Opera at the Super Bowl

There may seem nothing so unlikely as opera and football, but tomorrow, they will come together in what I can imagine is only going to be ... too amazing for words.

This year is the first year ever that the National Anthem will be sung by an opera singer at the Super Bowl.  This will be the debut of the opera at the Super Bowl, and I have to admit that I'm more than a little excited.

I grew up thinking I was going to be an opera star.  That, of course, didn't happen, but on my journey in music, I fell in love with an opera singer by the name of Renée Fleming.  I saw her perform on a PBS special one night--and after that, I simply had to see her.  So, my parents obliged, and I got to see Ms. Fleming at the Houston Grand Opera in a role that, to me, was simply amazing-- Dvořák's Rusalka.

The most interesting part about this role was that she sang it in its native language, Czech--which was a challenging endeavor.  Her performance of that role, however, opened the door for me to all of the other languages that songs could be sung in.  Not only were there the staples of French, German, and Italian, but there were all these other beautiful languages that composers had written in.  I was privileged to sing some Czechoslovakian folk songs many, many years later, and I have a strong belief that it is our folk songs that hold the power to convey the ideas and beliefs of a people and its culture.  And therefor they are important to preserve and to continue to create and sing.

But let's get back to Ms. Fleming.  I could go on for days about how amazing her voice is, but I'd rather just share it with you.  So here is a clip I found from September of last year on the David Letterman show.


Her ability to have fun with music is something that has made me fall in love with her all over again.  You see, when I sat down to write this, I was looking at many of her pictures and thinking to myself, "Wow...she seems to really have become a prima donna."  But as I began to do more and more research, I realized why I had loved her so much when I was younger.  She is talented, works hard, and she really, really loves making music.  As a testament to that, she has won four Grammy awards for her work, and George Solti even honored her with his own award, the first of its kind to be given to anyone, the  "Solti Prize", an award given to an outstanding younger singer, and given by the "Académie du disque lyrique" in a ceremony equivalent to the Grammy Awards.  You might also have heard her singing in Howard Shore's music for The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.  How cool is that?

There's an amazing article by Zachary Woolfe that you should read if you want to know more about opera, Renée, and how (and why) an opera singer got chosen to sing at this year's Super Bowl.  It's really very insightful, and I wish that I could write half as well as he does.

And here is Ms. Fleming speaking about her engagement for tomorrow, and just the way she talks about it makes me ten times more excited to see this.


And I'll leave you with one last video of Ms. Fleming in which she showcases her desire and willingness to embrace technology and to share the beauty and wonder of music with the world.


If you'd like to find out more about Renée Fleming, please click on the picture below to visit her site.