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Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Lose Yourself" - "Maria Fiselier" September 2018, Beste Zangers, a Dutch TV show. An opera singer arrives to sing Eminem. Maria Fiselier is Dutch, born in 1988, a mezzo-soprano: the female voice lower than the soprano's. In 2018 she was a soloist at the Komische Oper in Berlin, an opera house. It is as an opera singer that she enters the show. Then she sings "Lose Yourself." She sings Eminem's lyrics and turns into a rapper. Her colleagues react: "Who are you and what did you do with Maria?" The opera singer they knew left the scene. The one on stage was someone else. That other Maria has over 7 million views on YouTube. Would you have recognized Maria? 🎼 Work: Lose Yourself (soundtrack of the film "8 Mile," 2002) 🎹 Composer: Eminem 🎤 Performer: Maria Fiselier 🇳🇱 🎬 Recording: Beste Zangers, Dutch TV, September 2018 Show it to someone who thinks opera is boring. #BestOfOpera #MariaFiselier #Eminem #MezzoSoprano

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Lose Yourself" - "Maria Fiselier" September 2018, Beste Zangers, a Dutch TV show. An opera singer arrives to sing Eminem. Maria Fiselier is Dutch, born in 1988, a mezzo-soprano: the female voice lower than the soprano's. In 2018 she was a soloist at the Komische Oper in Berlin, an opera house. It is as an opera singer that she enters the show. Then she sings "Lose Yourself." She sings Eminem's lyrics and turns into a rapper. Her colleagues react: "Who are you and what did you do with Maria?" The opera singer they knew left the scene. The one on stage was someone else. That other Maria has over 7 million views on YouTube. Would you have recognized Maria? 🎼 Work: Lose Yourself (soundtrack of the film "8 Mile," 2002) 🎹 Composer: Eminem 🎤 Performer: Maria Fiselier 🇳🇱 🎬 Recording: Beste Zangers, Dutch TV, September 2018 Show it to someone who thinks opera is boring. #BestOfOpera #MariaFiselier #Eminem #MezzoSoprano

1,100,000 views • 6 days ago

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "O mio babbino caro" - "Montserrat Caballé" "O mio babbino caro, mi piace, è bello, bello." "Oh, my dear daddy, I like him, he's handsome, so handsome." 20 seconds on a single note. That was her voice. The Washington Post reported, in its 2018 obituary, that Montserrat Caballé held notes for 20 seconds. The critics spoke of the same breath: "fabulous breath control" and "an unrivalled sense of bel canto line". Her other trademark was the opposite of power: high notes sung very softly, almost in a whisper, "with utter confidence and clarity". One critic called it "the most luminous pianissimo in the business". In 1965, the New York Times critic heard in her a dark tone, "almost like that of a viola". Years later, the critic Tim Page told NPR it was "the single most glorious sound" he had ever heard from a human voice. All of this began on one night. On April 20, 1965, Carnegie Hall in New York called on Caballé to replace Marilyn Horne, who was pregnant, in a concert performance of "Lucrezia Borgia", by Donizetti. It was her American debut. She got an ovation, and her international career began there. Here there is no replacement and no shared stage. She sings standing, alone in front of the orchestra, and the camera moves from the wide shot to her face and the violins, from the introduction to the next-to-last phrase of the aria. The New York Times critic heard a viola in this voice. Which instrument do you hear? 🎼 Work: O mio babbino caro (Gianni Schicchi, 1918) 🎹 Composer: Giacomo Puccini 🎤 Performer: Montserrat Caballé 🇪🇸 🎬 Recording: not identified Written 108 years ago. It stopped you today. #BestOfOpera #OMioBabbinoCaro #MontserratCaballe #Opera

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "O mio babbino caro" - "Montserrat Caballé" "O mio babbino caro, mi piace, è bello, bello." "Oh, my dear daddy, I like him, he's handsome, so handsome." 20 seconds on a single note. That was her voice. The Washington Post reported, in its 2018 obituary, that Montserrat Caballé held notes for 20 seconds. The critics spoke of the same breath: "fabulous breath control" and "an unrivalled sense of bel canto line". Her other trademark was the opposite of power: high notes sung very softly, almost in a whisper, "with utter confidence and clarity". One critic called it "the most luminous pianissimo in the business". In 1965, the New York Times critic heard in her a dark tone, "almost like that of a viola". Years later, the critic Tim Page told NPR it was "the single most glorious sound" he had ever heard from a human voice. All of this began on one night. On April 20, 1965, Carnegie Hall in New York called on Caballé to replace Marilyn Horne, who was pregnant, in a concert performance of "Lucrezia Borgia", by Donizetti. It was her American debut. She got an ovation, and her international career began there. Here there is no replacement and no shared stage. She sings standing, alone in front of the orchestra, and the camera moves from the wide shot to her face and the violins, from the introduction to the next-to-last phrase of the aria. The New York Times critic heard a viola in this voice. Which instrument do you hear? 🎼 Work: O mio babbino caro (Gianni Schicchi, 1918) 🎹 Composer: Giacomo Puccini 🎤 Performer: Montserrat Caballé 🇪🇸 🎬 Recording: not identified Written 108 years ago. It stopped you today. #BestOfOpera #OMioBabbinoCaro #MontserratCaballe #Opera

