Alberto Remedios RIP

[Bert Coules]

An excellent appreciation of Remedios from the Daily Telegraph.

[Beef Oven!]

I'm late contributing to this thread, thanks to a recent move and curtailed internet access, but not, I hope, too late to add a thought or two.

I woke to this news on Radio 3 on Wednesday morning: a sad way to start the day. I was, and still am, a huge admirer of Remedios: there are some artists with whom it's possible to develop a bond that feels almost personal, even if you've never met them: he was like that for me. He embodied "my" Siegfried as no other performer had before or has since: under Goodall, the character became more lyrical, more sympathetic, more believable, more real, than I'd ever previously known him to be. I was a student in London when I went to the first night of the Blatchley/Byam Shaw/Koltai/Ornbo production at the Coliseum; the next day I bought a ticket for every other performance in the run: I simply couldn't stand the thought of them doing it and my not being there to watch. And to listen, of course: "the singer with a smile in his voice" Remedios was called once, but there was steel there too when it was needed, and astonishing stamina.

I saw him in the main Ring tenor roles (and as Froh at Covent Garden, a curious prelude to his Siegfried there a year later) as well as Tristan, Lohengrin, Walther and Erik. And also as Don José, in various Verdi parts (including a short and not entirely successful one-off run as Otello for WNO), in Tippett and in Berlioz: Faust in The Damnation, but most memorably a last-minute stand-in for an absent Jon Vickers in The Trojans at Covent Garden. And amongst other concerts I have fond memories of a Queen Elizabeth Hall lieder recital when for one song he reached into a pocket and produced a postcard covered in closely-packed writing. "Don't want to get the words wrong," he explained, completely unapologetically.

That sort of naturalness and ease came across on stage, too, and sometimes perhaps a little too much: he needed a firm directorial hand to discipline him into giving his best dramatically. But when that happened, when everything came together, my word there really was no-one like him. I count myself lucky to have been there during his golden days in a company enjoying theirs. Yes, that news was a sad way to start a day.

A most interesting and warm reminiscence of an artist who was clearly central to your enjoyment of music. I came to Remedios very late, when he'd finished performing and truly enjoyed his art in the Goodall Ring recordings. Thank you for posting.

[Beef Oven!]

An excellent appreciation of Remedios from the Daily Telegraph.

[LeMartinPecheur]

One of the very few great singers I can say I've sung with. Student choral society performance of "the Ninth" in 1973. The baritone was Raimond Herincx.