Walter Widdop
Encyclopedia
Walter Widdop was a British opera
tic tenor who is best remembered for his Wagner
ian performances. His repertoire also encompassed works by Verdi
, Leoncavallo
, Handel
and Bach
.
, near Halifax
, Yorkshire
, England. As a teenager, he worked in a woollen mill and sang in a church choir. He also won a number of singing prizes in his native county, earning praise for his "God-given" voice, which was honed by a local teacher, Arthur Hinchcliffe. He served with the British Army during World War One and married in 1917.
In 1923, Widdop made the first of many broadcasts for the BBC
. In the same year, he made his professional operatic debut as Radames in Verdi
's Aida
with the British National Opera Company
, in Leeds
. He made his London debut the following year, in the title role in Wagner
's Siegfried
at the Royal Opera House
, Covent Garden
. His other Wagnerian roles there were Siegmund (1932) and Tristan (1933, 1937, and 1938). He sang in the first HMV
78-rpm album of highlights from Die Walküre, with the bass-baritone
Friedrich Schorr
also in the cast, under the baton of Albert Coates
. Among his frequent stage partners in Wagnerian opera was the Australian dramatic soprano Florence Austral
, with whom he also recorded. Most of his recordings are available on CD reissues.
Widdop remained in demand at Covent Garden and elsewhere for his performances of taxing Heldentenor roles and the heavier Italian operatic parts. His operatic roles were not confined to the heavyweight parts. In 1928 he sang with Frida Leider
in Gluck
's Armide
and with Stiles Allen
in Handel
's Rodelinda
. He toured Australia and in 1936 he sang the title role in the British premiere of Stravinsky
's Oedipus rex
.
Widdop also appeared in oratorio
and other choral music. In 1928 he sang in Handel's Solomon
at a Royal Philharmonic Society
performance conducted by Sir Thomas Beecham
; in the same year he sang in the Verdi Requiem
at the Three Choirs Festival
, and in 1932 he sang in Elgar
's The Kingdom
, under Adrian Boult
. Among his recordings of extracts from oratorio are examples of the declamatory 'set-pieces' such as "Sound an Alarm" (from Judas Maccabaeus) and "Love sounds the alarm" and "Love in her eyes sits playing" (Acis and Galatea). He also recorded gentler numbers such as "Waft her, angels" (Jephtha). Many of his recordings have been transferred to compact disc. John Steane
in Grove
writes, "He brought an able technique as well as an ample voice to such music as 'Sound an alarm.' ... Records made around 1930 show a firm resonant voice and a virile style, confirming his place among the best heroic tenors of the century."
In 1938, Widdop was one of the four tenor soloists chosen to perform Ralph Vaughan Williams
's Serenade to Music
, which had been written to celebrate Sir Henry Wood's silver jubilee as a conductor. In the solo lines written for them, Heddle Nash
and Frank Titterton
, with their lighter tenor voices, preceded Widdop (his solo line was "Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins"), with the plaintive tones of Parry Jones
concluding the section.
Widdop sang in Spain, the Netherlands and Germany. He toured Australia in 1935, but never appeared in the United States. During World War Two, he toured South Africa, Canada and the Middle East for ENSA
. He resumed his stage and concert career after the war and in 1949 performed the title role in Wagner's Parsifal
, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult, at the Royal Albert Hall
in London. He sang less in his later years, but he appeared at The Proms
at the Albert Hall on 5 September 1949, performing "Lohengrin
's Farewell". The next day, he died suddenly in Hampstead
.
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
tic tenor who is best remembered for his Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
ian performances. His repertoire also encompassed works by Verdi
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
, Leoncavallo
Ruggero Leoncavallo
Ruggero Leoncavallo was an Italian opera composer. His two-act work Pagliacci remains one of the most popular works in the repertory, appearing as number 20 on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide.-Biography:...
, Handel
George Frideric Handel
George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
and Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
.
Career
Widdop was born at NorlandNorland, West Yorkshire
Norland is a scattered village to the south of Sowerby Bridge in the metropolitan borough of Calderdale in West Yorkshire, England.-History:...
, near Halifax
Halifax, West Yorkshire
Halifax is a minster town, within the Metropolitan Borough of Calderdale in West Yorkshire, England. It has an urban area population of 82,056 in the 2001 Census. It is well-known as a centre of England's woollen manufacture from the 15th century onward, originally dealing through the Halifax Piece...
, Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
, England. As a teenager, he worked in a woollen mill and sang in a church choir. He also won a number of singing prizes in his native county, earning praise for his "God-given" voice, which was honed by a local teacher, Arthur Hinchcliffe. He served with the British Army during World War One and married in 1917.
In 1923, Widdop made the first of many broadcasts for the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
. In the same year, he made his professional operatic debut as Radames in Verdi
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
's Aida
Aida
Aida sometimes spelled Aïda, is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette...
with the British National Opera Company
British National Opera Company
The British National Opera Company presented opera in English in London and on tour in the British provinces between 1922 and 1929. It was founded in December 1921 by singers and instrumentalists from Sir Thomas Beecham's Beecham Opera Company , which was disbanded when financial problems over...
