#9 of Top Bass-Baritones
9.) Sir Bryn Terfel Jones
Bryn Terfel is the most famous bass-baritone in the opera world today. He’s currently singing Wagnerian repertoire with much success. However, he’s in my top ten because of his early career.
Terfel’s big splash into the operatic world was in the 1989 Cardiff Singer of the World competition. He was incredible! His “Non piu andrai” was technically brilliant! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yz8n2tVyGwc Some people don’t understand the difficulty of this piece because it’s so cute. Bass-baritones need to have their cover right on point for every “e” natural, need to make sure they do not give too much juice so they can make those last e natural’s at the end, and they can’t underestimate the piece. The last one is crucial. Personally, I’ve added harder repertoire over the years, but the minute I underestimate this aria I’m in trouble. It is a technical workout that has a cute melody and the audience thinks it’s adorable. Terfel presented a polished performance of this piece, and he inspires me to be better whenever I listen to this.
Although he didn’t win the competition, Terfel launched his career after this point. He began singing a ton of mozart repertoire after this, including his main role of Figaro in Le Nozze di Figaro. For a while, people tried to cast him as a baritone. Yes, he can do a number of baritone roles (half of the fach ‘bass-baritone’ is baritone!). However, they tried to cast him in higher repertoire than his voice type. This is no surprise because he was technically brilliant at this point in his career. He had the top of his voice all the way to G perfect in his voice. Bryn sang Ford from Falstaff, Guliermo from Cosi fan Tutti, he was hired to sing Papageno at the Met, and there’s many performances of him singing baritone duet’s like from Don Carlo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDD-l4iN2AE. In this section of his career from 1990-2000, he was vocally brilliant. He had those high notes, so people thought he was a baritone. No, he was just that amazing. These are some older performances that put me in awe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUWgQ4G5c38, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MdXqtQ1vJQ, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tLrPVkfCIQ. How he switched into his cover on the upper voice, his power in his mid voice, and overall acting just put him on the path to be one of the greatest bass-baritones ever!!!!! Recently, I bought his schumann cd released in 2000 and it is impressive! Not only is his singing and interpretations of the pieces spectacular, he sings some of these art songs in the baritone key! “Mein Hertz ist Schwer” he sings a G than an F sharp brilliantly (of course it will be better in recording than live because you can redo mess ups, but it was still extremely impressive). It’s a rare gem and worth listening to!
If I was just talking about this decade of his career, I would have him in the top four easily. However, Terfel’s technique got a bit sloppy. He opens up on e flat, e natural, and f natural constantly, higher than that isn’t as good because he doesn’t cover at his passagio, and his mid rage lost a bit of it’s nobility. He was on track to be the greatest bass-baritone ever and maybe the best Wotan of all time, but his singing became less polished and that’s why I have him ranked so low. His acting improved and he’s more into the characters, yet it’s just not the same. I still enjoy listening to him, but comparing those two decades is like comparing Michael Jordon playing on the Bulls to Jordon playing on the Wizards. Still good, but just not the same.