One other factor: fashion. Opera goes through phases of expecting a certain sound (timbre) of voice in certain roles. For example, the role of Danilo in Lehar's MERRY WIDOW and Eisenstein in Strauss's DIE FLEDERMAUS are two roles that began life as tenor roles, but have through the years been taken on increasingly by baritones, then gone back to tenors, then to baritones, etc. These are the so-called "baritenor" roles that sit, tessiturawise, on a kind of fence while having ranges that aren't terribly demanding (no altitudinous high notes), so that both types of voices can sing them successfully. The Drum Major in WOZZECK is another role that has been sung successfully by baritones, despite being scored for tenor (Bartione Nelson Eddy was the first person to sing the role at the Met, for example).
Sometimes a particular singer can make such a mark singing an "out of fach" role that he/she redefines that role - or at least expands its possible performers - forever. Case in point: Don Giovanni - a baritone role sung so amazingly well by basso cantante Ezio Pinza that no one bats an eye these days when bassos undertake the role - it has been sung successfully, for example, in recent years by Terfel and Ramey.
Then there are roles like Carmen, which was conceived in a higher register, for soprano, rewritten by the composer for the singer-at-hand, a mezzo, but fashion dictated, for decades after Bizet's death, that Carmen would be sung primarily (though not exclusively) by sopranos - until the '30s, in fact, when mezzos like Rise Stevens "retook" the role, so that by the post-war years, Carmen was/is considered a mezzo-soprano role.
Mezzos at both ends of the spectrum are, in fact, increasingly "taking over" roles that were never intended (by the composer) for them. Santuzza in CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA is one example: this is a role that is sung much more often these days by mezzos than by sopranos; Kundry in PARSIFAL is another example; others: Adalgisa in NORMA, Giulietta in TALES OF HOFFMANN, Giovanna Seymour in ANNA BOLENA.
Early in the 20th Century, Mozart's Cherubino was as likely to be sung by sopranos as by mezzos. Nowadays, not only is Cherubino considered a mezzo role, but increasingly Zerlina is being sung by mezzos (and quite successfully).
I always find it fun to go through old opera guides, e.g., the old Victor Book of the Opera, from around the turn of the 20th century, to get an idea of what type of voices the audiences of that time expected in different roles. According to my 1911 edition of the Victor Book, for example, Aennchen in FRESCHUETZ is a mezzo-soprano role, as is Sophie in WERTHER - while Charlotte is a soprano. Part of the confusion may have stemmed, I have heard, from the fact that "mezzo-soprano" had a different meaning in the 19th Century than it does today, and was meant to designate some kind of young, "not quite ready for prime time" soprano who would eventually blossom into a soprano, but in the meantime whiled her time away singing what today are considered soubrette soprano roles. I'm not sure I "buy" this. I tend to think it more likely that the big dramatic roles like Charlotte did belong to the sopranos then - out of popular taste - so that the smaller, less demanding roles with limited ranges were given to slightly lower-voiced singers to provide vocal contrast. I've always found it interesting that Tchaikovsky gave his soubrette role, in ONEGIN, to a contralto - but this may not be the unusual "freak" it seems; it may well be that in Tchaikovsky's day, the soubrette was expected to have the lower voice, compared with the more dramatic (theatrically, if not vocally) soprano heroine.
Karen Mercedes http://www.radix.net/~dalila/index.html *************************************** Verdi and Wagner delighted the crowds With their highly original sound. The pianos they played are still working, But they're both six feet underground. - Michael Palin
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