Callas was unbeatable at what she did best (though it's not a competition). She wasn't too happy being made to record Puccini and all that verismo stuff (which she did amazingly well) but that was where the money was for the record producers: her talent was in bel canto, which is what we hear in this recording. I've said it elsewhere: some singers are the best at something, but no singer is the best at everything. In this repertoire, Callas is unsurpassed. Someone's going to come up with a counter example, and that will be great.
The fact that she was one of the rare few, who could execute the perfect minute interval (comma) in her voice. That slight little bump in that one note....that alone is evidence of her vocal mastery. Callas had many masteries: The comma, the trill, and most amazingly....her chromatic downscales. This aria is from, without a doubt, the most difficult opera for a Soprano to perform: Norma You ask any soprano today if she'll take on Norma, and she will almost always hesitate to answer or say "No" altogether. Because Norma is that challenging/intimidating. And Maria Callas performed it more than any soprano in history: A whopping 69 times in her career....and that's just stage performances, not counting the number of recording she made. Even now, 45 years after her death, she is still talked about and admired as the "gold standard" of operatic singing and performing. There was no one like her before, and there will be no one like her again. A soprano doesn't earn the title La Divina (The Divine) by being mediocre or playing it safe. The woman was a Soprano Sfogato. She was pure Bel Canto. She was an Assoluta. She was Opera!
Opera is a mixture of music and drama. Callas had the divine combination of a great voice and huge talent as an actress as well. She brought the full emotion out of what she sung. An amazing artist. Some find fault in her technique but I just react to the beauty of what she does.
Callas was quite large when she started. She lost a great deal of weight, and many say her voice was never the same again. I disagree. Opera singers are like anyone else, they come in all shapes and sizes. BUT, they need to be extremely fit, because singing opera is extremely taxing physically. In answer to your question re vibrato - Callas was known for a big vibrato. Again that's an individual thing.
Actually her vibrato varied. Sometimes it was quite fast. But this aria is slow and gentle. It was said by many thatCallas had 10 or 20 different voices, different timbres, colors, vibrators, etc. That said, her vibrato was generally slower in the top register.
Callas had a unique sound and her own wide vibrato that turned into a wobble late in her career. The wide vibrato adds a dramatic intensity that she was especially known for. She also had a metallic timbre that allowed her to portray big dramatic heroines. She could cut through the biggest orchestras.
Thanks for your reaction! BTW, "Callas" is pronounced as: Kal - lass. Also, you mentioned how opera singers are thought to have "bigger frames," well Callas is interesting because she had been overweight earlier in her career and famously lost weight so that at the beginning of the 1954-1955 season she had transformed her appearance. At first her colleagues didn't recognize her. Her goal I believe was to make a convincing appearance as she portrayed romantic heroines in such operas as Lucia di Lammermoor, La Sonnambula, and La Traviata.
Yes. And they started to sing correctly. Afterwards Maria Callas turned head to the right, sang another part and looked at the left side... Brillant action.
She was a spinto soprano, meaning almost the loudest of soprano voices. Voice weight classes, known as 'fach' are like the volume needed for the singer to produce as clear of a sound as they can to hit the notes with correct technique. Think the volume of Whitney Houston's voice being the same weight as Callas. This made Callas extremely versatile in lead roles she could perform which called for different weights of voice types. She could do the heavy (dramatic) voice roles and she could do the lighter (leggera) voice roles, usually but not always respectively corresponding to more mature aged characters and younger aged characters. She also had proper technique which made clearer the reverberation of sound. She also had this feature of her voice that could be compared to a violin or viola which made her voice ring with overtones and undertones almost every note she sang, easier to hear when she sings louder; whereas other sopranos sound like wind instruments, where you hear the note they sing just itself in complete clarity with very little overtones and undertones, think a flute. Side note: Callas was a little larger framed when she first started singing, but lost weight and had to retrain her voice with her new physical form. I think maybe that is why a lot of people critique her technique. Not that it was awful before or after her weight loss. Here is a favorite of mine: czcams.com/video/lxNThjjuqBk/video.htmlsi=7lyBD1vYDV4Xk5Gs Sincerely, Callas Fan đ¶đ
Opera singers treat vibrato similarly to violinists-itâs part accenting parts of a phrase and part technique. The technique part is so that they have enough air to sing long phrases over an orchestra.
