Maria Callas, Soprano, December 02, 1923

Of Greek emigré parentage, Maris Callas was conceived in Greece and born in New York. She was baptised Cecilia Sophia Anna Maria Callas, her namesake St.Cecilia the patron saint of music serving her in this case particularly well!

The actual date of birth is disputed, but considering this quote from the book by Stelios Galatopoulos, Maria Callas La Divina, Maria will have the final word. ‘The actual birth is uncertain. Maria Callas’ passport gives the date as the 2nd, and Groves dictionary the 3rd, but Callas’ mother remembers the 4th. Callas herself considers the 4th as her birthday primarily in order to agree, naturally, with her mother and also because St. Barbara is the patron saint of artillery for whom Callas says she has a special devotion.’ 

Simply said, Maria Callas was an amazing force of nature. Her instrument spanned many voice categories which she used with the greatest artistry and musicality over the diverse operatic repertoire she mastered and from all witness accounts in a most mesmerising way and utterly unforgettable.

If one had to classify her unclassifiable instrument it may have fallen into that of soprano dramatico d’agilitá, which is a voice of enormous range, capable of the florid style simultaneously accomplished with dramatic accentuations that gives it a very moving quality of tone. The voice possessed great volume compared with that, that a present-day dramatic soprano would legitimately exhibit as well as the extensive chest voice quality of a true mezzo-soprano.

When La Scala management eventually could no longer deny her a contract as a prima donna in her own right and not just as a jump-in substitution for their indisposed most popular and loved star at the time Renate Tebaldi, she rose to the dizzying heights of operatic stardom of world-wide fame and adulation.

La Scala had in Callas a singer capable of reviving the long neglected bel canto operas. So dependent was La Scala on Callas’ skills, that they could find no other living singer to sing the role of Donizetti’s Anna Bolena for the planned 1964-1965 visit to Russia which Callas declined to participate in, when she was not offered any other roles at La Scala for that season.

Her voice and mystique has resulted in many books, theories and films being made about her.

To give an idea of the sensation and impact she created we let others recollect who knew her and witnessed her performances.

Giuseppe di Stefano, friend and the other half of the operatic dream team he formed with Callas, when asked in an interview to compare his two leading ladies, replied, ’Tebaldi had the most beautiful voice in the world,” he says, “Maria had four different voices, but she was the most expressive singer I ever experienced. She was a true artist. She attracted news stories but she always only wanted to be treated like ‘The Other One’ (the common term used by the Tebaldi/Callas camps for the opposing diva).’

Madame Biki one of the most famous couturiers in Italy from the 1940s-1960s, designed for Maria Callas and played a part in Callas becoming a style icon of the time. Incidentally, the name Biki, was the nickname given her by step-grandfather who was none other than Giacomo Puccini himself. She wrote in the forward of Maria Callas La Divina, ‘Fashion: this is the reason Maria first came to me, and by no means a trifling or irrelevant reason. The elegance of Callas, both on the stage and in life, has been one of her many triumphs. Maria Callas is an outstanding character: a life lived at the summit. She is comparable to such figures of our time as Picasso, Cocteau and Chaplin, for in her art she has the same revolutionary and exciting influence they had and have in theirs. And, like all of them, she never judged art and life by two different standards. In art- as in life- there is no distinction between lesser and greater things. Everything is important.’

From Michael Scott opera director and Callas biographer, we find the following amazing anecdote, ‘The great turning point in Callas’ career occurred in Venice in 1949. She was engaged to sing the role of Brünnhilde in Die Walküre at the Teatro la Fenice, when Margherita Carosio, who was engaged to sing Elvira in I puritani in the same theatre, fell ill. Unable to find a replacement for Carosio, Serafin told Callas that she would be singing Elvira in six days; when Callas protested that she not only did not know the role, but also had three more Brünnhildes to sing, he told her “I guarantee that you can.” In Michael Scott’s words, “the notion of any one singer embracing music as divergent in its vocal demands as Wagner’s Brünnhilde and Bellini’s Elvira in the same career would have been cause enough for surprise; but to attempt to assay them both in the same season seemed like folie de grandeur”. Scott asserted that “Of all the many roles Callas undertook, it is doubtful if any had a more far-reaching effect.” This initial foray into the bel canto repertoire changed the course of Callas’ career and set her on a path leading to Lucia di Lammermoor, La traviata, Armida, La sonnambula, Il pirata, Il turco in Italia, Medea, and Anna Bolena, and reawakened interest in the long-neglected operas of Cherubini, Bellini, Donizetti and Rossini.’

It is well known that Callas worked with and admired the film and opera director Franco Zeffirelli. He summed her artistic character up with, ‘Maria is a common girl behind the wings, but when she goes onstage, or even when she talks about her work or begins to hum a tune, she immediately assumes this additional quality.

For me, Maria is always a miracle. You cannot understand or explain her. You can explain everything [Laurence] Olivier does because it is all part of a professional genius. But Maria can switch from nothing to everything, from earth to heaven. What is it this woman has? I don’t know, but when that miracle happens, she is a new soul, a new entity.’

