Musical talents that never quite made it....

[salymap]

Another trip to IPlayer saved.

It seems to me that once a musician becomes more 'personality' than simply performer the writing is on the wall.

Make your own list.

[Hornspieler]

Another trip to IPlayer saved.

It seems to me that once a musician becomes more 'personality' than simply performer the writing is on the wall.

Make your own list.

James Galway
Nigel Kennedy.
Vanessa Mae
Katherine Jenkins
Nicola Benedetti
Lang Lang

...going back a little in time:

Kenneth McKeller
Webster Booth

?

Once they start making "Albums", they are starting off down the slippery slope

HS

[salymap]

James Galway
Nigel Kennedy.
Vanessa Mae
Alison Balsam
Catherine Jenkins
Nicola Benedetti
Lang Lang

?

Once they start making "Albums", they are starting off down the slippery slope






HS

Absolutely

[edashtav]

Does the same apply to composers, I wonder, when they start to publish Albumblätter?

[Flosshilde]

James Galway
Nigel Kennedy.
Vanessa Mae
Alison Balsom
Katherine Jenkins
Nicola Benedetti
Lang Lang


HS

Is it fair to include Nicola Benedetti in that list? I'm not knowledgable enough to comment on the merits of her playing (although she must be several leagues above KJ), but I don't think that she can be classified as a 'personality' - she seems to me to be a fairly modest young woman whose forays into being a 'person' rather than a 'performer' are on the whole directed at promoting music education.

[salymap]

Can't altogether agree about Webster Booth HS. He certainly sang lighter stuff,usually with Anne Ziegler,his wife.

BUT I have 'Onaway wake Beloved' recorded with Sargent in 1944, that shows his beautiful tenor voice to perfection and he sang in many oratorio performances in the 40s/50s.

Perhaps a 50/50 case.

[Richard Tarleton]

Is it fair to include Nicola Benedetti in that list? I'm not knowledgable enough to comment on the merits of her playing (although she must be several leagues above KJ), but I don't think that she can be classified as a 'personality' - she seems to me to be a fairly modest young woman whose forays into being a 'person' rather than a 'performer' are on the whole directed at promoting music education.

I'd second that.

In James Galway's case things started to go downhill when he "came out" to Joseph Cooper and the panel of Face the Music in 1975. Actually the first few times he told the anecdote about his BPO audition it was quite amusing.....

The list of great opera singers who have supplemented their pensions in this way is a long one. Some do it when their careers are fading (te Kanawa?), others from the word go (Terfel), some don't seem to have allowed it to distract them from the main business (Domingo).

[Hornspieler]

Is it fair to include Nicola Benedetti in that list? I'm not knowledgable enough to comment on the merits of her playing (although she must be several leagues above KJ), but I don't think that she can be classified as a 'personality' - she seems to me to be a fairly modest young woman whose forays into being a 'person' rather than a 'performer' are on the whole directed at promoting music education.

Well, she did appear recently on BBC TV's Breakfast Show playing "a track from her latest album" and what a lot of tripe it was.
Nicola has to realise that she is no longer a juvenile prize winner - she's in the big time now and she won't stay with the opposition by knocking out "albums" of inconsequential music. She has done well, but she has a very long way to go.

As for Webster Booth, Sal, his wife Anne Ziegler dragged him down to Music Hall level and his potential operatic career was totally ruined.

Kenneth McKeller had a wonderful tenor voice. Former RCM students still talk about his performance of Britten's Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings when he was still a student.

I don't think this diversion really belongs on this thread, which is about a concert by the Ulster Orchestra.

Maybe someone would like to start a new discussion about great talents that didn't make it.

It's very sad when you hear someone described as " ... someone who has a great future behind him."

HS

[Nick Armstrong]

HS your wish is my wassisname

PS: There may be a more precise title for the thread, open to offers...

[Serial_Apologist]

I'm not sure if Karl Jenkins fits into the category defined in this thread. In the late 60s a product of the Barry Summer School in S Wales that introduced several UK jazz and fusion stars of the succeeding 3 decades, he contributed some fine charts to Graham Collier's band and to Soft Machine, as well as playing nifty oboe, baritone sax and some backing keyboards. Quite what overtook him to guarantee a much broader following than the one he'd forsaken, I have no knowledge.

[Flosshilde]

Well, she did appear recently on BBC TV's Breakfast Show playing "a track from her latest album" and what a lot of tripe it was.
Nicola has to realise that she is no longer a juvenile prize winner - she's in the big time now and she won't stay with the opposition by knocking out "albums" of inconsequential music. She has done well, but she has a very long way to go.HS

Well, she is at the beginning of her career

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Katherine Jenkins? When was she ever anything other than a middle-of-the-road personality - a sort of singing Liberace? (And I'm sure that, like the others we've mentioned, she'll cry all the way to the bank at such criticism; meanwhile, I have to get up at 6:30 am every working day. )

[Hornspieler]

Well, she is at the beginning of her career

Exactly! And that is precisely why she should be working on her technique and musicianship - not turning out worthless albums for the benefit of those people who are pushing her for their own gain. Does she really want to become another Vanessa Mae - a super-rich failure?

I care about these young musicians. I've witnessed too many whose lives and ambitions have been ruined by the failure of others to lead them on the right path.

HS

[teamsaint]

Exactly! And that is precisely why she should be working on her technique and musicianship - not turning out worthless albums for the benefit of those people who are pushing her for their own gain. Does she really want to become another Vanessa Mae - a super-rich failure?

I care about these young musicians. I've witnessed too many whose lives and ambitions have been ruined by the failure of others to lead them on the right path.

HS

Well now, there's an interesting germ of a different thread ,

[Mary Chambers]

Katherine Jenkins? When was she ever anything other than a middle-of-the-road personality - a sort of singing Liberace? (And I'm sure that, like the others we've mentioned, she'll cry all the way to the bank at such criticism; meanwhile, I have to get up at 6:30 am every working day. )

Katherine Jenkins is 'making it' in the only way she can. She'd never have got anywhere as a singer.