, in Leeds
Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
. He made his London debut the following year, in the title role in Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
's Siegfried
Siegfried (opera)
Siegfried is the third of the four operas that constitute Der Ring des Nibelungen , by Richard Wagner. It received its premiere at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus on 16 August 1876, as part of the first complete performance of The Ring...
at the Royal Opera House
Royal Opera House
The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply "Covent Garden", after a previous use of the site of the opera house's original construction in 1732. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The...
, Covent Garden
Covent Garden
Covent Garden is a district in London on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St. Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit and vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist site, and the Royal Opera House, which is also known as...
. His other Wagnerian roles there were Siegmund (1932) and Tristan (1933, 1937, and 1938). He sang in the first HMV
HMV
His Master's Voice is a trademark in the music business, and for many years was the name of a large record label. The name was coined in 1899 as the title of a painting of the dog Nipper listening to a wind-up gramophone...
78-rpm album of highlights from Die Walküre, with the bass-baritone
Bass-baritone
A bass-baritone is a high-lying bass or low-lying "classical" baritone voice type which shares certain qualities with the true baritone voice. The term arose in the late 19th century to describe the particular type of voice required to sing three Wagnerian roles: the Dutchman in Der fliegende...
Friedrich Schorr
Friedrich Schorr
Friedrich Schorr , was a renowned Austrian-Hungarian bass-baritone opera singer of Jewish origin. He later became a naturalized American....
also in the cast, under the baton of Albert Coates
Albert Coates
Albert Coates may refer to:*Albert Coates , Anglo-Russian conductor and composer*Albert Coates , Australian surgeon and soldier...
. Among his frequent stage partners in Wagnerian opera was the Australian dramatic soprano Florence Austral
Florence Austral
Florence Austral was an Australian operatic soprano renowned for her interpretation of the most demanding Wagnerian female roles, although she never gained the opportunity to appear at the Bayreuth Festival or the New York Metropolitan Opera.She was born Florence Mary Wilson, but adopted the...
, with whom he also recorded. Most of his recordings are available on CD reissues.
Widdop remained in demand at Covent Garden and elsewhere for his performances of taxing Heldentenor roles and the heavier Italian operatic parts. His operatic roles were not confined to the heavyweight parts. In 1928 he sang with Frida Leider
Frida Leider
Frida Leider was a German opera singer.Leider was one of the most important dramatic sopranos of the 20th century. Her most famous roles were Wagner's Isolde and Brünnhilde, Beethoven's Fidelio, Mozart's Donna Anna, and Verdi's Aida and Leonora...
in Gluck
Christoph Willibald Gluck
Christoph Willibald Ritter von Gluck was an opera composer of the early classical period. After many years at the Habsburg court at Vienna, Gluck brought about the practical reform of opera's dramaturgical practices that many intellectuals had been campaigning for over the years...
's Armide
Armide
Armide is the French and English form of the name Armida, a witch in Torquato Tasso's epic poem "Jerusalem Delivered" . The sequence of the poem recounting her love affair with the Christian knight Renaud inspired many operas, which are listed under the names of their respective composers in the...
and with Stiles Allen
Lilian Stiles-Allen
Lilian Stiles-Allen was a British soprano of the mid 20th century.She was born Lilian Elizabeth Allen, and later added her mother's maiden name....
in Handel
George Frideric Handel
George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
's Rodelinda
Rodelinda
Rodelinda, regina de' Longobardi is an opera seria in three acts written for the Royal Academy of Music by George Frideric Handel. It was based on a libretto by Nicola Francesco Haym, in turn based on an earlier libretto by Antonio Salvi set by Giacomo Antonio Perti in 1710...
. He toured Australia and in 1936 he sang the title role in the British premiere of Stravinsky
Igor Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ; 6 April 1971) was a Russian, later naturalized French, and then naturalized American composer, pianist, and conductor....
's Oedipus rex
Oedipus rex (opera)
Oedipus rex is an "Opera-oratorio after Sophocles" by Igor Stravinsky, scored for orchestra, speaker, soloists, and male chorus. The libretto, based on Sophocles's tragedy, was written by Jean Cocteau in French and then translated by Abbé Jean Daniélou into Latin...
.
Widdop also appeared in oratorio
Oratorio
An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...
and other choral music. In 1928 he sang in Handel's Solomon
Solomon (Handel)
Solomon, HWV 67, is an oratorio by George Frideric Handel. Its libretto is based on the biblical stories of wise king Solomon and is attributed to Newburgh Hamilton...
at a Royal Philharmonic Society
Royal Philharmonic Society
The Royal Philharmonic Society is a British music society, formed in 1813. It was originally formed in London to promote performances of instrumental music there. Many distinguished composers and performers have taken part in its concerts...
performance conducted by Sir Thomas Beecham
Thomas Beecham
Sir Thomas Beecham, 2nd Baronet CH was an English conductor and impresario best known for his association with the London Philharmonic and the Royal Philharmonic orchestras. He was also closely associated with the Liverpool Philharmonic and Hallé orchestras...
