Victoria de los Angeles

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive.

Speaker 20:05

For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen seventy eight and the presenter was Roy Plumley.

Speaker 10:14

Radio Four

Speaker 10:16

And now it's twenty past twelve.

Speaker 10:18

Desert Island Discs

Speaker 10:38

And as usual the castaway is introduced by Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:42

This week, our castaway is the celebrated soprano Victoria Los Angeles.

Presenter0:48

Now that's not your real name, that's your stage name, isn't it? Victoria of the Angels, which is very beautiful.

Victoria de los Angeles0:54

No, it's not it's not my stage name, it is my real name.

Presenter0:57

It's your real name,

Victoria de los Angeles0:58

I really, oh yes. My mother uh was Victoria. My godfather, that was my uncle.

Victoria de los Angeles1:05

uh was unchild and they had a little fight.

Victoria de los Angeles1:09

because they wanted each of them that I was called one Victoria or Los Angeles. And finally my father, the Andalusian, you know, they have great imagination and he knew that in Spain you can find many young girls with the name of Maria de Los Angeles. So he went to the church and asked to the priest if it was possible instead of Maria de Los Angeles somebody to be called Victoria de los Angeles, a combination of my mother and my uncle. So the priest say, well, yes, it's all right.

Speaker 11:41

Himself

Victoria de los Angeles1:44

It is for that that I have this name. Thanks God I I think my father had a great a great idea because for for stage I I think it is a a very good name.

Presenter1:55

How did you set about choosing just eight records? Are you looking into the past? Are they great performances, great pieces of music? How did you set about choosing your term?

Victoria de los Angeles2:06

Well, I I I choose this program. It's very difficult because it's there are so many great performances of everything and so great music that really it is very difficult to choose. Some of these records are associated of or something.

Victoria de los Angeles2:22

Others not, all others are because I like it. Uh what's the first one?

Presenter2:26

What's the first one? What are we going to hear first?

Victoria de los Angeles2:28

Well, the first one is Image, D V C Image, uh played by Benedetti Michelangelo.

Presenter3:32

One of the Debussy Image Reflections on the Water played by Otturo Benedetti Michelangeli.

Presenter3:40

Whereabouts in Spain were you born?

Victoria de los Angeles3:42

Ah, I was born in Barcelona.

Presenter3:44

where your father worked at the university.

Victoria de los Angeles3:45

Oh no, well

Victoria de los Angeles3:47

Oh yes, my father was a caretaker in university.

Victoria de los Angeles3:51

And I was born there. He was Andalusian and my mother was Castilian.

Presenter3:56

Yes. Did you have a lot of brothers and sisters?

Victoria de los Angeles3:59

I have a sister older than me and uh I have a brother that is younger. I am in in the middle and I don't say my age like that.

Presenter4:05

In the middle of the

Presenter4:08

Looking looking back, do you look back on your childhood as as a happy time?

Victoria de los Angeles4:09

Uh

Victoria de los Angeles4:12

Oh yes, oh yes.

Presenter4:14

Were your parents musical?

Victoria de los Angeles4:16

Yes. My mother sang very, very well. The the boys was

Presenter4:16

Uh

Victoria de los Angeles4:21

very similar to mine, more lyrical, and she used to sing morning till night, always, and I learned a lot of songs from her.

Victoria de los Angeles4:31

My uncle was a musician

Victoria de los Angeles4:34

He played vahia, guitar, the accordion, mandolin. He played even percussion.

Presenter4:40

Wonderful.

Victoria de los Angeles4:41

So I I leave it always in the in the middle of the music.

Presenter4:45

Whose idea was it that you should take lessons? Was that your idea or your mother's?

Victoria de los Angeles4:50

Since my childhood, of course, I have sang in the school and for my friends, and everybody was saying, Oh, this little child.

Victoria de los Angeles4:58

Beautiful voice, beautiful voice, but nobody thought it.

Victoria de los Angeles5:02

uh to make an artist of me. Uh

Victoria de los Angeles5:06

One day my sister

Victoria de los Angeles5:07

when I was fifteen year old.

Victoria de los Angeles5:10

She said to me, Why we don't go?

