Opera world grieves for La Stupenda

The death of opera legend Dame Joan Sutherland has left the music world grieving for
a plain-speaking Australian with a colossal voice and no talent at all for pretence.
Dame Joan, who has died at 83 at her home near Geneva, Switzerland after a long
illness, came to international renown after travelling to London as the winner of a
singing competition in her native Sydney.
Hers was "the voice of the century", the late Italian tenor Luciano Pavarotti said.
The Spanish diva Montserrat Caballe described it as like "heaven".
On many lists of the world's greatest sopranos, Dame Joan has ranked second only to
Maria Callas.
During a career spanning four decades, she was known in the opera world as an
"anti-diva" diva, whose warm, vibrant sound and subtle colouring helped revive the
early 19th-century Italian opera style known as bel canto.
Opera Australia artistic director Lyndon Terracini said Dame Joan "was tremendously
down to earth and tremendously joyous".
"When she came into the rehearsal room the whole place would light up, and I think
in performances that joy communicated from the stage to an audience in quite an
extraordinary way.
"I think she transcended not only the operatic form but was a great communicator to
the wider public," Mr Terracini said.
"I think it would be fair to say she was Bradmanesque."
New Zealand diva Dame Kiri Te Kanawa said Dame Joan could never be equalled.
"She's totally unique, and you will never ever hear another voice like that," Dame
Kiri said.
"It was elite, it was supreme, no one could ever reach that. We've all tried, but I
think with a lot of us it failed."
Dame Joan's first training was sitting at the feet of her mother Muriel, a
mezzo-soprano, as she practised scales and arpeggios. She didn't start serious voice
training until she was 18.
Young Joan went to London to study at the Royal College of Music in 1951. She later
joined the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, as a utility soprano earning 10 pounds
a week, and made her debut as the First Lady in Mozart's The Magic Flute in 1952.
In 1954 she married Richard Bonynge, a fellow Australian, who coached her as a
coloratura singer and set her on a path to the major roles of bel canto.
The repertoire - "beautiful song" in Italian - had languished for decades outside
Italy until the legendary Callas took on the roles in the early 1950s.
Italian director Franco Zeffirelli, who directed Dame Joan in the 1959 Covent Garden
performance of Lucia di Lammermoor that launched her international career, was
floored by her voice the moment he heard it.
"We went to the theatre and I saw her, as big as a sergeant in the army with a
terrible Australian accent," Zeffirelli said in an interview.
Then "she started to sing, and she conquered me. I said, my God, it is going to be
big trouble for Callas".
But the two sopranos were above "petty jealousies", he said.
"They were two enormous artists. ... They respected one another. When you reach that
level you are beyond how normal people react."
Dame Joan was soon considered the pre-eminent singer of bel canto opera. If she
couldn't project the raw passion of Callas, her voice was far steadier and she could
maintain a perfect vocal line in difficult roles.
"She had more vocal flexibility than Callas," said Lotfi Mansouri, former general
director of the San Francisco Opera, who directed her in more operas than any other
director.
When Zeffirelli's production of Lucia went to La Scala in Italy, Dame Joan became
known as La Stupenda.
Her marriage to Sir Richard, a pianist and conductor, was to be a life-long and
mutually supportive partnership.
The couple did much for opera in Australia, Mr Terracini said.
On their return to Australia, their opera company gave opportunities to many singers
and Dame Joan boosted the art as Opera Australia music director.
Her biographer, Dame Norma Major, said: "For me and countless others she was the
greatest coloratura soprano of the 20th century.
"Her glorious voice brought to us operas that were rarely heard, but which are now
in the standard repertoire of international opera houses."
For all her fame, offstage Dame Joan was famously unpretentious and plainspoken.
"She was an extraordinary woman and such a fantastic artist, but very down-to-earth
and professional," said Jonathan Pell, artistic director of the Dallas Opera.
She was one of the great singers of the last, or any other, century, but she was
also a wonderful colleague, and everyone loved her."
After her final appearance in the United States in 1987 - in the title role of Franz
Lehar's The Merry Widow - Dame Joan thanked the audience at the Fair Park Music Hall
in Dallas.
"I just feel the time has come. I'd rather leave you with a pleasant sound in your
ears than start croaking too much," she said.
Her last performances were at the Sydney Opera House and London's Covent Garden in
1990.
She was Australian of the Year in 1961.
Dame Joan is survived by her husband, their son Adam, daughter-in-law Helen, and two
grandchildren.
La Stupenda, who died peacefully on October 10 after a long illness, had requested a
very small and private funeral.