925,200 views • 20 days ago

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Waloyo Yamoni" - "Angel City Chorale" It was night on July 19, 2016, at Cadogan Hall, in London. Three choirs took the stage together with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra to sing a plea that isn't theirs. The lyrics are a litany of rain, sung in Lango, a language from northern Uganda. It's not image, it's not metaphor: it's a literal plea, the kind you make when the earth depends on it to survive. And this plea has a name. The lyrics list who needs it to rain — the women, the children, the young, the old — one by one, and each group gets back the same sung response: it is well. That's why just one voice can't carry this plea. The piece uses entire choirs to hold what belongs to a people, not to one person. And it was with this litany that Christopher Tin chose to close The Drop That Contained the Sea — a cycle where each movement is born in a different language. He himself conducts the orchestra that night, the first time Europe hears the complete work. A plea for rain, sung by an entire people, became the close of a symphonic cycle on the other side of the world. The lyrics name women, children, young and old, one by one. Who would you include if you were to compose your own plea? 🎼 Work: Waloyo Yamoni — final movement of The Drop That Contained the Sea 🎹 Composer: Christopher Tin 🎤 Performer: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra 🇬🇧, Angel City Chorale 🇺🇸, Prima Vocal Ensemble 🇬🇧 and Lucis 🇬🇧 📍 Recording: Cadogan Hall, London — European premiere, 19/07/2016 Send it to who would love / this story. #BestOfOpera #ChristopherTin #AngelCityChorale #ChoralMusic

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Waloyo Yamoni" - "Angel City Chorale" It was night on July 19, 2016, at Cadogan Hall, in London. Three choirs took the stage together with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra to sing a plea that isn't theirs. The lyrics are a litany of rain, sung in Lango, a language from northern Uganda. It's not image, it's not metaphor: it's a literal plea, the kind you make when the earth depends on it to survive. And this plea has a name. The lyrics list who needs it to rain — the women, the children, the young, the old — one by one, and each group gets back the same sung response: it is well. That's why just one voice can't carry this plea. The piece uses entire choirs to hold what belongs to a people, not to one person. And it was with this litany that Christopher Tin chose to close The Drop That Contained the Sea — a cycle where each movement is born in a different language. He himself conducts the orchestra that night, the first time Europe hears the complete work. A plea for rain, sung by an entire people, became the close of a symphonic cycle on the other side of the world. The lyrics name women, children, young and old, one by one. Who would you include if you were to compose your own plea? 🎼 Work: Waloyo Yamoni — final movement of The Drop That Contained the Sea 🎹 Composer: Christopher Tin 🎤 Performer: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra 🇬🇧, Angel City Chorale 🇺🇸, Prima Vocal Ensemble 🇬🇧 and Lucis 🇬🇧 📍 Recording: Cadogan Hall, London — European premiere, 19/07/2016 Send it to who would love / this story. #BestOfOpera #ChristopherTin #AngelCityChorale #ChoralMusic

2,000,000 views • 3 months ago

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Nessun Dorma" - Luciano Pavarotti "All'alba vincerò!" "At dawn, I will win!" Turin, February 10, 2006. Thirty-five thousand people stand in the cold of an Olympic winter, watching Luciano Pavarotti step onto the stage to sing Nessun dorma. He is considered one of the greatest tenors in opera history. In 1988, at Berlin's Deutsche Oper, he was called back on stage 165 times in 1 hour and 7 minutes — a world record for curtain calls. And he sang 378 times at New York's Metropolitan Opera, more than any other singer in the house's history. In the aria, Turandot decrees that no one may sleep until the name of the stranger who challenged her is discovered — or everyone dies at dawn. Calaf, the prince she ignores, hears the order alone in the palace garden and answers: no one will discover his name; he himself will tell her, with a kiss, when the sun rises. That night, in Turin, was the last time the public would see Pavarotti sing. Five months later came the diagnosis: pancreatic cancer. One year and seven months after that night, he died, in Modena, at 71. The career he left behind holds other numbers: 5 competitive Grammys and the Grammy Legend Award, in 1998. And the Three Tenors album, from 1990, sold 15 million copies — the best-selling classical album of all time. Which number strikes you more: the 165 curtain calls in Berlin, or the 15 million copies sold with the Three Tenors? 🎼 Work: Nessun Dorma (from Turandot) ✍️ Composer: Giacomo Puccini 🇮🇹 🎤 Performer: Luciano Pavarotti 🇮🇹 🎥 Recording: 2006 Turin Winter Olympics Send this to someone who loves a great voice. #BestOfOpera #Pavarotti #NessunDorma #Turandot