I have been a stage technician in theatres for almost 3 decades. I have participated in many operas, with their respective rehearsals, but... I am not an expert. What I know is that an orchestral musician or a singer must (usually) keep everything as it is written. Some conductors make corrections to the musical sheet, but not "aggressive" changes. So, when the notes on the side say "vibrato" the singer sings with vibrato, when it says "piano" or "pianissimo" means softly or very softly, and when it says "sostenuto" (sustained) the singer simply holds the note for the indicated number of bars. It is amazing to see the conductor making corrections here and there, again and again during the rehearsals. Pure technique and discipline.
I really enjoyed your reaction! Great observations. I've been listening to her for a long time and love her. To answer your questions, if I may: 1. The 'opera singers have to be large' thing is a myth. Breath support is a matter of technique rather than of biology. BUT Callas was actually heavier when she was younger, and famously decided to binge-diet a few years before this performance. She lost around 80 pounds in under a year. Some attribute the decline of her voice to that sudden weight loss. She probably learned how to support her voice when she was heavier, and didn't learn well enough how to adjust after she became lighter. (An interesting aside is that she got quite taken in by the Audrey Hepburn Roman Holiday look around the time of this performance. You can kind of see it in how she styles her hair.) 2. The operatic ideal regarding vibrato is for it to be steady. Different singers have different speeds of vibrato, but in general it shouldn't be too fast or too slow: it should 'shimmer.' It might intensify when emotions are heightened, but in general the rate should stay constant throughout the range and at different dynamic levels, except perhaps during special effects-situations. What I think you are picking up on in this performance is that her vibrato seems to become wider on the high notes. That was a technical defect that she struggled with more and more as her career progressed: at the top, it becomes a 'wobble' rather than vibrato. She didn't have this problem earlier on. The reason why some people attribute the decline of her voice to her weight loss is because the wobble emerged around the time when she binge-dieted.
I so greatly appreciate your comment and all the info you shared. One of my favorite part about reaction videos is when I am able to learn from others via the comment section.
@@Spo-Dee-O-Dee A lot of larger voiced singers happen to have larger frames, but thatâs just a tendency. Some larger voices come in smaller frames too! The case of Christa Ludwig (great singer) wasnât a matter of the size of her body, but rather a matter of tessitura. (For Steve) Tessitura is different than range. Ludwig was a mezzo soprano. Sopranos and mezzo sopranos can actually have similar ranges, but mezzos have lower tessituras: they are more comfortable when the notes cluster a bit lower. So singing soprano roles which are higher is not advisable for them, just as singing lower mezzo roles is not advisable for sopranos. Same applies for tenors and baritones. (Ludwig only recorded the recognition scene in Elektra. She never sang that in public. But she did sing some dramatic soprano roles like Lady Macbeth, Fidelio, and the Dyerâs Wife, as well as some isolated arias and scenes like the Immolation Scene and the Liebestod.)
Opera singers, the really good ones, do indeed tend to be "larger framed individuals" - and you are hearing Callas past her prime, after she lost weight. She herself acknowledged that the weight loss influenced her very rapid vocal decline, because with a bigger frame comes more breath support. Her voice when she was thin was still impressive, but nothing like what it had been, alas.
Bear in mind in opera the voice must be projected since there are no mics and the voice must be heard on top of a whole orchestra and full choir . That is the main difference?..
Callas always had an unusual voice. The sound was quite 'bottled' and she had three distinct ranges that did not always join up very well. Having said that, she used her unusual colours, her Belcanto training and the dramatic power of her voice in a quite startling way and is rightly considered one of the greatest singers in recorded music. She lost a huge amount of weight in 1954 and thereafter her voice went into rapid decline. By the time of this video the natural vibrato that is a feature of operatic singing was turning into a wobble, especially at the top of the voice, and her highest notes were becoming more like screams. The wobble is, I think, why you are questioning her vibrato. In this clip you can hear her struggling to hang on to some notes. The following year was her last full year singing; a number of concerts and a couple of performances of Norma and Tosca left in the early 1960's. She became an unhappy recluse in Paris and died of a heart attack in 1977 aged 53.
