Sharon Sweet Interview with Bruce Duffie . . . . . . . . .

Soprano Sharon Sweet

A Conversation with Bruce Duffie

Sharon Sweet (born August 16, 1951 in Gloversville, NY) is an American dramatic soprano. She has appeared in leading roles in several major venues in Europe and the United States and has made several recordings, in particular Lohengrin, Der Freischütz, Don Giovanni, and Il Trovatore. In 1999, she accepted a full-time teaching position at Westminster Choir College of Rider University. In a column in Opera News, Sweet stated that she made the move out of frustration with the current operatic scene which emphasized physical appearance over voice. She cited her struggles with Hashimoto's syndrome, a thyroid condition.

Her father had started a career as a lyric tenor, but abandoned it after serving in World War II. At age five, Sharon began studying the piano, which she had to give up after an accident. She studied singing, and then spent one year as a music teacher at a public school. After winning the Metropolitan Opera auditions, she studied at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia with Margaret Harshaw, then in New York with Marinka Gurewich [brief biography is shown in the box below]. During that time, she worked as a teacher of singing and music theory at the University of New York, and conducted the University Choir. At 24, she married a Presbyterian minister who came from her hometown.

She lived in Philadelphia, giving private evenings of songs and arias, and in 1985 went to West Germany. There, she attracted a sensation when she stepped in a concert in Munich as Aïda. From 1986–88 she was engaged at the Opera House in Dortmund, where she sang Elisabeth in Tannhäuser. She also was a member of the Deutsche Oper Berlin, with whom she toured to Japan in 1987. That same year she performed at the Paris Grand Opera as Elisabetta in Don Carlos.

In 1987-1988 Sweet appeared at the Staatsoper in Hamburg as Elisabetta, Leonora in Il Trovatore, and Elisabeth in Tannhäuser. She sang at the Staatstheater Braunschweig in 1988 as Desdemona in Verdi's Otello. At the 1987 Salzburg Festival she was heard as a soloist in the Stabat Mater by Dvořák. That same year she sang Gurrelieder by Schoenberg in Munich under the baton of Zubin Mehta. In 1988 she appeared at the Vienna State Opera as Elisabeth in Tannhäuser, and in Brussels as Norma in a concert performance.

In 1989 Sweet made her US debut at the San Francisco Opera as Aïda. In 1990 she was a guest performer at the Arena di Verona as Aïda, and in 1991 in Montpellier as Leonora in Il Trovatore. In 1992 she appeared at the State Operas of Vienna and Dresden, and at the opera in Dallas. In 1993 she sang in the amphitheater of Caesarea as Aïda, and at the Festival of Orange as Leonora, and in Munich as Desdemona. In 1992 she sang at the Lyric Opera of Chicago as Amelia in Verdi's Un ballo in maschera.

Sweet made her Metropolitan Opera debut in 1990 as Leonora, and over the next decade played 8 different Verdi, Mozart, Wagner, and Puccini roles with the company, including Lina in the Met premiere of Verdi's Stiffelio during the 1993/94 season. She also played Leonora in a new production of La forza del destino during the 1995/96 season. Both of these productions were directed by Giancarlo del Monaco.

In 1994 Sweet made her debut at Covent Garden Opera London as Turandot, and in 1995 was Aïda, and in 1996 again as Turandot. In 1995 she sang at the Teatro Comunale Bologna as Norma, and at the State Theater in Hanover as Tosca.

== Names which are links in this box and below refer to my interviews elsewhere on my website. BD

In the summer of 1995, Sharon Sweet was singing with the Chicago Symphony at the Ravinia Festival. The work was the Symphony #2 (Lobgesang) of Mendelssohn, along with Emily Magee, Vinson Cole, and the CSO Chorus directed by Duain Wolfe. The conductor was Riccardo Chailly. Despite her brief time there, she graciously agreed to meet with me at her hotel for a conversation. Sweet would return with the CSO during the following downtown season for the Symphony #8 (Symphony of a Thousand) of Mahler, led by Christoph Eschenbach. Other soloists included Marvis Martin, Ying Huang, Florence Quivar, Janis Taylor, Vinson Cole, Richard Zeller, and Eric Halfvarson. Sweet had also been with Lyric Opera as Amelia in The Masked Ball in the fall of 1992.

During our chat she was in very good humor, and there was much laughter amid the serious discussion. Portions were later broadcast on WNIB, Classical 97, and now in 2025 I am pleased to share the entire encounter.

Bruce Duffie:   Thank you for taking time from your very busy schedule.

Sharon Sweet:   Oh, I’m glad to do it.