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Nessun Dorma" - Luciano Pavarotti "All'alba vincerò!" "At dawn, I will win!" Turin, February 10, 2006. Thirty-five thousand people stand in the cold of an Olympic winter, watching Luciano Pavarotti step onto the stage to sing Nessun dorma. He is considered one of the greatest tenors in opera history. In 1988, at Berlin's Deutsche Oper, he was called back on stage 165 times in 1 hour and 7 minutes — a world record for curtain calls. And he sang 378 times at New York's Metropolitan Opera, more than any other singer in the house's history. In the aria, Turandot decrees that no one may sleep until the name of the stranger who challenged her is discovered — or everyone dies at dawn. Calaf, the prince she ignores, hears the order alone in the palace garden and answers: no one will discover his name; he himself will tell her, with a kiss, when the sun rises. That night, in Turin, was the last time the public would see Pavarotti sing. Five months later came the diagnosis: pancreatic cancer. One year and seven months after that night, he died, in Modena, at 71. The career he left behind holds other numbers: 5 competitive Grammys and the Grammy Legend Award, in 1998. And the Three Tenors album, from 1990, sold 15 million copies — the best-selling classical album of all time. Which number strikes you more: the 165 curtain calls in Berlin, or the 15 million copies sold with the Three Tenors? 🎼 Work: Nessun Dorma (from Turandot) ✍️ Composer: Giacomo Puccini 🇮🇹 🎤 Performer: Luciano Pavarotti 🇮🇹 🎥 Recording: 2006 Turin Winter Olympics Send this to someone who loves a great voice. #BestOfOpera #Pavarotti #NessunDorma #Turandot

1,300,000 views • 2 months ago

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Somewhere Only We Know" - St. Patrick's Junior Choir "And if you have a minute, why don't we go Talk about it somewhere only we know?" Thirty-six children walk onto the Britain's Got Talent stage. The live semi-final opens with them, before any other name on that night's bill. They come from a school of about eighty pupils. Almost half the school sings in that choir. The thirty-six who take the stage are between eight and twelve years old. The public votes, and they finish fourth out of eight acts. The night ends without a trophy. Seven years after the elimination, the show's own channel went back to this video and reposted it under the label "Unforgettable Audition." It now stands past 11.7 million views. They didn't win — and they conquered the world. Would you have voted for them that night? 🎵 Song: "Somewhere Only We Know" 🎤 St. Patrick's Junior Choir · choir · 🇬🇧 🎬 Recording: live semi-final, Britain's Got Talent, 2017 Follow for more moments like this. #BestOfOpera #BritainsGotTalent #ChildrensChoir #SomewhereOnlyWeKnow

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Somewhere Only We Know" - St. Patrick's Junior Choir "And if you have a minute, why don't we go Talk about it somewhere only we know?" Thirty-six children walk onto the Britain's Got Talent stage. The live semi-final opens with them, before any other name on that night's bill. They come from a school of about eighty pupils. Almost half the school sings in that choir. The thirty-six who take the stage are between eight and twelve years old. The public votes, and they finish fourth out of eight acts. The night ends without a trophy. Seven years after the elimination, the show's own channel went back to this video and reposted it under the label "Unforgettable Audition." It now stands past 11.7 million views. They didn't win — and they conquered the world. Would you have voted for them that night? 🎵 Song: "Somewhere Only We Know" 🎤 St. Patrick's Junior Choir · choir · 🇬🇧 🎬 Recording: live semi-final, Britain's Got Talent, 2017 Follow for more moments like this. #BestOfOpera #BritainsGotTalent #ChildrensChoir #SomewhereOnlyWeKnow

1,200,000 views • 2 months ago

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Duetto buffo di due gatti" - Kiri Te Kanawa and Norma Burrowes Two cats bicker, meow, trip over each other — and that's the entire libretto. Not one word beyond "meow," start to finish. No plot to explain, no Italian to translate. Just that. For two hundred years, this duet has carried a big name: Rossini. Buy the score today, and "Gioacchino Antonio Rossini" is still printed right there, in the composer field. But on that same page, the same publisher writes that he didn't write it. What actually exists is an anonymous compilation, published in 1825, signed under a name nobody has ever cracked: G. Berthold. And still, there's real Rossini inside it. The melody comes from two scenes of his Otello, which premiered in 1816. There, those same notes were sung by two men, Rodrigo and Iago. Here, two centuries later, two sopranos sing them — and their entire libretto is meow. They're Kiri Te Kanawa and Norma Burrowes. The one still with no name to this day is the piece's true author. A fake name signs the joke. A real name has carried the blame for two centuries. And whoever actually put it all together never said who they were. Did you know you can still buy this score today with Rossini's name on the cover — and his denial on that very same page? 🎼 Piece: Duetto buffo di due gatti ("Comic duet of the two cats") ✍️ Composer: credited to Rossini — actually an anonymous compilation signed "G. Berthold" (1825); melody drawn from Rossini's Otello (1816) 🎤 Performers: Kiri Te Kanawa 🇳🇿 and Norma Burrowes 🇬🇧 🎥 Recording: "Call Me Kiri" TV special, BBC, 26 December 1982 — never released on record Follow for more voices that refuse to be forgotten. #BestOfOpera #Rossini #Opera #FunFacts

