Dame Gwyneth JonesDBE (born 7 November 1936) is a Welsh dramatic soprano, widely regarded as one of the greatest Wagnerian sopranos in the second half of the 20th century.
After making her professional debut in 1962 as a mezzo-soprano in Gluck's opera Orfeo ed Euridice, she was engaged by the Zurich Opera House. She discovered that her easy top range could enable her to sing soprano roles and she switched to the soprano repertoire from around 1964, her first major soprano role being Amelia in Verdi's Un ballo in maschera.[1]
From these, she gradually proceeded to heavier roles such as Chrysothemis (in Elektra), Salome, the Marschallin (in Der Rosenkavalier), Eva (in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg), Senta (in Der fliegende Holländer), Kundry (in Parsifal), both Venus and Elisabeth (in Tannhäuser), Helena (in Strauss's Die ägyptische Helena), Ariadne (in Ariadne auf Naxos) and Sieglinde, as well as Brünnhilde (in Die Walküre). She has appeared frequently at the Vienna State Opera, the Zurich Opera, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, the Bayerische Staatsoper, the San Francisco Opera, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Paris Opéra, the Teatro alla Scala, the Los Angeles Opera, the Metropolitan Opera, the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the Grand Théâtre de Genève, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, as well as many prominent opera and music festivals.
She made her debut at Teatro alla Scala as Leonora in Il Trovatore on 4 April 1967. She returned to La Scala as the title role of Salome in January 1974. On 24 November 1972, she made her debut at the Metropolitan Opera House of New York as Sieglinde in Die Walküre. Until her last appearance at the Met on 22 April 1995 (as Kundry in Parsifal), she sang 11 parts in 10 operas for 93 times at the Met; the most frequent part was the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier (20 times). In August 1979, she made her debut at Salzburg Summer Festival as the Marschallin.
Jones's large-scaled, powerful dramatic soprano voice, unusually robust vocal stamina, stage presence and acting abilities were widely admired.
One of her most noted achievements was her interpretation of Brünnhilde in the BayreuthJahrhundertring (Centenary Ring) in 1976, celebrating the centenary of both the festival and the first performance of the complete cycle, conducted by Pierre Boulez and staged by Patrice Chéreau. It was recorded and filmed in 1979 and 1980 for both video and audio discs. The recording won a Grammy in 1983.
Jones made roles that exemplify the Wagnerian or heavy dramatic soprano fach, such as Brünnhilde, Isolde, Elektra, the Dyer's Wife and Turandot, part of her core repertoire, and performed them throughout the 1980s and 1990s. She once famously undertook the roles of both Elisabeth and Venus in Götz Friedrich's production of Tannhäuser at the Bayreuth Festival in the 1970s, and has also been credited with the rare achievement of having performed all three major female roles in Elektra on stage.
She also performed in concerts and lieder recitals, television and radio broadcasts and participated in several film projects, including the epic television series, Wagner, in which she played the first Isolde, Malvina Schnorr von Carolsfeld. She has also devised for herself a couple of music-theatrical shows – Oh Malvina![5] and Die Frau im Schatten – which are inspired by real historical characters, namely, Malvina Schnorr von Carolsfeld and Pauline de Ahna (wife of Richard Strauss). The soprano part in the Symphony No. 9, titled "Vision of Eternity", of Welsh composer Alun Hoddinott was written for, and premiered by, her.
In 2003, Jones made her debut as director and costume designer in a stage production of Der fliegende Holländer in Weimar, Germany. She has also given master-classes for young singers at notable venues and colleges of music, and acted as an adjudicator in international vocal competitions, including the 2009 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition, the 2017 season of the reality operatic singing competition on the Russia-Kultura TV Channel, "The Big Opera" (the whole series of competition now being available for viewing on YouTube), and, more recently, the International Vocal Competition 's-Hertogenbosch 2024.