Victoria de los Angeles5:13

without saying to nobody.

Victoria de los Angeles5:16

Why we don't go to the conservatory to try the voice, what he's going to say about it. And because he had a great faith

Victoria de los Angeles5:24

And the teacher said to me

Victoria de los Angeles5:27

Will you have a surprise?

Victoria de los Angeles5:29

Yeah, she said a lot of

Victoria de los Angeles5:31

wonderful things and she said, You must study Of course So I went quickly to my home and I said, Father, I I think I'm going to to study singing.

Victoria de los Angeles5:42

At the same time that I do high school as you want.

Speaker 25:44

Uh

Presenter5:45

Yes.

Victoria de los Angeles5:45

You see, I never had the idea of study singing because I wanted to be a singer. There was nothing to do with that. It's only because I I like to sing. The only the the thing that happened is the the circumstance that in my home was not enough money.

Victoria de los Angeles6:04

And I begin to have great success and conservatory in my studies.

Victoria de los Angeles6:09

And I was popular in there.

Victoria de los Angeles6:12

I had a a big success in the radio, and I began to earn some money each month.

Victoria de los Angeles6:18

And I realize it.

Victoria de los Angeles6:20

That uh I was from the three children of my parents, the only one that could help them.

Victoria de los Angeles6:27

So I I begin with that. That was the idea. Uh and I never had the ambition to be to be single.

Presenter6:32

Bend it.

Presenter6:35

And you were singing on radio while you were still a student, while you were still a conservative.

Victoria de los Angeles6:37

I had seventy five percenters each month. That was the third part of the earnings of my father.

Presenter6:42

The door lost.

Presenter6:47

Let's have another record. What will your next one be?

Victoria de los Angeles6:48

Yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles6:49

Well it's distant.

Victoria de los Angeles6:52

Ah, I love Tristan, he's all that.

Victoria de los Angeles6:55

very much because uh

Victoria de los Angeles6:57

Ah, well, I cannot go to see the performances. I cried from the beginning till

Victoria de los Angeles7:02

till uh is finished.

Victoria de los Angeles7:04

because of the love of these two persons. And also I had the great chance to hear Flaksted when I was a student in Barcelona.

Victoria de los Angeles7:15

And uh the sound of this great singer stills in my heart, in my mind, in my ears, and uh so I choose this tan.

Victoria de los Angeles7:25

And I think it's a great performance.

Presenter7:27

Which part of the opera shall we hear?

Victoria de los Angeles7:29

Uh leave a story.

Presenter7:30

The End.

Victoria de los Angeles7:31

The end, yes.

Presenter8:33

Kirsten Flagstadt the Lieberstod from Tristan and Isolde.

Presenter8:38

Your first appearance in opera was in Orfeo, was it not, when you were still a student?

Victoria de los Angeles8:43

Soil is

Victoria de los Angeles8:44

No, well, no, no. I make my debut in nineteen forty four.

Victoria de los Angeles8:48

First in a recital,

Victoria de los Angeles8:50

and in the same year in the Countess of Maria Figueroa. Uh That was my

Victoria de los Angeles8:57

My debut.

Presenter8:58

You were seen at at a graduation concert by some very influential people.

Victoria de los Angeles9:02

Well, I was seen two years before I finished my studies in the conservatory by a group that uh was dedicated to ancient music of Spain.

Victoria de los Angeles9:11

as an amateur group.

Victoria de los Angeles9:13

and they used to work uh together

Victoria de los Angeles9:16

with uh Eugenio Mosen Anglies, who was a great musicologist, and they created this uh as music. So they went to hear singers during the examinations in the conservatory, and they heard me.

Victoria de los Angeles9:32

and they thought, well, it could be a great lost.

Victoria de los Angeles9:37

If now uh the parents, maybe because they don't have money

Victoria de los Angeles9:41

She sings, it's going to begin to sing Sarzuela or something like that. So they.

Presenter9:46

Uh

Speaker 29:46

Yeah.

Presenter9:46

Observe.

