The article to which you link states that "Music critic Norman Lebrecht, who knew Boulez personally, speculated that he was gay, citing the fact that for many years he shared his home in Baden-Baden with Hans Messmer, whom he sometimes referred to as his valet". On that basis, Mr Lebrecht merely "speculated" on the matter, which quite different to his claiming" that Boulez was "gay"; although he supposedly knew Boulez personally, he appears not to have done so well enough to be able to do other than "speculate" on this. He doesn't mention the word "homosexualist". All that said, Boulez's sexuality and sexual inclination/s were/are no one else's business and matter/ed to no one other than Boulez himself and his partner/s in any case!
I did not doubt that Boulez stated as he did about opera when he was young; I was already well aware of his remarks on that subject. The mere fact of his having made them does not lend them credibility and it shold in any case be remembered that not only did he go on to conduct in some of the world's great opera houses but he also contemplated writing an opera himself at various times during his last half century or so (although, like a number of his other projects, this came to nought).
I will refrain from comment on Stocken's article to which you link other than to note that it is not entirely free from misjudgements and factual miunderstandings; I am certainly not about to compare his writings with anyone else's, including ex-members of this forum. What if anything you mean by whether or not Stocken is "known" escapes me; if you want to find out more, just look him up! Are
you "known"?...
I note that, in your post above, you have carefully ignored my comments in response to yours about the female voice. In that response, I carelessly omitted from my shortlist of composers such vocal luminaries as Donizetti, Bellini, Verdi, Wagner and Puccini, although my point was that almost
all composers have almost always written at one time or another - and indeed still do write - for the female voice; why indeed would they not?
What does your comment say for the great - and wide variety of - female voices of the present and past, from Bahr-Mildenburg through Flagstad, Turner, Ferrier, della Casa, Baker, Nilsson, Popp, Manning, Norman and Lott to Fleming, Leonard, Booth, Stemme, Dessay, Bartoli and hundreds upon hundreds of other notable names? Do you take some kind of puerile quasi-sadistic pleasure in dispensing such gross and gravely unfounded blanket insults despite their inevitable destiny of falling flat on their own faces by reason of their pleonastic absurdity?
I should also have questioned why you sought to attribute lack of musicality to the female
voice in particular - and
all female voices, for goodness' sake! - when you have not done the same for women conductors, composers, instrumentalists, musicologists, music lecturers, music teachers, music librarians or those who practice in any other branch of professional musical activity. If you do indeed single out singers thus, in what specific ways, on what grounds and with what proof would you seek to distinguish them and their skills (or alleged absence thereof) from those of other female musical practitioners? If, on the other hand, you believe that women have no place whatsoever in any branch of musical activity, so be it although, in so doing, you would be making an utter mockery and laughing-stockery of yourself which, of course, it is your sole prerogative to do should you so choose.
Lastly, I note my careless omission to request that you provide evidence that the respective beliefs of Mahler, Strauss and Boulez in the female voice "destroyed the careers of all three of them"; this inexplicable assertion must surely be no more than a figment of your own uniquely bizarre imagination, though why it is so is quite beyond me.
Mahler was one of the most widely respected conductors of his time and, although his symphonies (other than the Eighth) were arguably not all as greatly admired during his own lifetime as they have become since, no sensible claim that his career was "destroyed" by anything other than the ill-health that took him from us at the age of 50 could possibly be made.
Strauss enjoyed immense international successes as a composer, conductor and occasionally pianist during his lifetime and even the régime that reared its ugly head during the 1930s in his country fortunately did little to compromise this.
Likewise, Boulez's career - again, like those of Mahler and Strauss, as conductor and composer - was not compromised by anything except, perhaps, his difficulties in finishing works; he was also by all accounts a considerable pianist and could, had he so chosen, developed a successful career as one.
So, in sum, then, whilst it is hard to determine which of your two statements - that Mahler, Strauss and Boulez committed a "common error" (how patronisingly disrespectful to their respective memories is that?) or that the female voice cannot be musical - is the more incredible, the mere fact of them appearing in a single post in a forum whose principal topic is music frankly beggars belief! As I admit to having committed the self-same "common error" on more than one occasion (which places me in a great deal of exceptionally good company!), it would seem clear that my time is up and my career has already likewise long since self-destructed. Ah, well...