In June 2007, she created the role of the Queen of Hearts in the world premiere of Unsuk Chin's new opera, Alice in Wonderland, at the Bavarian State Opera. In February 2008 she returned to the Mezzo-soprano repertoire singing the role of Herodias in Stephen Langridge's production of Richard Strauss' Salome at Malmö Opera in Sweden. She repeated this role in August 2010, alongside the Salome of Deborah Voigt, in a concert performance at the Verbier Festival in Verbier, Switzerland, and performed the part on stage at the Vienna State Opera in May 2012. She took part in a piece of musical theatre about the women of the Wagner clan and their influences on the Bayreuth Festival entitled Wagnerin. Ein Haus der Kunstmusik, directed by Sven Holm at the 2012 Munich Opera Festival, playing Cosima Wagner.
In March 2016, she made her debut as the Countess in Tchaikovsky's The Queen of Spades in a new production of the opera at the Staatstheater Braunschweig, Germany. In April 2017, she took on the speaking part of the Narrator in Richard Strauss' Enoch Arden in a concert in Landsberg.
Jones makes a guest appearance in Quartet, a film by Dustin Hoffman, based on the comedy by Ronald Harwood about several retired opera singers planning to put on a concert to celebrate Verdi's birthday. She takes on the role of Anne Langley, a former operatic rival to Jean Horton, played by Dame Maggie Smith. The film was premiered to largely favourable reviews on 9 September at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival, and Jones's performance was critically acclaimed.
Gwyneth Jones: Scenes from Verdi: Arias from Aïda, Don Carlo, Macbeth, Otello. Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden/Edward Downes. Decca 1969.
Gwyneth Jones sings Strauss Lieder: Includes Zueignung, Die Nacht, Allerseelen, Cäcilie, etc. Geoffrey Parsons, pno. Capriccio 1989.
Gwyneth Jones sings Strauss: Vier letzte Lieder, etc. Tokyo Symphony Orchestra/Roberto Paternostro. KOCH Schwann 1991.
Gwyneth Jones sings Wagner: Scenes from Tannhäuser, Lohengrin, Tristan und Isolde, Götterdämmerung. Kölner Rundfunk-Sinfonie-Orchester/Roberto Paternostro. Chandos 1991.
Beethoven, Symphony No. 9: Wiener Philharmoniker/Karl Böhm. Deutsche Grammophon
Beethoven, Symphony No. 9: Konzertvereinigung Wiener Staatsoper, Wiener Philharmoniker/Leonard Bernstein. Deutsche Grammophon
Mahler, Symphony No. 8: London Symphony Orchestra/Leonard Bernstein. Sony Classical
Sibelius, Tone Poems and Songs: London Symphony Orchestra, Scottish National Orchestra, Wiener Philharmoniker, BBC Symphony Orchestra/Antal Doráti, Alexander Gibson, Sir Malcolm Sargent. EMI (this included the world premiere recording of Sibelius's Luonnotar, sung by Jones)[6]
Mendelssohn, Elijah: New Philharmonia Orchestra/Frühbeck de Burgos. EMI
Operafest – A Gala Concert at the Zurich Opera House: Zurich Opera House/Ferdinand Leitner, Ralf Weikert, Andre Presser. Video Artists International (DVD)
Gwyneth Jones in Concert (live concert 23.8.88) VAI DVD. VAI
10,000 Voices: The World Choir and others/Owain Arwel Hughes. EMI
Le Donne di Puccini: Münchner Rundfunkorchester/Garcia Navarro. Nightingale
L'Art du Chant: Les Sopranes: DVD. Le Coulisses de L'Opera
Wagner, Götterdämmerung (Act 3): Orchestra of the Royal Opera House/Georg Solti. Testament
Complete opera recordings (commercially released):
Liese, Kirsten, Wagnerian Heroines. A Century Of Great Isoldes and Brünnhildes, English translation: Charles Scribner, Edition Karo, Berlin, 2013. OCLC844683799
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