BD:   I don’t want this to be a sexist question but...

Sweet:   But??? [Laughs]

BD:   ...how do you juggle family and concert responsibilities?

Sweet:   [Smiles] I always said I was a housewife who sang a little bit. [Much laughter] I have a wonderful husband who is on sabbatical from the Presbyterian church. He’s a minister working on his Ph.D., and he’s Mr. Mom while I’m working. It’s a little easier now that the kids are older, so they kind of go their own way.

BD:   Did you purposely delay your singing career a little bit for them?

Sweet:   I don’t know which came first. I was actively trying to get a career going, and nothing was happening when the children just came along. Maybe it was Divine Providence.

BD:   Because you have children of your own, does this make any difference in the way you project your music to the audience of both experienced concert-goers, and the young people who are the potential audience for later?

Sweet:   I would hope it makes a difference to them. What it does for me, as a performer, shows and helps me to remember that the singing is not the only part of my life. I have a husband, I have three children, and I do have a life outside of my singing. Maybe it helps make me a bit calmer and more satisfied with what I do, and maybe that snowballs so that the public can sit back and be more relaxed.

BD:   Does that alter which engagements you accept, and which ones you turn down? [Vis-à-vis the recording shown at right, see my interviews with Eva Marton, and Jan-Hendrik Rootering.]

Sweet:   I try to be very careful not to be on the road away from home for more than six weeks at a time. Occasionally it has been eight weeks.

BD:   Where is home for you?

Sweet:   Now I’m proud to say it’s Princeton, New Jersey! For the last nine years, it was Berlin, Germany.

BD:   You were ‘Fest’ there?

Sweet:   I was ‘Fest’ for the first two years, and then I freelanced starting in 1988. The children were in school, and most of my career was in Europe, and that was good. My husband was at the university, so it was home for a while.

BD:   Have the children been brought up German or American?

Sweet:   Yes! [Laughs] They are all fluent in German. They went to a German school. It was a bilingual school, but it was still a German school with a German program.

* * * * *

BD: From the vast array of operatic roles and concert works that you can sing, how do you select which you will learn and keep in your repertoire, and which you will postpone or turn down completely?

Sweet: I had a wonderful teacher... in fact, I had two really wonderful teachers. I studied with Margaret Harshaw for a while when I was Curtis and I was still a mezzo. Then I went to Marinka Gurewich about fifteen years ago. She said, “When you’re looking at a new piece, your voice will tell you in the first five minutes whether or not it's right for you. But the real test is if you wake up the next morning, and you can still sing. Then you know you have a good chance that this is right.” She gave me a list of repertoire that she was sure that I would sing, and made me promise that I would not stray. I owe this woman so much that I’m pretty faithful to her guidelines. I have not really strayed as far as operatic work is concerned. In the concert work, I’m not sure she really gave me all of the repertoire that was possible, from the War Requiem to Gurrelieder.

Marinka Gurewich (1902, Bratislava – December 23, 1990, Manhattan) was an American voice teacher and mezzo-soprano of Jewish-Czech descent. She is best remembered for teaching several successful opera singers, including Martina Arroyo, Marcia Baldwin, Grace Bumbry, Joy Clements, Ruth Falcon, Melvyn Poll, Florence Quivar, Diana Soviero, and Sharon Sweet.

Born Marinka Revész in Bratislava, Gurewich trained as a singer and pianist at the Berlin University of the Arts where she was a pupil of Lula Mysz-Gmeiner. She also studied privately with Elena Gerhardt and Anna von Mildenburg in Munich. Her career as a singer in Germany was hindered by World War II, and she fled Europe for the United States in 1940.

Prior to the war she had appeared in concerts and recitals in Europe. After coming to the United States, she appeared in a few recitals and concerts in New York City, but ultimately began devoting her time to teaching. During the 1960s and 1970s she taught on the voice faculties of the Manhattan School of Music and the Mannes College of Music. She continued to teach privately up until her death.

BD:   You started out as a mezzo. How and when did you decide that the voice was going upwards?

Sweet:   [Laughs] Margaret Harshaw always told me that I would become a soprano when I grew up. When I auditioned for Marinka Gurewich after I had left Curtis, she said, “My dear, you’re either going to be a soprano or a very funny mezzo.” It’s an absolutely true story. For the first year with her, she took all the opera away, and we did the Brahms Lieder, Italian art songs, and Purcell, all in the high key just to work the upper passaggio.

BD:   I wonder if Harshaw recognized in your voice something that she heard in her own voice, because she started as a mezzo and then moved up.

