Jane Winton News
American actress (1905-1959)
Commemorations 2025 (Birth: Jane Winton)
- soprano
- United States of America
- opera singer, dancer, painter, writer, film actor
Last update
2024-04-23
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2021-09-27 06:47:57
From Rinaldo to Amadigi di Gaula: a look at Handel's highly experimental early London period
[…] in the French fashion, and the placement of the arias owes something to the French original. Whereas Italian opera was focused on the large-scale da capo exit aria (sung just before the character left the stage), French opera was more flexible with shorter arias dotted around the work. In Teseo there are five examples of where the same character has two arias in succession, which sits somewhat uneasily with Handel's writing of large-scale da capo arias. Winton Dean speculates that an older, more experienced Handel would have exerted more control over the placing of these arias. Certainly, Handel never returned to this style again. But the music he wrote for Teseo has an extraordinary richness, partly because there are fewer borrowings, Teseo was written largely from scratch. The work as handsomely staged in January 1713, and there are tantalising hints that an initial plan might have been to have more dance in the […]
2020-11-21 11:59:34
Despite lockdown, Handel's Ariodante returns to the main stage of Covent Garden
[…] centre of gravity on the serious side, this was a young woman with scruples, yet Bevan's voice had no trouble at all negotiating Dalinda's music, and the musicality of her performance was a real joy. This meant that her regret in Act Three, when she realised that she had been taken in, was profoundly intense. Polinesso is perhaps one of the nastiest characters in Handel, made all the more so by the fact that, as Winton Dean suggests, being written for a woman the character does not bluster, instead he is sly and slippery. Polinesso has to be plausible, he takes Dalinda in completely and Iestyn Davies was wonderfully plausible, giving us some incredible singing, combining superb technique with sheer beauty. But he was also oily and nasty, so that we wouldn't trust him as far as we could throw him. A wonderful performance. The role of the King of […]
2020-11-19 07:36:02
[…] edition used for the performance is based on Bernardo Ticci's new critical edition, but the version performed by Dantone evidently combines the 1711 premiere with Handel's radical revisions for the 1731 season. The opera had a number of revivals during Handel's Italian opera period, but the final one in 1731 was perhaps the most radical. The title role was transposed down, whilst Argante and Armida became altos (losing much of their music in the process). Winton Dean, in his book on Handel's Italian operas is scathing, 'All the principal persons except Rinaldo are given music that is not merely irrelevant but at variance with the character as drawn in the libretto'. Not all Dean's judgements in the book are right of course, but the booklet notes are rather vague as to which elements of 1731 are included with 1711, but the opera as performed here uses all the voice types […]
2020-07-24 09:43:01
Zest and relish: Handel's comic masterpiece Semele directed by John Eliot Gardiner with young cast enjoying every minute
[…] as can sometimes be the case and the loss of 'Endless pleasure' helps this. In Act Two, 'O Sleep' is profoundly beautiful and rather touching, with some delicate instrumental textures, yet she is urgent in 'With fond desiring'. In Act Three, 'My racking thoughts' is rather moving whilst 'Myself I shall adore' is simply delightful and as self-regarding as one could wish for. Alder very much makes Semele a multi-sided figure, yet does not neglect Winton Dean's 'sex-kitten' aspect to the role. 'No, no, I'll take no less' is finely decisive, with stupendous passage-work, and in 'Ah me!' we really feel sorry for her. Jupiter is a lyric role, but it is worth bearing in mind that the first Jupiter, John Beard, sang the title role in Handel's Samson the year before Semele! Hugo Hymas is perhaps younger than many singers in the role, but he brings to it […]
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