Joan Sutherland

One of the indisputable privileges of calling oneself a music critic—in addition to attending endless performances and then writing about the experience—is the opportunity to interview artists of world-class reputation and temperament. I have been truly fortunate in this area, having completed one-on-one Q&A sessions with scores of the greatest operatic artists of the last forty years, in the hope of possibly one day compiling these transcripts into a volume. In the process I have found certain of my idols possessing feet made of still tacky clay; but there also stand out in my memory those few who have exceeded their legendary graciousness and humility to completely reduce me to glowing admiration.

In this definite minority I count an afternoon spent in the delightful company of Joan Sutherland as one of the absolute highlights of my journalistic career. It has been just over ten years' time now, but I can still recall every detail of our meeting that chilly, snowy December day in the little Swiss village she and Richard Bonynge have called home since the 1960s.

It took some months to set up the interview, which might not have happened but for the intercession of Marilyn Horne, whom I had befriended some time before and with whom I had already collaborated on several projects for the newspaper and radio station I worked for in central North Carolina. Letters to Dame Joan came and went, to and fro, until a date and time were mutually agreed upon. These notes—typed on her distinctive pink stationery and always inscribed with the signature I knew well from many backstage autographing visits following performances—were warm and encouraging. I was nonetheless stunned to pick up the phone one day, weeks before I was to leave for Europe, to be greeted by the familiar Sutherland Sydneyese on the other end, asking if she might make a reservation for me in Les Avants at the little hotel down the hill from her home, Chalet Monet. As it happened, the hotel was booked solid (she called back to tell me this, too), and I instead made plans to remain in nearby Montreux, home to the famous jazz festival.

Before long the appointed hour for our meeting arrived. I was met at the station by Dame Joan's secretary and driven to the house sitting atop a hill: it was a typical A-frame chalet, I took note, though inhabited by two atypical, extraordinary homeowners. Dame Joan met me at the back door, greeting me warmly and asking me immediately if I would stay for lunch. Flabbergasted, I managed to mutter "thank you" as we entered the house. Almost immediately I met her housekeeper and friend Ruthli—who had been with the family for many years—and I was ushered, following Dame Joan, upstairs, passing by a portrait of her as Lucia and arriving at the spacious music room hung with more of the same along with images of prima donnas past.

Figure 1.

Dame Joan Sutherland and Carl J. Halperin, Les Avants, 7 December 1993. (Photograph by Ruthli Ingold; courtesy of Carl J. Halperin.)

The room looked out onto the Alps below at one end and, at the opposite, was dominated by a piano that no doubt had accompanied attentively as she learned new repertory. I admired Bonynge's famous collection of bric-a-brac—nineteenth-century figurines and the like—scattered throughout the area, and said so. "Yes," Dame Joan replied, "but you don't have to dust it, do you?" I laughed in response, imagining the world's reigning Lucia and Norma with a dustrag in hand, carefully working the crevices of each and every piece of porcelain.

We sat in chairs covered in a beautiful fabric, part of a suite that surrounded this far end of the room, in front of the picture window. "Did you do these?" I asked, knowing that she was a keen needlepointer, having taken up the hobby to kill time in dressing rooms and recording studios. She proudly affirmed that the work was...