I'd wager to say that her vocal decline was not due to her weight loss. It was more her sheer workload, powered by her tenacious professionalism which led to her early decline. She sang more by the age of 30 than most sopranos sing in an entire career. Her repertoire was one of the most vast, everything from Wagner to Bellini. She performed Norma, the most difficult role for a soprano, more than any other soprano ever....69 times (not counting the number of recordings she made of it). I believe it was after a performance of Medea in the mid-50's perhaps in Dallas, that she noticed a major problem in her voice, and it terrified her. Her co-star Giulietta Simionato summed it up quite correctly to her in the dressing room: "You've overworked yourself, and your diaphragm is suffering." That's what I believe too. She did so very much in such a short span of time. She didn't sing safely in rehearsals, always rehearsing in full voice. She gave every ounce of herself in everything she did. And she wore out the mechanism. But my God, look at all she did! Look at the legend she is to this day, nearly 50 years after her death. There will never be another Callas, as rightfully there shouldn't be!
To say Callas' voice went into "rapid decline" after 1954 suggests that the person making the statement might not be familiar with Callas' recordings made between 1954-1959. When I think of her London and Lisbon Traviata's of 1958, her RAI recitals of 1954 and 1956, her Anna Bolena (listen to the final scene, usually called the "mad scene." Likewise, listen to the final scene of "Il Pirata.") Listen to a recording of Callas singing "Lucia" "La Sonnambula," or "Norma" made during those years and decide for yourself whether or not you're listening to a voice in decline. Callas' voice lost some of the "beef" it had before the weight loss, but frankly I think she sounded better than before. Having said all that, everyone is entitled to their opinon, and after all, this the nature of art: no two people will ever agree about everything!
@@danawinsor1380 Agreed. There was a performance on November 11th 1959 at the Dallas Civic Opera house, where Callas knew the problem was a severe one. She was performing Lucia Di Lammermoor, and had missed a top E flat during the mad scene. That infuriated her, and she spent time in her dressing room hitting the note over and over again. Subsequently, she avoided the top E flats in her last performance of Lucia. That night, to her friend and companion Giovanna Lomazzi, she professed the following: "I gambled my career tonight. My career ends here tonight."
I wouldnt say "rapid decline" at all. 1955 may have been her best year ever. There were many great performances right up to the 1964 Tosca. The 1962 concerts in Hamburg are wonderful. But having a love life for the first time took her away from the spartan training that was essential for her very unusual voice. She certainly wasnt a recluse prior to breaking up with Onassis in 67-68. She said she loved her 8 years with him and that still saw each other as friends afterwards. The "heart attack" was very likely a prescription drug overdose. Di Stefano describes her undisciplined use of pills, but this was the period when many people started that, because the risks werent fully understood yet.
I just finished her biography 'Cast a Diva', one of the saddest lives I've read about. She grew up through WWII, survived fascists, Nazis, revolutionaries, and severe privations, had a mother from hell, a truly awful woman, and later pretty much died of a broken heart at 53 after her main romantic involvements with two quite appalling men in Tito Gobbi and Aristotle Onassis.
I wish you had chosen an earlier version of her singing this aria as this is a good version but by no means one of her best interpretations of the role, for instance the chorus in this version is quite sloppy and not exactly what would be up to her usual standard of accompaniment!! And the situation with Maria was that at the beginning of her career she was comparatively with her later years what they would call her bordering on morbidly obese and she completely changed herself during a summer break in the La Scala opera house program, and when I say changed herself I mean to the extent that her colleagues who were extremely close with her didnât recognise her when she came back because the change was so ridiculously profound!! I would suggest that you have a look at this (one of her very last performances in an opera)!! This is what is generally referenced as the definitive interpretation of this particular role (Tosca)!! Listen to her Berlin Lucia or Scala Lucia from the 1950âs or her Scala La Sonnabula closing aria Ah non giunge, especially the Leonard Bernstein La Scala performance, where she interpolates a diminuendo on a high e flat (she was known for doing the occasional breathtaking additions, but in general steered clear of going to far as she thought it was crass and inappropriate most of the time!!) Here, check this out: czcams.com/video/0O-mgVB50i0/video.htmlsi=Xk_mzCzzSdFPAPvK
She was fat her whole life until age 31 or so, when she simply decided to lose weight. She lost 80 pounds in a year and never regained any of it the rest of her life. Very typical of her famous willpower.
