Today, “crossover” has become the golden word of the age. Crossover is based, in fact, on the model used for the development of pop artists. It is a lesson taken directly from the recent pages of star development, where bands are constructed out of pretty faces with an ability to dance in sync. Their recordings do not generally travel internationally, and some of the groups are actually paid a salary rather than a royalty, allowing the company to reap great profits if the band takes off; or, alternatively, an enormous amount is spent on promotion and development. The image is decidedly far more important than the content, enhanced with arrangements of classical tunes or original material, light shows, costumes, and choreography. Crossover is definitely finding an audience, and an enormous audience at that.
It was the staggering sales of Andrea Bocelli’s CD Romanza that spawned a series of successful CDs by people who are generally referred to as opera singers without actually having the requisite training or stage career. Most could also never be heard without amplification, not necessarily because their voices are small, but because they haven’t had the years of development and knowledge of projection and the craft of singing. Furthermore, higher voices have a juvenile purity of sound and not the ripe, warm tone of a true operatic voice. The smart ones will either use their overnight success as a launching pad for a career in television or film, or will find a way to develop as musicians and change with the times, as some pop idols can.
Ironically, the success of crossover repertoire for these performers means that young artists who are pursuing a traditional classical career face choices that were not there just a few years ago. Young musicians want to sell their extraordinary gifts to the major labels, but when they get no response, they hire professional photographers to shoot them draped across the top of a piano or around a cello in tight clothes. Then the labels start to be interested.
In today’s market, classical recordings, at least at the major labels, are also being held to the same standards as pop. There are fewer releases, enormous expectations for sales, more money spent on promotion, and shorter contracts, with artists no longer being signed for the duration of their careers. But classical music isn’t pop, and its numbers really can’t be run the same way. It used to be expected that a classical recording would recoup its investment in seven years, and that was an investment companies were willing to make. But by 1999, it seemed that classical recordings were being held to the same standards as those of U2: the investment had to be made back in one year. Most operas cost at least $250,000 to record; Solti’s Die Frau ohne Schatten cost a million including all marketing expenditures and company overhead. My recording of Rusalka cost around $300,000 and has sold forty thousand units to date. It will have to sell seventy-five thousand to earn back its cost. Yes, these recordings may stay in the red for a long time; but in truth, even staying in the black is no longer enough. The only thing that counts for the share-holders of the largest companies is a huge profit.
Fortunately, huge does happen every now and then. In recent years, classical artists such as Yo-Yo Ma and Joshua Bell have even made it onto the Billboard pop charts. And the phenomenon of Pavarotti, Domingo, and Carreras, the Three Tenors, flew—eventually to the tune of twelve million copies. Their success, however, ultimately served to mask an overall malaise in classical recording. Thanks to the seventeen million units they sold, the bottom line for classical record sales looked very bright on average, but if anyone bothered to examine individually some of the other recordings, it was easy to see there were huge losses. In the end, the Three Tenors’ legacy was primarily an extraordinary string of spin-offs: Three Mo’ Tenors, the Three Scottish Tenors, the Three American Tenors, the Three Irish Tenors, the Three Countertenors, the Three Broadway Divas, Three Men and a Tenor, the Three Phantoms, the Three Sopranos, the Opera Babes, Ten Australian Tenors, and the Three Finnish Basses. It seems that all the music industry took away from the experience was that three seemed to be a very palatable number for the buying public.
Studio executives suddenly turned their attention to their classical divisions and had the idea that all of their projects should live up to these results. Executives who were considered “old-fashioned” were asked to step down and were replaced by mostly young, marketing-driven managers. But the forces that were driving the sales of the Three Tenors had little to do with classical music. Their success was a phenomenon: a confluence of stars, the connection to the World Cup, well-established artists performing at the peak of their careers, and a great human-interest story. In the long run, this spike in popularity did little if anything to tarnish the seriousness with which Pavarotti, Domingo, and Carreras were taken as opera singers. They were firmly established by the time the recording was made, and each had a substantial body of work. Even some aficionados were thrilled to hear Plácido sing Mac-duff in a Three Tenors concert in Los Angeles or José sing the tenor aria from Le Cid. Where else would they be able to hear that?
Some have criticized the Three Tenors phenomenon and other exceptional classical music events as bad for the classical music industry, in that they accustomed major artists and the labels themselves to unsustainably high advances and royalties, while rewarding record companies with unrealistically high profits. This may be an unnecessarily negative view. No singer I know, myself included, would ever turn down an opportunity to preserve the legacy of a career in the opera house simply because she’s not being paid Three Tenor-size royalties. Yes, singing is how we make our living. But sometimes it really is a labor of love, and for most of us, the artistic satisfaction of a challenging role is far more alluring than a big fee. If not, why would we have become classical musicians in the first place?
