Stories and recollections

My international breakthrough with Purcell and Bach

The first piece in the “Songbird” programme, is Purcell’s The Blessed Virgin’s Expostulation. This recording is from the finalists’ concert following the 1974 ARD International Vocal Competition, where I won first prize. As it happens, at the time I was seven months pregnant with my first child. I recall my singing teacher in Munich, Hans Hotter – who had suggested entering the competition well before I knew I was pregnant – being pleasantly surprised that I returned to take part. It didn’t really occur to me not to – after all I was not unwell, only pregnant! I would consider that quite normal – my daughters think it indicative of my allegedly single-minded and determined nature! Either way, back to Munich I went. Winning wasn’t on my mind, I just wanted to sing my best – before going back to Scotland and having my baby. And I do recall I rather enjoyed singing when pregnant as it felt as though there was an extra level of support.

At that time in my career I hadn’t yet performed any complete operas apart from at college, so my chosen repertoire comprised oratorio and lieder. I remember hearing these enormous voices singing opera from the concert hall. Listening too much could have had a negative impact, so I consciously never went to hear any of the other singers perform in the various rounds to avoid being distracted by what they were doing. Having come through the three piano-accompanied qualifying rounds, I found myself in the final round with the orchestra. The Jury had initially wanted me to sing “The sun goeth down” from Elgar’s “The Kingdom,” but at the last minute they couldn’t get hold of the orchestral parts so asked me instead to sing the Purcell along with the first movement of J.S. Bach’s cantata “Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen.” The Purcell is usually performed with a piano or harpsichord – and is not so well known in its orchestral version. The work showcases Purcell’s genius for setting words and capturing changing emotions. It is an extremely dramatic work – from the coloratura in “Cruel Herod’s way”, to the pathos when Mary questions why her child has disappeared, through to her desperation when she calls for Gabriel and the realisation that he won’t come back, leading to her desolation in “flattering hopes.” Along with Jauchzet Gott, it certainly gave me plenty of opportunity to showcase my best vocal talents. Jauchzet Gott is a wonderful exulting coloratura aria which I loved to sing. I first performed it at the RSAMD – indeed it was when I first met Ena Mitchell – and also performed it at the last concert I gave before my retirement. Every singer is unique in what they find more, or less, challenging to sing. I was fortunate in that I seemed to have a naturally agile voice and so really enjoyed singing works like this.

The winner was announced in German. I had to ask the person next to me if they could confirm who had won as I wanted to make sure I had properly understood what had been announced. Of course, when it became clear they really had announced my name – in fact they awarded the first prize to “Miss Marshall mit baby” – I was absolutely thrilled and elated.

The world of opera and classical singing is highly competitive and winning this competition was huge in terms of the opportunities it presented. Now I had proof of achievement, finding an agent was not the challenge it had been before. I signed with Harold Holt as it was then known. But the most rewarding part of the prize was that it included invitations from various German radio orchestras, who had supported the competition, to give concerts and do studio recordings. These recordings were then broadcast throughout Europe giving me a huge platform on which to perform. Some of these recordings feature in this programme.

But first of course I had to have the baby!

For the love of Vivaldi!

I recorded a lot of Vivaldi between 1975 and 1980. My elder daughter says one of her first memories is of me singing Vivaldi.  Which is certainly possible as she was born in 1974 and there would have been a lot of Vivaldi going on in our house in the following years.

Much of that was the complete recording of Vivaldi sacred music – which is a lot of music – but also the opera Tito Manlio.  It was all conducted by Vittorio Negri, who was a great champion of Vivaldi and had persuaded Philips Records to invest in these recordings. Vittorio was an extremely talented man – not just a wonderful conductor but also a very talented producer – something I had not realised until we met subsequently when he was the producer of a recording I made of the B Minor Mass, conducted by Sir Neville Marriner.

