E strano, e strano...Sempre Libera - Joan Sutherland, Texas 1987

From a concert with Luciano Pavarotti in Texas on April 25th, 1987.
Reordered from the audience, here is the Sutherland voice that continued to wow audiences her entire career!
Richard Bonynge conducts.

[@MiguelArcangel-zi7xd]

Brava brava brava!!! La Stupenda!!!!

[@cadoh8143]

Thank you so much!!!! Sutherland for me is the greatest singer in Bel canto repertory. All she did is always marvellous.

[@ahogbin2644]

Thanks so much for sharing. Even at this late stage of her career she was still astonishing. Any more?

[@lastupendajoansutherland]

Yes 🙂

[@joshuamcpherson007]

Astonishing....Thank you so much. I read about this concert, but I have never heard anything from it. This truly is a treasure...hearing something "new" from Dame Joan, so many years after she has passed. 💕💞

[@highbaritone]

Is this the outdoor concert she did. Amazing. Look forward to more. Thank you.

[@wotan10950]

It’s a great rendition, for sure. I saw her in 1986-87 in Puritani and Trovatore; brilliant, but she was no longer singing Eb’s. And she doesn’t here either. It’s transposed down a full tone, but I don’t think anyone noticed or cared.

[@joshuamcpherson007]

It was transposed a half tone, ending on the D natural. But I agree, most didn't notice or care.

[@ahogbin2644]

I think by the later 1980s she avoided them as she said they gave her a headache! She still ended the Mad Scene in London in 1985 with one and it was spectacular. BTW, she touched a top E in Esclarmonde in 1983!

[@joshuamcpherson007]

@@ahogbin2644 Yes, she still had the Eb into her early 60's, but satisfied herself with the D natural or Db mostly. She did touch the E natural in Esclarmonde...in fact, she touched the F in another recording on UA-cam...same place in the score in Esclarmonde.

[@nicco1032]

I believe she made his last high E-flat on stage in Sydney's 1986 Lucia di Lammermoor in "Spargi d'amaro pianto".

[@joshuamcpherson007]

@@nicco1032 That is probably true. There may have been one or two after that, but if they weren't recorded, how would we know? She gave a concert series in Jan/Feb of 1987, which included Lucia's Mad Scene. She gave a concert in Glasgow an Edinburgh later in that same year which also included Lucia's Mad Scene. I don't know if she concluded those with an Eb?