@bestofopera.en: Follow @bestofopera.en for the voices that refuse to be forgotten. 🎵 "Vocalise" - Montserrat Caballé She stands before the camera, ascending and descending a scale. At the end, she laughs, as if it cost her nothing. That impression deceives. Montserrat Caballé became one of the most celebrated sopranos of the twentieth century, and anyone who has never heard her in person associates this fame with what they imagine from a great voice: power, a high note, volume at maximum. But her signature was the opposite. It was to sustain the high note at the lowest sound that a voice can reach, with a breathing control that her colleagues couldn't copy. It's that control that sustains the scale she sings here — the work behind sounding without any effort. It was that same control that placed her at the center of the stage for the first time. On April 20, 1965, she replaced Marilyn Horne at the last minute at Carnegie Hall, in the title role of "Lucrezia Borgia" — learned in less than a month. She became a star in a single night, not by singing louder than anyone, but by holding the right note, at the right volume, under the pressure of someone who had no time to rehearse. Did you know that singing softly, sustaining a high note, can be more difficult than singing loudly? 📋 Fact Sheet 🎼 Work: Vocalise (scales exercise) ✍️ Composer: not applicable — vocal improvisation, no authorship 🎤 Performer: Montserrat Caballé 🇪🇸 🎥 Recording: video footage, date not identified Share it with someone who thinks opera is just volume. #BestOfOpera #MontserratCaballe #Soprano #Opera

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Thursday 20 August 2026 17:00:15 GMT