Jessye Norman Interview (page: 7 / 9) Legendary Opera Soprano	Print Interview

Of your operatic roles, which is the nearest to your heart?

Jessye Norman: Oh gosh. That would be difficult to answer. I can honestly say that I have not sung any opera roles that I didn't really, really want to do, but I suppose if I had to choose one, I would probably choose Dido in the Trojans of Berlioz, because first of all the music is so beautiful and the story is glorious. You have the fourth book of the Aeneid as your opera libretto, and I admit that opera libretti, the words can be a little less than great literature, shall we say.

And the story is sometimes a little bit...

Jessye Norman: A little bit ridiculous, to say the least. I mean, try to explain the story of Il Trovatore of Verdi to somebody without breaking into laughter. But to have that text, the Aeneid, translated into French, just to have words that are that beautifully translated, and that they're beautiful to say, and then to have them set to music. I suppose if I had to choose one, I would choose Dido.

Do you like Italian opera?

Jessye Norman: Yes, I love Italian opera. I don't sing a great deal of Italian opera, but I love to listen to it from other people. One of my favorite roles to listen to is La Traviata. I love the role of Violetta in that opera. I really just love it.

But you would never sing it?

Jessye Norman: It's not for my voice at all. It's not for my sort of voice, even my very different voices. There isn't one of those voices inside of me that would suit that role. I suppose that's one of the reasons I love to listen to other people sing it.

Have you ever felt that people discriminate against people who are bright, and who say the things that they feel, and who know perhaps more than the people who are directing them?

Get the Flash Player to see this video. Jessye Norman: I've had the odd experience of working with my colleagues who would have preferred that I should keep quiet when I have expressed a differing opinion to what was going on. I was working, for instance, years ago -- I was just thinking -- working years ago for one of the Queen's birthdays in Britain, and the conductor wanted to do some music of Scott Joplin, except I don't think he had ever seen any music of Scott Joplin before, much less performed it. It was a slow drag which is in two. (Hums). And he was doing it in four, which is... (hums). There were a couple of other singers involved, and this was our first rehearsal, and it was with the piano, so we weren't with the orchestra yet, and he kept doing that, and we finally had a pause in the rehearsal, and I sort of went forward. I said, "Excuse me, but actually a slow drag is in two, not four. So if we could go through that perhaps again." And he said something like, "Well it's your music, you must know about it." And so I said in response, "We can talk about the Great Symphony in C of Schubert if you'd like. I have some things to say about that too." So it shows you that people would sometimes rather you just sort of do what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to sing. You're not supposed to point out that he's actually conducting the piece in the wrong meter!

Do you think he said that because you happened to be the same color...

Jessye Norman: As the composer, yes.

Not because you could read the music.

Jessye Norman: Yes, exactly. No, no, no, not at all.

Well he just didn't know you.

Jessye Norman: He didn't know me, but he got to know me over time.

In 1989 you were asked to participate in a celebration in Paris, marking the bicentennial of the French Revolution. Could you describe that experience?

Get the Flash Player to see this video. Jessye Norman: I was asked by President Mitterrand through an emissary of his, a year before the celebration should take place. I have been singing in France all of my performing life, and have a very special relationship which I treasure with the French musical public. I was very concerned that perhaps, because I spent so much time performing there, I was very concerned that perhaps President Mitterrand thought that I was from Haiti, or from Cameroon, or from a former French colony in Africa or somewhere. So I said to the person who was asking me this on the behalf of the President, Monsieur du Pavignon was his name, I said, "Does the President realize that I'm American, and that I'm not French in any way?" He said, "Yes, the President probably knows what he's doing. Thank you, Miss Norman." I was very flattered, of course, and on the occasion of singing this national anthem for the bicentennial of the French Revolution it still sounds kind of implausible. I was very comfortable. I was very happy to be a part of it, and everybody else around me -- the people that were responsible for it -- were as nervous as they could be. I mean at one point, one of the people in charge of the entire sort of parade, as we call it -- it's called a défilé in French -- came to me and said, "Are you nervous?" and so I said no. And he said, "How can you not be nervous going out to sing for three billion people watching on television all over the world, not to mention the people that are actually on the Champs-Élysées and at the Place de la Concorde?" And so I said," I practiced, I know the tune, I've practiced the words. You could wake me up in the middle of the night and say, 'Sing the third verse of the national anthem of France,' and it would come out of me, so I'm just going to have a good time. I get to wear the tricolor, the French colors, as a dress, as an American singing the Marseillaise. I'm not nervous. I'm having a wonderful evening." And I did have a wonderful evening.

What's harder to sing, "The Star-Spangled Banner" or the Marseillaise?

Get the Flash Player to see this video. Jessye Norman: "The Star-Spangled Banner." It is unsingable. No, truly, and I know that there are people who say, "She must be absolutely crazy," but I really do feel that "The Star-Spangled Banner," it covers too much territory. That is an octave and a fifth. That means you've got 13 notes that are incorporated into our national anthem. For a song that is to be sung by a general public, one octave is enough. And the song that I wish we had as a national anthem is "America the Beautiful." It doesn't talk about war, it doesn't talk about anything except for the beauty of this land, and the joy that we should have in being in this land, and it's a much more -- for me -- a much more beautiful song, even though I understand completely the rousing that happens in the heart from listening just to the opening bars of "The Star Spangled Banner."

Would you sing "America the Beautiful" at Yankee Stadium to kick off a game?

Jessye Norman: Why not? Absolutely. I've sung "America the Beautiful" for the tennis open. Why not?

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