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Duetto buffo di due gatti" - Kiri Te Kanawa and Norma Burrowes Two cats bicker, meow, trip over each other — and that's the entire libretto. Not one word beyond "meow," start to finish. No plot to explain, no Italian to translate. Just that. For two hundred years, this duet has carried a big name: Rossini. Buy the score today, and "Gioacchino Antonio Rossini" is still printed right there, in the composer field. But on that same page, the same publisher writes that he didn't write it. What actually exists is an anonymous compilation, published in 1825, signed under a name nobody has ever cracked: G. Berthold. And still, there's real Rossini inside it. The melody comes from two scenes of his Otello, which premiered in 1816. There, those same notes were sung by two men, Rodrigo and Iago. Here, two centuries later, two sopranos sing them — and their entire libretto is meow. They're Kiri Te Kanawa and Norma Burrowes. The one still with no name to this day is the piece's true author. A fake name signs the joke. A real name has carried the blame for two centuries. And whoever actually put it all together never said who they were. Did you know you can still buy this score today with Rossini's name on the cover — and his denial on that very same page? 🎼 Piece: Duetto buffo di due gatti ("Comic duet of the two cats") ✍️ Composer: credited to Rossini — actually an anonymous compilation signed "G. Berthold" (1825); melody drawn from Rossini's Otello (1816) 🎤 Performers: Kiri Te Kanawa 🇳🇿 and Norma Burrowes 🇬🇧 🎥 Recording: "Call Me Kiri" TV special, BBC, 26 December 1982 — never released on record Follow for more voices that refuse to be forgotten. #BestOfOpera #Rossini #Opera #FunFacts

894,100 views • 2 months ago

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Con te partirò" - Andrea Bocelli & Aida Garifullina By Andrea Bocelli's side, a soprano sings the same song, first in Italian, then in English. Verizon Center, Washington, December 13, 2015, a full arena, under the direction of Eugene Kohn. For whoever is in the audience, she is the voice that shares the stage with the most famous tenor in the world — and that is all you see from there. It is Aida Garifullina, Russian soprano, there as Bocelli's partner on a night too big to fit in a regular theater. The audience knows nothing more than that: her name comes after his, if it comes at all. One year later, the same voice appears in a place without a stage and without a live audience. In 2016, Garifullina plays the soprano Lily Pons in the film "Florence Foster Jenkins" — and sings "The Bell Song", aria from "Lakmé", inside the story, for the camera. The voice you hear by the side of the most famous tenor in the world had already brought opera into the cinema before this scene — not as a guest of a bigger name, but carrying the aria alone, with no one sharing the stage with her. She sings opera in two places: on the stage, live, by Bocelli's side — and inside the screen, alone. If you did not know her name, would you have noticed that this is the same voice that sings opera inside a film? Work: "Con te partirò" (Time to Say Goodbye) Composer: Francesco Sartori 🇮🇹 (lyrics: Lucio Quarantotto) Performers: Andrea Bocelli 🇮🇹 & Aida Garifullina 🇷🇺 Recording: Verizon Center, Washington DC — 13/12/2015 (conductor: Eugene Kohn) Now try to hear that emotion the same way. #BestOfOpera #AndreaBocelli #AidaGarifullina #Opera

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Con te partirò" - Andrea Bocelli & Aida Garifullina By Andrea Bocelli's side, a soprano sings the same song, first in Italian, then in English. Verizon Center, Washington, December 13, 2015, a full arena, under the direction of Eugene Kohn. For whoever is in the audience, she is the voice that shares the stage with the most famous tenor in the world — and that is all you see from there. It is Aida Garifullina, Russian soprano, there as Bocelli's partner on a night too big to fit in a regular theater. The audience knows nothing more than that: her name comes after his, if it comes at all. One year later, the same voice appears in a place without a stage and without a live audience. In 2016, Garifullina plays the soprano Lily Pons in the film "Florence Foster Jenkins" — and sings "The Bell Song", aria from "Lakmé", inside the story, for the camera. The voice you hear by the side of the most famous tenor in the world had already brought opera into the cinema before this scene — not as a guest of a bigger name, but carrying the aria alone, with no one sharing the stage with her. She sings opera in two places: on the stage, live, by Bocelli's side — and inside the screen, alone. If you did not know her name, would you have noticed that this is the same voice that sings opera inside a film? Work: "Con te partirò" (Time to Say Goodbye) Composer: Francesco Sartori 🇮🇹 (lyrics: Lucio Quarantotto) Performers: Andrea Bocelli 🇮🇹 & Aida Garifullina 🇷🇺 Recording: Verizon Center, Washington DC — 13/12/2015 (conductor: Eugene Kohn) Now try to hear that emotion the same way. #BestOfOpera #AndreaBocelli #AidaGarifullina #Opera

