Bass means low in Italian, and the word defines the lowest type of male voice. The true bass singer is a rare creature. The lowest trained voices of all belong to Russians and other Slav basses. On a good day they can produce a rich tone down to the G two and a half octaves below middle C. This represents the lowest grunt available early in the morning for most middle-aged men.
Russia has always adored the bass voice, epitomised in the dark tragedy of Boris Godunov in MussorgskyΓÇÖs opera. The Basso Profondo is the Italian equivalent, denoting a deep character in every sense, and also needing a broad, rich tonal quality throughout the range. The bass singer can be easily identified, as the tall, broad-shouldered man who always has time to philosophise. Never cast as lover or hero in opera, he represents the tragedy of wisdom, and the dark voice of doom.
As priests and rulers, their human passions repressed, basses frequently show a vicious streak.
Sarastro, the High Priest of the Temple of Wisdom in MozartΓÇÖs opera, The Magic Flute, preaches peace, forgiveness and understanding, but in a rare emotional outburst, sentences his slave Monostatos to a good foot-lashing for getting a little lusty with the heroine, Pamina.
In VerdiΓÇÖs Requiem, the bass is elected, characteristically, to make a personal approach to God thus: Confutatis maledictis, Flammis acribus addictis, Voca me cum benedictis. (When the cursed ones are confounded and sentenced to burning flames, summon me to be amongst the blessed.)
Basses are nearly always given some high notes to sing above middle C, when they momentarily reveal their repressed passions. In opera, this moment usually comes shortly before their inevitable downfall.
