Customer Reviews

The Stanford Archive Series: Lawrence Tibbett

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Lawrence Tibbett left a priceless legacy, not only to all baritones who would come after him, but to all singers: It's alright to color outside the lines; it's OK to interpret a role from your own emotions; dare to be different! This is what keeps opera vibrant and viable! From the swaggering Toreador to the chilling Iago to the tender "Under Your Spell" to the glorious "Glory Road," Tibbett proves his point. David Stearns,in his mean-spirited blog says, "for Tibbett fans only." Right! You will be! Just listen to this album!

Buy it and learn what it was to sing when singing was a national pastime, not a yelling contest.

These CDs of Lawrence Tibbett contain two examples of arias from the tenor and bass repertoires, showing the singer's voice range. Such was his physical and vocal strength during the 1930s that Mr Tibbett was able to produce pleasant enough sounds beyond the middle, chest voice. It is quite possible that such pushing of the voice may have hastened the vocal decline which unfortunately affected his career during his late forties and into his fifties, at the part of a baritone's life when the voice, properly conserved, might reasonably be expected to have a decade at least of good singing remaining to the singer.
This is an interesting selection of arias and songs which should please the singer's many fans and possibly prove attractive to new admirers.
The transfers and remastering of the recordings seem to have been well done, although there is some occasional dullness in the sound quality suggesting that much treble cutting may have been used to reduce hiss on the original recording media.