Victoria de los Angeles9:49

uh make a offer to say, look,

Victoria de los Angeles9:52

You are going to have more uh teachings and more professors for yourself and you are going to sing with us to learn ancient music of Spain. And they introduced me also why you don't sing Brahms and Schubert and all all these all the composers. Because in the conservatory I did only opera, it was only the thing I learned.

Presenter10:17

And they arranged a tour for you, did they not? A tour for you to sing your your Spanish songs.

Victoria de los Angeles10:23

In Spain there were a lot of uh musical societies.

Victoria de los Angeles10:27

They arranged that I had two, three times a year.

Victoria de los Angeles10:32

a tour of recitals.

Victoria de los Angeles10:35

But this was not considered as a professional thing. It was considered as the practice of my theoric uh learnings in the conservatory. So I went, I earned some money, it was not professional, this I had always in my mind, and I came back to my conservatory at Barcelona, I continued my studies, and so until nineteen fifty I began my professional career. Yes.

Presenter11:02

What was your first appearance outside Spain?

Victoria de los Angeles11:05

Outside Spain was a part of the contest in in Geneva in nineteen forty seven.

Victoria de los Angeles11:12

After that I came some months afterwards. I came here to London, to the BBC.

Victoria de los Angeles11:18

And I sang

Victoria de los Angeles11:20

Vida Vreve in English uh was very difficult, but

Presenter11:25

Uh

Victoria de los Angeles11:25

Uh

Presenter11:25

Yes, having sung it in Spanish so often.

Victoria de los Angeles11:28

But it was very difficult to put the same the same uh excitement or expression

Victoria de los Angeles11:35

in English for me was very difficult.

Presenter11:37

Well, they are a BBC artist, so let's break your next record. What shall we have next?

Victoria de los Angeles11:40

Ben

Victoria de los Angeles11:42

Next I choose Pablo Neruda, the poet.

Presenter11:47

Mm-hmm. Why?

Victoria de los Angeles11:47

Uh

Victoria de los Angeles11:49

Well, because he

Victoria de los Angeles11:51

He impressed me very much some years ago.

Victoria de los Angeles11:55

Um I read uh the twenty poems of love.

Victoria de los Angeles11:59

and the the song of despair of him

Victoria de los Angeles12:03

And I I find him the kind of a man that I would really like to have known.

Victoria de los Angeles12:11

because I thought uh his way of saying things was so sincere, so open, so so great, that I I fell I fell nearly in love with Neruda.

Presenter12:22

You've chosen a poem of his in English.

Victoria de los Angeles12:25

In English, yes.

Speaker 212:26

Yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles12:26

Let the rail splitter awake.

Victoria de los Angeles12:31

Let A become

Victoria de los Angeles12:33

Let his aged yeast

Victoria de los Angeles12:36

Raise the green and gold earth.

Victoria de los Angeles12:39

of Illinois.

Victoria de los Angeles12:41

Let them march singing and smiling.

Victoria de los Angeles12:45

The young white, the young negro.

Victoria de los Angeles12:49

Let them sing.

Victoria de los Angeles12:51

Laugh and conquer.

Presenter12:54

A poem by Pablo Noruda, Let the Rail Splitter Awake, read or recited by Paul Robeson. Mimi in La Boheme was the was the first role you sang at Goben Garden in London, is that?

Victoria de los Angeles13:07

Yes, yes, yes. With everybody singing in English.

Presenter13:10

I I remember this used to happen. You you sang Massenaise Manon in French when the rest of the cast were singing in English.

Victoria de los Angeles13:11

Yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles13:15

Yes.

Victoria de los Angeles13:16

Yes, it was very f very funny and difficult for me.

Presenter13:18

Very difficult, of course. You were getting all sorts of cues that didn't sound right.

Victoria de los Angeles13:22

Yeah

Presenter13:24

And some of the translations, I'm sure, didn't quite match with what was going on.

Victoria de los Angeles13:27

Maybe, but I didn't know nothing about it.

Presenter13:33

And you've been a regular visitor at the Metropolitan in New York.

Victoria de los Angeles13:36

Oh yes, yes. I think it's the theater where I have sung more. I have been nearly fourteen

Victoria de los Angeles13:44

seasons there singing. And I I I did in between a a lot of recitals. I worked a lot.