It was a joy to work with him, particularly as a young singer.  Vivaldi can sound quite deceptive – it looks very easy on the page but holds many surprises especially in some of his coloratura passages which can be quite difficult to navigate.  But I have always loved singing coloratura and so embraced the opportunities that Vivaldi gave the soprano voice.

It was also the first time I met Jeffrey Tate, who was the harpsichordist for the recordings and also a talented and successful conductor.  I remember Jeffrey flinging off some suggestions for ornaments at a rehearsal which were so brilliant I carefully notated them down.  The next day when I added them in during the recording, he asked me where the ornaments came from as he liked them so much – he had added them in so naturally he didn’t realise they were his!

There was a seemingly never-ending amount of music which required seven CDs to capture in its entirety (available on Spotify: search Vivaldi Sacred Choral Music, Vittorio Negri).  I feel privileged that I had the opportunity to record this wonderful music as part of a complete series, along with some extremely talented musicians including my dear friend Ann Murray whom I first met on this recording.

With so much wonderful music to choose from, it was difficult to pick out a few pieces to include in this programme. I narrowed it down to four pieces. The “Canta In Prato” from the Introduction to Dixit Dominus. And “De Torrente” from Dixit Dominus. Two from Tito Manlio – “A la caccia” and “Non ti lusinghe la crudeltade”. (NB I am waiting for A la caccia to be uploaded to Spotify by Decca who have kindly agreed to make it available. In the meantime, I have included the link to “Combatta un gentil cor”).

The Introduction to Dixit Dominus is simply an exhilarating piece to sing with exuberant, repeated staccato colouring the joy of the notes.  My daughter Nicola, who has been instrumental in putting this website together, asked me how you sing staccato as she imagines it to be very difficult.  I told her, rather unhelpfully I suspect, that her question was like asking a violinist how he plays pizzicato.  I don’t mean to make light of it, but an excellent skill or performance is not something you achieve overnight – ultimately everything in singing is down to support, technique, knowledge and experience – which takes years to accumulate.

The “De Torrente” is its opposite in mood and always reminds me of Venice and the flowing water.  It is a beautiful calm melody, an exquisite piece of music and just as challenging sing in its own unique way, demanding an exquisitely sustained line throughout.

The sacred music was all recorded in London and I recall it being an extremely enjoyable period.  Tito Manlio by contrast was recorded in East Berlin in 1977.  It was my first time there and a big adventure at that time, even more so as I was six months pregnant with my second daughter.  I still recall vividly being struck by the contrast compared with how we lived and remember how the musicians of the East Berlin Chamber Orchestra were so pleased to see us, delighted we had come to perform with them and so grateful to receive any books or magazines that we could give them.  The recording always took place in the evening so there would be complete silence uninterrupted by the noise of traffic, although I can remember a take being stopped to allow an airplane to fly overhead.

Tito Manlio has since become popular with star singers for its virtuoso arias – but this was the first time the work had ever been professionally and commercially recorded.  This was thanks to Vittorio and his passion for Vivaldi.  My part Lucio – which I also sang on stage at La Piccola Scala in a leather tunic and boots, my first and only trouser role on stage – had some of the most beautiful and show-stopping arias for soprano.  “Combatta” with trumpet, and “Fra le procelle” and “Alla caccia” with horns which makes the colour of the aria so exciting.  These early experiences during my career mean that Vivaldi will always be one of my favourite composers to sing……so much wonderful music…..but then there is J.S. Bach and Mozart.

Opera is wonderful, but my heart belongs to oratorio

Part 1

I always loved singing oratorio. To me the genre is absolutely the equal of opera and indeed if I were pushed to choose a favourite work to perform, it would most likely be an oratorio. That is a very personal choice and others would choose differently. But the composers I loved to sing – Bach, Handel, Mozart, Purcell, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Britten and Vaughan Williams – were all the authors of exquisite works for the voice outwith the medium of opera.

