What makes a star singer? Other than a good voice, of course. The last few hundred years have produced more good singers that we can even begin to count. But who are the best opera singers to have graced the stages of the world’s opera houses?
But it’s that particular alchemy of personal gifts – and I say ‘personal’ because personality is fundamental to the whole package – that makes for a once in a generation phenomenon. Not that everyone will be unanimous on who that happens to be.
Here is our list of ten best opera singers in history.
Best opera singers of all time
1. Luciano Pavarotti
Is this the first name that came to your mind? It’s likely that it was. A man of many sides – charming, boyish, unreliable, demanding, jovial, philandering, and many other adjectives besides – Luciano Pavarotti wasn’t everyone’s favourite human being: he was famously banned for life from the Lyric Opera of Chicago after cancelling 26 out of 41 scheduled appearances over an eight year period.
But the fact remains: whether you put it down to the stadium-filling vocal power, the honeyed tone or the colossal charisma, the talent of this Italian tenor towered over that of almost all other singers, and continues to do so 15 years after his death. We named him one of the greatest tenors of all time.
2. Maria Callas
Born in New York to Greek immigrant parents, Maria Callas grew up in an unstable household – her mother eventually left her father, taking their young daughters with her to Athens.
Later on she herself became known for the turbulence of her personal life. As for her voice – it divided critics, with one stating that its timbre ‘considered purely as sound, was essentially ugly: …a thick sound, which gave the impression of dryness, or aridity.’
Yet it was an unforgettable voice – penetrating, and full of communicative power – especially when allied to her considerable dramatic talent. It was for this reason that she was widely hailed as La Divina (‘the Divine one’), while Leonard Bernstein called her ‘the Bible of opera’, which pretty much tells you what you need to know.
3. Renata Tebaldi
The supposed rival of Maria Callas, Renata Tebaldi might not have had quite the former’s expressive dynamism. But she had one thing that Callas did not: a classically beautiful sound. In fact Callas herself once said in an interview: ‘Sometimes, I actually wish I had [Tebaldi’s] voice’.
Rich and even, with perfectly produced tones, and a poignant, but never over sentimental quality, that voice served her well in the role of many a tragic heroine – most notably Mimi, Violetta and Aida. Was there a sad quality to Tebaldi herself? The singer, who never married, once told The Times that she had no regrets about her single life: ‘I was in love many times. This is very good for a woman. [But] how could I have been a wife, a mother and a singer? Who takes care of the piccolini when you go around the world? Your children would not call you Mama, but Renata.’
4. Plácido Domingo
One of ‘The Three Tenors’, the operatic supergroup of the 1990s which also included Pavarotti and José Carreras, this tenor-turned-baritone is that rare thing: a superstar singer with a gorgeous voice, whose fame has not come at the expense of warmth, commitment, good taste or sensitivity.
Born to musician parents, Plácido Domingo started his singing career in his twenties, and has since sung an enormous number of roles, many of them taken from the world of Italian opera, but also French, Russian and, in latter years, German opera – especially Wagner. A self-confessed workaholic, he also conducts opera, is in charge of the Washington National Opera and the Los Angeles Opera, and has recorded Christmas albums and discs of popular Italian and Spanish songs.
5. Kiri Te Kanawa
Kiri Te Kanawa grew up in a remote corner of New Zealand, and ended up one of the world’s most famous opera singers. Dame Kiri Te Kanawa’s career was not the most conventional, particularly given that she started out as a pop star and entertainer at clubs in New Zealand.
But it was inexorable. That’s because Te Kanawa, who is of Maori and European heritage, had the kind of voice – mellow, warm, rich and completely unforced- that only comes around once in a blue moon. She enrolled without an audition, and without an operatic singing technique, at the London Opera Centre in 1966; three years later she was singing the role of the Countess in
The Marriage of Figaro under conductor Colin Davis, who famously said of her audition: ‘I couldn’t believe my ears. I’ve taken thousands of auditions, but it was such a fantastically beautiful voice.’ She went on to perform a huge number of roles, specialising in the music of Mozart, Strauss, Verdi, Handel and Puccini, and won a number of accolades, including the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music. She announced her retirement in 2017.