If I wanted to capitalize on my commercial potential entirely, I would sing only the most popular classical arias, not in their original forms, but arranged stylistically to fit everything from techno to Holly-wood film music. I would sing even less opera, and then only Italian opera and not the lesser-known Strauss and French rarities that I adore. I would tour only my recordings in pursuit of ever larger sales, rather than performing world premieres and the concert repertoire of Strauss, Berg, and Schoenberg. I am not at all against adding visual elements to a performance, whether through image and fashion or through lighting or perhaps film. In fact, I would welcome opportunities in the future to bring, say, the imagination of a Pina Bausch production to a musical performance, but never at the expense of the integrity of the music.
The most important point to be made about mass audience events that sometimes feature opera singers, whether the Olympics or televised celebrations such as the Kennedy Center Honors, has to be this: that somewhere out in the audience, whether on a grassy hillside viewing a big-screen monitor or at home watching his own television, will be someone hearing opera for the first time—possibly even hearing classical music for the first time. That alone has to make it worthwhile for artists to continue—in appropriate settings, with musical integrity—to try to expand the audience for their music. If we failed to do that, we would be, and should be, criticized even more strongly, as our audience, at least in the Western world, shrinks away.
My own recording career got its big boost after I stepped into the role of Fiordiligi for Sir Georg Solti. He suggested to his label’s new vice president of artists and repertoire, Evans Mirageas (who, along with Bettie Buccheri, a pianist for the Chicago Symphony, had recommended me for the engagement in the first place), that I be signed up as an exclusive artist for Decca. Evans asked my London manager, Tom Graham, if I had a recording contract and was told with emphasis, “Not yet.” That contract came into being over the course of two telephone conversations between Evans and Tom, but the actual signing took much longer. RCA and Decca were both interested in me, and I was in the enviable position of having to choose between the two. I went with Decca.
Having an exclusive recording contract with a record label is a delicate arrangement. Often the payoff doesn’t come until the second or third recording. No one wants
to make a supreme effort and investment in an artist’s early recordings, only to see the artist taking the benefits of that promotion and support to another label. Fortunately for me, the senior management at Decca and its parent, Universal Classics, and I were ultimately in total agreement on this point. I believe that I’m now seen as one of the label’s core artists, who has continuing long-term sales potential. In turn, I’ve learned that besides recording, my contribution is in the promotion of my recordings, which includes seeking out the kind of celebrity that goes beyond the classical audience. Of the group of people who are available to purchase a classical recording—that is, those who have been exposed to classical music before—5 percent will probably purchase one of my recordings. The next 15 percent who like classical music will purchase something if it catches their attention, and the next 25 percent will purchase the Three Tenors, Andrea Bocelli, or popular classics such as the Beethoven Ninth. The remaining people simply won’t buy classical music; it isn’t going to happen.
Therefore, it’s necessary to invest in publicity, even if it means that I spend my own money, trying to take myself above the usual level attained by core classical artists. The only way I’ll reach that other 25 percent of potential buyers is to appear on, say, the Late Show with David Letterman or perform at such events as the lighting of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center. I take advantage of the opportunities that come my way. If I don’t maintain my sales, I can’t continue to record, and recording is the only chance I have to reach that larger audience and to keep my art alive after I’ve stopped performing. It’s also something I genuinely enjoy. What a luxury to spend a week in the studio focused solely on the music, with no uncomfortable costumes, no worrying about the public or the critics, no wondering if I’ll forget the text, or how the lighting is—just an unadulterated collaboration with musicians and composers I admire.
My performing career and my recording career dovetail and reinforce each other. It’s been a slow and steady climb, but at least it’s always been a climb. Making recordings enables me to communicate with people, many more people than would ever have the chance to hear me sing. I’m not sure I have a definitive answer for why that is important to me, but it is. Perhaps it’s wanting to re-create the wonder I felt when hearing recordings as a young singer and hoping that someday I would sound just like them. Perhaps it’s just part and parcel of my personality, the need to continually strive and improve, which seems such an integral part of my being. Or perhaps it’s simply the excitement of continuing to grow.
There are ominous signs about the future of classical music. The record companies are facing threats from piracy and unauthorized downloading. It’s important for those of us who have achieved success to speak out for the choristers and violinists, and beginning artists who won’t have work at all if the piracy continues. I asked Christopher Roberts, president of Universal Classics and Jazz, if I could interview him about technology and the future of the recording industry for this chapter. He has been the only continuing thread throughout my relationship with Decca, and it was his support some years back that helped turn the company in my favor. So many dire predictions abound right now about the future of recording: studio recordings will cease to exist altogether; the large labels will collapse and only small and budget labels will survive the illegal downloading and piracy crisis; operas will be available only on live recordings and DVDs or will be streamed live via the Internet around the world.