Presenter13:52

I'll be

Speaker 113:52

Uh

Victoria de los Angeles13:53

And they used to call me the healthy soprano of metropolitan.

Presenter13:58

Yes. Let's have another record.

Victoria de los Angeles14:00

Uh

Presenter14:01

What next?

Victoria de los Angeles14:02

The next one is um

Victoria de los Angeles14:05

Carmen sang by My Dea Dear Superville.

Presenter14:10

Conjita Supervien.

Victoria de los Angeles14:11

And chita soperville, yeah.

Presenter14:12

Did you ever see her? No, you you couldn't?

Victoria de los Angeles14:14

Never I I didn't have this uh luck because she died in nineteen thirty six.

Victoria de los Angeles14:20

And the name of Superville came

Victoria de los Angeles14:23

uh alive when I begin in the conservatory, my teacher says something about her. But when I heard more the name of Superbia, was in nineteen forty seven here in in London, where

Victoria de los Angeles14:38

Always I had in my the critics or conversations there came always the name of Superville.

Victoria de los Angeles15:08

Uh

Presenter15:08

Uh

Victoria de los Angeles15:08

Uh

Presenter15:08

And I'm sure.

Presenter15:34

Conchita subavia as Carmen.

Presenter15:38

Where is your home? Do you still live in Barcelona?

Victoria de los Angeles15:40

Yes, yes, yes, I have.

Presenter15:42

Yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles15:43

I humble there.

Presenter15:44

And you will have two children.

Victoria de los Angeles15:45

I have two children.

Victoria de los Angeles15:47

fourteen and ten year old.

Presenter15:49

Both boys.

Victoria de los Angeles15:50

Both fire

Presenter15:50

Are they musical?

Victoria de los Angeles15:53

Yes, in a way, my my older one has begin now with rock and roll and jazz and playing percussion.

Victoria de los Angeles16:02

Yeah, and sometimes

Victoria de los Angeles16:03

I hear that he puts uh

Victoria de los Angeles16:06

Some records of mine for their friends to hear my My Mother Sings, You See Malam Butterfly. So it is something.

Presenter16:14

How do you try to plan your travels? Do you like to to go away for a long time once a year, or do you like to go away for just a short time and go home again?

Victoria de los Angeles16:24

Well, I used to do long tours, uh five months, six months, seven months. But uh since my first boy I arrange shorter periods out of my home because I wanted to see the little woman and uh it was very difficult. Uh so I I I begin to arrange more recitals than operas. This was one of the reasons when I I put the opera more aside little by little.

Victoria de los Angeles16:51

because of the first child, after came the second one.

Victoria de los Angeles16:55

and happened the same thing. So I like to come back home, not to stay too long.

Presenter17:00

Another record. What's number five on your list?

Victoria de los Angeles17:03

Well, I think uh nobody can go to uh uh island.

Victoria de los Angeles17:08

without modert. And uh so I thought uh the concerto number three in G major uh for violin with my dear, dear friend Isaac Stern.

Speaker 117:22

Uh

Presenter18:20

The slow movement from the third Mozart violin concerto with Isaac Stern and members of the Cleveland Orchestra conducted by George Sell. I've been looking up the list of your recordings, Sectorian, and it's a very impressive list. Nearly fifty long players of songs and twenty-something operas. You've recorded with very many celebrated conductors. Is it true that your recording of La Boheme with with Beecham was done in about three days?

Victoria de los Angeles18:47

Yes.

Victoria de los Angeles18:48

Yes, at least my parts were in three days done.

Presenter18:52

You've said that you knew how to handle Beecham.

Victoria de los Angeles18:53

That you

Victoria de los Angeles18:56

But I I never try to handle bitchum. You see, I find that Sir Thomas Beachum.

Victoria de los Angeles19:02

A very kind person. I like it very much. He's you.

Presenter19:06

Some people didn't. Now you must have had some of the other things.

Victoria de los Angeles19:08

Well, he didn't have he didn't understand that just for the pleasure of a joke he said things. I mean, it was nothing against you. I laugh at him. I I think he was a great artist.