6. Cecilia Bartoli
Born in Rome, where her singer parents were members of the Rome Opera Chorus, Bartoli has often joked that when she was a child, her babysitters were the likes of Rossini and Verdi. Her vocal coach, however, was her mother, Silvana Bazzoni, who inculcated in her daughter a sense of intense discipline and helped her to find her unique voice. And what a voice it was: quicksilver in its agility, enormous in range.
Glyndebourne famously failed to recognise its potential, telling her that they were looking for a more ‘Mozartian singer’, even though Bartoli sold 200,000 copies of her recording of Mozart arias shortly afterwards. ‘These things can happen,’ Bartoli was quoted as saying in The Guardian: ‘When Verdi did his audition at the conservatory they turned him down and said that he wasn’t musical.
That is worse than me being turned down by Glyndebourne.’ Later on, Bartoli specialised in some relatively obscure corners of the repertoire, including lesser known fare by Gluck and Vivaldi – but her popularity did not dwindle. She remains widely acknowledged as one of the finest coloratura mezzo-sopranos in the world.
7. Enrico Caruso
Enrico Caruso is one of the earliest of the best opera singers whose voice is still available to us from his recordings. Born in Naples, the third of seven children, to a poor but not destitute family (his father was a mechanic and foundry worker), Caruso was encouraged in his early musical ambitions by his mother.
He initially found work as a street singer in Naples, making his professional stage debut at the Theatre Nuovo in Naples in the now-forgotten opera L’Amico Francesco by Mario Morelli. He went on to gain a huge following, known as much for his natural sense of showmanship as he was for his powerful and seemingly effortless voice.
Notorious, too, was his charm and cheek: he was arrested for indecent assault at the New York Zoo, outside the monkey house, and found guilty of pinching a lady’s bottom, but claimed that a monkey had done it. Distinctive as a man and as a musician, he is still considered by many to be the most famous opera star of all time, with many singers continuing to draw influence from his vocal mannerisms.
8. Joan Sutherland
With a career that lasted almost four decades, Joan Sutherland had perhaps the most compelling soprano voice of her age: warm, enormous in range, seemingly effortless and versatile enough to wrap itself around pretty much any repertoire.
Born in Sydney, Australia, to Scottish parents, she was 18 when she began seriously studying the voice. She trained to be a Wagnerian dramatic soprano, but under the advice of her husband, the conductor Richard Bonynge, ventured elsewhere, eventually specialising in the bel canto repertoire.
Critics showered her with superlatives, while fans often referred to her as ‘The Voice of the Century,’ and yet, even at the end of her career, Sutherland retained a shyness and a modesty that set her apart from many an opera diva.
We named Sutherland one of the greatest sopranos of all time
9. Jonas Kaufmann
Some call him ‘the hottest tenor in the world’. We couldn’t possibly comment. One Australian critic called him ‘the sort of man your mother warned you about.’ I couldn’t comment about that either.
But Kaufmann is undeniably one of the most bankable operatic tenors in the world. Gifted with superb acting skills and a a remarkable voice – as bewitching at both ends of its expansive range, he has a huge repertoire, encompassing opera, lieder, operetta, cabaret, carols and more.
But many know him best as the preeminent Wagnerian of today. Born in Munich to a musical, if not musician family – his father worked for an insurance company; his mother was a kindergarten teacher – Kaufmann grew up studying the piano and singing in school choirs. He was all set to study mathematics at university, then changed his mind, and, in the summer of 1989, began his vocal training at the University of Music and Performing Arts Munich. Now, he presides over a kind of mass hysteria, with legions of fans scrambling for tickets to his every performance.
10. Leontyne Price
Not only was Leontyne Price one of the best Verdi sopranos of her time, but she was instrumental in breaking down musical barriers, becoming the first African American woman to sing a leading role at La Scala in Milan.
Born in Mississippi, US, to a carpenter and a midwife, she displayed her musical talent from an early age, beginning piano lessons with a local pianist when she was three and a half. As a black woman in a highly segregated state, she initially embarked on the only available musical career path open to her: music education, studying at Central State University, a historically black school in Wilberforce, Ohio.
While there she participated in a masterclass with the renowned bass Paul Robeson, who, impressed by her voice, helped to help raise money that would allow her to study at the Juilliard. She went on to have a long and prolific career, widely praised for her warm and luscious voice, as well as her apparently effortless capacity to fill an opera house.
Pic of Maria Callas by IISG