Jon Vickers
While Jon Vickers was best known as a Wagnerian heldentenor, he was also capable of singing lieder, Baroque opera, spinto Italian roles, and even the comic role of Vasek in The Bartered Bride. His voice and physique both radiated power, and his stage presence was one of the most impressive of his era. Like many singers with huge voices, he sometimes resorted to crooning soft passages, but the effect of such a voice scaled down was still highly impressive. He was a man of equally powerful convictions and refused to sing roles he considered to be lacking in morality, or whose lack of morality did not carry a lesson.
His father was a lay preacher, and the young Vickers often sang for services. As his vocal gifts became more and more evident, he began to reconsider his aspirations for a career in business; his inclination toward music was confirmed in 1950, when he received a Royal Conservatory scholarship to study voice in Toronto. There he learned technique (founded in Baroque rather than Wagnerian music) from George Lambert and interpretation from Herman Geiger-Torel. He made his operatic debut as the Duke in Rigoletto at the Toronto Opera in 1954, and continued to sing in local houses and for Canadian radio in a wide variety of roles, from Ferrando in Così fan tutte to Alfredo in La Traviata to a few excerpts from Die Walküre and Parsifal.
In 1956, frustrated with what appeared to be a limited career and unsure whether he wanted the pressures of an operatic lifestyle, he was considering leaving music, but within a month of the deadline he gave himself to decide, Covent Garden invited him to make his debut as Riccardo in Un ballo in maschera in 1957. Other roles and debuts quickly followed: his Bayreuth debut as Siegmund in 1958, his Vienna State Opera debut in 1959 in the same role, his Met debut as Canio in 1960, and his La Scala debut the same year as Florestan in Fidelio. His first Peter Grimes was at the Met in 1967. By that time, he was one of the world's major heldentenors, and in 1969 he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada. He made his Salzburg Festival debut the next year, as Verdi's Otello (a role he filmed with von Karajan). In 1976, he took on the title role of Handel's Samson at the work's United States premiere in Dallas, and followed that with performances in other major U.S. houses. He retired in 1988.
Vickers was known for having a prickly temperament and was famous for once interrupting the last act of Tristan und Isolde to shout at the audience, "Stop your damned coughing!" In other ways, he was deeply modest. He refused to call himself an "artist," insisting that he was merely the interpreter of the real artists, the composers, and refused to make recital pieces or recordings of arias outside of the context of the complete work, saying that this practice inappropriately elevated the performer above the music.
His Peter Grimes is one of the most memorable renditions of the role (despite the fact that Britten found the thought of Vickers singing it so far from the original spirit that he refused to attend his performances or hear the recording), and his Tristan und Isolde is magnificent, with one of the most moving death scenes on record. In the Italian repertoire, he made a powerful Radames on the Solti recording with Leontyne Price.
© Anne Feeney /TiVo
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Beethoven: Fidelio, Op. 72
Christa Ludwig, Jon Vickers, Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer
Klassik - Erschienen bei Warner Classics am 01.01.1994
24-Bit 192.0 kHz - Stereo -
Bellini: Norma
Montserrat Caballé, Jon Vickers, Josephine Veasey, Agostino Ferrin, Marisa Zotti, Gino Sininberghi
Oper - Erschienen bei Opera d'Oro am 01.01.1998
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Fidelio (Stereo Version)
Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, Christa Ludwig, Jon Vickers
Klassik - Erschienen bei BNF Collection am 01.01.2013
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Verdi: Otello by Tullio Serafin
Tullio Serafin, Jon Vickers, Orchestra del Teatro dell'Opera di Roma
Oper - Erschienen bei Alexandre Bak - Classical Music Reference Recording am 16.09.2022
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Mahler: Das Lied von der Erde
Jessye Norman, Jon Vickers, London Symphony Orchestra, Sir Colin Davis
Klassik - Erschienen bei Decca Music Group Ltd. am 01.01.1982
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz: Les Troyens (The Trojans)
Sir Colin Davis, Jon Vickers, Josephine Veasey, Berit Lindholm, Chorus of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Royal Opera House Orchestra
Klassik - Erschienen bei Decca Music Group Ltd. am 01.01.1970
Qobuz’ Schallplattensammlung16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Saint-Saëns: Samson et Dalila, Op. 47
Rita Gorr, Jon Vickers, Orchestre du Theatre National De L'Opera De Paris, Georges Prêtre
Klassik - Erschienen bei Warner Classics am 01.01.1963
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Britten: Peter Grimes
Jon Vickers, Heather Harper, Jonathan Summers, Chorus of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Royal Opera House Orchestra, Sir Colin Davis
Klassik - Erschienen bei Decca Music Group Ltd. am 01.01.1978
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Wagner: Die Walküre
Oper - Erschienen bei OperaPrima am 01.01.2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Verdi : Aida
Leontyne Price, Jon Vickers, Robert Merrill, Coro del Teatro dell' Opera di Roma, Orchestra del Teatro dell'Opera di Roma, Sir Georg Solti
Klassik - Erschienen bei Decca Music Group Ltd. am 01.04.1962
Qobuz’ Schallplattensammlung16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Jon Vickers The early years
Oper - Erschienen bei Preiser Records am 25.03.2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bizet: Carmen
Grace Bumbry, Jon Vickers, Mirella Freni, Orchestre du Theatre National De L'Opera De Paris, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
Klassik - Erschienen bei Warner Classics am 01.01.1970
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bizet: Carmen
Grace Bumbry, Jon Vickers, Mirella Freni, Orchestre du Theatre National De L'Opera De Paris, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
Klassik - Erschienen bei Warner Classics am 01.01.1970
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Verdi · aida
Leontyne Price, Jon Vickers, Sir Georg Solti, Orchestra del Teatro dell'Opera di Roma
Klassik - Erschienen bei G.O.P. am 08.04.2022
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
An Evening at the Opera: Famous Arias And Duets
Agnes Baltsa, Edita Gruberova, Luciano Pavarotti, Jon Vickers
Klassik - Erschienen bei Deutsche Grammophon (DG) am 25.01.2008
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Fidelio
Gundula Janowitz, Christa Ludwig, Jon Vickers, Walter Berry, Orchester der Wiener Staatsoper, Herbert von Karajan
Klassik - Erschienen bei Deutsche Grammophon (DG) am 01.01.2008
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bizet: Carmen (Highlights)
Grace Bumbry, Jon Vickers, Mirella Freni, Orchestre du Theatre National De L'Opera De Paris, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
Klassik - Erschienen bei Warner Classics am 01.01.1970
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Verdi: Don Carlo · Mozart: 3 arie per basso e orchestra K.512, K.513, K.432
Boris Christoff, Jon Vickers, Carlo Maria Giulini, Royal Opera House Orchestra
Klassik - Erschienen bei G.O.P. am 28.04.2022
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
JON VICKERS IN RECITAL 1974 (Alessandro Scarlatti - Henry Purcell - Benjamin Britten)
Klassik - Erschienen bei CBC am 28.05.2001
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Handel: Samson (Live)
Jon Vickers, The Royal Opera Chorus, Royal Opera House Orchestra
Vokalmusik (weltlich und geistlich) - Erschienen bei mpLive am 31.05.2017
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Fidelio (Complete Opera)
Jon Vickers, Christa Ludwig, Gottlob Frick, Walter Berry, Philharmonia Orchestra & Chorus, Otto Klemperer
Klassik - Erschienen bei Musical Concepts am 26.02.2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo