Megan Marie Hart (b 1983) is an American soprano based in Germany. [Thanks to a German reader (Franco) who alerted me to Ms Hart’s impressive voice] Born in Eugene Oregon, she studied with Mignon Dunn and then with Marilyn Horne. She won Horne’s Song Competition in 2010.
She began her career more than a decade ago singing lighter roles such as the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro and Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte. She also sang the more dramatic part of Donna Anna in Don Giovanni. More recently she’s added the title role of Puccini’s Tosca to her repertoire.
She sang Luisa Miller in Verdi’s opera of the same name at the Landestheater in Detmold. Germany seems to have an opera company if every city, village, or hamlet. This is why so many American singers of note got their starts in Germany. Hart has recently been engaged by the Staatstheater in Darmstadt. Of course, like all performers she currently at home with her computer rather than with colleagues in front of an audience.
There aren’t very many recordings of her voice available. I’ve picked four that show the development of her voice realizing yet again that there’s nothing like a live performance.
The Jewel Song from Gounod’s Faust was made early in the soprano’s career. It gives little hint that a spinto was lurking a few pages hence. O mio babbino caro from Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi is a lyric role, but the richness of Ms Hart’s sound indicates that she’s ready for heavier roles. Tosca needs a spinto soprano. Vissi d’arte is the show stopper from Act 2. It literally stops all the action and is there because Puccini needed a soprano solo and couldn’t think of anywhere else to put it. This excerpt is the only one of the four with an orchestral accompaniment.
Finally, here’s the recording that really got my attention. Hart’s reading of Pace, pace mio Dio! had me thinking back to Zinka. if you have to ask Zinka who? make a few clicks on this site and refresh (or fresh) your memory. Listen to the first word – Hart builds it and then diminishes it just the way only a great soprano can. If this singing is representative of what she can do onstage in a regular fashion, then the operatic universe is hers with the qualifier just below.
Assuming we can ever overcome the planet wide epidemic of stage fright that has gripped all but the bravest, I look forward to seeing how this nascent artist evolves. Thanks again Franco.
The recording which “really got [your] attention,” the “Forza” aria, is the one that got mine for two reasons: first, as the biographer of Rosa Ponselle, for whom Leonora was her debut role at the Metropolitan Opera premiere of “Forza del destino” in 1918, I have heard her recordings of the aria; and second, I have heard “live” and recorded performances of “Pace” by almost every soprano who sang the role.
After hearing Ms. Hart’s “Jewel Song,” I wasn’t much impressed by her singing of the coloratura passages, nor did I find the brief “Gianni Schicchi” aria a very good indication of her vocal promise because of the limitations of the aria. Then came the “Vissi d’ rate” and I heard a vocal and dramatic expansiveness that I hadn’t in the previous “live” recordings. Her “Tosca” aria led me to the same conclusion you had drawn—and her “Pace, pace” made me certain of her vocal and dramatic maturation, which I hope is ongoing.
I also agree that her diminuendo in the opening measures of “Pace, pace mio Dio” is reminiscent of Zinka Milanov’s “live” and studio recordings of the aria. I would be tempted to substitute Rosa Ponselle’s Victor electrical recording because it captures the timbre and ease of her singing of this difficult aria, but I can’t because Ponselle herself said that the recording is at best a semblance of how she sang it onstage. “I had to sing it too fast because those recordings only ran about four minutes long,” she told me, “but onstage I sang it at a much slower tempo, and I prolonged the opening diminuendo as well as shaped every phrase with more nuance than that recording could capture.”
A sidebar but one your readers may find interesting: when I asked her if she heard similarities between her voice and Zinka’s, she replied bluntly, “None at all. She has a Slavic voice, and mine is an Italian voice.”
When I told her that both Alexander Kipnis and Wilfrid Pelletier had said that Milanov’s voice was a lirico-spinto compared to what Kipnis described as Ponselle’s “enormous dramatic-soprano voice,” she said to me, “He is a great artist and he knows voices better than most anyone.” After a few moments of silence she added, “I will admit that I’d like to have had Milanov’s high notes.”
For me this voice lacks the open and smooth sound and has an irritating vibrato.
In which recording do you hear the flaws you’re describing? I ask because the sequence of recordings which Dr. Kurtzman posted were intended to illustrate her vocal growth and development.
Thank you, Mr. Kurtzman, for helping to get this hidden gem of a voice into the light. I’m happy I could inspire you to write this article. As you wrote in your Pace article, Ponselle and Milanov are a good standard to measure the Verdi soprano. I agree full heartedly. Right now, I’m keeping my eyes on Angel Blue and Megan Marie Hart. Attending Ms. Harts performances is going to be easier for me, though, I’m not as often in NY as I used to. Nevertheless, I hope to get to see both of them live again soon. I have my fingers crossed Angel Blue’s Tosca in Berlin doesn’t get cancelled in spring.
@Operafilly, I assure you, her Luisa Miller was impeccable, including a controlled and intentional use of vibrato. The above recordings don’t show the varied colours and artistry she uses throughout an opera to make her character a living person you will fall in love with. Unfortunately, the audio files can only hint at the real experience to hear her live with full orchestra and choir, as 3 of them are with piano and the orchestration of Vissi d’arte is not comparable to big Verdi moments. But the recordings are all there is to get your attention, until there is full opera recording. (On a side note, Operafilly, great username! I just italianize my name…)
@Jim Drake, I assume Operafilly was talking about the Gounod. The vibrato is most noticeably strong in the jewel aria, I think. It is probably to light for her voice. I haven’t hear her sing the full role, though. As in Traviata, it would be a mistake to cast a light voice just for the first aria, and having seen Ms. Hart act, I would have loved to see her become insane at the end!
About my experience, hearing a Met sized voice in a 600 seat house was mind blowing. Her voice was everywhere, it was as if the air itself was the aria. (Pun intended.) In intermission a local patron told me she had never heard anyone like Ms. Hart in her decades of attending every production in Detmold, she believed she now had an idea what it must be like to go to the Met. Of course, it was not a Met quality show, neither the staging nor the remaining cast, nor orchestra. Nevertheless, I assured her, this was better than going to the Met. Mostly to humour her, but also because I had the recent disappointing Luisa Miller with Domingo and Yoncheva in mind, where neither the beautiful set and costumes nor the Met orchestra could help the lifeless and underwhelming delivery. (Most apparent in the close ups on the broadcast DVD, the Laura is the only lively soul on stage. Very ironic, compared to the Detmold production, which had every character being dead and appear out of coffins!)
I got to see Ms. Hart again as Aida in the same house. The production struggled to fit this monster opera on a Mozart stage. But I have seen a lot worse. The director made Aida a cleaning lady in a museum, dreaming to be in an Egyptian fantasy. The premise, though silly, worked most of the time. Ms. Hart showed an even wider range of acting as Aida, both vocally and physically, as a headstrong cleaning lady, an intimidated slave, a love smitten girl, and as a noble princess.
I was looking forward to travel to Detmold again to see her in Don Giovanni, something more appropriate for the small house. It was scheduled to be her farewell production, but got cancelled because of the pandemic. Her website lists one upcoming role in Verdi, two in Puccini and Donna Anna — all tba, because of the virus.
I mentioned Ms. Hart in a comment to the Verdi Soprano article, since I thought any opera fan reading it might not only be looking for a recommended recording, but also for current performers worth seeing live. I’m a big Verdi and Puccini fan, and wanted to share my excitement of having stumbled upon a true Verdi soprano in the Landestheater Detmold — in the middle of nowhere!
Dear Franco,
I saw Tebaldi, Moffo, and Sutherland live so I’m too picky. Yes, there’s lots of improvement up to Pace, Pace. But still not consistent, and too much vibrato on the high notes. I realize she still could improve. I too am a Puccini Verdi fan. If you are Franco Corelli I got your autograph several times!!
Dear Operafilly,
My real world name is Franklin, not Franco. Much to my regret, I never got to see Tebaldi, Moffo or Corelli live. The curse of the late birth; I guess I am a colt. I did not want to change your mind or impose my opinion, it is just that, an opinion. I’m glad my suggestion to Mr. Kurtzman made you listen to Ms. Hart’s recordings. Where would opera be, if we gave up looking for a grandiose experience, the excitement of the new! And who knows, maybe one day, in the intermission of one of her performances, you will tell how you never liked the vibrato in her high notes, and then everyone will be comparing the divas of the past with what they just heard.
(Oh, how I miss going to the opera!)
To me, the beauty of opera, like religion, true to the origin of the word according to Cicero, is that it gets re-read, reinterpreted and reinvented. There are no definitive 3 minute studio versions engineered to sterile perfection, as in pop music. Some recordings I listened to hundreds of times, some maybe twice. All have flaws, not one is perfect. Though I might never not be disappointed by some aspect of a performance, I will attend live performances as long as I’m physically able, and hopefully listen to live streams for a while after. There is never a perfect cast, a perfect orchestra, a perfect staging, in the best acoustic, with all of the performers having a perfect voice day. Maybe there was in the past, or maybe it was just more difficult to compare, before the digital age. All I’m looking for are perfect moments, snapshots of greatness, and when I get them, I will tell.
I have yet to know a devout opera fan who didn’t say aloud, “I came along too late because what I wouldn’t give to have heard Corelli, Callas, and Tebaldi,” or “Bjoerling, Milanov, and Warren,” or “Caruso, Ruffo, and Ponselle.” At least it is some compensation to have asked knowledgeable people who did hear these now-legendary artists to describe in detail what they were like onstage. In my case, I had the privilege of being Ponselle’s biographer (twice), as well as Tucker’s and Lily Pons’, and interviewed nearly everyone then living who sang with them.
This is so kind of you to write about me Mr. Kurtzman, I appreciate you sharing my music so very much! My husband found your article today, and I have been reading your very interesting blog, and greatly enjoying it. Thank you for bringing attention to the opera world, we in the business cannot thank you enough for what you are doing. It means a lot knowing that people like you are attending and writing about our performances.
I completely understand what people are saying about my Jewel Song- I lightened my voice in the performance for the exact reasons you all suspected: Faust starts out light and gets progressively heavier, just like Traviata. So I always try to make a contrast when singing the full role with orchestra because I feel that it is so much more shocking when Marguerite has a serious emotional break. So in the first half, I sang very lightly, trying to portray the innocent maindenly qualities, and later, when I murdered my child, I used my full voice. In the jail scene, I would temporarily go back to the very light singing, as I remembered the past, but in the very end, the trio, out came my full voice once again. Of course, as you can hear, singing Verdi feels much easier to me and more natural now, and is indeed my absolute favorite composer to sing. Everything he writes feels easy in my voice, so I am looking forward to getting to perform more Verdi in the future. I can understand what @Operafilly says about my vibrato, I suppose if I am singing a more full lyric role, some of the spinto qualities in my upper range could feel like overkill. The word spinto means “pushed,” so most true spintos do have a sort of driven quality in their upper ranges. It is this pushed sound that allows us to get above a loud orchestra, but we differ from dramatic sopranos, who must have this quality all of the time, so their voices can be even more metalic- spintos have the opportunity to sing in many different colors, and need coloratura for roles like Gilda, Violetta or Abigaille, the richness for roles like Tosca, and that more dramatic metalic quality for the heaviest passages of Verdi, Strauss and Puccini. This quality is what allowed me to sing Chrysothemis without straining to be heard over the orchestra. Many of the “spintos” today in big houses are actually full lyrics, as the focus of many big houses can be how attractive a singer will be in HD, and sadly it can become apparent after a few years as the vibrato widens, that these heavier roles were a mistake. But full lyrics often have beautiful blooming high notes, I would consider that the hallmark of a good lyric soprano, and if one is used to hearing full lyrics singing spinto roles, it might be surprising to hear a spinto in the same role, and wonder where the limpid high notes are. I do nevertheless greatly enjoy getting to sing lyric roles as well, I think it keeps my voice fresh, so I am grateful for the opportunity always. On the other hand, I do recognize that not everyone can love my voice, and I don’t take it personally. I am a member of several online forums where people endless argue if Callas or Caballe or Price were the greatest singers, and everyone has their personal favorites (Price! Obviously!). Opera is a subjective art form, and I can only try to be true to my voice, and to myself as an artist as I develop.
I understand @Operafilly ‘s love of Tebaldi, she was my grandfather’s favorite singer. Tebaldi had a larger voice than mine, I would consider her a dramatic soprano who chose to sing mostly Italian repertoire. Moffo on the other hand was a lyric coloratura. I had the great honor of singing for Ms. Moffo before she died. I sang Schubert, and I was so nervous, I repeated the first verse twice. I was only 19 years old, and afterwards she came up to me and held my hand and kissed me on the cheek. She was so gracious, and I swore I would never wash my cheek again! I almost met Sutherland. Her best friend, my voice teacher Marilyn Horne, called her on the phone and asked her to accept me into her masterclass. Joan accepted me, and I was so excited to attend, but sadly in the fall only a few months later, she passed away. I was devastated.
I hope that those of you in Germany will come to hear me sing at the Staatstheater Darmstadt, which is my new theater, as soon as it is safe to come again. So far, it is planned that I will sing Donna Anna as the season opener in the fall, followed by Mimì, and a lovely little operetta by Paul Abraham, a fascinating Jewish composer, and in the spring of 2022 I am supposed to sing Liù, and Elsa in Lohengrin. Don Carlo has unfortunately been pushed to the following season because of the pandemic, and there is a possibilty that I will guest as Butterfly, but this will only happen if it works with the schedule of my theater, so I may have to wait to sing Butterfly. But the plans are changing constantly, so we will just have to see. Currently my theater is in talks to have me participate in a Jewish cultural project, and I am hoping to be able to present a virtual online Liederabend of Jewish composers.
Anyway, thank you again for writing about me and sharing my music, I feel so fortunate, especially because I have not yet had the opportunity to sing in huge houses yet. If you do come to Darmstadt, please come and visit me after the show, you can contact me via the contact form on my website. And Angel Blue is one of my good friends, she is fantastic, and if you have a chance to hear her, please take it! She is wonderful, and as kind as she is beautiful!
Warmly,
Megan Marie Hart
My dear Ms. Hart, thank you for joining this discussion and sharing your opera anecdotes. I’m overjoyed to read of your friendship with Ms. Blue. Sadly, her Tosca in Berlin was cancelled. But I would not have been there anyway, since I was, and still am recovering from Covid-19. I have lost two friends to this terrible virus. And despite being careful and always wearing a mask, I caught it. Please, everyone, be careful, be safe, wear a mask, and get vaccinated as soon as you can.