Chris explained that the recording industry has historically been driven by new technology, from wax to the electronic microphone, from the 78 to the long-playing record, and most recently the development of digital recording and the compact disc. I joined the company at the end of an enormous wave of sales, as the public scurried to replace their LPs with the smaller, indestructible disc with digital quality. The future savior of the market appears to be the Internet, the beauty of which is that it offers unlimited choice. Traditionally, recordings are kept in or eliminated from each label’s catalog based on their ability to earn more than their basic upkeep. Imagine, though, a digital catalog available on the Internet that includes every available recording ever made. As Chris explained, though, before a piece can appear on iTunes, it has to be compressed in digital format. That’s an initial expense at a time when people are skeptical about undertaking expenses without being assured of the future. At Universal, one thousand out of four thousand tracks are on iTunes. The acceptance of this technology is still in its early stages, but Chris predicts it will grow within five years. China especially may prove to be an enormous market, given its public’s appreciation for, knowledge of, and awareness of classical music, and its huge media outlets. The downside of the technology is piracy. Chris doesn’t see retail sales disappearing altogether, even though they are shrinking and are certainly under pressure. Anything but a hit-driven CD is being replaced with DVDs, in general, and that applies to classical, jazz, new age, and soundtracks as well. The same choice offered in the area of recorded music can also exist in the domain of performances. Imagine tuning into a recital in Tokyo just by turning on your computer. Most radio lovers have already discovered this feature on the Web for music alone, and it’s just a matter of time before the picture follows.
The music itself will never disappear. Beethoven still makes people cheer, Richard Strauss can thrill, and Mozart can even develop young minds. It’s our responsibility to learn how to speak to an audience that is less informed about music, to give it a reason to want to come and see us instead of going to the movies. For me and for the rest of the industry, it’s going to take hard work and a lot of creative thinking. But then, thinking creatively is our business.
CHAPTER EIGHT
LONGEVITY
MY BELOVED Beverley Johnson died in January of 2001, after suffering from a serious illness the year before. In some ways those long months helped me and the tenor Anthony Dean Griffey to prepare for what was to come. Tony was like a surrogate son to Beverley, and we both took shifts at the hospital. Mary Lou Falcone came to visit and wisely counseled me to ready myself for losing not only my friend but my teacher. Yet it was even more than that: I was losing my touchstone.
“Maybe one imagines that people expect more of us than they really do,” she wrote to me in 1999. “I think, by and large, your public has come to love you and they are happy just hearing your voice, just as it is. So I wish I could help you believe that it is there for you to call on. You have nurtured it and been good to it, so it won’t let you down. I know for sure that this is true. I get so awkward when I try to tell you how much I respect what you have accomplished and what you are doing.”
Amazingly, Beverley remained active right up until the end of her life. She gave me a lesson on December 23, a day I still remember so clearly, as she lay on the couch and just listened to me sing, and in her deep blue eyes there was so much wonderful joy, so much strength. Singing meant more to Beverley than to anyone else I’ve ever known. I brought the girls by the next day to wish her a merry Christmas Eve, and she was visibly tired. She clearly hadn’t been well, and a few days later I checked her into Columbia Presbyterian hospital. I told her I would pick her up to take her there, but she insisted on meeting me at the hospital. This was a woman who didn’t want anyone doing anything for her. She couldn’t stand having a nurse in her home and didn’t want to be taken care of, for she just couldn’t bear to be weak. She was going to live her life to the fullest, and when she couldn’t do it her way anymore, that would be it. When I got to the hospital I found her sitting in a wheelchair in the waiting room, looking terribly small, a scarf wrapped around her head. “I’m coming here to die,” she said to me sadly.
Her last three weeks were especially painful for me, not only because it was clear that she was dying but because in those final days she pushed me away. I was rehearsing a Live from Lincoln Center telecast at the time, and in retrospect, given Beverley’s condition, I wonder if I should just have canceled it. But it was imminent, and
everyone was relying on me to come through. Every day I would leave rehearsals and go straight to the hospital on my way home to Connecticut, and though at times I’d arrive as late as two o’clock in the morning Beverley was usually awake. She would look at me for a second and then stare up at the ceiling. “Oh, Miss Fleming is here. Miss Fleming has come for a visit,” she would say, for she spoke of me only in the third person then. She was so angry at me, or maybe it wasn’t directed at me so much as at her awareness that she was dying. I would sit by her bed in the middle of the night and try to talk to her, and sometimes I would be quiet and touch her hand. I felt how strongly she wanted to live, to stay and to help me through Traviata, to help Tony through Britten’s Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings, a piece her husband, Hardesty Johnson, had premiered in America. She wanted to remain involved in our lives, and we wanted the same.
In mid-January I had to make a trip to Europe. Yet again, I was following the old dictates of “should”: I should go to London, and I should meet my obligations instead of staying close by. Two days after I left, she died of pneumonia. Tony called and told me she was very peaceful in the end. She was taking a great deal of pain medication by then, for she had cancer, though we hadn’t known. We hadn’t known, either, that she was ninety-six. I was scheduled to sing the Verdi Requiem that night but called my manager in London and said, “I’m sorry—this is just impossible.”
“You have to do it,” he told me. “It’s a live telecast, and we don’t have anyone to replace you.”
I learned that night that it’s possible to set aside whatever else is going on in my life and play the part. I have no memory of that concert; it was as if I were not even present, and yet so many people have come up to me since then and told me how moved they were by the performance, how much it had meant to them.
The Inner Voice: The Making of a Singer Page 16
