Christopher Maltman: In Range of Venice

Since winning the lieder prize at the 1997 Cardiff Singer of the World competition, Christopher Maltman has ascended to the top ranks of operatic baritones. Acclaimed for his rich-toned vocalism as well as his dramatic intelligence, the English artist has excelled in opera roles from Papageno and the Count in Le nozze di Figaro to the title roles in Billy Budd and Don Giovanni. Yet Maltman is an avid recitalist, and he arrives in the Bay Area for a vocal recital that includes music by Schubert, Schumann, Mahler, Mendelssohn, Fauré, and Reynaldo Hahn. Presented by San Francisco Performances and accompanied by pianist Malcolm Martineau, the event is March 18 at Herbst Theatre. This will be Maltman’s third San Francisco recital, and in a recent call from his home in Brighton, England, he took time to speak with SFCV about the program, his voice, and the future.

This looks like a wonderful program, beginning with Venetian songs by Schumann, Schubert, Mendelssohn, and Hahn, and ending with the Rückert lieder of Schubert and Mahler. How did you put it together?

As always, it’s this sort of infernal jigsaw puzzle that you put together. The whole reason behind the Venetian theme is that I was invited to give a concert in Venice: On Tuesday [March 15] I’ll be in Venice singing in a palazzo. They wanted a one-hour program which was Venice-themed. I knew the Fauré Cinq Melodies de Venise, the Schumann Gondolier songs, the Schubert Gondelfahrer, and the Mendelssohn Venetianisches Gondellied. Then my friend and colleague Graham Johnson suggested that I should do the Hahn Venezia, which I didn’t know at all. It’s a fantastic little cycle of seven songs in Venetian dialect. I thought it couldn’t get more perfect than that, except of course then I had to go and find out about singing in Venetian dialect. Not entirely simple, especially since I’ll be singing them in Venice!

So the first half [of the San Francisco recital] is basically the program I’m doing in Venice. Then several other recitals came up, of which San Francisco is the first, and the second half ended up just being favorite songs of mine. The Mahler Rückert lieder are a favorite; and the thought of pairing them with some Schubert was very nice. That allowed me to put in some less well-known Schubert, and that’s the Metastasio songs [Drei Lieder, “Metastasio” D. 902]. They’re fantastic — very un-Schubert-like and much more like operatic arias than the typical Schubert lieder. So, as ever, the program is a blend of expediency and design. But it seems to fit together very nicely — there’s a beautiful, quite light sweep to the first half. Then the second half becomes deeper and much more profound, ending, of course, with Mahler’s “Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen.”

You’ve recorded some of this music, and so much more, from John Adams to Vaughan Williams. If someone wanted to hear your finest, which recording would you suggest?

There are two discs that really stand out for me, which were sort of personal milestones, as well. Both are on Hyperion: One was the very first Schumann disc I recorded with Graham Johnson in his Schumann series, which includes Dichterliebe. I’m still very proud of that disc. I felt that I found my stride in the song repertoire there. It was the first disc that I was proud of in its entirety. The second was the Debussy disc with Malcolm [Martineau]. It’s a chronological disc of Debussy songs, and it was a sort of vocal milestone for me because I was singing the Baudelaire settings, which are extremely high and really associated now with sopranos, but should really be baryton-martin repertoire — sort of Pelleas repertoire. [Baryton-martin, named for an early French opera singer, is a tessitura that lies between tenor and baritone.] With the help of my singing teacher, I discovered that I could sing them, and it proved to me that I could sing that kind of high French repertoire. I felt a huge sense of satisfaction from that, and it’s one of the few discs that I go back to just to show myself that I can do things.

You actually started your career as a bass. How did you make the transition to baritone repertoire?

My singing teacher considered me a bass when I first started singing with him. I was 16, 17 years old, and I started out singing bass repertoire at 18, 19, when I was still at university. By the time I got to music college, after my degree, my voice was already moving up. I think I’ve been very lucky that through my various teachers I’ve been able to discover the top of my voice. I added an extension to the voice I already had, so I’ve managed to maintain a lot of the bass range whilst adding things like Pelleas and the Rossini Barbiere [di Siviglia] to my repertoire. I’m working on a recording of Poulenc songs at the moment, which, again, is baryton-martin stuff — quite high and floaty, with high Gs and G-sharps. I’ve worked very hard to add that facility to my voice.

How did the 1997 Cardiff win change your life?

That was one of those real turning points. Things were already going reasonably well at that point: I left the Royal Academy of Music in 1995, and I walked straight into work of one sort or another. I was relatively lucky to be in that position. But still, people come up to me now and say, “I heard you in the Cardiff Singer of the World.” That shows what a powerful platform it was for me, both as a showcase for the industry and a showcase for me to get a fan base: people who knew my name and therefore wanted me to come to sing for their musical societies and various recitals and things. It was a huge shot in the arm for me. I think that’s something I underestimated at the time. It was also a wonderful experience personally, because it made me discover my A-game. It really made me focus.

Here in San Francisco, of course, we’ve heard you in the Opera House singing Papageno, but not again. When will you return to the opera, and which role would you most like to sing here?

Sadly, I’ve had no return invitation from San Francisco.

That’s just a shame.

[Laughs] It is for me, because San Francisco is a place I really love. It’s a great opera house, a great company, and a great city culturally. I rather miss being involved in its cultural life. But, should I come back at some point, my repertoire is broadening out into the Italian repertoire and also some of the German repertoire. So if I could choose, it would be for the role that is closest to my heart at the moment — Don Giovanni — or perhaps as the Marquis de Posa in Don Carlo, which is a role I’m debuting next season.

You’re also singing the Count [in Le nozze di Figaro] in Paris this spring. What else are you looking forward to in the fall?

I have my debut at Vienna State Opera, which I’m looking forward to tremendously. It’s a new production of Janáček’s House of the Dead. That should be fantastic. I’m also doing [conductor Daniel] Barenboim’s very first Rossini. I can’t believe he’s never conducted Rossini, but he’s conducting Barbiere in Berlin, and I am his Barber. I’m singing a Don Giovanni with him in Berlin, as well, and that will be the first two times I’ve worked with Barenboim. Those are two roles that are great favorites of mine. And I’ll be singing my first Verdi with Yannick Nézet-Séguin. So that’s very exciting.

Aside from opera, recitals are my most consistent musical pleasure and my real passion. I think that’s where I find myself, and where I find the artistic truth of myself as a singer. I welcome any opportunity to sing in recital, especially in cities that I love and feel an affinity for. And San Francisco really is one of those towns.