Jackie, Oh! - singer Marilyn Horne - Review

National Review, Nov 5, 2001 by Jay Nordlinger

An aging diva has to ask some hard questions: When to retire? How much decline to accept? When to quit opera? How long to hang on in song recitals? What to sing?

Of course, different divas come up with different answers. Beverly Sills determined not to sing a note past 50 (though she agreed to a "Jingle Bells" with President Reagan). Leontyne Price bowed out of opera in 1985, then gave song recitals until 1998, when she was 71. (She came out of retirement just the other week, to participate in a benefit concert at Carnegie Hall for a World Trade Center fund. Someone had said, "It would be good to get someone like Leontyne Price." Someone else had replied, "Why not Leontyne Price?") The Italian soprano Magda Olivero went on for something like forever, and never really embarrassed herself.

As for Marilyn Horne, she wrote in her 1984 autobiography, "I have a deal with Marty Katz [her longtime accompanist]. He's promised to let me know when I'm no longer singing the way he and I know I want to sing. If I go on too long, blame Marty."

Who knows what kinds of conversations she has had with Katz? Horne is now 67, and she seems to be "retired from classical music," as the press clips have it, but she occasionally gives a kind of pops recital (to coin a necessary phrase). She gave such a recital on October 13 at little Converse College in Spartanburg, S.C. The diva in twilight tends to like to appear in out-of-the-way places (although Converse has a distinguished music program): Leontyne Price gave her last recitals in smallish venues, often on college campuses. Her very last recital-full recital-was in Chapel Hill, N.C., and it was attended by none other than Marilyn Horne: one American treasure paying tribute to, and soaking up the last notes of, another.

Now, Horne is almost universally acknowledged to be one of the greatest singers not just of her own time, but of all time. In her decades as a performer, "Jackie" (to use her nickname) set standards that are nearly impossible for others to reach. So how she spends her last professional years is of some interest. Mainly she busies herself with the Marilyn Horne Foundation, which is devoted to the nurturing of young singers, and of the song recital. She gave a master class at the Juilliard School last January, when she had a nasty cold and had injured her leg or foot, forcing her to use a cane. She told the students, "I was worried that I would come looking like the dowager voice teacher. Then it hit me: I am the dowager voice teacher!" But she has some of that historic voice left, she has loads of wisdom and musicianship, and she has what just may be an undimmed yen to perform.

Fortunately for her, she has always had an affinity for American popular music (meaning, by and large, folk songs, patriotic songs, and show tunes). She did much of her growing up in southern California, and she is encyclopedic about the popular culture-certainly the musical aspect of it-of an earlier, better era. After all, here's someone who was the (dubbed) voice of Dorothy Dandridge in the movie Carmen Jones, the "black version" of Bizet's opera Carmen-not bad for a chubby- cheeked white girl born in Bradford, P-A.

At Converse College, Horne presented a program made up chiefly of Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Irving Berlin. In collaboration with her was the Broadway arranger and all-purpose music man Don Pippin (Katz's services are no longer required, apparently). Horne is still recognizable as herself: that is, she sounds like Marilyn Horne, and often does some Horne-like things in her singing. It's sort of like seeing a beautiful woman who is well on in years: The face is still recognizable, but it has wrinkled and otherwise changed. We may delight in seeing that face, but at the same time we may be a little sad (and even ashamed of being so).

Horne was miked-she, one of the greatest vocal projectors in history. That itself was a jolt. She kept up a patter with the audience, revealing that well-loved personality: witty, bright, engaging. She treats these show tunes essentially as art songs, according them a dignity, and, of course, keeping her own dignity. It's a bit hard to hear her sing flat-the Horne intonation was always unshakable-and she suffered some most un-Horne-like wobbles. But her breathing is still a marvel, and model, and she remains one of the great singers in English- enunciators of English-ever.

This time, too, she was fighting a cold, but she never mentioned it, and worked easily around it. She had on stage with her a glass of water, remarking that she had always envied cabaret and lounge singers for the water they had by them. And now she could indulge! Her "In the Still of the Night"-once a favorite encore of hers-was shimmering and thrilling. "Over the Rainbow" was slow, delicate, and exquisite, the best treatment I, for one, have ever heard accorded this song (sorry, Judy). "Georgia" was southern, soulful, and well nigh definitive (sorry, Ray). A graceful "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" showed the difference between Horne and Eileen Farrell, the great soprano who spent the last portion of her career as a jazz singer: Horne applies her classical knowledge and standards to these . . . well, standards; Farrell performed in a separate jazz style. Each is irreproachable.