There is no one path for a singer to tread, and our individual journeys are all unique. As my career progressed, I spent an increasing amount of time singing opera, but my heart always reserved a special place for oratorio. Indeed, I have never liked the categorisation of classical singers as “opera singers” because that gives a hierarchy to opera that I feel is unfair to other classical musical genres. That is not to minimize the demands that singing an opera puts on singers – three plus hours out there on the stage with all the pressures on your voice to perform perfectly are incredibly demanding – and only become more so, not less, over time. I believe that the skill required for other genres of classical singing – namely oratorio and lieder, should be celebrated in the same way.

I remember Hans Hotter telling me that oratorio would help my opera, and lieder would help my oratorio – and how right he was. The three different genres enrich each other and only by appreciating the differences can one come close to mastering the intricacies of any. Opera on the surface may be the most dramatic of the three, but intimate lyrical lines have their place in opera as much as they do in lieder. In the concert hall there might be an opportunity for nuanced singing as there is in a typical lieder venue. And oratorio can be the dramatic equal of anything you will find on the operatic stage – just think of Elijah, the wonderful soprano aria Hear ye Israel and the widow woman’s duet.

Singing Fiordiligi in Michael Hampe’s acclaimed production for the Salzburg Festival, conducted by Riccardo Muti.

Opera is wonderful, but my heart belongs to oratorio

Part 3

Some of these opportunities are captured in this programme – including the glorious aria “Guardian Angels” from the Triumph of Truth and Time by Handel.  Along with Bach, Handel is the undisputed King of the Baroque era.  Yet his music is quite different to Bach’s – both to listen to and to sing.  As a singer this is about understanding the style of each and adapting accordingly how you approach the vocal line.  Both wrote exquisite music for the voice but Bach, I believe anyway, treats the vocal line in a more instrumental and angular way that demands a flawless sound, but still one imbued with deep feeling.  The challenge is to capture that feeling and sound in your voice so that it integrates perfectly with whatever instrument it is partnered with.

In Handel there is more freedom, more ability to differentiate the voice from the orchestral accompaniment.  Both are equally rewarding to sing.

The Triumph of Truth and Time is a very interesting work in that Handel wrote three iterations of it over his lifetime.  The first version, “Il Trionfo del Tempo e Disinganno” was written when he visited Rome in 1707 at the age of 22.  Subsequently he returned to the work twice, the first time resulting in “Trionfo della Verita” and the final time “The Triumph of Truth and Time” written in 1737 30 years after his first look at the work. 

The performance of this aria is from the Handel Festival in Gottingen, with the conductor Gunther Weissenborn.   We performed two versions of the work – the original 1707 version and the final 1737 version in two concerts over three days.  I do have a recollection of preferring the Italian version, which was full of magnificent arias, bubbling with the youth of the exuberant Handel, but there can be no denying this is an exquisite melody and I am delighted to have this recording.  In the aria, my character Beauty, after looking in the mirror of truth, announces her intentions to pass her days in sacred solitude and invokes her guardian angels to direct her.  I do remember being slightly shocked when this vast score arrived, with my part written in the soprano clef.  Fortunately, I had some good friends to call on who helped me write it all out in the treble clef and stick it into the score making it even heavier to carry around.  This memory  reminds me of when I saw an unusually thin score of Rosenkavalier.  I remember asking the owner, who sang the Marschallin, why her score was so thin.  “My dear,” she replied, “why should I carry other people’s music around with me?”  She had simply cut out the large parts of the opera where her character did not appear.  Definitely better for your back but not something I ever did!

Singing alongside me in the Handel performances were some great British singers, including Helen Watts and Norma Proctor.  They were both very supportive and kind to me as a young singer – and indeed Helen became a dear friend – but they were also the font of very practical and useful advice.  German towns, indeed many continental towns but I didn’t know it then, have clocks that chime loudly on the hour.  I remember coming down to breakfast on the day of the first performance having slept badly due to the noisy chiming, and relaying this to Helen, who cheerfully told me that she had slept like a baby and that I needed to invest in some Ohropax ear plugs.  After that I never travelled without them – you just never know when there is going to be an hourly chiming of a clock the night before a performance!

Handel, Samson

“The evening belonged to Margaret Marshall.  What a wonderful and memorable duet “Let the Bright Seraphim” between soprano and trumpet.  What an appealing solo “My Faith and Truth” was.  From Margaret Marshall’s appearance with the magnificent “Ye Men of Gaza” all were enthralled by her every intonation”

“Margaret Marshall proved in many ways the single most memorable element in the whole performance.  Even more than in the opera house, Miss Marshall provided purity and poise, an unfailing flow of golden tone perfect diction and immaculately precise divisions.”

The Act 2 finale of Mozart’s Cosi fan Tutte from the Salzburg Festival, conducted by Riccardo Muti.

Studying Lieder with the best

In 1971, I was awarded a Sir James Caird Travelling Scholarship and Herbert Wiseman Prize to study abroad.  I had recently graduated from the Academy (now the Royal Scottish Conservatoire) and was based in Stirling, travelling to Carlisle regularly for lessons with Ena.  As you will already have picked up if you have read the other stories, as far as I was concerned Ena was the perfect teacher and so I asked, in all sincerity, if travelling to Carlisle for my lessons would count as travelling abroad!

Unsurprisingly the Trust said no, it really did mean I needed to study outside of the UK.  Ena was also fully on board and reassured me that I would also continue to study with her. The head of the panel, Watson Forbes, was very keen for me to study with Hans Hotter, who as many readers of this site will know was a highly renowned German bass/baritone – indeed one of the great voices of the 20th century.

Mr Hotter was perhaps most famous for his Wagnerian roles but also an exceptional Lieder singer.

The first vision that comes to mind when I think of him was his sheer physical presence.  He was a tall, imposing character with a huge voice to match.  He was also an exceptionally kind man, as I would learn in the coming years.

At my audition, where I sang the Strauss lied “Allerseelen.”  I remember feeling diminutive in his presence and thinking keenly how tiny my voice seemed compared with his.  The audition went well, and he accepted me as a student.  I had recently married and while in a parallel life I might have been settling into my new home with my husband, instead I found myself setting off for Munich where I was to stay for three months.  I must add here that my husband has never been anything but fully supportive of my career.  When we met I don’t think either of us imagined the direction my life would take, but he embraced it and understood that pursuing a singing career would, if I were successful, mean that I would be away from home a lot.

Munich was the start of that.  I really had barely travelled abroad at this point and certainly not by myself for three months.  I was horribly home-sick and ended up only managing six weeks for my first visit.  Mr Hotter was incredibly supportive, never pressured me and just said I should come back when I felt ready.  After that I made regular visits ever month or so, staying for a couple of weeks at a time.

The main reason Ena and Mr Forbes were keen for me to study with Hans Hotter was to extend my knowledge and understanding of Lieder singing.  Mr Hotter may have had a large voice, but he also had the most amazing ability to pare down his voice to the most exquisite pianissimo.  This is something I learned from him in our studies together.

We studied a lot of songs, but I particularly enjoyed the Lieder of Wolf and Richard Strauss.  Mr Hotter had been a notable creator of many of Strauss’s roles for baritone and therefore could give me unique insight into the singing of Strauss’s music.  I soon came to realise how fortunate I was to have not just one but two great artists as my teachers – and they complemented each other very well.

My daughter Nicola asked me if there is any benefit in studying with someone who has the same voice type, which essentially means studying with a female if you are female or a male if you are male.  I would say ultimately no – what matters is that you understand the language of your teacher and that you are able to apply what they say to your voice.  My voice on the surface resembled Ena’s more than Mr Hotter’s and not only for the obvious reason that I am a soprano!  But I arrived in Munich with a developed technique and with Mr Hotter we were able to build on that.  The top of my voice especially benefitted from our collaboration, and through the focus on pianissimo singing improved my ability to “float” my voice.