Sweet:   Yes, exactly. I think she did, and I’m very grateful to her not to have pushed the top, because then when I was grown up and the voice was ready, the top was what I call ‘virgin territory’. It really had not been touched or misused in any way. So it was a blessing.

See my interview with Gustav Kuhn

BD:   Do you still study with Gurewich?

Sweet:   I study in my head with her. She died three years ago, but I was with her for fifteen years.

BD:   Can we assume that the best teachers will eventually no longer be needed by the student, and that you will be able to do most or all of it on your own?

Sweet:   If Gurewich was still alive, I would still go to her for checkups. I used to pick up the telephone when I was in Berlin, and call her in New York and say there’s a problem. She would want to hear it, and I would sing over the phone. She would fix whatever she thought to make it right. She was wonderful, and I have her voice in my head all the time. After fifteen years, it would be difficult to go astray. I have some wonderful coaches who have been with me along the way, so they know my voice, and they’re able to keep me going.

BD:   Are the coaches just for your new repertoire?

Sweet:   Basically yes, but if I’m in that area and working on things that I have been doing, I either have them come to rehearsals or to performances, and they can usually tell.
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BD:   You have a certain repertoire and you’re offered certain roles, so now we’ll go back to my question. How do you decide yes or no?

Sweet:   If it’s a new piece and I haven’t done it before, I take a look at it. I say to give me a couple of days, and I look at it, and I can tell within a very short time whether it’s something that I can really do. If it’s at all possible for me to do it without too much stress on the voice, I try to do it because people do not like to hear you say, “No.” But it’s an important word to have in your vocabulary in all languages! [Both laugh]

BD:   Once you decide you’re going to sing a role or a concert piece, about how long does it take to get it into the throat and into the mind?

Sweet:   That’s a tricky question. If you have time, perhaps a year or so before you’re going to do something, then you can do it slowly. Unfortunately, when you’re at the beginning of your career — and I would still like to say I’m towards the beginning — one doesn’t have the luxury of time. For instance, I learned Alice Ford in three days for a recording, because the soprano had canceled. Colin Davis desperately needed someone...

BD:   Was he right to ask someone who had never done the part, or should he have gone to someone who knew the part and had done it on stage?

Sweet:   I don’t know. You’d have to ask him that.

BD:   Was it a satisfying experience for you?

Sweet:   Yes and no. I’m not sure that I would ever want to do that again because I was ready for a Funny Farm after two weeks. Every day I’d know what I was going to work at in the morning with a coach, and prepare, and then record in the afternoon. Then I would get the new things in the evening. There was a constant two-week struggle, but it was very satisfying to know that I was able to accomplish something like this. This is not an easy part. It’s very wordy. Musically it’s not terribly difficult, but word-wise it’s just clackity-clackity-clack.

BD:   Plus, you don’t get a big aria.

Sweet:   No, you don’t get a big aria! But you do get high Cs, and that’s nice. [Gales of laughter] It was wonderful. It was very satisfying because it was my first time working with Sir Colin. I had several contracts in the future, but I had never worked with him before, and this was also an opportunity to work with Marilyn Horne and Rolando Panerai. These opportunities to work with wonderful artists don’t come very often. [This recording is shown at right. Besides the two artists just mentioned, see my interview with Piero de Palma.]

BD:   They are so experienced.

Sweet:   Exactly, and Marilyn Horne was just so wonderful. She said to just relax and take my time. It’s going to be all right. Their years of experience helped me relax to be able to get through it. So in that way, yes, I would say it was very satisfying. On the other hand, I would say it wasn’t satisfying because you really don’t have the time to get into the depth of the character like you would like to.

BD:   When it was all over, you wanted to then start?

Sweet:   Yes, now I’d like to start again! [Much laughter]

BD:   Was that your first recording?

Sweet:   No, my first recording was the Verdi Requiem, done in 1988 with Carlo Maria Giulini and the Berlin Philharmonic [shown below-right]. Then I did the Mahler Symphony No. 8 with Lorin Maazel [shown at the bottom of this webpage, along with another recording conducted by Sir Colin Davis], and the Verdi Four Sacred Pieces again with Giulini. That was a long time ago. I also did the Schumann Paradise and the Peri with Gustav Kuhn [shown above], and the Four Last Songs of Strauss with Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos and the London Symphony Orchestra. That’s out of print now! [Laughs] It was on a very small London label called Collins Classics [shown below-left].

BD:   I’ll find a copy...