Sir Rudolf Bing, Metropolitan Opera director expressed similar sentiments, ‘Once one heard and seen Maria Callas—one can’t really distinguish it—in a part, it was very hard to enjoy any other artist, no matter how great, afterwards, because she imbued every part she sang and acted with such incredible personality and life. One move of her hand was more than another artist could do in a whole act.’
The conductor Carlo Maria Giulini, recalled, ‘It is very difficult to speak of the voice of Callas. Her voice was a very special instrument. Something happens sometimes with string instruments—violin, viola, cello—where the first moment you listen to the sound of this instrument, the first feeling is a bit strange sometimes. But after just a few minutes, when you get used to it, when you become friends with this kind of sound, then the sound becomes a magical quality. This was Callas.’

Biographer Stelios Galatopolous who witnessed Callas’ Italian Debut in La Gioconda in Verona in 1947 and her Covent Garden debut as Norma in 1952, as well as over one hundred of her performances, recollected in his book, ‘On 8th November 1952 Callas made her London debut creating a sensation in Bellini’s Norma which was talked about many years after by those who saw the performances as the greatest thing they had ever heard on the operatic stage.’

‘Still there was one critic who would not surrender unconditionally. The late Ernest Newman, in the Covent Garden foyer after the performance, found himself surrounded by a crowd of people who wanted to hear his opinion. After all, [at that time] he was the eldest music critic in London, and the only one who had heard some of the great Normas of the past. Newman said very little: “She was wonderful, truly wonderful.” And then raising his umbrella and almost in a high pitched voice: “But she is not a Ponselle.”’

Even at the time of her final operatic performances when it was observed she was longer at her full vocal powers, she could still draw admiration from the highest level. In 1965 ‘Clarendon, possibly France’s most eminent music critic, described the performance an unforgettable theatrical experience. I have seen Puccini’s Tosca many times- hundreds, but last night I was convinced it was really the first time, he wrote.’

In 1969, the Italian filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini cast Callas in her only non-operatic acting role, as the Greek mythological character of Medea, in his film by that name. The film was not a commercial success, but as Callas’ only film appearance, it documents something of her stage presence.
From October 1971 to March 1972, Callas gave a series of master classes at the Juilliard School in New York. These classes later formed the basis of Terrence McNally’s 1995 play Master Class.
Callas staged a series of joint recitals in Europe in 1973 and in the U.S., South Korea, and Japan in 1974 with the tenor Giuseppe di Stefano. Critically, this was a musical disaster owing to both performers’ no longer being at their peak .
Nevertheless, the tour was an enormous popular success. Audiences thronged to hear the two performers, who had so often appeared together in their prime. Her final public performance was on 11 November 1974, in Sapporo, Japan. Callas and di Stefano were to have appeared together in four staged performances of Tosca in Japan in late 1975 but Callas cancelled.
Sadly after a relatively early retirement from the stage she died in Paris in 1977 at the age of 53 and her ashes returned to Greece and scattered in the Aegean Sea.

In 2007, Callas was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In the same year, she was voted the greatest soprano of all time by BBC Music Magazine.

More recently Callas still continues to fascinate the world. In 2017 the film director Tom Volf made the French documentary Maria by Maria based on interviews, letters and performances to tell her story and in 2024 the biopic Callas played by Angelina Jolie and directed by Pablo Larraín had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival where Jolie received an eight minute standing ovation reminiscent of ‘La Divina’s’ at the height of her fame.

Alfredo Kraus, Tenor, November 24, 1927

Alfredo Kraus was born on this day in 1927. It is not difficult to acknowledge that he was deserving of the title Tenore di grazie by the way he sang and conducted his life.

Born to an Austrian father and a Spanish mother in the Canary Islands, Alfredo and his older brother Francesco Kraus Trujillo, a baritone, were given a solid musical education starting with piano lessons from an early age and went on to study music and opera alongside each other.

In 1948, the twenty-one year old Alfredo left for Barcelona where he studied singing for two years under a Russian teacher, Gali Markoff, who applied a rigorous and scientific method to his natural but light weight voice. He was also a pupil of Francisco Andres, who taught him a singing technique similar to that imparted by Mercedes Llopart, the great Spanish singer and teacher. Then in Milan, both he and his older brother studied with Mercedes Llopart herself. Under her guidance, he learnt the correct positioning of sound in the “mask” (the facial cavities of resonance), how to lean on the diaphragm, and in fact compress the breath between diaphragm and mask. All these are elements of the famous Lamperti-Garcia singing technique of the mid 1800s.

Like many Spanish singers, he started his career singing Zarzuela on stage in Madrid and Barcelona.

At the age of 29, in 1956 after winning the silver medal at the Geneva International Singing competition he was engaged to make his operatic debut in Cairo as the Duke of Mantua in Rigoletto.

After his successful Cairo debut, he was invited to sing Alfredo, in Verdi’s, la Traviata. Firstly, in Venice and subsequently in Turin and Barcelona during 1957, and at the Stole Theatre in London in 1958, where his partner, was the then equally unknown young soprano, Renata Scotto.

By 1958 he was singing along side Maria Callas in the legendary La Traviata performance at the Teatro Nacional de Sāo Carlos in Lisbon of which a live recording was later released. Of his experience singing opposite Maria Callas in Lisbon, he recalls, with gratitude and special satisfaction.
Overawed by Callas’ fame and reports of her difficult temperament, offstage and on, he was understandably nervous. To his surprise, she proved an outstandingly supportive and sympathetic colleague, whose stimulating presence was a contributing factor to his own success.

