298:– one with full orchestra and one with piano accompaniment. In his prime Talvela made a shattering impact not only on the opera stage but also as an ardent interpreter of Lieder. After a recital given by Talvela and Ralf Gothoni in London's Royal Festival Hall in July 1974 (which included Brahms' Vier Ernste Gesänge), a critic with the Financial Times likened Talvela's appearance to an Old Testament prophet and his voice to granite, describing how this Finnish bass giant captivated his audience with thunderstorms, prayers and invocations. Referring to the same recital, the respected critic John Steane wrote, "For at least one member of the audience on that occasion the great and irreplaceable feature of the recital was the sheer magnificence of voice."
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Talvela possessed a "voice of immense size and wide range" and was able to bring to his roles a combination of both "grandeur and gentleness". A large man, 6 feet 8 inches (203 cm) tall and weighing nearly 300 pounds (140 kg), he was a fine vocal actor who brought an air of
353:, Eastern Finland, while continuing his official career as an opera singer. His health had begun to decline in 1975, when he was diagnosed with diabetes and gout. In 1982 alone, he suffered two heart attacks at the Metropolitan Opera. Stomach problems also plagued him at times in the 1980s.
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During the last eight years of his life (1981–1989), he worked as a farmer on the Inkilänhovi (Inkilä manor) farm in
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As his final record he left, terribly thinned out by illness, a warm and heartfelt version of
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Hannu-Ilari
Lampila from the Ondine CD "A Tribute to Martti Talvela 1935-1989" ODE 945-2 1999
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Talvela died of a heart attack at age 54 while dancing at his daughter's wedding in Juva.
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In 1973 he received the Pro
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in Sweden from 1961 to 1962, before becoming a regularly employed singer at the
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and, in the later part of his career, the title character in Glinka's
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He can be seen performing on video as Boris
Godunov, as Sarastro, as
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Martti
Talvela, 54, Imposing Bass Regarded as Peerless in 'Godunov'
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dignity to his roles, even to pure-evil roles like Hagen and the
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Originally
Talvela was educated as a primary school teacher in
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John Steane Martti
Talvela: The Singers Decca 467 903-2 2001
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of Berlin in 1962, the same year as his debut at
Bayreuth.
506:"Suomen Leijonan Pro Finlandia -mitalin saajat 1945-2015"
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between 1974–1987, and as Pimen from the same work, as
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383:, nytimes.com, 24 June 1989; accessed 7 June 2014.
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488:"Martti Talvela (Bass) – Short Biography"
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444:Songs and Dances of Death.
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41:Background information
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163:in 1960 as
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365:References
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357:Death
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457:Lied
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