Sweet:   I would love to do it again. My first opera recording was Don Giovanni with Sir Neville Marriner [shown below-left], Alice Ford, Der Freischütz with Marek Janowksi [shown below-right], and Lohengrin [shown at top-right] is coming out this summer. There is also a Beethoven Symphony No. 9 with Colin Davis [shown at the bottom of this webpage], and I can’t remember what else... [More laughter]

BD:   You’re used to singing for a live audience. Do you sing differently for the microphone?

Sweet:   No, I don’t. The voice is the voice. I love recording because you are able to go back and do things over again, and maybe try to find different colors and different little nuances that you may not always capture in a live performance. So in that case, yes, recording can be different, but technically, no, I don’t do anything differently.

BD:   Are you pleased with the recordings that have come out so far?

Sweet:   [Thinks a moment] That’s a difficult question. I’m probably my worst critic. The first recording that I’m really pleased with is the Freischütz that came out a year ago. It has been well-received with the critics, although I don’t always like to read the critics. My husband doesn’t allow me to read the critics anymore! The recording that is the most special to me is the Verdi Requiem with Giulini because it was my first, and that will probably remain my favorite. However, the recording company did not capture the essence of what he was trying to create.

BD:   Was it a recording of a concert or made in the studio?

Sweet:   It was a studio recording. Those things happen. The singers feel something that maybe the producers are unable to pick up on tape, and it was a pity because at the end of the recording, everybody was in tears. It was such a moving and spiritual moment. Probably my most vocally satisfying recording with be this Lohengrin that’s coming out. I’m really very pleased with it.
sweet

BD:   Tell me a little bit about Elsa. What kind of a character is she?

Sweet:   I used to say that she was a one-sided character, but after doing the recording and learning the role, she just is so in awe of Lohengrin. But yes, she’s really very stupid in that she seems to be extremely insecure. I probably will get letters over this, but sometimes if women could learn to keep their mouths shut, they would stay out of trouble! [Both laugh] Elsa is a perfect example of that. If she had just stayed quiet, she would have been all right.

BD:   If she had not asked the fatal question, would Lohengrin and Elsa been happy in ‘Act Four’?

Sweet:   I don’t know. That’s a tough question. They could have been, but knowing her character, she probably would always be looking for her brother. Maybe in some ways they might have been happy, but maybe not. I feel that Lohengrin is the kind of person that doesn’t want to stay around one place too long. [More laughter] So maybe they wouldn’t have been very happy. That’s one for Freud.

BD:   Can these characters be overanalyzed, or should you just simply take the libretto at face-value, and let it go at that?

Sweet:   Most of the time singers try to overanalyze things. These are generally not deep characters, and the composers really capture their essence in their music. We need to spend more time letting the composer’s music sing through us, instead of us trying to always say that this person has this or that kind of syndrome. When these operas where written, there were no syndromes, so we can analyze the joy right out of singing if we try hard enough.

BD:   [With a wink] You don’t want to put Elsa and Lohengrin on TV shows like Jenny Jones, or Geraldo Rivera?

Sweet:   [Laughs] No, no. Maybe I’m not deep enough, but I have great problems trying to say this character had this particular problem. The music is too beautiful to ruin it with that.

BD:   Then where is the balance between the music and the drama in opera?

Sweet:   Most of the time the composers have done it. You have to be a good actor on stage, but the emotions of these characters are in the music. I was doing Stiffelio with Giancarlo del Monaco, and he said just to let go, and your singing will come through your emotions instead of trying to manipulate it. Just let it flow, and nine times out of ten it’s right.

BD:   Did he get that from himself, or from his father [tenor Mario Del Monaco]?

Sweet:   He must have gotten it from his father, because that’s the kind of an actor his father was. We, as opera singers, have to let the voice do a good part of the acting for us. We need to find the colors and the nuances in the singing, and we should leave some of the melodramatic staging effects to Broadway, or Shakespeare, or theater. If you look at Shakespeare plays, they’re not over-dramatic. They let the words do the acting for them, and that’s what we have to do as singers.

* * * * *

BD:   Did Wagner write well for the voice?

Sweet:   That’s a dangerous question. He wrote three operas in the Italian style, and I do those three operas! [Much laughter] Those are Tannhäuser, Lohengrin, and Tristan and Isolde. The other ones were not in the Italian style, and I don’t do them.

BD:   Might you do them eventually? I’m sure you’re asked for them all the time.

Sweet:   I’m asked for them all the time, but again, going back to Marinka Gurewich, these are roles she said stay away from.

BD:   Did she say stay away from them forever, or stay away from them until you hit fifty?

Sweet:   I think she meant stay away from them forever, but I’m not sure she knew exactly how far my voice was going to grow. So when I reach fifty, maybe then I’ll reanalyze some of these roles. I know if I were to do Brünnhilde, I would have to sacrifice some of the other repertoire that I do.
sweet

BD:   The Mozart?