Subsequent debuts followed in 1959 as Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor at Covent Garden and Elvino in La Sonnambula at La Scala in 1960. His American debut took place in Chicago in 1962 as Nemorino in L’elisir d’amore, followed by his debut at the Metropolitan in New York in Rigoletto where audiences celebrated his finely honed technique, impeccable diction and mastery of the bel canto repertoire.

Kraus managed his career very carefully and ‘stuck to his guns’ so to say. He avoided ever singing outside of his lyrical tenor voice repertoire, though offers to do so were forthcoming and frequent.

He was especially known for his interpretation of Massenet’s Werther, Gounod’s Faust and roles requiring extreme high notes such as Bellini’s i Puritani which the conductor Tulio Serafin thought that the role was made for him, with its fiendishly difficult Tessitura, culminating in a series of D naturals. It goes almost without saying, he sang La fille du Régiment with its nine high C’s. He still sang this aria masterfully at the Gala Lirica in Seville in 1992 even at the age of sixty five years. His superlative technique and determination never to sing beyond his capabilities enabled him to sing and perform into his seventies.

Of his Art and his life philosophy Kraus said: …for the artist has a duty to be a teacher, an educator, beyond popular tastes and fashion. Instead of singing to the gallery, we should sing for that section of the public, be it 50, 20, 10 or even 1%, who really understand. I deeply believe in elitist standards, not from the snobbish social aspect, but from the point of view of quality and excellence. In singing for this minority of the public, capable of truly appreciating what you do, we also help raise the level of understanding of the majority, who have now heard and will know the difference between excellence and mediocrity. Maybe not today, but certainly tomorrow, or the day after. What does it matter if one’s temporary antagonised? I give my art, it is the public who should come to me, not vice versa. This is the way of the bequeathing something valid and worthwhile to the future of our art.’

From a technical point of view, he gave variety to his voice using piani, pianissimi, smorzature, rinforzati and top notes with color bursting into a head squillo, which Mr. Gualerzi, a top Italian critic, felt it was a falsetto. In a Spanish magazine, Ritmo, of March 1978, Kraus responded to Gualerzi’s criticism by saying: ‘I never attempted the falsetto technique. I never felt the need for it, and further, I do not know how to do it. Maschera and falsetto are two wholly different emission techniques. If you do one you cannot do the other. It is not easy to shift the voice from one position to the other.” He reiterated this view in his interview with Bruce Duffie in 1981.
Kraus’ discography is extensive making many full opera recordings with EMI and he was involved with a recording label. Les Pêcheurs de Perles featured in long playing operatic records, later marketed by a record company, Carillon Records, and distributed in Italy by the House of Giancarlo Bongiovanni.

Throughout his career, Alfredo Kraus received numerous distinctions and awards, including Grand Cross of the Order of Alfonso X the Wise; Order of Isabella the Catholic, Commander by Number; Knight of the French Legion of Honour; Austrian Grand Cross of Honour for Science and Art; Enrico Caruso Prize, Italy; Metropolitan Opera House Prize, New York; and the title of Kammersänger from the Opera of Vienna. He also received awards in the islands of his birth, including Canary Islands Gold Medal; distinction as Favourite Son of the City of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria; the Can de Plata and Can de Oro Awards for the Arts, from the Cabildo Insular de Gran Canaria; and the Canary Islands Fine Arts and Performance.
One of his most cherished projects was the establishing in 1990 of an international biannual singing competition and continues in his name to help young opera singers of all nationalities.
Three auditoriums, in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Majadahonda (Madrid) and Aspe (Alicante), and two cultural centres, in Mirasierra-Fuencarral (El Pardo, Madrid) and Tejeda (Gran Canaria) have been named after Alfredo Kraus. A primary school in Lomo Los Frailes (Tamaraceite, Gran Canaria), the Chair of singing at Barcelona’s Liceo Conservatory, and the Aula Cultural (cultural department) of the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria are also named after him. In 2000, the Opera Season in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, organised by Amigos Canarios de la Ópera, took the name Alfredo Kraus, the same year that the Spanish postal service highlighted his career with a stamp in its Personajes Populares (Popular Figures) series.
He died in Madrid in 1999 of a prolonged illness at the age of 71 two years after the death of his wife Rosa whom he married in 1956.

From the Los Angeles Times obituary, it was written that Kraus maintained that it was emotion, not precision, that made an opera singer great. ‘For me, to live and breathe a role is far more important than singing it to perfection, because a perfect voice can be as dull as dishwater,’ he has said. ‘What the public must understand is that singing is a matter of musicality, sensitivity, personality, and above all, maturity.”

Amelita Galli Curci, Soprano, November 18, 1822

Galli Curci was born in Milan, Italy into an upper middle class family of Italo-Spanish heritage. Her musical prowess was evident at an early age graduating from the Milan Conservatorium and winning the first prize as a pianist in 1903.

We have the opera composer Piero Mascagni to thank for encouraging her to have some vocal lessons with Carignani and Sara Dufes, but apparently she remained mainly self taught as she began her career using piano exercises and treatises available from the former greats to hone her vocal skills. Later in New York she coached with coloratura soprano Estelle Liebling.

