Deliberately Bad Music?
“[For the opera scene in Citizen Kane] we needed something that would terrify the girl and put the audience a bit in suspense. I wrote the aria in a very high key which would make most performances sound strained. Then we got a very light lyric soprano and made her sing this heavy dramatic soprano part with a very heavy orchestration which created the feeling that she was in quicksand. Later on, that aria was sung many times by Eileen Farrell, who had the voice to sing it absolutely in that key, and it sounded very impressive. Some writers have said that the singer in the film performed it deliberately badly, but that’s not so. She was a good singer performing in too high a key.”
— Bernard Herrmann, interviewed for Sight & Sound magazine (Winter 1971-1972 issue)
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