Presenter19:21

You worked a lot with Monteaux?

Victoria de los Angeles19:23

Yes, a lot.

Presenter19:25

You enjoyed working with him?

Victoria de los Angeles19:26

Very much, very much. It was a

Victoria de los Angeles19:29

I was a simple kind of a person.

Victoria de los Angeles19:33

And um you can talk with him. You and uh I I had uh a funny study in the in the Metropolitan Opera House when I did Peleas in Melezon.

Victoria de los Angeles19:43

It was a repertoire there and we were were making a rehearsal.

Victoria de los Angeles19:49

And uh the petitor said to me, I'm sorry, Victoria, but uh

Victoria de los Angeles19:54

You uh didn't pronounce very well that in French.

Victoria de los Angeles20:00

An

Speaker 120:00

Yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles20:01

Monte

Victoria de los Angeles20:03

laughing, saying he was not angry at all, because the repetitor said that to me. No, no, no, no. He said only But you don't know that uh Melisanthe nobody knows from where he came, nobody knows what

Victoria de los Angeles20:19

She can speak French or any other language in any way she wants or stop it.

Victoria de los Angeles20:27

And and the other one was

Presenter20:27

And and

Victoria de los Angeles20:29

We would just laugh.

Presenter20:31

We've got to number six. What's that?

Victoria de los Angeles20:33

Number six is Pelias.

Presenter20:37

I've been just talking about it.

Victoria de los Angeles20:38

Oh, well, Peliasi Melisante is uh one of my great loves because I love uh metalling. I love the poetry very much. I I love the words and uh

Victoria de los Angeles20:54

I choose this last part uh

Victoria de los Angeles20:58

That is a dueto with Peleas when he goes away.

Victoria de los Angeles21:03

And finally,

Victoria de los Angeles21:05

For first time we hear both of them.

Victoria de los Angeles21:09

Saying

Victoria de los Angeles21:10

I love you.

Victoria de los Angeles21:12

For me

Victoria de los Angeles21:13

I was a very a special kind of person in this time in Metropolis. I was very, very, very shy.

Victoria de los Angeles21:20

And you know to say

Victoria de los Angeles21:21

to say j or see without

Victoria de los Angeles21:24

any kind of sound.

Victoria de los Angeles21:26

in the orchestra, just alone.

Victoria de los Angeles21:30

with all these people in front of me.

Victoria de los Angeles21:32

saying to a young man near to me,

Victoria de los Angeles21:36

Jeteme, or si and you know I was waiting the whole night.

Victoria de los Angeles21:41

Just this moment to say J Mossy and it is for that that I choose that.

Speaker 221:59

Faithful.

Victoria de los Angeles22:06

We are focusing on our youth.

Presenter22:10

Yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles22:11

Yeah.

Presenter22:11

Yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles22:12

Cirqueu C'est des Jars.

Victoria de los Angeles22:16

Tene c'est pas que je méto di menon, menon, pu je nous tuina c'est pas pour quai na faux que je menoigne. Tina c'est pas que c'est passe que na.

Speaker 122:23

Uh

Victoria de los Angeles22:31

MOCT

Speaker 222:34

Aux catre die, mais les entre.

Presenter22:43

An excerpt from Debussy's Pellias Émile Sande with Irene Joachim and Jacques Johnson. Now why did we hear that recording instead of yours?

Victoria de los Angeles22:53

I don't think it is right to hear myself.

Victoria de los Angeles22:57

If I didn't like what

Presenter22:57

Be fact.

Victoria de los Angeles22:59

I'm not sure if I can do it.

Victoria de los Angeles23:00

did. Maybe I choose mine, but I love the way she does, so I prefer another singer.

Victoria de los Angeles23:10

That the to heal myself.

Presenter23:11

You'll be able to sing your own version on the island for yourself.

Victoria de los Angeles23:15

Oh yeah, very badly.

Presenter23:17

On this island, there you are all alone. Could you look after yourself in isolation?

Presenter23:22

Could you build somewhere to live?

