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To witness the success of Mexican tenor Ramón Vargas in Munich's Opera Festival 2010, singing the main role in Verdi's "Don Carlo" was a wonderful experience. The audience's response to the whole cast was enthusiastic and the final curtain applause lasted almost 10 minutes. With more than 25 years of an international career on stage, Vargas is still going strong in roles as Don Carlo and is still busy learning new roles which he sang last year, such as Foresto in "Attila" at the MET, Giasone in "Medea in Corinto" in Munich and this year he debuts the role of Gabriele Adorno in "Simon Boccanegra" at the MET.
It was after the first performance of this "Don Carlo" in Munich that I had the chance to interview Mr. Vargas and we talked about his career, his upcoming new roles and his vision of the world of singing nowadays.

Mr. Vargas, we want to congratulate you for this huge success in such a demanding and long role as Verdi's "Don Carlo". You've sung both versions of this opera, the French one and the Italian. Which are the differences for you when you sing either of the two versions? Which one do you prefer, the four act one or the five act one?
Thanks for your congratulations! Well, I've sung the role of Don Carlo in Washington, Houston, Viena (several times), in Japan with La Scala on Tour and now in Munich. It is a role that I've been singing a lot lately. I do think that this opera was conceived to be sung in French. Verdi thought about it while composing the music in such a style an also because of the musical language of the text. The Italian language is very dramatic, French is softer and you can make more elegant phrasing when you sing in it. The voice gets less tired if you sing it in French, even if you do the five act version. To sing it in Italian is also amazing because this opera is nevertheless beautiful, but that is how I feel when I sing it in those two languages.

How have you felt this production in the Bayerische Staatsoper, which is a bit closed, claustrophobic, dark but a bit more traditional than the one you did in Vienna with a very talked-about production by Peter Konwitschny?
I like very much the conception of this production by Jürgen Rose. The character of "Don Carlo" is much better conceived and I enjoy very much that we included the extra music of the confrontation between Carlo and Filippo II after Rodrigo's death. There is the first version of the "Lacrimosa" that Verdi would use later on in his REQUIEM. It gives the main character another dimension because, sometimes, he is punished a lot in the opera by being portrayed as weak. He does sing a lot and in some stagings, there is not a lot going on with him in terms of an evolution. With Rose's concept, there is a change in him, a journey from being a young boy in love to becoming a full grown up prince. You feel this transformation in the last duet of the fifth act. He has matured, he overcomes the fear he had of his father, which is a very common subject in Verdi operas such as "Luisa Miller" or "La Traviata". Thanks to the scene of the confrontation, his personality evolves.

What do you think happens to Don Carlo at the end of the opera? For many people, the end is never clear enough and we don't really know what happened to this character. It all depends on the stage director.
I think that at the end, his grandfather Charles V protects him to save Carlo from his father's rage. The real fact is that the real Don Carlo died very young but under other circumstances.

Speaking of the other French roles that you've sung and that you are now also including, in January 2010 you made your first performance of the role of Des Grieux in Massenet's "Manon" in Vienna with Diana Damrau as the title role. How did you feel this new role?
I've been interested in singing this role for a very long time but there was always something that postponed the opportunity of doing it. Two years ago, I was going to sing it at the MET with Anna Netrebko but it was cancelled because of her pregnancy and changed into "La Bohéme". Times went by and I had the chance of singing it in Vienna in a lovely production with Diana. She is such an amazing Manon and it was great singing it with her.

The first time you sang the role of Des Grieux, in fact, was in the Opening Night of 2008 at the MET with Renée Fleming but you only sang the aria "Ah, fuyéz" and the St. Sulpice duet. Was it then when you thought it was time to do it?
Well, it is a very long role and it is one of the things that makes it difficult to sing. That act that I sang at the MET is the most exciting scene for the tenor but not the most difficult part. It is longer than Puccini's Des Grieux in "Manon Lescaut", which so often tends to destroy some tenor voices.

Would you sing it again in the near future?
Yes, maybe in Vienna. I really want to sing it again.

Another French role that you have added to your repertory recently is Faust from Berlioz's "La Damnation de Faust", which you've sung in Vienna, Mexico and NY. What do you think of this role?
It is a pity that this opera is not so often performed. I had a big success at the MET with it in the marvelous production of Robert Lapage. When I sang it in Mexico, it is always difficult to sing because there are a lot of things that can alter your way of singing, such as the altitud, for example. The role of Faust in this Berlioz opera really needs three tenors: a very lyric one for the first act, one with very good center in his voice for the second act and a dramatic almost baritonal one for the last act. You have to prepare this role very well. The music is so beautiful that it was worth the work and I enjoyed singing it in Mexico because many people got to know it. The orchestra and the chorus of Bellas Artes where fantastic in those performances, by the way.

This has been a year of many new roles for you: Des Grieux, Giasone, Gabriele Adorno at the MET in January 2011, but you have also brought back to your repertory Don Ottavio in "Don Giovanni"not long ago. Why did you get back to Mozart?
Well, I like Mozart a lot; he wrote a lot of many interesting operas, not only in a musical way but also very special in its theatrical style. That said, not all his operas are of my taste. "Don Giovanni" is the one I like most and I enjoy "Le Nozze di Figaro" a lot.
It's not easy to sing Mozart although there are a lot of people who think so. In my opinion, he was not very good writing for the voice. He composed many difficult things for the voice and he was not an expert vocalist as was Rossini, who wrote with lots of vocal logic. I don't mean that Mozart wrote in a wrong way, not at all! I just think he wrote for the voice as if he was writing for a musical instrument.
Speaking of my return to singing Ottavio in London, I've sung it quite a lot in my career. I also sung other Mozart roles in Mexico: Tamino in "Die Zauberflöte" in 1989, when I had just returned from my two years stay in Europe, and the title role in "La Clemenza di Tito" a couple of years later.