From what I've heard opera singers especially ones who are prolific may sing 5 to 6 times a week in the evening, and then go for a large meal to decompress, which isn't the best way to keep your waistline, and they don't need to commit to diet the same way as dancers, so the stereotype that opera singers have larger frame isn't completely untrue.
You'd do yourself a great service if you'd learn more about opera before reacting, perhaps your comments will be more informed and educated and less culturally deprived.
Nah⊠I donât post reaction videos so I am âperceivedâ as an expert by others; I post to allow others to witness my journey and help me along the way. đ
There are and were sopranos and then there was Maria Callas. She was in a league of her own. She was the greatest soprano that ever lived.
That of course is a subjective view. And I'm one of Callas' biggest fans. But we all have to have our loves
Callas was unbeatable at what she did best (though it's not a competition).
She wasn't too happy being made to record Puccini and all that verismo stuff (which she did amazingly well) but that was where the money was for the record producers: her talent was in bel canto, which is what we hear in this recording.
I've said it elsewhere: some singers are the best at something, but no singer is the best at everything. In this repertoire, Callas is unsurpassed. Someone's going to come up with a counter example, and that will be great.
The fact that she was one of the rare few, who could execute the perfect minute interval (comma) in her voice. That slight little bump in that one note....that alone is evidence of her vocal mastery. Callas had many masteries: The comma, the trill, and most amazingly....her chromatic downscales.
This aria is from, without a doubt, the most difficult opera for a Soprano to perform: Norma
You ask any soprano today if she'll take on Norma, and she will almost always hesitate to answer or say "No" altogether. Because Norma is that challenging/intimidating. And Maria Callas performed it more than any soprano in history: A whopping 69 times in her career....and that's just stage performances, not counting the number of recording she made. Even now, 45 years after her death, she is still talked about and admired as the "gold standard" of operatic singing and performing. There was no one like her before, and there will be no one like her again. A soprano doesn't earn the title La Divina (The Divine) by being mediocre or playing it safe.
The woman was a Soprano Sfogato.
She was pure Bel Canto.
She was an Assoluta.
She was Opera!
it took me a year fully to get it right any other a 1 month tops
Opera is a mixture of music and drama. Callas had the divine combination of a great voice and huge talent as an actress as well. She brought the full emotion out of what she sung. An amazing artist. Some find fault in her technique but I just react to the beauty of what she does.
Maria callas unika, nobody like she can to sing casta diva viva maria callasâ€â€â€â€â€â€â€â€â€â€
Callas was quite large when she started. She lost a great deal of weight, and many say her voice was never the same again. I disagree. Opera singers are like anyone else, they come in all shapes and sizes. BUT, they need to be extremely fit, because singing opera is extremely taxing physically. In answer to your question re vibrato - Callas was known for a big vibrato. Again that's an individual thing.
Actually her vibrato varied. Sometimes it was quite fast. But this aria is slow and gentle. It was said by many thatCallas had 10 or 20 different voices, different timbres, colors, vibrators, etc. That said, her vibrato was generally slower in the top register.
Callas had a unique sound and her own wide vibrato that turned into a wobble late in her career.
The wide vibrato adds a dramatic intensity that she was especially known for.
She also had a metallic timbre that allowed her to portray big dramatic heroines. She could cut through the biggest orchestras.
Thanks for your reaction! BTW, "Callas" is pronounced as: Kal - lass. Also, you mentioned how opera singers are thought to have "bigger frames," well Callas is interesting because she had been overweight earlier in her career and famously lost weight so that at the beginning of the 1954-1955 season she had transformed her appearance. At first her colleagues didn't recognize her. Her goal I believe was to make a convincing appearance as she portrayed romantic heroines in such operas as Lucia di Lammermoor, La Sonnambula, and La Traviata.