She debuted as Gilda in Verdi’s Rigoletto at the age of 24 and became increasingly more successful over the next eight years in the coloratura repertoire not only in Italy but in Spain, Egypt, Russia and Central and South America. During this time in Buenos Aires she sang two performances of Lucia di Lammermoor with Enrico Caruso.

Having only been offered a contract for minor roles at La Scala in Milan, she vowed never to sing there in the future. Looking for more opportunities he sights were set across the Atlantic. She married the aristocrat Marchese Luigi Curci an aspiring painter architect, costume and set designer and they became the toast of Italian society.

In New York, Galli-Curci hoped to be engaged by the Metropolitan Opera, but Maestro Gatti-Cassazza had already hired his wife, Maria Barrientos, to sing all the coloratura soprano roles that season. Fortunately, Cleofonte Campanini, of the struggling Chicago Opera, was in town looking for singers and was willing to give the diva a chance. Against Luigi’s (her husband) wishes, the Curci family packed their bags and moved to Chicago.

Her much-anticipated Met debut in the same opera was slated for Opening Night, November 14, 1921, alongside two fellow Italians, tenor Beniamino Gigli, who inherited much of Caruso’s lyric repertory, and baritone Giuseppe De Luca. The new production, designed by Joseph Urban and conducted by Roberto Moranzoni, did not disappoint. Max Smith reviewing for the Herald American wrote:
“How fascinating is Amelita’s impersonation of Violetta, already made familiar during her association with the visiting Chicago Opera Company! How imaginatively vivacious in the first act; how pathetic in the second; how tragic in the last. It was fitting, indeed, that Giulio Gatti-Casazza should bring forward his latest “star” in Traviata. For surely no other role reveals her own peculiar powers, histrionic as well as vocal, to greater advantage: None permits her to disclose more affectingly the characteristic delicacy of her art, the essentially feminine charm of her persuasions.”
Comparisons with the greatest coloraturas of the recent past—Adelina Patti, Marcella Sembrich, Luisa Tetrazzini—followed in the press, proving that even for those who found faults with the new diva, she had clearly joined an illustrious line of bel canto virtuosos. In addition to her appearances in opera and numerous recital tours, Galli-Curci’s fame rested equally on her best-selling recordings. Sales for her records rivalled those of Caruso, and she often recorded popular or light songs as well as opera arias. Her distinctive vocal timbre—soft-grained, velvety, and pure—transferred well to records even by the crude technology of the time.”

Her fame and popularity spread. 1918 was a pivotal year in Galli-Curci’s development as an international star. In addition to being followed by paparazzi (which she adored), Amelita became a celebrity endorser for RCA Victor’s “Talking Machines,” appearing in full-page ads in the New York Times in glamorous outfits throughout 1918 and 1919. She also extolled the virtues of cosmetics, furs, and automobiles.

After the Armistice in 1918, Luigi begged Amelita to return to Italy to save their marriage, but Amelita refused to give up stardom and her affair with Homer Samuels, her rehearsal accompanist in Chicago.

Luigi demanded a divorce, and a public scandal ensued, appearing in the society pages of Chicago papers for almost a year.

Amelita Galli-Curci and Homer Samuels were married in Homer’s parents’ home in Minneapolis on Jan. 15, 1921, and Amelita became an American citizen. She never returned to Italy.

The couple bought a country home in the Catskill Mountains in Upstate New York. They called their getaway “Sul Monte” and escaped the stress of Galli-Curci’s career whenever possible.

The rigours of being in such demand and popularity in both two major opera houses Chicago and New York started to tell in her voice, and in 1935 after refusing to acknowledge an ever increasing growth in her neck and the subsequent pain it caused her, she agreed to have the goitre caused by thyroid disjunction removed by a doctor who was not perturbed by operating on such a famous golden throat. On the contrary he apparently bathed in the glory and many photo opportunities were made with his famous patient. However, the operation was not without consequences, and she was never able to move into the lyric and dramatic soprano repertoire that the doctor had led her to believe would be awaiting her after she healed. The dubious honour of having the damaged nerve, the external branch of the superior laryngeal nerve named after her ensued, and is still referred to as the “nerve of Galli Curci” up until this day.

In their retirement years Galli Curci and her husband Homer became interested in Eastern spirituality and were active members of the Yogananda Society. Galli Curci wrote the forward to Paramahansa Yogananda’s 1929 book Whispers from Eternity. Yogananda’s most famous book being Autobiography of a Yogi, a work known to have inspired many people worldwide, including George Harrison and Apple founder Steve Jobs.

In a video recording Joan Sutherland recounts how she and her husband Richard Bonynge were very excited to have the opportunity to meet their vocal heroine, and apart from exchanging Coloratura talk, she reminisced on how she was very taken by the style and presence of the diva when she opened the door to greet them completely dressed in matching pink apart from a tortoise shell comb in her hair. Sutherland lovingly ordered pink note paper in her honour which always made her remember her.

She was also appreciated and honoured with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Galli Curci died eight days after her 81st birthday at her home in California.

From the forward of Whispers of Eternity she wrote:
“The followers of all religions can drink from this fountain of universal prayers. These invocations are the answer to the modern scientific mind, which seeks God intelligently. The prayers in this book are presented in great variety, and therefore enable each one of us to choose those prayers best suited and helpful to his own particular needs.

