I would love to hear Meade sing this as she is really good and maybe the best around today to sing it, but I would have LOVED to have heard Sutherland sing this. I know Meade has the size voice you need to do this aria with a huge orchestra. Sutherland is probably the best to sing it since it's premier.

 

A premier is a political figure (like a Prime Minister). The first night of a new play, or an opera is a première.

 

Most...unfair...competition...ever

 

Meade I am not really familiar with. She displays problems with many modern sopranos. She has reasonable volume, but the sound isn't very pretty at all to me. Both she and the other singer are very nasal and spread. I think she may have a good core voice, but the breath support is inadequate for the breath pressure she is applying and it is a sound with a lot of glottal tension and an overly wide vibrato. If I am unkind I will say they wobble. She does have a fast response instrument, but there isn't enough beauty in the sound for me to enjoy this.

Sutherland makes a beautiful smooth velvety round sound in all her acuti and virtuoso attacks non matter how wide the leap, or how high the note or angular the approach. She simply sounds beautiful, sensual, and stunningly brilliant. The voice is huge, but this isn't why I favor Joan. Anyone can make lots of noise. Joan's breath support is so staggering that she never once seems to scream or yell harshly at any dynamic level. This is the point of virtuoso repertoire, that it sound beautiful and easy in emission, as she makes it. The other one cannot compare.

 

yup, Meade has like 5 different types of strain going on at once. She needs to take a few years off, retrain and get back to basics.

 

I’ve never thought much of Mead, even though she was praised to the skies by Will Crutchfield, who conducted her first Norma. The most I can say about her is that her diction is better than Sutherland’s (no surprise there).

In every other aspect, Joan is leagues ahead of her. Even the orchestra sounds fantastic compared to Meade’s. Sutherland blows all,other contestants out of les ondes.

 

I'm very excited for our next soprano contest. Last time I didn't know enough to create a good contest for The Song of the Moon, but now I have some top notch singers for you.

 

Meade makes an awful noise and is unbearable, for any and all of the reasons others have stated. I had to turn her off halfway through.

Sutherland is past her best. Her mouthy middle voice and slowing vibrato make her less than a pleasure. Vague enunciation undercuts her effort to sound dramatic. She's nevertheless much better than Meade.