Sweet:   Of Mozart, I only do Donna Anna, but that would be very good for me to keep the voice in line for Wagner. So, I don’t think I would ever probably give her up. But I would have to give up a lot of the bel canto repertoire just because it’s a different style of singing. You tend to lose some of the flexibility when you’re pounding away in some of the Wagner. It’s a shame that one has to feel like it’s pounding away, but with the size of the orchestras that play the Wagner, you get some conductors who have a problem accompanying. They’re wonderful conductors, and I won’t mention names, but when the voice has to compete with so much and for so long, you can lose the flexibility, and I’m not willing to give up Norma and things like that at this point.

BD:   Do you ever want to scream over the footlights and tell him to hold it down?

Sweet:   [Laughs] Since I don’t do Brünnhilde, I really have not had the problem. I’ve been very fortunate with the people I’ve worked with.

BD:   Your voice dictates that you sing certain roles. Do you like the characters that are imposed on you?

Sweet:   Most of my characters are a load of Goody Two-Shoes! [Gales of laughter] That’s why this year was so exciting for me because I added Turandot to my repertoire.

BD:   She is hardly a Goody Two-Shoes!

Sweet:   Yes, but she is a very complicated woman. We could spend a whole session just talking about her character. I’ve also added Norma on the stage this year. The character and the emotional level and these two women are so exciting for me. But when you do Aïda, and Il Trovatore, and Ballo, they’re all in the same style. They love and die, but with each one there is a little different sparkle to their character. But most of them are about the same level of emotional depth. They’re strong women, but... Desdemona is one of my favorite characters, and I love to do her. She’s certainly not ‘milk toast’ as we would say. It takes a very strong person to leave her family and marry very young, and marry a black man in that day and age.

BD:   Do you feel that a character like that, with her strengths, speaks more the women of the 1990s than some of these other ladies?

Sweet:   I think so, yes, absolutely. Otello is something that could easily be updated. There are a lot of stage directors out there who update operas, and this is one that could be. Today we still have the problem with interracial marriage, even though it’s much more accepted than it ever was. In many circles, it’s still a problem, and it takes a certain strength in order to do that. As to Trovatore, there aren’t too many troubadours around anymore.

BD:   You wouldn’t commit suicide for your guy?

Sweet:   No, I don’t think I would!

BD:   Then how do you take this woman and portray her for audiences that have come through a couple of World Wars, and Depressions?

Sweet:   That’s a deep question. Trovatore is not one that you could update. Think of the period when it was written. I’ve been to these mountains in Spain where it supposedly took place. When you get a bit of a local flavor, and get to know the people and their emotional level in that area, then you could begin to understand where it could happen. There is a such an enormous amount of passion in that character. If that was my only choice, I would not be afraid to lay down my life for someone else. Scripturally we’re told that we should, and it was to save somebody else’s life.

BD:   When you walk out on stage, are you becoming the character or are you simply portraying that character?

Sweet:   I’m portraying it. I try very hard not to become that character. I’ve known a lot of singers who get into trouble losing their own identity by becoming these characters. I would like to think that I’m portraying these characters, but with my emotional level, so that there is a little bit of me in these women.

BD:   You don’t need to name it, but is there a character that is so far away from you that you just can’t get into it, but your voice says you must sing it?

Sweet:   Oh, dear! [Thinks a moment] I haven’t met her yet, I really haven’t.

BD:   Let me turn that question directly around, and again you don’t have to say which, but is there a character that is perilously close to the real Sharon Sweet?

Sweet:   [Laughs] Yes, probably! As much as I know Sharon Sweet, probably yes.

BD:   Does doing all of these various characters help get you to know yourself more and better each time?

Sweet:   It may, in some ways, but it’s a little frightening. I haven’t done her that much, so when I first did her, it was really kind of scary to see how much of this person really parallels a little bit the kind of person I am.

* * * * *

BD: Tell me about doing concert work.

Sweet: I love it! I love to be able to stand there and make music, and try and get away from the wigs, and the make-up, and the costumes, and just stand there like a person and say, “Here I am. I have something to offer, and do with me what you will.” I really wish I were doing more.
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BD:   Who is it that is ‘doing with you’, the composer or the conductor?

Sweet:   Both. The composer is part of it. For example, I have done the Verdi Requiem with so many different conductors that each one brings a different emotional level. With some, it’s just a straightforward concert work, but others bring such passion and spirit. Giulini went to the other end with a real spiritual experience. [Vis-à-vis that recording shown at right, see my interview with Simon Estes.]

