San Francisco Classical Voice

A textless "Vocalise en forme de habañera" by Ravel brought out two of the singer's best qualities: the silky sensuousness of her voice, coupled with a smooth, beguiling coloratura. But with the introduction of French and German repertory into her program, she needed to lead us beyond the ravishment of passion, commitment, and beauty of voice to style and intent; and in this she was less successful. Songs like Chausson's "Le colibri" (The hummingbird), Fauré's "En sourdine" (Muted), and Mahler's "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen" (I have become lost to the world) require thought and attention to matters of style in order to communicate the many-layered beauties of the songs. Here, to contradict the writer in the New York Times listing, it really does matter what songs a particular singer chooses to sing: they are not all to be dressed in the same accouterments.

The French and German repertory made apparent a disconcerting inattention to detail that was overshadowed by the larger passion of the arias and other songs, and that now emerged to oppose the power of the beautiful voice. Hunt Lieberson's tendency to slight unaccented notes or words gave the impression that some notes were undeserving of full attention. In the phrase "les rivières sont roses" (the rivers are pink) in Debussy's "Beau soir" (Beautiful evening), the first three words fell by the wayside as the singer drove towards the high point of the musical phrase — the final word "roses" — where the voice suddenly blossomed. At the end of the same song, three successive phrases were unevenly handled: "comme s'en va cette onde" (as this wave goes) was unphonated, dead tone; "Elle à la mer" (it to the sea) was a lovely vibrant pianissimo; but then "Nous au tombeau" (we to the tomb) was again sung in a reserved tone meant to project quiet emotion, but which somehow flattened it instead.

The exquisite word at the end of Fauré's "En sourdine" (Muted), "chantera" (will sing), written pianissimo on a slow downward octave, was partly achieved: the first syllable was faultless, but Hunt Lieberson marred the effect by once again withdrawing her voice from the last two syllables, which petered out over the delectable piano arpeggiation that urges the song gently forward for three more measures. Robert Tweten, the pianist, was not encouraged — or not able — to be the full partner that the song calls for. Where the piano should have emerged in a long ascending step-wise line to the tender climax, it was only by means of hard listening that the design of the delicate musical steps could be discerned.

One more French example: the climactic point in "Le colibri" is the word "vers" (towards), coming at the end of a long crescendo-accelerando as the hummingbird reaches the high point of his flight and is poised to begin his descent into the flower from which he will drink nectar and then expire. If the singer and pianist do not allow this moment of exquisite poise, marked "f" and "a tempo," there is no ecstasy and no release into the subsequent descending line. This moment is one of the supreme examples of what French mélodie is all about: emotion discreetly guided by style. Like a dancer who comes off point just a split second too fast, Hunt Lieberson did not hover, did not let her thought (and voice) float into ecstasy, did not seem to understand the importance of this one tiny but vital instance.

In the final song, "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen," the words "Es ist mir auch gar" were sung as if they were merely a run-up to "nichts" (it hardly means anything to me), the musical high point of the line and the lone word to which Hunt Lieberson gave full phonation and expression. But what about the other words? They need as fervent a treatment as "nichts." The thought is double-edged: the poet says he doesn't care; the music, however, indicates a more complex feeling. But it was as if the singer were not really thinking, here as in other phrases, between musical focal points, and then poured too much into the one climactic word of each phrase, unbalancing the line. Her several late entrances, another stylistic fault, might have additionally indicated a disconnection of her thought from the line.

There were three encores: a wistful early song by Copland, "Pastorale," serenely sung; "Angels Ever Bright and Fair" from Handel's Theodora, in which ornamentation became ever more wayward and inappropriate; and "Deep River," for which the singer unleashed a plangent, thrilling high note. The audience were, once again, ravished.