My humble request to the readers is expressed in the following lines:

Pass not by, with hurried intellectual reading, the mines of realization hidden in the soil nourishing the word plants in this book. As the author tells us, dig into them deeply, daily and repeatedly, with a pickaxe of attentive, reverential, and meditative study. Then you will find the priceless gem of Self-realization.”

YouTube video with an array of photos including Galli Curci on her Australian tour pictured with a Kookaburra (another famous bird with an amazing trill!)

JON VICKERS, TENOR, OCTOBER 29TH, 1926

Born in 1926 in rural Saskatchewan, Jon Vickers was a very private man. Indeed as one of the greatest tenors of the twentieth century, his reticence comes as a surprise until one recognises he harnessed his emotions, dynamism, and single-minded professionalism for his stage performances. No greater tribute can be given than that of his ideal partner in so many Wagnerian roles than that of Birgit Nilsson who wrote, ‘..I have had many wonderful tenors on stage. … But Jon Vickers was different, very different, both as an artist and as a human being. He looked neither right nor left; his opinions were as strong as the rock of Die Walküre. He had to have it his way, no matter what.’ His amazing dedication to his art can be heard in his performances and his statement that, ‘No matter what we did in this pursuit of excellence, we did it for the glory of God. I have never lost that.’ His sense of religious purpose gave his performances an unforgettable and thrilling tension, that made him a superlative singer, without pretensions and total immersion in the character and drama.

His early upbringing was marked by the depression, labouring in the family fields, which sometimes is attributed to his strength and stamina. His family, who were all enamoured of music and singing, listened to the radio broadcasts from the Metropolitan Opera on Saturday afternoons and this meant young Jon heard the very best of the best. Young Jon was in great demand as a church singer, and he performed frequently, but he observed years later, ‘To begin with, I sang because I had to sing. It was part of me … an absolute necessity, fulfilling some kind of emotional and even physical need in me.’

His singing in churches eventually brought him to the notice of George Lambert who scouted Canada for fresh young talent, and although Jon was 25 at the time, Lambert offered him a scholarship to Toronto Conservatory. In later years, Vickers acknowledged Lambert as the sole teacher he had.

His first professional performance was a concert in Toronto on 17 April 1951. Throughout the years 1952 to 1956 he was performing in Canada. At this point, even though regularly performing, he was having doubts about a career as it was difficult for him to provide for his growing family and he had set a deadline to quit singing for June 1956. At this crucial point gate stepped in when Regina Resnik recommended Vickers to her agent. International attention meant that by 1957 he made numerous appearances in London singing Verdi and French repertoire. But it was in the performance of Wagner that he truly made his mark, and his legend. His first Bayreuth appearance was as Siegmund in Die Walküre on 28 July 1958. Thereafter Siegmund was his domain. He sang the heavy Verdi roles, and his Florestan in Beethoven’s Fidelio and Britten’s Peter Grimes of the eponymous opera are the standard by which all others are measured against. His final performance was typical of the great but publicity shy man, a concertina performance of Act 2 of Parsifal in Kitchener, in rural Ontario.

His huge and powerful voice may be heard in the classic recording of Tristan und Isolde, under the baton of Herbert von Karajan. Despite Vickers’ reputation as a challenging colleague, he was one of Karajan’s favourite singers. It is regrettable that we can no longer observe him live on stage. In the words of one critic, Vickers ‘dominated the stage from first to last. In ringing voice, the tenor created a tragic figure of terrifying strength and heart-rending poignancy, shaped with the full range of hues, from the arrogant military man to the whimpering creature on the floor of his cell.’ It is interesting to note that such was the intensity and excitement of his stage persona, that other singers were allegedly fearful of him.

The most heroic of tenors, Jon Vickers passed away on 10 July 2015. His signature role, is arguably Peter Grimes.

JENNY LIND, SOPRANO, OCTOBER 6TH, 1820

Jenny Lind 1820

Coined the ‘Swedish Nightingale’, Jenny Lind was born in Stockholm in 1820. Her exceptional voice was noticed at age ten, and as even as a young girl she was enrolled in the Royal Opera School in Stockholm. In 1838 she made her debut at Agathe in Der Freischütz. Early demands and success overtaxed her voice and this led her to travel to Paris to seek consultation and tutelage from Manuel García the younger, who immediately prescribed some time of vocal rest before taking her on as a student. In 1842 upon returning to Stockholm her much improved voice was apparent when she appeared in the title role of Norma.

