Until the fat lady sings

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I've heard it many times.

It ain't over until the fat lady sings.

Now I'm wondering where that phrase comes from.
My best bet is that it has to do with the closing act of an opera. Was there a tradition that the (traditionally fat) diva of the show would sing the last number?

Does anyone know for sure?

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All I know was that in the past, many great opera stars were very big women. (Wagnerian sopranos especially). It is only in the last few decades, that we have seen opera stars that are of slender to medium builds.

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Quote:

The reference is to the last act of an opera, in which the heroine often appears to deliver her final, show-stopping piece. Opera singers are popularly imagined to be endowed with figures as full as their voices, giving rise to a universal image of an overweight soprano brandishing a spear and wearing a Viking helmet.

http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Article1577.html

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Thanks.

And with that the fat lady sang... Smile

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Why were all the opera singers fat then? How does that make their voices better - I'm curious now. Any one know?

x

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DP--

Folk wisdom: A big voice needs a big body.

Besides, in those days "a fine figure of a woman" meant that a diva standing 5'3" in her stocking feet could weigh 140-150 pounds without being considered plump.

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This is what I have in mind when I hear that cyracuz:

http://www.zenwaiter.com/photos/indexnew/fat%20lady%20sings.jpg

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Noddy24 wrote:

DP--

Folk wisdom: A big voice needs a big body.

Besides, in those days "a fine figure of a woman" meant that a diva standing 5'3" in her stocking feet could weigh 140-150 pounds without being considered plump.

so there's no physical reason for it?

x

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It was once believed that a full figure meant a strong diaphragm, and that a strong diaphragm meant a really out-of-this-world voice.

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Also, opera singers are susceptable to the High Life.

Look at the number of portly tenors in the world.

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Well, tomorrow is new year's eve, and I'm gonna find myself a fat lady to sing with. Then at the stroke of midnigt we'll kiss goodbye, and I'll lose myself dancing the beginning of next year's opera. Cool

Happy new year!!

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Cyracuz--

Better an opera than a soap opera.

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Depends

If you put on a soap opera I can't sleep...

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I have heard it said that women who sing like birds eat like horses - and vice versa.

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You mean they eat like birds and sing like horses?

So it's either your ears or your wallet... :wink:

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Today's opera singers are all in good shape, the myth about a huge body is no more. There is even a baritone who was a thalidomide baby and has overcome his 'handicap'. He has one of the most remarkable voices.
.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Quasthoff

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On of the greatest opera voices of norway comes from a man as thin as a reed. He dressed up in a skeleton suit once, and it just made sense. Not the voice, his girth...

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A skeleton suit? Was he in a production of Ligeti's Le Grand Macabre?

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No, he did a comedy act as a member of a group called Prima Vera, as I recall it. Very basic humor that has never really appealed to me.
His name is Jan Teigen, but I am not sure he is know beyond the borders of norway.

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noinipo wrote:

Today's opera singers are all in good shape, the myth about a huge body is no more.

Well, that's hardly true. Just one look at Jane Eaglen would convince you of that. But it is true that the average opera singer is more physically fit now than in the past. For instance, Deborah Voigt, a world-class soprano, was fired by Covent Garden for being too fat to fit into her costume of Ariadne in Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos. She later underwent gastric bypass surgery and lost over 125 lbs.

Once the old generation of voice teachers, who claimed that added pounds meant added vocal heft, had passed, it was inevitable that singers would adapt to a lifestyle more like that of non-singers.

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Until the fat lady sings

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