Callas is the epitomy of the hellenic spirit in the 20th ...
I love the moment where the chorus goes wrong and she cuts in with a hand gesture and pulls it all together again.
Yes. And they started to sing correctly. Afterwards Maria Callas turned head to the right, sang another part and looked at the left side... Brillant action.
She was a spinto soprano, meaning almost the loudest of soprano voices. Voice weight classes, known as 'fach' are like the volume needed for the singer to produce as clear of a sound as they can to hit the notes with correct technique. Think the volume of Whitney Houston's voice being the same weight as Callas. This made Callas extremely versatile in lead roles she could perform which called for different weights of voice types. She could do the heavy (dramatic) voice roles and she could do the lighter (leggera) voice roles, usually but not always respectively corresponding to more mature aged characters and younger aged characters. She also had proper technique which made clearer the reverberation of sound. She also had this feature of her voice that could be compared to a violin or viola which made her voice ring with overtones and undertones almost every note she sang, easier to hear when she sings louder; whereas other sopranos sound like wind instruments, where you hear the note they sing just itself in complete clarity with very little overtones and undertones, think a flute.
Side note: Callas was a little larger framed when she first started singing, but lost weight and had to retrain her voice with her new physical form. I think maybe that is why a lot of people critique her technique. Not that it was awful before or after her weight loss.
Here is a favorite of mine:
czcams.com/video/lxNThjjuqBk/video.htmlsi=7lyBD1vYDV4Xk5Gs
Sincerely,
Callas Fan
đ¶đ
MarĂa Callas is the Queen â€
probablemente la mejor voz existente
BTW, those diamonds were allegedly loaned for the performance by Cartier. Worth $1 million in 1959, so maybe $20 million today.
Hey Steve, if you want to hear the legendary power of Callas' voice, pull up the 1952 Il Suicidio.
Opera singers treat vibrato similarly to violinists-itâs part accenting parts of a phrase and part technique. The technique part is so that they have enough air to sing long phrases over an orchestra.
opera consists of arias and this is an aria from play Tosca of puccini .who i consider the most emotional composer ever to live and im a rock guy.
Bellini: Norma
It is not Tosca the opera and the author neither Puccini. This is Casta Diva from the opera Norma, and the autor is Vincenzo Bellini.
I have been a stage technician in theatres for almost 3 decades. I have participated in many operas, with their respective rehearsals, but... I am not an expert. What I know is that an orchestral musician or a singer must (usually) keep everything as it is written. Some conductors make corrections to the musical sheet, but not "aggressive" changes. So, when the notes on the side say "vibrato" the singer sings with vibrato, when it says "piano" or "pianissimo" means softly or very softly, and when it says "sostenuto" (sustained) the singer simply holds the note for the indicated number of bars. It is amazing to see the conductor making corrections here and there, again and again during the rehearsals. Pure technique and discipline.
also soprano, Brigit Nelson "Liebestod"
I really enjoyed your reaction! Great observations. I've been listening to her for a long time and love her. To answer your questions, if I may:
1. The 'opera singers have to be large' thing is a myth. Breath support is a matter of technique rather than of biology. BUT Callas was actually heavier when she was younger, and famously decided to binge-diet a few years before this performance. She lost around 80 pounds in under a year. Some attribute the decline of her voice to that sudden weight loss. She probably learned how to support her voice when she was heavier, and didn't learn well enough how to adjust after she became lighter.
(An interesting aside is that she got quite taken in by the Audrey Hepburn Roman Holiday look around the time of this performance. You can kind of see it in how she styles her hair.)
2. The operatic ideal regarding vibrato is for it to be steady. Different singers have different speeds of vibrato, but in general it shouldn't be too fast or too slow: it should 'shimmer.' It might intensify when emotions are heightened, but in general the rate should stay constant throughout the range and at different dynamic levels, except perhaps during special effects-situations. What I think you are picking up on in this performance is that her vibrato seems to become wider on the high notes. That was a technical defect that she struggled with more and more as her career progressed: at the top, it becomes a 'wobble' rather than vibrato. She didn't have this problem earlier on. The reason why some people attribute the decline of her voice to her weight loss is because the wobble emerged around the time when she binge-dieted.