When touring Denmark, in 1843, she met the writer Hans Christian Andersen who fell in love with her. The two became good friends but his romantic feelings were not reciprocated. She is believed to have inspired three of his fairy tales: “Beneath the Pillar”, “The Angel” and “The Nightingale” and possibly the “Snow Queen”, after what was perceived as an icy rejection from Lind. He wrote, “No book or personality whatever has exerted a more ennobling influence on me, as a poet, than Jenny Lind. For me she opened the sanctuary of art.”
Among her early admirers were Robert Schumann, Hector Berlioz and, most importantly for her, Felix Mendelssohn. The pianist and composer, Ignaz Moscheles wrote: “Jenny Lind has fairly enchanted me… her song with two concertante flutes is perhaps the most incredible feat in the way of bravura singing that can possibly be heard”.
The character of Vielka, from Meyerbeer’s Ein Feldlager in Schlesien (The Camp of Silesia) 1844, was a role specifically written for Lind but not premiered by her. Nevertheless the Gypsy Song from the opera became one of the arias most associated with Lind, and she was called on to sing it wherever she performed in concert. Her operatic repertoire included the title roles in Lucia di Lammermoor, Maria di Rohan, Norma, La sonnambula and La vestale as well as Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Adina in L’elisir d’amore and Alice in Robert le diable.
Mendelssohn who was greatly enamoured with Lind wrote the soprano part of the Oratorio Elijah with her voice in mind, apparently giving great attention to the tessitura of the aria around the note F-sharp (F#5), which was a note in her range that Mendelssohn supposedly found irresistibly charming. Devastated by Mendelssohn’s early death, Lind felt unable to perform the piece at its premiere.
Her fame had spread and when she arrived in England, she took the English audiences by storm. Queen Victoria herself attended all sixteen of Lind’s premiere performances.
Of her performances at Her Majesty’s in London it was written by the reviewer in The Sun, on 5 May 1847, ‘So highly had Jenny Lind’s musical powers been praised, that we went almost prepared to be disappointed. We expected to find her a second Sontag from the descriptions we had read, but we certainly were not prepared to find, as we did find, the beautiful tones of a Sontag, united to the powers of a Grisi, the compass of a Malibran, the more than flexibility of a Persiani, and the correctness of intonation of the most perfect of musical instruments. It is impossible by language to convey any idea of what the voice of Jenny Lind really is, because it is so surpassingly beautiful – so superior to any other voice, uniting, as it does, the perfection of all voices, that there is no standard to which it can be compared. It is, in fact, itself the standard, as being the nearest approach to perfection of any voice ever heard, and hence the difficulty, nay, the absolute impossibility of doing justice by description to the powers of Jenny Lind. Truly has she been called the nightingale, for she possesses in the utmost perfection the “jug” note of the bird, and also that marvellous power of throwing, as it were, the warble into the distance – now dying away, and now swelling again, even as an organ does – a power possessed by no other human voice that we have ever heard.’
In 1849 after performing at two successful seasons at Her Majesty’s in London and an extensive tour of Great Britain she gave her final performance at Her Majesty’s and from the retired from the opera stage.

A next chapter was to open with a collaboration in America with the entrepreneur and showman B.T. Barnum of ‘Barnum and Bailey’s Circus’. Before her arrival, Barnum had managed to whip up a fever by an immense publicity campaign, which resulted in what was known in the press as, Lindomania. The eight months of concert tours were a huge success, and by the end of the New York engagement, the Lind concerts had generated some $87,055.89, which would be over three million dollars in today’s money. The total receipts for the concerts amounted to $712,161.43, being in 2020 the equivalent of $24.5 million.
Lind commanded a guaranteed fee $1,000.00 per performance. Later, as a result of Lind tiring of Barnum’s relentless promotion, she invoked a clause in her contract to terminate the agreement and continued to tour under her own management.

Her devotion and generosity to charitable causes remained a key aspect of her career and greatly enhanced her international popularity, even among the unmusical, as she chose to give most of it away to charities she loved—primarily music scholarships and private schools. Some of the recipients were in the United States and the rest were mostly in England and Sweden.

During the American tour she met her husband, pianist and conductor, Otto Goldschmidt. In 1852 they returned to Europe where they initially lived in Dresden Germany. It was in Dresden that her first child was born. Later, in England, two other children were born to Jenny and Otto. She refused requests to return to the opera stage but continued to give concerts.

The critic H. F. Chorley, who admired Lind, described her voice as having “two octaves in compass – from D to D – having a higher possible note or two, available on rare occasions; and that the lower half of the register and the upper one were of two distinct qualities. The former was not strong – veiled, if not husky; and apt to be out of tune. The latter was rich, brilliant and powerful – finest in its highest portions.”
In 1883, at the request of the Prince of Wales, “she accepted the post of first Professor of Singing in the Royal College of Music”.

She believed in an all-round musical training for her pupils, insisting that, in addition to their vocal studies, they were instructed in solfège, piano, harmony, diction, deportment and at least one foreign language.
Among the numerous recognitions of her remarkable career and vocal art still visible more than 130 years since she died in 1887; there are streets named for Jenny Lind in a dozen or more American cities – but two towns bear her name as well: Jenny Lind, Arkansas and Jenny Lind, California! Her name is honoured at Mammoth Cave in Kentucky, and her image adorned the Swedish 50-krona banknote. Another interesting fact is an Australian schooner was named Jenny Lind in her honour. In 1857, it was wrecked in a creek on the Queensland coast; the creek was accordingly named Jenny Lind Creek.

ETTORE BASTIANINI, BARITONE, SEPTEMBER 24TH, 1922

ETTORE BASTIANINI
24 September 2022

Today we celebrate the baritone’s baritone, the great Ettore Bastianini, born in Siena, Italy. His voice was first recognised and trained by Fathima and Anselmo Ammanati as a bass. It was when touring Egypt with another great baritone Gino Bechi and the soprano Maria Caniglia in the early 1950s, that one day Gino Bechi leaned over and whispered, ‘You’re really a baritone, you know. I’m a fool to say so as I don’t need more competition, but it’s true.’ As a bass, he had possessed a delightful timbre, but it was limited in volume and in the bass register soft and weak, he had trouble reaching the lowest notes, and, in Rigoletto, relied on choristers to supply the last “Fa” in Sparafucile’s aria.