I am delighted for two reasons to be able to include these three songs (Du meines Herzens Krönelein, Ich wollt’ein Sträusslein Binden, and Schlagende Herzen) from a recital at the Wigmore Hall in 1976, on the Songbird platform.  First, they are just wonderful songs both to sing and to listen to.  Collectively they showcase not only the passionate, spirited and beautiful soaring phrases that characterise Strauss’s vocal music, but also his humorous side which is present here in Schlagende Herzen, and can be found in other songs including Für Fünfzehn Pfennige, Hat Gesagt bleibt’s nicht dabei,  and Schlechtes Wetter, which are great fun to sing.

Second, they feature my dear friend John Fraser as accompanist.  John subsequently made his name as a highly successful classical recording producer.  We performed a lot together in our earlier years, after meeting at The High School in Stirling.  We would enter local music competitions together, give local recitals and even, as John reminded me recently, perform at church daffodil teas.  I look back on those times, starting when we were just talented teenagers exploring our love of music and performing together, with enormous affection.  I am delighted that we can include a little piece of our joint music making on this platform, which would also not exist without John’s encouragement and persistence.  Thank you to the BBC, and particularly Yvette Pusey, for enabling me to include it.

The beauty of English song

I sang a lot of English song at the start of my career.  It is ideal for young singers as the range is not too extended and for native English speakers not yet proficient in foreign languages, there are definite advantages to singing in your own tongue, even if we do not sing in quite the same way we speak.  When it comes to word painting for example – which in singing means to paint a metaphorical picture with the colour of your voice to capture the atmosphere of the words – this is certainly easier in a language you are intimate with.

Ena was a master of word painting and the English repertoire (which demands it) and was full of suggestions for works I could sing by composers including Vaughan Williams, Herbert Howells, Gustav Holst, Benjamin Britten, William Walton and Gerald Finzi.

Finzi’s “Dies Natalis” or “day of birth,” which is included in this Songbird programme, describes the wonder and greatness of the gift of life and the entrance to the world from the new born child’s experience.  It is innocent, pure, direct and full of wonder.  The words are exquisite, the orchestral accompaniment lush, warm and at times heart-breaking – combining to capture the wonder of birth and how we all come to live on this earth.   It is a perfectly designed work of art from start to finish, with a subtle inflection of the word setting and the arching of the phrases.   I find the last two movements, “How like an angel” and “These little limbs, these eyes, these hands, this panting heart” with their long melodic lines, especially moving.

It helps to love whatever music you are singing and performing, but I find this to be particularly true in the case of this piece.  The subject matter is so delicate and intimate that it needs to be approached with real care, tenderness and a purity of voice that enables you to capture the innocence required.

I certainly loved it and that is why I suggested it to the conductor Gunter Kehr as a work that we could perform together.  He had never heard it before and I think it was in a completely different style to anything he had played before.  But he listened to it and immediately identified with the beauty of the work.  I was thrilled when he said we would perform it together and his Mainzer Kammerorchester made a splendid realisation of the music.

Having obtained a copy of the recording from the Rundfunk, I was very keen to include it in this programme, not only because it was a piece I loved singing but because perhaps more than any other music, it reminds me of Ena and her extraordinary musicality and gift for word painting, which is required throughout this piece right from the first phrase and which I was so fortunate to benefit from.

However, I knew that Gunter had passed away, and I did not have any contact with the orchestra.  I took the obvious route and looked them up on the internet, found a telephone number and called it.  Incredibly the woman that answered the phone happened to be his widow who somehow after all these years recognised my speaking voice.  She was very happy to agree to my request and put me in touch with the manager of the orchestra, who also agreed, as did Boosey and Hawkes.

Coincidentally I learned 2020 also marks 120 years since Finzi was born.  Against the backdrop of other events being planned to mark this date, I am delighted to make a small contribution to his memory with this recording.