Richard Morrison

It’s unrealistic to expect opera houses to audition for roles by voice alone

Can we really judge opera singers by voice alone?

As the son of a man who conducted a very fine brass band, I was exposed at a tender age to one of the most terrifying rituals in the artistic firmament. I’m referring to the brass band contest, in which as many as 20 ensembles follow each other onto the stage, play exactly the same, technically fiendish (but usually musically arid) 11-minute ‘testpiece’, and be marked out of 100 with microscopic exactitude by an adjudicator.

What then follows is akin to the day of judgment: alcohol-fuelled ecstasy for the winning band and its supporters; anguished despondency for the losers, especially if you happen to be, say, the soprano cornet player who fluffed a single top note, costing your band not just marks on the day, but the possibility of humiliating ‘relegation’ to a lower division, just as in football.

I encountered all this back in the 1960s, and I must confess I haven’t attended many brass band contests since. As Dvo ák said when taken to hear psalms sung to Anglican chant at St Paul’s Cathedral: ‘Why do they keep on repeating the same terrible music?’ But the one thing that has stayed in my mind was the effort the brass-band contest organisers made to ensure that the adjudicators remained impartial. They would be enclosed in a small, windowless cabin in the centre of the hall, so they could hear but not see.

And just to make certain there was no ‘dodgy business’, the adjudicators also didn’t know the order in which these fiercely competitive bands – Black Dyke, Grimethorpe, Cory, Brighouse and the rest – would play. Nor did the bands themselves, until the adjudicators were safely shut away.

It was years later, when I started reporting on the wider world of music, that I realised that this eminently fair way of evaluating performances was very much the exception. Some American orchestras conduct auditions with prospective candidates playing behind a curtain, but generally the people deciding who gets the prizes in music competitions, or the roles in operas, can not only see the competing candidates but also examine their CVS. So however unbiased they may think they are, their judgments may well be

The physical appearance of the singers has a big impact on an audience’s enjoyment

influenced by factors other than just the sound produced by that person, that day.

I was fascinated to learn, then, about a new singing competition titled By Voice Alone (byvoicealone.com), in which – for the first round anyway – the judges will be assessing what they hear without knowing what the competitors look like (they will sing behind a screen), or what they have done in their careers to date. As those judges will include quite a few of the people casting shows for Britain’s leading opera companies, By Voice Alone could be a valuable platform for singers who hitherto haven’t been able to break into the magic circle.

So should the concept should be unreservedly welcomed? Certainly, if our sole concern is to ensure that singers are judged only by the sounds they produce, and not by their age, colour, weight, physique, attractiveness, education or social connections. And with classical music still playing catchup with regards to, for instance, its black and ethnic minority representation, that is a laudable aim.

But opera is a complex artform. It’s not just about the singing. The set design and director’s staging, the acting and, yes, the physical appearance of the singers all have a big impact on an audience’s enjoyment. We can argue forever about how much a singer’s looks should matter – and I accept the pendulum may have swung too far in favour of filmstar glamour and slim bodies – but it’s unrealistic to suggest that casting should be done ‘by voice alone’.

Melanie Lodge, whose website Audition Oracle is behind the competition, clearly wants to see singers of all shapes and sizes, races and disabilities getting roles. ‘If you go and watch a show and you can’t see anything of yourself up there on stage, why would you connect with it?’ she asks. Hmm. Nobody ever mistook me for a consumptive waif, but that doesn’t stop my eyes getting moist when Mimì dies in La bohème. The main thing is that singers appear credible in the roles they are portraying.

And actually, Lodge appears tacitly to acknowledge this. The first round of her competition may be held behind screens – but the singers will be in full view for the second round and the final. Quite right too. Idealists may deplore it, but in any sphere of public performance – from opera to politics – looks do count. A lot.