BD:   Is the Requiem really Verdi’s best opera?

Sweet:   No, I wouldn’t say it’s his best opera, but it is probably some of the best concert music that has ever been written.

BD:   Do you do sing recitals, too?

Sweet:   I did in Europe. I haven’t had the opportunity here in the States, but I’d like to very much.

BD:   Is there something special about singing songs?

Sweet:   Oh, yes. I like the intimacy of it. I like being able to not feel like I have to sing to 4,000 people, or 30,000 people like in Verona. It’s like being in your living room. You can paint pictures and do much more subtle things. You can look at people in the face. I like to do recitals with the lights still up, so that there is a real unity in the whole room.

BD:   You like being conscious of the audience?

Sweet:   Oh, yes.

BD:   Do you feed off of them?

Sweet:   Oh, yes, and it’s great.

BD:   Are you conscious of the audience in the opera house, when you have all the lights in your face and there’s no light in the auditorium?

Sweet:   No, not really. You know they’re there, obviously, but in good productions you get so wrapped up in the scenery and the costumes. It’s like when you put on make-up, part of you begins to get shadowed, and you’re playing role. You’re not really being purely yourself. I’m not really conscious of the audience until they break in with applause... or don’t break in with applause! [Both laugh] Then you’re really conscious of your audience!

BD:   I hope that doesn’t happen too often.

Sweet:   It depends where you are.

BD:   Do you like this new gimmick of having the supertitles above your head?

Sweet:   No!

BD:   Why not?

Sweet:   I think it allows people to be ignorant.

BD:   Even though it would bring them closer to the drama?

Sweet:   So would picking up a libretto and reading it the night before you’re going.

BD:   So, you expect a lot out of your audience?
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Sweet:   I do, and they expect a lot out of me. With the exception of England, supertitles in Europe would really be unheard of. The audience is trained. If they’re going to an opera they’ve never been to, they research it. They research the story, the libretto, the words.

BD:   And of course, in at least a couple of the countries, many of the operas are in their own language.

Sweet:   Yes, that does make it easier. I’m not saying that it would be easy for the American audience. Most of them don’t speak Italian or German or French, but that doesn’t mean that we have any more right to be to be less educated. For a well-rounded person, one has to be educated in the arts.

BD:   Do you work harder at your diction when you are singing in the language of the public that night? [Vis-à-vis the recording shown at left, see my interviews with Hartmut Welker, and Claudio Abbado.]

Sweet:   Oh, yes! Oh, yes, but to great success! When I did Tannhäuser for my debut in Vienna, the papers said, “Finally, we have an Elisabeth where we understand every word.” So, this was the great coup for me. I just did Norma in Italy, and they told me every word was understood! If you listen to so many Italians, you can’t understand what they’re singing, but they all know the pieces, so it doesn’t matter.

BD:   Do you automatically have to work harder?

Sweet:   Yes, the American is expected to work harder, absolutely.

BD:   Have you sung some operas originally in English for American or English audiences?

Sweet:   I did as a mezzo. I did Mama McCourt in Douglas Moore’s The Ballad of Baby Doe. I also did parts of Menotti’s The Consul years ago. I won’t tell you how many years ago! [Laughs] I’ve done Britten’s War Requiem, but my part really is more in Latin.

BD:   Is it satisfying singing in the language for people who understand it?

Sweet:   Yes, I think so, sure! Even though it’s your language, you’re expected to project it, and to understand what each word means. There are a lot of English words that still have to be looked-up to know what really is being talked about.

BD:   Since you don’t like the idea of the supertitles, would you do something in America in translation?

Sweet:   No, because I’m a purist as far as that’s concerned. Also, it’s taking the easy way out for the audience again. I know it’s walking a tightrope, and I know I will get in trouble for saying this, but it’s easy for me to say it since I sing in so many countries where the arts are subsidized by the government. We do have an awful problem in the United States by not having our government support the arts, with the public having such a hard time supporting the arts. We have to be careful not to be held hostage. We sacrifice what is meant to happen, and what the composer has meant to happen in order to get the money to put things on. It’s a fine line, and it goes back to public schools. The educational system in the United States is really missing the boat by taking the emphasis off music and art. We talk about being behind in mathematics and sciences in school, but we’re also behind in music, in art, in literature, in drama.

BD:   Then let me ask the big question. What is the purpose of music in society?

Sweet:   Scripture tells us that music soothes the savage beast. If I can be religious for a moment, there are over 600 references to music and singing in the Bible. That’s a lot of reference for one topic. It is important to the Universe. It’s important to the soul. It’s important to the spirit. It’s important to our minds. It’s another language, and it’s an important language. We need it.