760,400 views • 3 months ago

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Africa" - "Angel City Chorale" More than 160 voices sing here, and the sound that opens the video comes from no instrument at all. It's rain — made only of hands, palm against palm, in rhythm. No effects, no hidden mic. Just the Angel City Chorale, an amateur choir from Los Angeles. The choir was founded in 1993 by Sue Fink with 18 singers. By 2013 it had grown past 160 voices — and it was this larger lineup that recorded "Africa," by Toto, and went viral. But the hand-rain that opens the video wasn't born there. The director herself credits the gesture to the Kearsney College Choir, a boys' school in South Africa: the arrangement is Angel City Chorale's, the gestures were borrowed. And that's not the only time this borrowing happened. The Slovenian culture portal culture.si independently confirms that the Slovenian choir Perpetuum Jazzile used the same technique, learned from the same South African school — and it was their 2009 video that made the "hand rain" famous worldwide. Today the scoreboard has flipped. Perpetuum Jazzile's video sits at 24.51 million views. Angel City Chorale's, posted four years later, already tops 28.80 million — more watched than the video that inspired it, measured on the same day. And the song carrying all of this has another borrowed origin. "Africa" was written by David Paich, of Toto, who had never set foot on the continent. The lyrics grew out of a UNICEF commercial he saw on TV and readings of National Geographic. Had you seen this hand-rain before — or did you think it was born in this choir? Work: "Africa" Composer: David Paich and Jeff Porcaro Performer: Angel City Chorale 🇺🇸 Recording: YouTube, 11/25/2013 Follow for more moments like this. #BestOfOpera #Africa #Toto #AngelCityChorale

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Africa" - "Angel City Chorale" More than 160 voices sing here, and the sound that opens the video comes from no instrument at all. It's rain — made only of hands, palm against palm, in rhythm. No effects, no hidden mic. Just the Angel City Chorale, an amateur choir from Los Angeles. The choir was founded in 1993 by Sue Fink with 18 singers. By 2013 it had grown past 160 voices — and it was this larger lineup that recorded "Africa," by Toto, and went viral. But the hand-rain that opens the video wasn't born there. The director herself credits the gesture to the Kearsney College Choir, a boys' school in South Africa: the arrangement is Angel City Chorale's, the gestures were borrowed. And that's not the only time this borrowing happened. The Slovenian culture portal culture.si independently confirms that the Slovenian choir Perpetuum Jazzile used the same technique, learned from the same South African school — and it was their 2009 video that made the "hand rain" famous worldwide. Today the scoreboard has flipped. Perpetuum Jazzile's video sits at 24.51 million views. Angel City Chorale's, posted four years later, already tops 28.80 million — more watched than the video that inspired it, measured on the same day. And the song carrying all of this has another borrowed origin. "Africa" was written by David Paich, of Toto, who had never set foot on the continent. The lyrics grew out of a UNICEF commercial he saw on TV and readings of National Geographic. Had you seen this hand-rain before — or did you think it was born in this choir? Work: "Africa" Composer: David Paich and Jeff Porcaro Performer: Angel City Chorale 🇺🇸 Recording: YouTube, 11/25/2013 Follow for more moments like this. #BestOfOpera #Africa #Toto #AngelCityChorale

143,800 views • 2 months ago

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Baba Yetu" - "Angel City Chorale" Baba yetu, yetu uliye Mbinguni Our Father, who art in heaven A choir of more than 180 voices fills the stage. The lyrics rising up aren't English, aren't Portuguese — they sound like an ancient hymn, sung in another tongue. Anyone listening recognizes the shape of a prayer before knowing which one. It's the Lord's Prayer, translated into Swahili. "Baba Yetu" means "Our Father" — and the lyrics stay faithful to the original, verse by verse, all the way to "Baba yetu, yetu uliye Mbinguni": Our Father, who art in heaven. But this song wasn't born in a church. Christopher Tin wrote it to open a video game: Civilization IV, released in 2005. The version that conquered the world isn't the 2005 one. It's the 2009 re-recording, with the Soweto Gospel Choir, on the album Calling All Dawns — and that's the one that, on February 13, 2011, at the 53rd Grammy Awards, made "Baba Yetu" the first video game score in history to win Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s). The idea started long before: Tin roomed with Soren Johnson, the game's design director, during a Stanford/Oxford exchange program. Years later, at their five-year reunion, Johnson sought him out to score the game — inspired by performances from the a cappella group Stanford Talisman. Had you heard the Lord's Prayer in Swahili before this video? 🎼 Piece: Baba Yetu 🎹 Composer: Christopher Tin 🎤 Performer: Angel City Chorale 🇺🇸 🎬 Recording: not identified Send this to someone who'd love this story. #BestOfOpera #BabaYetu #ChristopherTin #AngelCityChorale