; in the same year he sang in the Verdi Requiem
Requiem (Verdi)
The Messa da Requiem by Giuseppe Verdi is a musical setting of the Roman Catholic funeral mass for four soloists, double choir and orchestra. It was composed in memory of Alessandro Manzoni, an Italian poet and novelist much admired by Verdi. The first performance in San Marco in Milan on 22 May...
at the Three Choirs Festival
Three Choirs Festival
The Three Choirs Festival is a music festival held each August alternately at the cathedrals of the Three Counties and originally featuring their three choirs, which remain central to the week-long programme...
, and in 1932 he sang in Elgar
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet OM, GCVO was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the Enigma Variations, the Pomp and Circumstance Marches, concertos...
's The Kingdom
The Kingdom (Elgar)
The Kingdom, Op. 51, is an oratorio for soloists, chorus and orchestra composed by Edward Elgar.It was first performed at the Birmingham Music Festival on 3 October 1906, with the orchestra conducted by the composer, and soloists Agnes Nicholls, Muriel Foster, John Coates and William Higley. The...
, under Adrian Boult
Adrian Boult
Sir Adrian Cedric Boult CH was an English conductor. Brought up in a prosperous mercantile family he followed musical studies in England and at Leipzig, Germany, with early conducting work in London for the Royal Opera House and Sergei Diaghilev's ballet company. His first prominent post was...
. Among his recordings of extracts from oratorio are examples of the declamatory 'set-pieces' such as "Sound an Alarm" (from Judas Maccabaeus) and "Love sounds the alarm" and "Love in her eyes sits playing" (Acis and Galatea). He also recorded gentler numbers such as "Waft her, angels" (Jephtha). Many of his recordings have been transferred to compact disc. John Steane
J.B. Steane
John Barry Steane was an English music critic, musicologist, literary scholar and teacher, with a particular interest in singing and the human voice...
in Grove
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, it is the largest single reference work on Western music. The dictionary has gone through several editions since the 19th century...
writes, "He brought an able technique as well as an ample voice to such music as 'Sound an alarm.' ... Records made around 1930 show a firm resonant voice and a virile style, confirming his place among the best heroic tenors of the century."
In 1938, Widdop was one of the four tenor soloists chosen to perform Ralph Vaughan Williams
Ralph Vaughan Williams
Ralph Vaughan Williams OM was an English composer of symphonies, chamber music, opera, choral music, and film scores. He was also a collector of English folk music and song: this activity both influenced his editorial approach to the English Hymnal, beginning in 1904, in which he included many...
's Serenade to Music
Serenade to Music
Serenade to Music is a work by Ralph Vaughan Williams for 16 vocal soloists and orchestra, composed in 1938. The text is an adaptation of the discussion about music and the music of the spheres in Act V, Scene 1 of The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare. Vaughan Williams later arranged...
, which had been written to celebrate Sir Henry Wood's silver jubilee as a conductor. In the solo lines written for them, Heddle Nash
Heddle Nash
William Heddle Nash was an English lyric tenor who appeared in opera and oratorio in the middle decades of the twentieth century. He also made numerous recordings that are still available on CD reissues....
and Frank Titterton
Frank Titterton
Frank Titterton was a well known British lyric tenor of the mid twentieth century. He was noted for his musicianship.Titterton's career was mainly in the concert hall...
, with their lighter tenor voices, preceded Widdop (his solo line was "Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins"), with the plaintive tones of Parry Jones
Gwynn Parry Jones
Parry Jones , known early in his career as Gwynn Jones, was a Welsh tenor of the mid-twentieth century.-Life and career:...
concluding the section.
Widdop sang in Spain, the Netherlands and Germany. He toured Australia in 1935, but never appeared in the United States. During World War Two, he toured South Africa, Canada and the Middle East for ENSA
ENSA
ENSA may refer to:* ENSA, the Entertainments National Service Association* ENSA * École Nationale des Sciences Appliquées d'Oujda, an engineering school in Morocco* EC-Council Network Security Administrator...
. He resumed his stage and concert career after the war and in 1949 performed the title role in Wagner's Parsifal
Parsifal
Parsifal is an opera in three acts by Richard Wagner. It is loosely based on Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, the 13th century epic poem of the Arthurian knight Parzival and his quest for the Holy Grail, and on Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval, the Story of the Grail.Wagner first conceived the work...
, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult, at the Royal Albert Hall
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....
in London. He sang less in his later years, but he appeared at The Proms
The Proms
The Proms, more formally known as The BBC Proms, or The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts presented by the BBC, is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts and other events held annually, predominantly in the Royal Albert Hall in London...
at the Albert Hall on 5 September 1949, performing "Lohengrin
Lohengrin (opera)
Lohengrin is a romantic opera in three acts composed and written by Richard Wagner, first performed in 1850. The story of the eponymous character is taken from medieval German romance, notably the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach and its sequel, Lohengrin, written by a different author, itself...
's Farewell". The next day, he died suddenly in Hampstead
Hampstead
Hampstead is an area of London, England, north-west of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Camden in Inner London, it is known for its intellectual, liberal, artistic, musical and literary associations and for Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland...
.