BD:   Do you view your performances as religious experiences?

Sweet:   I do very much, because I’m a firm believer that what gift I have is a gift from God. If you think of how many billions of people there are in the world, and how few are professional musicians, it puts a little bit of awe into you. But there are other musicians. If they don’t sing or play an instrument, it doesn’t mean they’re not musicians. It takes a real gift to be able to sit and enjoy music.

BD:   Do you feel that your performances are for everyone, or just for musicians?

Sweet:   They’re for everybody. Why wouldn’t they be for everybody? I don’t know of anybody who doesn’t enjoy music. I’m not saying which kind of music that somebody enjoys, but there are other forms of music to be enjoyed. I’m a great fan of Country music.
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BD:   Then, the lighter music and the popular music and even rock music, is music?

Sweet:   Oooooh! [Much laughter] You’ve got me on this one! I hope my son doesn’t hear this, but I have to say yes, it’s music. I may not enjoy it. It may not be something that I would go out and buy, but yes, it is music, and it’s a legitimate form.

BD:   Is there a balance between art and entertainment?

Sweet:   I wish there were. Then the fine arts would have more money. With recording companies, most of them put all their money into popular music and into rock music, so they can finance the classical, and there’s something wrong with that. There ought to be more money put into it. Some of what they put into the rock’n’roll should go into the fine arts. But again, it’s a Catch-22 because we have stopped educating our children in classical music.

BD:   Have you made sure that your children have a basic education in music?

Sweet:   Oh, yes. My oldest started the violin when he was four. He’s now going into the eleventh grade, and he’s played with several orchestras, and he plays with his high school chamber group.

BD:   Do you want him to go into music, or do you want him to stay away from the profession?

Sweet:   All of his teachers have said he’s very capable, and has the ability to do it, but he has no desire. He wants to be a lawyer. That’s fine with me, but as long as he’s in high school he has to continue his music. It’s part of his well-rounded education. My other son plays the cello, and he wants to be a cellist. He just auditioned for his first non-school orchestra, the Greater Princeton Youth Orchestra, and was accepted. So he’s really excited. He says that if he can’t be the next Yo-Yo Ma, he either wants to play for the London Symphony Orchestra, or the New York Philharmonic. I told him to wait until he hears the Chicago Symphony, and maybe he’ll put them on the list! [More laughter] Then my daughter plays the piano...

BD:   So, you have a trio!

Sweet:   Yes, I have a trio, the Sweet Trio! She also sings like a bird. All of my children sing, but I would never push any of them into this profession, because it’s very difficult. I never really had anybody push me. I studied classical piano. I have a degree in piano, and a degree in voice, but it was something that was inside of me that pushed me. For this career, this kind of lifestyle, it has to come from them, because they’ve seen what it takes. They’ve seen the sacrifice, and it's something that they really have to got to do by themselves.

BD:   In the end, is it all worth it?

Sweet:   I think it is. It depends on the night, it depends on the place, it depends on the piece of music you’re doing, and on the conductor, and on how long you’ve been on the road. There are some moments that it’s a little bit of heaven, and there are some moments when it’s just a job.

BD:   If you have a run of eight or twelve performances of a work, how do you keep number five and number seven fresh?

Sweet:   It’s hard. You get past the premiere because so much weight is put on opening nights with the critics being there. Those publics are not usually the best publics. The second performance is always a bad one because it’s the let-down from the premiere, so we work towards three, four, and five. We’re human beings, so we’re going to have good nights and we’re going to have bad nights. We’re going to have nights where we’re really up, and then other nights when we’ve got to go to work.   Hopefully, most of the time we can make it special.

BD:   [With a gentle nudge] There’s no time you wish you were just a robot?

Sweet:   No, I haven’t experienced that yet. [Laughs] That’s not to say it won’t come. I’m still young in my career.

BD:   Is it nice coming back to a role that you know?

Sweet:   Oh yes, because I don’t have to study!

BD:   It’s not just a repeat, is it???

Sweet:   No, but it’s constantly putting words back into your head, and just the labor of re-learning things which are there. I can sing Aïda at the drop of a hat, which is nice. I don’t have to think what page this is, and what is this word? Is it a feminine ending, or is it a masculine ending? I don’t have to think about those things, and I can really just think about the music and the character, and that’s nice. I can really start getting into it, but all of that takes [gasps] a few years!

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BD: Are you optimistic about the whole future of classical music?