Follow @bestofopera for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Baba Yetu" - "Angel City Chorale" Baba yetu, yetu uliye Mbinguni Our Father, who art in heaven A choir of more than 180 voices fills the stage. The lyrics rising up aren't English, aren't Portuguese — they sound like an ancient hymn, sung in another tongue. Anyone listening recognizes the shape of a prayer before knowing which one. It's the Lord's Prayer, translated into Swahili. "Baba Yetu" means "Our Father" — and the lyrics stay faithful to the original, verse by verse, all the way to "Baba yetu, yetu uliye Mbinguni": Our Father, who art in heaven. But this song wasn't born in a church. Christopher Tin wrote it to open a video game: Civilization IV, released in 2005. The version that conquered the world isn't the 2005 one. It's the 2009 re-recording, with the Soweto Gospel Choir, on the album Calling All Dawns — and that's the one that, on February 13, 2011, at the 53rd Grammy Awards, made "Baba Yetu" the first video game score in history to win Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s). The idea started long before: Tin roomed with Soren Johnson, the game's design director, during a Stanford/Oxford exchange program. Years later, at their five-year reunion, Johnson sought him out to score the game — inspired by performances from the a cappella group Stanford Talisman. Had you heard the Lord's Prayer in Swahili before this video? 🎼 Piece: Baba Yetu 🎹 Composer: Christopher Tin 🎤 Performer: Angel City Chorale 🇺🇸 🎬 Recording: not identified Send this to someone who'd love this story. #BestOfOpera #BabaYetu #ChristopherTin #AngelCityChorale

88,400 views • 1 month ago

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Five generations of mezzos, one Habanera. Which Carmen seduces you?" - Anna Caterina Antonacci, Elīna Garanča, Agnes Baltsa, Anita Rachvelishvili, Teresa Berganza Watch all five, then comment 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5: the generation number on the scoreboard. 🎭 The Habanera comes from Bizet's Carmen, which premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875 to a cold reception. A Paris revival in 1883 brought the success. All five mezzos sing the same opening line: "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle, que nul ne peut apprivoiser." ✨ The numbers go by generation, oldest to youngest, as on the scoreboard. Antonacci (3, 1961) sings it at the Royal Opera House with Jonas Kaufmann as Don José. Garanča (4, 1976) sings it in Richard Eyre's production at the Met, from the 2010 Live in HD broadcast conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Baltsa (2, 1944) made her Met debut in 1979 as Octavian. Rachvelishvili (5, 1984) sings it at the Met, in Eyre's production. Berganza (1, 1933) first sang Carmen at the 1977 Edinburgh Festival under Claudio Abbado. 🎤 The Habanera is not Bizet's tune. It adapts "El Arreglito," a habanera by Sebastián Iradier published in 1863. Bizet thought it was a folk song and credited the source in the first vocal score once he found out. Five generations, from 1933 to 1984. Which Carmen seduces you? Vote by the scoreboard number: 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5. 🎼 Georges Bizet · composer · 🇫🇷 · 1838-1875 🎤 Anna Caterina Antonacci · mezzo-soprano · 🇮🇹 · b. 1961 🎤 Elīna Garanča · mezzo-soprano · 🇱🇻 · b. 1976 🎤 Agnes Baltsa · mezzo-soprano · 🇬🇷 · b. 1944 🎤 Anita Rachvelishvili · mezzo-soprano · 🇬🇪 · b. 1984 🎤 Teresa Berganza · mezzo-soprano · 🇪🇸 · 1933-2022 Follow for more of the stories the music keeps. #BestOfOpera #Habanera #Bizet #MezzoSoprano

