant in-roads made in jazz, sports, or politics in the 20th century. Its real start came with a singer who was born a slave in the South nearly 40 years before the outbreak of the Civil War. Her name was Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield; she crowned her career with a command performance before Queen Victoria at Buckingham Palace.

Elizabeth was born in Natchez, Mississippi 1809 and was reared in Philadelphia by "a Quaker lady named Greenfield" whose name she adopted. After Ms. Greenfield's death in 1844, Elizabeth moved to Buffalo, New York. Seven years later she appeared before the Buffalo Musical Association at Corinthian Hall. She began singing to packed houses "... of respectable, cultured and fashionable people", observed the Buffalo Press, and was critically acclaimed for her vocal artistry. She frequently performed before government officials, heads of state, and visiting dignitaries in Boston and New York.

In 1853, Elizabeth went to Europe with the aid of Harriet Beecher Stowe. She was befriended by the Duchess of Sutherland who arranged many concerts patronized by royalty. May, 1854 she gave a command performance at Buckingham Palace for Queen Victoria and was accompanied by Her Majesty's royal organist and composer, Sir George Smart.

Elizabeth returned to the United States July, 1854; and, as usual, was well received by audiences and critics alike. She received favorable reviews from newspapers that were pro-slavery. As so appropriately stated by the Provincial Freeman, a black antislavery press, "...not a few gentlemen and ladies conquered their prejudices and made call upon the gifted vocalist during the few days she stayed in their midst".

After the Civil War she settled in Philadelphia and opened a voice studio. In 1866 she and her students performed at the National Hall, "Festival of the Friends of Freedom", sponsored by the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society. Elizabeth Taylor-Greenfield received world-wide acclaim as a most gifted vocalist with an "astonishing" range easily embracing 27 notes, which represents 3 octaves plus. She passed away in 1876 at the age of 67. AFRO-American Almanac

There is so much history left out by mistake, intentionally, lost, etc. I could go on and on...

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One Regal Diva after Another, July 31, 2009

By 

Jeffery Mingo (Homewood, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Aida's Brothers and Sisters: Black Voices in Opera (DVD)

Black students almost fell on the floor laughing when they saw that I was a Mathlete. Instead of being ashamed, I had to giggle too because I no Black folk wouldn't expect one of our own to join that. I met a brother in college who said people are shocked that he played water polo at Amherst. Notice that Condi Rice with her conservative self majored in Russian, or something. Dr. Angela Davis discussed how people deemed her inauthentic for having studied in Germany. You don't have to be an opera fan to be fascinated by this documentary. It's really a meditation about when African Americans do things that are not deemed "typical."

Interviewees speak of universal concerns to our group. They spoke about having to be better than the majority to get a job. They spoke of being paid less. They spoke about their discomfort in having to play that one role designated for a Black performer. A great thing is how they honor the past. The work pays attention to Marian Anderson and Paul Robeson. The singers fight the idea that opera is Eurocentic. In a time when Obama is now president, there is a message of healing here. The Daughters of the American Revolution, who banned Anderson, invited Leontyne Price to perform decades later and she praised Anderson before her performance. This work focuses on the sisters, but then speaks to the brothers. They speak of being denied roles solely because decision makers refused to pair them with white female love interests.

There were several times when I would unexpectedly shout, "Work, girl!" when seeing some of these people hit those high notes. I simply loved that this DVD offered many foreign language subtitle options. This work is actually old; at one point an interviewee refers to the 1990s only. This had the late Dr. Edward Said in it. I know he's famous for his thoughts on orientalism, but I didn't know he had so much knowledge on African-American cultural productions. May he rest in peace. Some performers said, "I can tell when a Black person is singing." Many may not like the essentialism of that statement. Some may feel that the work shows too many performance scenes while others will deem it to have shown too few.

I really liked this work and encourage all those interested in African-American expressive culture to view it.