I so greatly appreciate your comment and all the info you shared. One of my favorite part about reaction videos is when I am able to learn from others via the comment section.
@@Spo-Dee-O-Dee A lot of larger voiced singers happen to have larger frames, but thatâs just a tendency. Some larger voices come in smaller frames too!
The case of Christa Ludwig (great singer) wasnât a matter of the size of her body, but rather a matter of tessitura. (For Steve) Tessitura is different than range. Ludwig was a mezzo soprano. Sopranos and mezzo sopranos can actually have similar ranges, but mezzos have lower tessituras: they are more comfortable when the notes cluster a bit lower. So singing soprano roles which are higher is not advisable for them, just as singing lower mezzo roles is not advisable for sopranos. Same applies for tenors and baritones.
(Ludwig only recorded the recognition scene in Elektra. She never sang that in public. But she did sing some dramatic soprano roles like Lady Macbeth, Fidelio, and the Dyerâs Wife, as well as some isolated arias and scenes like the Immolation Scene and the Liebestod.)
Argh - never interrupt this , no one could command a stage like her âŠ
she was a soprano drammatico di coloratura
Opera singers, the really good ones, do indeed tend to be "larger framed individuals" - and you are hearing Callas past her prime, after she lost weight. She herself acknowledged that the weight loss influenced her very rapid vocal decline, because with a bigger frame comes more breath support. Her voice when she was thin was still impressive, but nothing like what it had been, alas.
Bear in mind in opera the voice must be projected since there are no mics and the voice must be heard on top of a whole orchestra and full choir . That is the main difference?..
check out the tenor Jon vikers singing "La fleur que tu m'avais jetée"
The style is call belcanto.
Thanks so much. Gives me a good starting place as I work towards learning more
Joan Sutherland and Luciano Pavarotti were masters in bel canto.
Indeed - "bel canto" literally means "beautiful singing" in Italian.
You should listen to the next part
Callas always had an unusual voice. The sound was quite 'bottled' and she had three distinct ranges that did not always join up very well. Having said that, she used her unusual colours, her Belcanto training and the dramatic power of her voice in a quite startling way and is rightly considered one of the greatest singers in recorded music. She lost a huge amount of weight in 1954 and thereafter her voice went into rapid decline. By the time of this video the natural vibrato that is a feature of operatic singing was turning into a wobble, especially at the top of the voice, and her highest notes were becoming more like screams. The wobble is, I think, why you are questioning her vibrato. In this clip you can hear her struggling to hang on to some notes. The following year was her last full year singing; a number of concerts and a couple of performances of Norma and Tosca left in the early 1960's. She became an unhappy recluse in Paris and died of a heart attack in 1977 aged 53.
Thanks for the info Andrew
I'd wager to say that her vocal decline was not due to her weight loss. It was more her sheer workload, powered by her tenacious professionalism which led to her early decline.
She sang more by the age of 30 than most sopranos sing in an entire career. Her repertoire was one of the most vast, everything from Wagner to Bellini.
She performed Norma, the most difficult role for a soprano, more than any other soprano ever....69 times (not counting the number of recordings she made of it).
I believe it was after a performance of Medea in the mid-50's perhaps in Dallas, that she noticed a major problem in her voice, and it terrified her. Her co-star Giulietta Simionato summed it up quite correctly to her in the dressing room: "You've overworked yourself, and your diaphragm is suffering."
That's what I believe too. She did so very much in such a short span of time. She didn't sing safely in rehearsals, always rehearsing in full voice. She gave every ounce of herself in everything she did.
And she wore out the mechanism.
But my God, look at all she did! Look at the legend she is to this day, nearly 50 years after her death.
There will never be another Callas, as rightfully there shouldn't be!
To say Callas' voice went into "rapid decline" after 1954 suggests that the person making the statement might not be familiar with Callas' recordings made between 1954-1959. When I think of her London and Lisbon Traviata's of 1958, her RAI recitals of 1954 and 1956, her Anna Bolena (listen to the final scene, usually called the "mad scene." Likewise, listen to the final scene of "Il Pirata.") Listen to a recording of Callas singing "Lucia" "La Sonnambula," or "Norma" made during those years and decide for yourself whether or not you're listening to a voice in decline. Callas' voice lost some of the "beef" it had before the weight loss, but frankly I think she sounded better than before. Having said all that, everyone is entitled to their opinon, and after all, this the nature of art: no two people will ever agree about everything!