Sweet: [Sighs] I would like to be optimistic about it. I know it will always be here. I would like the United States to remain competitive. After living in Europe for so long, I know a lot of musicians — mostly singers that are out there — and I really believe some of the finest singers in today’s theaters and concert stages, are from the United States. It is a competition, but it’s hard to compete with the entire world when you know that your government is at the point of cutting out what support they were giving. In Germany, even if it’s not a great singer, the government is behind that singer. It is the same in France and Italy, because they insist that those countries’ houses take these singers. If you have two singers who can sing the repertoire, and one was an American and one is a German, when you’re in Germany the government will push that that the German gets the job, and not the American. We don’t have that. We don’t have the Fest houses that Germany has. Germany has about seventy full time opera houses which are open ten months out of the years, seven days a week. How do we compete with that? Yet our country has been able to put out some of the finest singers in the world.
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BD:   I was going to say it is a victory over everything.

Sweet:   It is, but if our government starts to decrease their support, that’s going to make it harder, and harder, and harder for us to be competitive.

BD:   But doesn’t it mean that we’ve been able to succeed in the arts despite the government?

Sweet:   Yes, over there, but what about here? How many opera houses do we have that are full-time, putting on twenty productions a year? There’s just the one, the Met in New York.

BD:   Then there are two which do eight or ten productions in the fall and winter [Chicago and San Francisco].

Sweet:   Yes. But any town in Germany that has 150,000 people, has an opera house.

BD:   I’ve often said any city in America that has a major sport team should have an opera house! [Vis-à-vis the recording shown at left, see my interviews with Thomas Allen, Karita Mattila, Francisco Araiza, Marie McLaughlin, and Robert Lloyd.]

Sweet:   There you go! Look at some of these cities! Look at Chicago! You’ve got five major sports teams in this city, and you have an opera house which is competitive around the world, but it only does eight productions a year. You also have one of the best symphony orchestras in the world, so something is not right in the balance.

BD:   So, back to my question. Are you optimistic about the future of classical music?

Sweet:   A lot of it is going to depend on the government. I’d like to be optimistic because we have the talent here. This country is very wealthy, and I’m not talking just financially. I’m talking about what we have to offer.

BD:   One last question. Are you at the point in your career that you want to be at this age?

Sweet:   No!

BD:   Where do you want to be?

Sweet:   Even if I were at the point where I wanted to be, I would still probably say no, simply because I don’t want to be satisfied. One of the weak points in my career right now, when making the move back to the States, is the concert work. I’m working very hard to build up my concert name here in the United States. I also don’t sing in any of the opera houses right now except the Met. The Met is not a bad place to sing. It’s a great place to sing, but I’m not where I would like to be in my recording career. I have to be centered as far as that is concerned, because recording is a gift. It’s an extra bonus. It’s something I enjoy doing, but I’m also tired of recording companies that record people who either don’t have the nerve, or are not able to do it on stage. I’m a firm believer that I wouldn’t record anything that I wouldn’t be willing to do on stage, because I don’t think that’s honest, and unfortunately, I’m honest. In this business, it is sometimes a rare commodity. Once I told Giulini that my career was either thirty years too late, or thirty years too early because of the different things that were happening. The first thing he said to me — and he said it very often — was, “My dear, you’re very special! Sing as little as possible for as much money as you can get!” [Much laughter] I try to live by that. It’s good sound philosophy.

BD:   Good business sense, too!

Sweet:   Right.

BD:   Thank you for spending some time with me.

Sweet:   Oh, you’re welcome.

See my interviews with Vesselina Kasarova, Brigitte Fassbaender, Richard Leech, and Siegmund(!) Nimsgern

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See my interviews with Paul Plishka

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This conversation was recorded at her hotel near the Ravinia Festival on July 20, 1995. Portions were broadcast on WNIB a few week later. This transcription was made in 2025, and posted on this website at that time. My thanks to British soprano Una Barry for her help in preparing this website presentation.

To see a full list (with links) of interviews which have been transcribed and posted on this website, click here. To read my thoughts on editing these interviews for print, as well as a few other interesting observations, click here.

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Award - winning broadcaster Bruce Duffie was with WNIB, Classical 97 in Chicago from 1975 until its final moment as a classical station in February of 2001. His interviews have also appeared in various magazines and journals since 1980, and he continued his broadcast series on WNUR-FM, as well as on Contemporary Classical Internet Radio.

You are invited to visit his website for more information about his work, including selected transcripts of other interviews, plus a full list of his guests. He would also like to call your attention to the photos and information about his grandfather, who was a pioneer in the automotive field more than a century ago. You may also send him E-Mail with comments, questions and suggestions.