Well before this, as a bass, he had won the sixth National singing competition at the Teatro Communale in Florence which brought with it an accompanying scholarship. But due to the war, it was a bad time in 1942 for artistic achievments, and he was drafted into the Airforce and unable to claim his prize. In 1945 he made his debut as Colline in La Bohěme at the Teatro Alighieri in Ravenna.

In 1946 he was able to finally able to take advantage of his scholarship to study with Maestro Flamino and his wife, singer Dina Manucci Contina at the Teatro Communale.

Until 1950 he sang successfully as a bass, but it was after his coach/teacher Luciano Betterini encouraged him to explore his baritone range, that he took time off from the stage to delve into this new voice category. Being very determined, competitive and diligent, it wasn’t long after making his debut as a baritone as Giorgio Germont in Sienna, that he was singing opposite Maria Callas as Enrico Ashton in Lucia di Lammermoor at the Teatro Communale and by 1953 he was making his Metropolitan debut as Giorgio Germant in La Traviata.

By 1954 he was singing opposite Renata Tebaldi and Giuseppe di Stefano in Eugene Onegin at La Scala.

Recording contracts with Decca ensued leaving opera lovers with a catalogue of some of the most iconic recordings of the post war era with an array of contemporary artists of equal fame, calibre and legend.

Reading of his work load, performances and yo-yo travelling from America to Europe and back again, is a dizzying experience. He ultimately succumbed to throat cancer in 1967 which was first diagnosed in1962. However, he refused to let this prevent him from singing in his last years on the stage, despite undergoing many rounds of radiotherapy.

His esteemed colleagues now have the final word.

‘Mario Del Monaco knew him as a great and dear colleague, the dearest and the best he had in his career: “E, con infinita nostalgia, Ettore Bastianini, una delle piu belle voci di baritono di questa scorcio di secolo, un raro esempio di dizione e di belcantismo espressi con una voce di eccezionale bellezza.” (“One of the most beautiful voices from this part of the century, a rare example of diction and belcantismo expressed with a voice of extraordinary beauty.”)

Carlo Bergonzi remembered him so: “A natural beauty of voice, evenness of timbre, elegance of phrasing and gesture, soundness of diction and expression, a sure technique and, not least, a deep seriousness and professional discipline: these were the fundamental characteristics of Ettore Bastianini, which made him a great baritone – perhaps the last real Verdian baritone .

RICHARD TUCKER, TENOR, AUGUST 15TH, 1913

On this day in 1913, the tenor, Richard Tucker, was born in Brooklyn, New York. His career was intimately linked to the city of his birth. It was at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, in a career that spanned over three decades, that he made an unforgettable mark in operatic history.

The esteem of his colleagues was such, that when Tucker suddenly died after collapsing in his hotel room, baritone, Robert Merrill, who was touring with him at the time, said quite simply, ‘He was the greatest tenor in the world,’

Only two other star singers in the company’s 90‐year history—Giovanni Martinelli, the tenor, and Antonio Scotti, the baritone—lasted longer in the cruelly competitive Metropolitan arena, Martinelli for 32 seasons and Scotti for 34.
Mr. Tucker’s operatic career was, in a sense, a felicitous result of his marriage to Sara Perelmuth. Sara was the sister of Jan Peerce, already a well‐known tenor. The Peremuth family did not consider the young salesman a great catch for their daughter, but soon, Richard found himself in a friendly rivalry with his borther‐in‐law. He decided that he too could become a famous singer, and began, taking voice lessons from the Wagnerian tenor Paul Althouse. Althouse, impressed with his student’s determination recalled that, ‘Tucker just came for his lesson, took off his hat, sang, put on his hat again and went’.

He made his debut as Alfredo in La Traviata in the Salmaggi Opera New York in 1943. He received the prestigious invitation to sing Radames in a recorded broadcast with Arturo Toscanini conducting in 1947 and he sang Enzo opposite the much written about debut of Maria Callas in the Verona Arena in La Gioconda.
He later appeared in Covent Garden, Vienna, La Scala and Florence.

Luciano Pavarotti, himself one of the Met’s leading tenors, said from Milan: “Richard Tucker was one of my gods. In my life… he has always been that great voice to use as an inspiration. I, as well as the world, mourn the death of this magnificent tenor.”

The soprano Joan Sutherland and her husband, the conductor Richard Bonynge, said in London: “One of the phenomenal voices of this century. It was always more and more amazing how fresh and young his voice sounded. The world of music will miss him very much.”

Richard Tucker was aware that his acting skills may not have matched his vocal ability. When Rudolf Bing arrived at the Met as general manager in 1950, however, Mr. Tucker wryly complained that his voice was no longer considered enough. “Being an opera star,” he said, “isn’t what it used to be. With Mr. Johnson, he wanted you to act, but with Mr. Bing you hafta act.”

Nevertheless, such was the power and beauty of his singing, that he was compared by critics with greats such as Caruso and Mario Lanza. The magnificent voice was well recorded and quoting The Grove Book of Opera Singers, ‘…he had few peers in the projection of Italianate passions, or in fervour, ease, evenness and vocal security.’