@@danawinsor1380
Agreed.
There was a performance on November 11th 1959 at the Dallas Civic Opera house, where Callas knew the problem was a severe one. She was performing Lucia Di Lammermoor, and had missed a top E flat during the mad scene. That infuriated her, and she spent time in her dressing room hitting the note over and over again. Subsequently, she avoided the top E flats in her last performance of Lucia.
That night, to her friend and companion Giovanna Lomazzi, she professed the following:
"I gambled my career tonight. My career ends here tonight."
I wouldnt say "rapid decline" at all. 1955 may have been her best year ever. There were many great performances right up to the 1964 Tosca. The 1962 concerts in Hamburg are wonderful. But having a love life for the first time took her away from the spartan training that was essential for her very unusual voice. She certainly wasnt a recluse prior to breaking up with Onassis in 67-68. She said she loved her 8 years with him and that still saw each other as friends afterwards. The "heart attack" was very likely a prescription drug overdose. Di Stefano describes her undisciplined use of pills, but this was the period when many people started that, because the risks werent fully understood yet.
I just finished her biography 'Cast a Diva', one of the saddest lives I've read about. She grew up through WWII, survived fascists, Nazis, revolutionaries, and severe privations, had a mother from hell, a truly awful woman, and later pretty much died of a broken heart at 53 after her main romantic involvements with two quite appalling men in Tito Gobbi and Aristotle Onassis.
I think you meant her husband, Giovanni Meneghini.
Tito Gobbi was a baritone whom she sang with often.
She didnt consider Onassis appalling at all. She said her 8 years with him were wonderful. And they remained close friends even after
breaking up.
I wish you had chosen an earlier version of her singing this aria as this is a good version but by no means one of her best interpretations of the role, for instance the chorus in this version is quite sloppy and not exactly what would be up to her usual standard of accompaniment!! And the situation with Maria was that at the beginning of her career she was comparatively with her later years what they would call her bordering on morbidly obese and she completely changed herself during a summer break in the La Scala opera house program, and when I say changed herself I mean to the extent that her colleagues who were extremely close with her didnât recognise her when she came back because the change was so ridiculously profound!! I would suggest that you have a look at this (one of her very last performances in an opera)!! This is what is generally referenced as the definitive interpretation of this particular role (Tosca)!! Listen to her Berlin Lucia or Scala Lucia from the 1950âs or her Scala La Sonnabula closing aria Ah non giunge, especially the Leonard Bernstein La Scala performance, where she interpolates a diminuendo on a high e flat (she was known for doing the occasional breathtaking additions, but in general steered clear of going to far as she thought it was crass and inappropriate most of the time!!)
Here, check this out:
czcams.com/video/0O-mgVB50i0/video.htmlsi=Xk_mzCzzSdFPAPvK
All true, but this performance has the video, which the others don't. And the visual Callas is a powerful aspect of her magic.
Love this but itâs pronounced with an âLâ
thank you
She was fat her whole life until age 31 or so, when she simply decided to lose weight. She lost 80 pounds in a year and never regained any of it the rest of her life. Very typical of her famous willpower.
Maria Cajas ... seriously? đ
the greatest opera singer ever
From what I've heard opera singers especially ones who are prolific may sing 5 to 6 times a week in the evening, and then go for a large meal to decompress, which isn't the best way to keep your waistline, and they don't need to commit to diet the same way as dancers, so the stereotype that opera singers have larger frame isn't completely untrue.
2 or 3 times a week max
you're out of your league. what a travesty
@@frankcamacho1257 yet here you are commenting. Thankfully, I will not be deterred by your arrogance. I hope you have a great day Joe đ
You'd do yourself a great service if you'd learn more about opera before reacting, perhaps your comments will be more informed and educated and less culturally deprived.
Nah⊠I donât post reaction videos so I am âperceivedâ as an expert by others; I post to allow others to witness my journey and help me along the way. đ