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Five generations of mezzos, one Habanera. Which Carmen seduces you?" - Anna Caterina Antonacci, Elīna Garanča, Agnes Baltsa, Anita Rachvelishvili, Teresa Berganza Watch all five, then comment 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5: the generation number on the scoreboard. 🎭 The Habanera comes from Bizet's Carmen, which premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875 to a cold reception. A Paris revival in 1883 brought the success. All five mezzos sing the same opening line: "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle, que nul ne peut apprivoiser." ✨ The numbers go by generation, oldest to youngest, as on the scoreboard. Antonacci (3, 1961) sings it at the Royal Opera House with Jonas Kaufmann as Don José. Garanča (4, 1976) sings it in Richard Eyre's production at the Met, from the 2010 Live in HD broadcast conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Baltsa (2, 1944) made her Met debut in 1979 as Octavian. Rachvelishvili (5, 1984) sings it at the Met, in Eyre's production. Berganza (1, 1933) first sang Carmen at the 1977 Edinburgh Festival under Claudio Abbado. 🎤 The Habanera is not Bizet's tune. It adapts "El Arreglito," a habanera by Sebastián Iradier published in 1863. Bizet thought it was a folk song and credited the source in the first vocal score once he found out. Five generations, from 1933 to 1984. Which Carmen seduces you? Vote by the scoreboard number: 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5. 🎼 Georges Bizet · composer · 🇫🇷 · 1838-1875 🎤 Anna Caterina Antonacci · mezzo-soprano · 🇮🇹 · b. 1961 🎤 Elīna Garanča · mezzo-soprano · 🇱🇻 · b. 1976 🎤 Agnes Baltsa · mezzo-soprano · 🇬🇷 · b. 1944 🎤 Anita Rachvelishvili · mezzo-soprano · 🇬🇪 · b. 1984 🎤 Teresa Berganza · mezzo-soprano · 🇪🇸 · 1933-2022 Follow for more of the stories the music keeps. #BestOfOpera #Habanera #Bizet #MezzoSoprano

33,900 views • 16 days ago

Some voices belong to another century entirely. ✨ When Jakub Józef Orliński opens his mouth, time collapses. The sound that emerges belongs to the courts of Venice in 1724, yet it lands in our modern ears with the force of something utterly new. This is the countertenor voice—a register so rare, so technically demanding, that for centuries it was almost lost to history. Watching him navigate Vivaldi's "Vedrò con mio diletto," you witness something unsettling: a young man producing notes that seem to defy the laws of human anatomy, all while embodying a character consumed by the dark pleasure of revenge. 🎭 Vivaldi wrote Il Giustino for the castrati of his era—male singers who sacrificed their bodies to preserve the ethereal purity of their boyhood voices. Today, countertenors like Orliński have reclaimed this repertoire through sheer virtuosity, training their natural voices to reach heights most tenors abandon. This aria is a minefield: rapid coloratura passages that demand absolute precision, breath control that would exhaust an Olympic athlete, and the emotional complexity of singing beautiful music about ugly emotions. Every run, every ornament is a tightrope walk between technical perfection and raw theatrical power. 🎤 Soloist * Name: Jakub Józef Orliński * Voice Type: Countertenor * Nationality / Background: Polish * Vocal Signature / Artistic Identity: Rising star of the Baroque revival movement; known for bringing athletic energy and modern intensity to historical repertoire * Career Highlights: Grammy-nominated; recognized globally for redefining countertenor artistry for contemporary audiences 🎼 Work * Piece: "Vedrò con mio diletto" * Composer: Antonio Vivaldi * Opera / Context: Il Giustino Countertenor or soprano: Can you tell the difference? Follow for more moments where music becomes emotion. #countertenor #classicalmusic #operasinger #bestofopera #opera

Some voices belong to another century entirely. ✨ When Jakub Józef Orliński opens his mouth, time collapses. The sound that emerges belongs to the courts of Venice in 1724, yet it lands in our modern ears with the force of something utterly new. This is the countertenor voice—a register so rare, so technically demanding, that for centuries it was almost lost to history. Watching him navigate Vivaldi's "Vedrò con mio diletto," you witness something unsettling: a young man producing notes that seem to defy the laws of human anatomy, all while embodying a character consumed by the dark pleasure of revenge. 🎭 Vivaldi wrote Il Giustino for the castrati of his era—male singers who sacrificed their bodies to preserve the ethereal purity of their boyhood voices. Today, countertenors like Orliński have reclaimed this repertoire through sheer virtuosity, training their natural voices to reach heights most tenors abandon. This aria is a minefield: rapid coloratura passages that demand absolute precision, breath control that would exhaust an Olympic athlete, and the emotional complexity of singing beautiful music about ugly emotions. Every run, every ornament is a tightrope walk between technical perfection and raw theatrical power. 🎤 Soloist * Name: Jakub Józef Orliński * Voice Type: Countertenor * Nationality / Background: Polish * Vocal Signature / Artistic Identity: Rising star of the Baroque revival movement; known for bringing athletic energy and modern intensity to historical repertoire * Career Highlights: Grammy-nominated; recognized globally for redefining countertenor artistry for contemporary audiences 🎼 Work * Piece: "Vedrò con mio diletto" * Composer: Antonio Vivaldi * Opera / Context: Il Giustino Countertenor or soprano: Can you tell the difference? Follow for more moments where music becomes emotion. #countertenor #classicalmusic #operasinger #bestofopera #opera

