Soprano Melissa Shippen is coached by Fedora Barbieri at a master class in October. Photo by Nan Melville

Pick up a review of a recent opera performance or recording and you will read that national schools of singing no longer exist. You will read nostalgic accounts of the days when Italian singers really understood verismo, or when French singers were masters of the subtle alchemy that connects the French language with the French mélodie. Luckily, these traditions are still alive: Two of their most prominent practitioners—José Van Dam and Fedora Barbieri—visited Juilliard in October.

José Van Dam visits New York relatively infrequently now, but each visit is marked by a great sense of occasion. On this trip he flanked his Juilliard class with two rapturously received recitals at Alice Tully Hall: the first a haunted, unforgettable journey through Schubert's Winterreise, the second a traversal of the lesser-known Kerner songs of Schumann followed by a highly personal performance of Schumann's Dichterliebe. For those of us lucky enough to have been operagoers in the '70s and '80s, Van Dam was a regular and treasured visitor to the Met, offering definitive performances of a wide repertoire including Debussy's Golaud, Wozzeck, the Hoffman villains, and Wagner's Flying Dutchman.

In his class on October 25 the repertoire was French mélodie. Songs by Fauré, Poulenc, Ibert, Duparc, and Chausson were sung by Daniel Gross, Susanna Phillips, Benjamin Sosland, and Camille Zamora along with three pianists from the collaborative piano department. These singers represented all programs of vocal study at Juilliard, from the undergraduate level to the pre-professional Juilliard Opera Center. Some of the songs selected have been signature pieces of Van Dam's throughout his decades of recital singing.

And it showed. His intimate grasp of the musical and linguistic nuances of these exquisite songs manifested itself in every remark. His teaching was detailed, highly focused, and almost entirely derived from his profound knowledge of the poetry. He demanded that the colors of the words be expressed through the consonants, not just the vowels, and suggested subtle shapings of the musical line that would allow the text to come through as a blending of speech and song.

In the lyrical romantic repertoire (Duparc's "Chanson Triste" and Fauré's "Sylvie"), Van Dam emphasized the romantic ardor of the text and found subtle ways, through highlighting key words and using a gentle rhythmic freedom, to suggest that the singers were speaking from the heart to the heart. In Poulenc's "Chanson d'Orkenise," Van Dam found in the poet Apollinaire's wacky Surrealism a level of vocal and physical comedy. Bass-baritone Daniel Gross offered that last song of Ibert's, "Don Quichotte à Dulcinée," a signature work of Van Dam's throughout his career.

Tenor Benjamin Sosland (with collaborative pianist Yasuko Oura) was among the young artists who had the chance to benefit from the recent master class by José Van Dam, whose visits to Juilliard confirmed the vitality and nuance of old-school European vocal traditions. Photo by Nan Melville

Here the teaching took on a more personal element as teacher and student sang phrases in alternation, working on fine points of text and vocal color. Van Dam's theatrical gifts came to the fore, reminding us that we were hearing not only one of the world's great recitalists, but an artist who had embodied characters as diverse as Golaud, the Hoffman villains, and Messaien's St. Francis. Although his stage deportment in recital is almost ascetic in its stillness, the face and the voice express infinite dramatic shadings. His ability to help young singers bring these subtleties to life was a gift to them and the many singers who attended, as well as proof positive that the tradition of French mélodie lives on.

Fedora Barbieri's class, less than a week later, was a study in contrasts. This legendary mezzo is known to most American audiences through her many recordings—many of them decades old and, as such, a precious point of contact with that fertile period when many verismo operas were still being written and Italy was the home of a vibrant and passionate musical culture. Born in Trieste in 1920, Barbieri began her career in Italy with repertoire ranging from Monteverdi to world premieres. Her career later focused on the major Verdi roles at La Scala and the Metropolitan. The stellar roster of conductors with whom she sang—Toscanini, Furtwängler, Serafin, Reiner-is rivaled only by her extraordinary roster of vocal colleagues, including Callas, Gigli, Tebaldi, Di Stefano, and Gobbi. With Juilliard's Corradina Caporello providing expert translation and Speranza Scappucci giving expert support at the piano, Barbieri offered strong opinions on voice production and repertoire.

Her own voice rock-solid at age 82, her advice to most of the singers concentrated on technical matters of vowel placement and position, with constant reference to the keystone of her approach: "il fiato," the breath. Sopranos Maria Jooste and Melissa Shippen, as well as mezzos Hyun-Jee Kim, Erin Smith, and Alison Tupay, offered a feast of Italian repertoire. Many of them were treated to an impromptu sing-along when Madame Barbieri, whose energy surpasses that of many Juilliard undergraduates, could not contain her passion for singing. (Apropos of stamina, she reminded us that she once sang a performance of the Verdi Requiem with Toscanini at 5 p.m., capping off the evening with a Met performance of Trovatore with the likes of Zinka Milanov.)

The clarity and energy of her singing were remarkable in themselves, and proof positive that a lifelong reliance on the correct employment of "il fiato" could produce wonders. A lifetime of experience also spoke in her brief remarks on choosing repertoire, which could be summarized briefly as "not too much, too soon." She had particular words of caution about the role of Carmen, remarking that it should be studied "two pages at a time," echoing Callas's observation that Verdi's Violetta should be studied "one page at a time."

Both of these classes were part of an ongoing series of classes named in honor of the great mezzo-soprano Jennie Tourel. Tourel's artistry was characterized by a fertile musical and theatrical imagination, as well as an uncanny ability to shift gears from language to language and style to style. A member of the Juilliard faculty from 1963 to 1973, Madame Tourel's legacy was indeed honored by the presence of these two great artists who, each in their own way, are living proof that national styles of singing do exist and can be powerfully and persuasively passed on to the next generation.

Brian Zeger is director of vocal performance activities.