Victoria de los Angeles23:24

I suppose I oh yes, I have I'm going to work like crazy. Going to search for food and all these things. I I'm going to learn a lot of things.

Presenter23:28

Yeah.

Presenter23:33

Would you try to escape if it were possible if you were to?

Victoria de los Angeles23:36

Possible to escape off the island.

Victoria de los Angeles23:38

Well, maybe not. Maybe if I feel

Victoria de los Angeles23:42

Finally with myself so well

Victoria de los Angeles23:45

Maybe I don't. To escape will will uh represent to begin again another life.

Presenter23:53

Back to music, number seven.

Victoria de los Angeles23:55

It's um malar that I choose.

Victoria de los Angeles23:59

The other geeto.

Victoria de los Angeles24:01

From the Fifth Symphony.

Victoria de los Angeles24:04

These are the jet accounts um

Victoria de los Angeles24:07

in a part of my life.

Victoria de los Angeles24:09

where I was I was very, very, very sad.

Victoria de los Angeles24:13

And um one day I heard it.

Victoria de los Angeles24:16

And um

Victoria de los Angeles24:18

touch me so much that I still having inside of me.

Victoria de los Angeles24:22

And I cry all the time, and even when I talk to you now, I could cry. So I will need it, Mahler, very much.

Presenter25:30

The adagiato from Mahler's Fifth Symphony

Presenter25:34

George Shulty conducting the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Presenter25:38

Now, Victoria, you've just got one more record. What's that to be?

Victoria de los Angeles25:42

Well, I choose, if it is possible, all kind of noises.

Victoria de los Angeles25:48

songs of birds, sounds of animals, the cars crossing all kind of sounds that remind me that there is a world that still exists. It is not only your island.

Speaker 125:55

Right.

Speaker 126:48

Yeah, yeah.

Presenter27:06

How was that? Was that a fair sample of the Sons of the Outside World?

Victoria de los Angeles27:10

Fine.

Presenter27:10

Settle for that.

Presenter27:12

If you could only take one disc out of the eight you've played us, which would it be?

Victoria de los Angeles27:16

Uh it would be at a teeto.

Presenter27:18

The attagietto from the Mahler Symphony No. 5, George Sheltey and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Now you're allowed to take one luxury with you.

Victoria de los Angeles27:27

Well, the first thing that came in mine in mind was uh oh, such a great luxury

Victoria de los Angeles27:34

Um

Victoria de los Angeles27:35

The Victoria of Samotracia, how you say it in English?

Presenter27:39

The victory of of Samothrace.

Victoria de los Angeles27:41

Yes, victory of Samotress.

Presenter27:42

From the Louvre.

Victoria de los Angeles27:43

If I'm the Louvre, imagine full Louvre.

Presenter27:46

Yes, we'll have to get it from the law before you, but we'll manage somehow.

Victoria de los Angeles27:47

Yeah, yeah.

Victoria de los Angeles27:49

Have a night.

Presenter27:50

And we're going to let you have one book.

Victoria de los Angeles27:53

My book is a book of letters, poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke.

Presenter27:58

Rainer Maria Rilke. Would you like it in German or in translated into Spanish?

Victoria de los Angeles28:03

I would like to know so much German as to read

Victoria de los Angeles28:08

Rilke.

Victoria de los Angeles28:09

But I have a book.

Victoria de los Angeles28:11

Where in one side is literally is a translation of the German and the other side is the German. And because I know a little of German, I enjoy it very much the work.

Presenter28:22

And it's German and Spanish or German and German and Spanish, right. You shall have that addition.

Victoria de los Angeles28:25

German and Spanish.

Victoria de los Angeles28:28

Yes.

Presenter28:28

And thank you, Victoria de Los Angeles, for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Victoria de los Angeles28:28

Thank you.

Victoria de los Angeles28:33

Thank you very much.

Presenter28:34

Goodbye everyone.

Speaker 128:51

Desert Island Discs was introduced by Roy Plumley and the producer was Derek Drescher.

Speaker 128:58

Next Tuesday at twelve twenty the castaway will be Derek Jacobi, the actor.

Speaker 229:04

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co. uk slash radio four.