We have to talk also of your fabulous "Idomeneo" in the Salzburg Festival in 2006 in the season that celebrated Mozart's bicentenary. What can you tell us about your participation in this production?
It was done by the Hermann couple; he was a great scenic and costume designer. They both found the formula to make a fabulous production. To be doing this opera in the year of Mozart's bicentenary was very special for me. I felt that this performance was an innovation in the way of performing this piece. With it, Mozart got away from his father's power and he did some interesting musical experiments that will give us a hint of what would come in the Romanticism. He composed many beautiful musical moments in this "Idomeneo".

You sang the role again in Paris with another superb cast such as Joyce Didonato as Idamante and Camila Tilling as Ilia.
Yes, it is a role that I would like to keep in my repertory for a long time and adapt it to my age. I feel very happy because I've been singing for almost 30 years and I'm still going strong, people appreciate my work and that gives me a lot of pride, to be able to still be there, no matter who is "en vogue" for a short time.

What can you tell us about the role of Giasone in Mayr's less known opera "Medea in Corinto"?
It was a wonderful idea from the Bayerische Staatsoper to stage this opera. Mayr was a Bavarian composer and he was Donizetti's protector. He discovered him when he was young and helped him a lot.Thanks to Mayr, we have a great composer such as Donizetti. Mayr's "Medea in Corinto", which I consider to be a good opera, would never be part of the standard repertory but it has indeed very nice music to sing.The style sounds sometimes like Rossini, Donizetti, then some bits like Mozart, it might sound also like Haydn and even to Gluck! Mayr was in the middle of the change from the classicism to the early XIX century so he was like a musical bridge. This opera has lovely moments for my character, Giasone, such as his duet with Medea. It is like looking at a bullfight, you have to wait to see the good moments that will jump immediately to your ear.
In Munich, we did a very strange production by stage director Neuenfels, who I consider to be a provocative director to whom they allow to scandalize with his stagings. He is a very intelligent person and very charming but I didn't his vision of this opera. It is ok to do innovations in stagings because opera has to be renewed in its way of being performed. In the "Don Carlo" that we spoke about, also from Munich, the staging was minimalist and you could concentrate in the characters more. It is good to modernize stagings as long as you don't make a concept that contradicts what you listen in the music. I don't like seeing violence on stage or things that will provoke.

Speaking of your new Verdi role, Gabriele Adorno,  is it the first time you sing this role?
Yes it is my first time. My voice has come close to that kind of repertory. There are so many types of operas by Verdi that go from the belcanto style to the more dramatic ones, like "Otello". At the beginning of 2010 I sang Foresto at the MET conducted by Riccardo Muti and now, it's the time to sing Gabriele Adorno.
I always listen to my voice; after a rehearsal or a performance, if I feel that something went wrong with my voice I think about continuing singing that role. There were certain roles I stopped singing for a couple of years because of this such as Rodolfo in "La Bohéme", which I sang in Mexico in the 90s and then stopped singing it until I felt it was good for my voice. In that time, I still sang lots of belcanto roles that were very "leggeros" and I felt I shouldn't be taking such a big step without first feeling it good. Later on I came back to it and I feel it comfortable now.
There was as singing teacher that said to me: why do you want to do a long career? Better to do a short one of just three or four years but very intense. I, of course, did not and do not agree with this.

Continuing with Verdi, you did a recording of the "Requiem" conducted by Semyon Bychkov. How often do you sing sacred music and do you like it?
Well, I don't receive a lot of offers to sing it but I love to do it. I like this kind of music very much. Speaking of the recording industry, it is hard to do lots of CDs nowadays. It is the fault of the recording companies that don't have so much money to produce a lot and also because of their desire to do false idols. They create "wash-and-wear" singers and sell them as megastars in the way of pop singers. It is a legacy that has been there, for better or worse, since the famous "Three Tenors". It is a wrong way of chosing what to record and how to promote it.

Speaking of the Live in HD MET cinema transmisions, you've appeared in three of them: "Eugene Onegin", "La Bohéme" and the 2008 Opening Night Gala with Renée Fleming. What is your opinion of this way of making opera more approachable to people?
I like it very much because, although it is cinema, it still maintains its theatricality and it is a live transmision. Of course, there is the risk of what might happen on stage in a live performance but that is part of the charm of it. Nowadays we live in a time where there is a lot of pressure for the opera singers. Anyone can make a recording of your performance and then upload it on the internet. This causes a lot of conflicts for us, the singers, because the people that do that will record you and put it on the web, no matter how you sang. If you didn't sing well one day because you were sick or you were not feeling well, they put it online nevertheless. What is good about the MET's transmisions is that everything is well planned.
What would be nice is that all the people who go to the cinemas to see those operas, will go also to see it in the theaters. In Mexico, for example, we have our beautiful Teatro de Bellas Artes with an amazing accoustic. Attending opera there is great because you aslo have the chance of listening and seeing a performance in the best of ways from wherever you sit.

Can you tell us something about your future plans?
Of course! Well, apart from singing Gabriele Adorno at the MET, I will be singing Werther in San Francisco, Giasone in Munich again and there are plans to sing at La Scala, maybe "Les Contes D'Hoffman" which I have just sang once at the MET in 2004. I have also plans of singing Faust in Boito's "Mefistofeles".

(By the time this interview is published, Mr. Vargas would have already sung Werther in San Francisco, Giasone in Munich for the second time and Garbiele Adorno at the MET).

Thanks for the interview, Mr. Vargas.
Thanks to you!

Ingrid Haas