by I have never heard María Callas sing. But I saw her once. In 1971, as a student on my first visit to the United States, I managed to get a back seat in the stalls of the Metropolitan Opera in New York for a gala performance of Verdi’s Don Carlo, with a rising young tenor named Plácido Domingo in the Title of the role.
At the interval I entered the dazzling lobby of the Met. Standing at the bottom of the stairs leading to the grand stand, I heard applause from above. The crowd parted and, descending the stairs, appeared this completely unmistakable woman, instantly recognizable to any opera fan, and also to millions of others.
Callas was on the arm of Rudolf Bing, the Met’s general manager, with whom she had had an epic falling out in the 1950s and who was now beginning his final season at the helm in New York. He passed me at the bottom of the stairs, almost close enough to touch me. But, like everyone else, I just applauded. I don’t remember much about the opera that night. But I will never forget seeing Callas.
Six years later, he died in his Paris apartment, aged only 53. Today, as we commemorate the centenary of Callas’s birth, she remains for many the unparalleled opera singer of the 20th century. His is the most interesting, the most exciting and the most instantly recognizable of all operatic voices. Her unhappy life has nothing to do with this legacy, and of course there are many other great singers to consider as well, but Callas’ control over the story is justified. She owes it all to two things: first, to the exceptional vocal and dramatic standards she set and often met; and, secondly, to the good fortune that her career coincided with the explosion of long-playing records and the complete recording of operas.
Few singers, before or since, have had that opportunity. As a result, Callas’s discography is extensive, including several operas that she recorded more than once, some that she rescued from oblivion, as well as dozens of recordings (of varying sound quality) of live performances. As far as I know, there are no video recordings of Callas in a complete opera, but there are some standout excerpts worth tracking down.
Any selection of the following type is personal and arbitrary, but here are my five introductory recommendations.
The Traviata
In many ways, Violetta in La Traviata is the perfect role for Callas. Her engagement with Verdi’s doomed heroine is always moving and always performed with total commitment. There are at least four Callas recordings of La Traviata, all very good in different respects. The one to have is probably the 1955 live recording at La Scala, conducted by Carlo Maria Giulini. But be sure to also look out for the beautiful video clips from her live recording in Lisbon from 1958, which contain treasured moments.
Rule
One of Callas’ signature roles, even in her decline. Always sung with great mastery, her identification with the priestess Norma is so complete that it is often difficult to separate Bellini’s writing for her tragic central character from Callas’s interpretation of it. As is often the case with Callas, 1952’s Norma, recorded on her Covent Garden debut and conducted by Vittorio Gui, finds her in her best voice and sets the recorded benchmark (she also has a small role for Joan Sutherland, the defining Norma of a slightly later time). Callas can be seen singing Norma’s Casta Diva aria in the newly recolored and re-edited video of her 1958 Paris concert of Italian arias, directed by Georges Prêtre.
coarse
Puccini’s 1899 opera is the one with which Callas is most frequently associated today. Part of this is due to the modern sentimentalization of Callas as the operatic martyr, a bit like Floria Tosca herself. Much of it is because there is a full video of her tremendous second act performance with Tito Gobbi’s incomparable Scarpia from Covent Garden in 1958. Callas also recorded Tosca twice, and again it is the earlier studio version under masterful direction of Victor de Sabata where he is at his best.
Lucia of Lammermoor
Donizetti’s betrayed and traumatized heroine, based on Walter Scott’s 1819 historical novel The Bride of Lammermoor, gave Italian opera some of its most accomplished moments and Callas one of its finest roles. She made two studio recordings but, for the visceral intensity of it and a direct connection to what is so special about her, it is Lucia live under Herbert von Karajan in Berlin in 1956 that stands out. Purists will hate it because it’s cut and the sound isn’t studio perfect, but Callas’ performance is passionate, sensitive and on another level.
Parsifal
Surely some mistake? Are you silent singing Wagner? But yes, he did it, and fascinatingly well too, although only in the early years of his career. In those days she had Brünnhilde in Die Walküre in her repertoire, as well as Isolde in Tristan und Isolde (of which a private tape of a performance in Genoa is said to have existed). In his first studio work in 1949, Callas recorded Isolde’s Liebestod in Italian. But Callas-Wagner’s main recorded exhibit is her Kundry (again in Italian) in a complete recording of Parsifal under the direction of Vittorio Gui of Rome in 1950. A performance of the highest class and an important reminder of her artistic range .
And, as an encore, another Callas moment, small but somehow extremely moving. She never sang the mezzo-soprano role of Eboli in Verdi’s Don Carlo on stage. In 1962, when the cameras were there to record her singing Eboli’s aria O don fatale – O don fatale – at a concert in Hamburg, the damage to her voice was increasingly evident and her vibrato could get out of control. . But what penetrating intensity it brings, what dramatic mastery. This is infinitely more than a common or garden recital encore. Somehow you can feel that she knows how flawed her greatness has become. But the enduring greatness is there anyway, in this exciting glimpse of what we all still sorely miss today.