460,600 views • 9 months ago

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "The Phantom of the Opera" - "Sarah Brightman and Antonio Banderas" Banderas walks in alone and keeps walking. She waits standing at the microphone. He is the Phantom. She is Christine. April 1998, Royal Albert Hall, in London: the gala for Andrew Lloyd Webber's 50th birthday. On stage, Sarah Brightman sings the title song of The Phantom of the Opera with Antonio Banderas. But this Christine is the original. Brightman created the role in London, at the premiere on October 9, 1986, and took it to Broadway on January 26, 1988. Christine was written specifically for her. The first Phantom was someone else: Michael Crawford, in both cities. Banderas was not in the original cast. His Phantom is the one from this performance. At the end, the two sing very close, with almost no space between the voices. One voice has owned the role since the premiere. The other takes it for one night. Banderas or Crawford: which Phantom would you have wanted to see next to her? 🎼 Work: The Phantom of the Opera (title song of the musical The Phantom of the Opera) 🎹 Composer: Andrew Lloyd Webber 🎤 Performer: Sarah Brightman and Antonio Banderas 🎬 Recording: gala for Andrew Lloyd Webber's 50th birthday, Royal Albert Hall, London, April 1998 Who introduced you to this song? Tell us here. #BestOfOpera #SarahBrightman #AntonioBanderas #OFantasmaDaOpera

Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "The Phantom of the Opera" - "Sarah Brightman and Antonio Banderas" Banderas walks in alone and keeps walking. She waits standing at the microphone. He is the Phantom. She is Christine. April 1998, Royal Albert Hall, in London: the gala for Andrew Lloyd Webber's 50th birthday. On stage, Sarah Brightman sings the title song of The Phantom of the Opera with Antonio Banderas. But this Christine is the original. Brightman created the role in London, at the premiere on October 9, 1986, and took it to Broadway on January 26, 1988. Christine was written specifically for her. The first Phantom was someone else: Michael Crawford, in both cities. Banderas was not in the original cast. His Phantom is the one from this performance. At the end, the two sing very close, with almost no space between the voices. One voice has owned the role since the premiere. The other takes it for one night. Banderas or Crawford: which Phantom would you have wanted to see next to her? 🎼 Work: The Phantom of the Opera (title song of the musical The Phantom of the Opera) 🎹 Composer: Andrew Lloyd Webber 🎤 Performer: Sarah Brightman and Antonio Banderas 🎬 Recording: gala for Andrew Lloyd Webber's 50th birthday, Royal Albert Hall, London, April 1998 Who introduced you to this song? Tell us here. #BestOfOpera #SarahBrightman #AntonioBanderas #OFantasmaDaOpera

18,400 views • 11 days ago

🌪️Dies irae — Verdi’s Requiem ✨This is one of the most visceral works ever written by mankind. Verdi’s "Dies irae" (Day of Wrath) is not just music; it is a sonic phenomenon that describes the end of time with a force that makes the earth tremble beneath the audience's feet. Imagine standing at the center of a sound hurricane. Giuseppe Verdi, the master of Italian drama, composed this Requiem Mass not for the church, but for the theater of the human soul. When the bass drums strike with violence and the chorus explodes in unison, there isn't a soul who doesn't feel a chill running down their spine. This specific performance, held by the Metropolitan Opera to mark the 20th anniversary of 9/11, carries an overwhelming emotional weight. Under the intense baton of Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the orchestra and chorus become a force of nature. It is the sound of final judgment, where every note is a cry of dread and majesty. Legend has it that after the premiere, some critics considered the work "too operatic" for a funeral mass. But the truth is that Verdi knew that death and judgment are the greatest dramas of all. If you close your eyes, you can feel the fire and the storm in every bar. 🎤 Yannick Nézet-Séguin 🇨🇦 Conductor Born: March 6, 1975 🎼 Dies irae (Messa da Requiem) Giuseppe Verdi Composed: 1874 #opera #verdi #metopera #epicmusic

🌪️Dies irae — Verdi’s Requiem ✨This is one of the most visceral works ever written by mankind. Verdi’s "Dies irae" (Day of Wrath) is not just music; it is a sonic phenomenon that describes the end of time with a force that makes the earth tremble beneath the audience's feet. Imagine standing at the center of a sound hurricane. Giuseppe Verdi, the master of Italian drama, composed this Requiem Mass not for the church, but for the theater of the human soul. When the bass drums strike with violence and the chorus explodes in unison, there isn't a soul who doesn't feel a chill running down their spine. This specific performance, held by the Metropolitan Opera to mark the 20th anniversary of 9/11, carries an overwhelming emotional weight. Under the intense baton of Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the orchestra and chorus become a force of nature. It is the sound of final judgment, where every note is a cry of dread and majesty. Legend has it that after the premiere, some critics considered the work "too operatic" for a funeral mass. But the truth is that Verdi knew that death and judgment are the greatest dramas of all. If you close your eyes, you can feel the fire and the storm in every bar. 🎤 Yannick Nézet-Séguin 🇨🇦 Conductor Born: March 6, 1975 🎼 Dies irae (Messa da Requiem) Giuseppe Verdi Composed: 1874 #opera #verdi #metopera #epicmusic

58,100 views • 9 months ago

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