Hi, my name is Linda Grace, the author of this website. I'm a mezzo-soprano singer, and I couldn't find a website that was especially helpful for mezzos, so I took the plunge and decided to produce this one myself. It's proving to be a very exciting project, though the work itself is quite time-consuming! Scores which have to be turned into sound-files take the longest to produce, as they are not just simple reproductions. The OCR scanner frequently makes a mess of all but the simplest scores, and then each note and expression mark must be checked against the original. One page can take up to an hour to produce and edit!

So your patience is requested, but I am making steady progress, and if you check in once a month or so you should find new goodies and different freebies at each visit.

Hear me sing

 

 

Visit the Mezzo Heaven guestbook and forums

  

Welcome to Mezzo Heaven

Whether we are experienced Mezzo-Sopranos, students or beginners, we are all looking for great new repertoire for auditions, recitals, music festivals, competitions etc. But choosing it isn't that easy. How do we know:

  • What songs will suit us best?
  • Where to get songs transposed if the original key is too high? If you love a song and it suits your voice, it is frustrating to have to sing it in a key which does not show off your voice at its best.
  • Where to find more unusual repertoire? Compilation books often duplicate each other with a limited repertoire. Much mezzo repertoire has fallen out of print and badly needs to be revived.
  • When faced with an unfamiliar score, especially if there is no available recording, how can we hear it to decide if we want to learn that piece?

It is possible to find sheet music online, but first the mezzo soloist has to spend hours looking for it, then having to extract the vocal music, and then eliminate all the songs for ensembles, male voices and sopranos!

Mezzo Heaven is a brand new site launched on November 3rd 2006. Using the tools of the computer age, we aim to provide a one-stop site where you can find a large selection of sheet music for the medium female voice. Our scores are in the form of pdf files which can be downloaded and printed. We have also searched for mezzo songbooks, and recordings on CD, and offer an extensive selection of links to online bookstores, which take you directly to the pages you need.

Where recordings are not available, we will convert our scores into electronic sound-files which you can play online, so it will be possible to hear a piece before you buy.

Mezzo Heaven music sources and legal issues

As we know, it is illegal to duplicate copyrighted material and publish it on the internet. Mezzo-Heaven does not do this. We buy and copy antiquarian music scores which are out of copyright, and make these scores available to you online. The fees we charge are barely enough to cover the cost of the time, expense and work involved, so please do help out if you can by buying them and ordering your CDs and songbooks through Mezzo Heaven. You won't pay any extra, but we will earn a little commission which we can use to keep down the prices of our downloads.

You are licensed to print out copies for your own use, of scores purchased on Mezzo Heaven. The music itself is in the public domain, but Mezzo Heaven owns the graphic rights to the scores on our site.

Future plans

Mezzo Heaven will continue to develop as we work on it. The development of the site is in two stages. First come the pdf files. These are straightforward scans of a song or aria. Once you have downloaded a pdf you can print out the song using Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is pre-installed on most computers or can be downloaded free of charge from the internet. All our scores are in keys suitable for mezzos, and every month two new scores will be available for free download.

Starting with the songs where no current recording is available, we will gradually convert the pdfs to electronic soundfiles which can be instantly played on the site to help you select new repertoire. This is quite a labour-intensive task, so your patience is appreciated!

Please do visit the site once a month or so to see what new things have been added.

Guest book and Directories

There is also a Forum and Guest book on the site, where you can say Hi, leave feedback or requests, and exchange questions with other mezzos. Both mezzo singers and teachers can also have their details entered in the online directories.

Mezzo Songbooks currently in print

These can also be ordered through Mezzo Heaven. We have searched the extensive online catalogue of Sheet Music Plus to find aria- and songbooks currently in print with mezzo repertoire. Nowadays many of these books come with accompaniments on CD.

Or browse vocal sheet music at Musicroom.com UK

This recommended site has a handy browse feature split into different vocal categories.

For items currently under copyright I highly recommend Sheet Music Plus because it has much sheet music not found elsewhere. Their service to the UK is cheap, speedy and, in my experience, reliable.

This month's free downloads

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Mezzo-Soprano

A mezzo-soprano (meaning "half soprano" in Italian) is a female singer with a range usually extending from the A below middle C to the A two octaves above (A3-A5). Mezzo-sopranos generally have a darker (or richer) vocal tone than sopranos, and their voice type sits between the soprano and the contralto. Mezzo-sopranos typically sing supporting roles in operas, with Bizet's Carmen and Dalila (in Saint-Saens' Samson et Dalila) as the most notable exceptions. Typical operatic roles for mezzos include "witches, bitches, and breeches". Witches are the old hags, nurses and wise women, such as Azucena and Ulrica; breeches are male roles sung by female singers, such as Rinaldo and Cherubino; and bitches are villains and seducers, such as Amneris or Eboli.

Some roles designated for soubrette sopranos may also be sung by mezzo-sopranos. This gives the roles a fuller and more dramatic quality. Such roles include Despina in Cosė fan tutte and Zerlina in Don Giovanni. Some roles designated for dramatic sopranos walk a fine line between soprano and mezzo territory. Mezzos quite often play Santuzza in Cavalleria Rusticana, Lady Macbeth in Verdi's Macbeth, and even Isolde in Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. These examples suggest that the line between soprano and mezzo soprano is not clearly defined.

Adapted from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Some famous Mezzos

Janet Baker

Cecilia Bartoli

Kathleen Ferrier

Marilyn Horne

Anne-Sofie von Otter

Frederica von Stade