His funeral was held on January 10 on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera House, the only singer ever to be so honoured.
The memory and achievements of Richard Tucker are kept alive by the Richard Tucker Music Foundation.

EMMA CALVÉ, SOPRANO, AUGUST 15TH, 1858

EXTENDED FEATURE

The acclaimed enigmatic French operatic soprano of the Belle Époque Emma Calvé was born in Department of Aveyron in the South of France in 1858.

As a very young child growing up in the rocky treeless terrain, before the family moved to Spain, she once exclaimed to her playmates in jest that the Chateau on the hill at Cabrières would one day be hers. This prediction was to become true, as her great international fame and wealth allowed her to acquire the Chateau later in her life. It became her summer retreat where she claimed that

‘I truly believe that the extraordinary preservation of my voice is largely due to the long months I spend in that quiet spot, far from worldly gaieties and distractions. If I stay away too long, I become ill, like a plant deprived of water. My lungs crave the dry, bracing air of the mountain plains. I need my country, my home!

In her autobiography, she describes those early childhood years in Spain and her fascination with Gypsy culture. Interestingly, considering her later fame as being the ultimate interpreter of the role of Carmen, she recalls how she wandered off and her family searched for her, until ultimately her mother found her singing and dancing happily in a Gypsy camp.

At age seven the family returned to France and after acquiring enough French she was sent to a convent. She writes of this time.

‘Not long after this, when I was in my seventh year, my parents decided to go back to their native land. I spoke only Spanish, and they had the greatest difficulty in the world forcing me to learn French. When I had finally mastered my new language, I was sent to a convent at Millau, not far from the home of my father’s family.

‘The atmosphere of religion and mysticism in which I found myself in the convent made a deep impression upon me. I became extremely devout; and when I was confirmed, I was fully determined to become a nun. Apparently this kind of temporary “vocation,” or call to the religious life, is not unusual among singers and actresses. I know two very great artists who have been through the same experience.

Her vocal and musical talent was remarked by neighbours and friends, whose praises were enough to make her mother take notice, and pack up Emma and her two brothers off to Paris, to seek out the most famous and respected singing teacher there, the retired tenor Jules Puget . She had no money to pay for the tuition but promised to repay him,”Give my daughter a hearing. You yourself will judge what talent she may have. I am not rich, but you can have entire confidence in me. We will pay you as soon as she has succeeded!”

Puget taught her the principles of Bel Canto for three years before encouraging her to start to seek performance experience. It wasn’t long after that that she made her debut at the Theatre de la Moniaire de Bruxelles as Margarite in Gououd’s Faust, which apart from only knowing the Le Roi de Thulé aria from the opera, she had no knowledge of the role and had a mere two weeks to learn it in.

Before this the local butcher being entranced by Calvé’s voice and realising the family were facing financial hardship, offered to give food on credit to help build her up which could be paid later once she found employment with her voice.

“Your daughter has a pretty voice,” the butcher remarked, as he prepared her order. “My wife and I think she is a wonder!”
“It’s very kind of you to say so,” my mother answered. “She works very hard, and I hope some day…”
“Yes, she’s a fine singer,” he interrupted, “but she’s too thin. Much too thin! She ought to eat lots of beefsteaks and cutlets!”
My mother was taken by surprise at what appeared to be a rather crude way of increasing trade. Before she could answer, however, the astonishing man continued’
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” he said. “To prove to you how much confidence I have in your daughter’s future, I’ll open an account for you at this shop. You can pay me when she makes her debut !”

After the death of her teacher Puget, she continued her studies with Madame Marchesi in Paris for six months, and during this time she met and was able to observe and learn from great artists, such as the soprano Madame Gabrielle Krauss and Victor Maurel the French baritone who engaged her to sing opposite him in the opera Aben-Hamet by Theodore Dubois. She attributes Maurel in giving her invaluable lessons in lyric declamation which influenced her artistic career.

She was then engaged to sing at the Opéra Comique in Paris, where she for two years and was deeply influenced and befriended by Madame Marie Caroline Carvalho who was at this time at of her end of her career having created leading roles in many of Jules Massenet’s operas.

It was her ambition to sing in Italy and this wish came true in an engagement to sing and create the leading role of Flora in Mirabilio by Samara at La Scala in Milan which had disastrous consequences but gave her the resolve to perfect her shortcomings and art.

In her words, ‘I went to Milan with all the faults and all the advantages of my youth. My seasons at the Opera Comique had taught me nothing, I seemed only to have acquired a new timidity which paralysed my faculties at the most crucial moment. In spite of the burning fires within me, I gave the effect of being cold, for I was unable to communicate with my audience, or in any way to express my emotions.

The night of my debut at the Scala, I was horribly frightened. I sang out of tune and lost my head completely. The audience hissed me, and quite rightly ! How often, since then, have I blessed that fortunate hissing which made me realise my shortcomings and spurred me to undertake the serious studies which I so much needed!’

The well known publisher M. Hugel came to her rescue by introducing her to Madame Rosina Laborde, who was to transform her into the accomplished singer and artist she became. Laborde had been a member of the Paris Opera for many years and had known Madame Malibran, La Pasta, La Sontag, La Frezzolini, Grizi, Mario, Tamburini, Lablache.

‘She would describe to us their way of singing, their gestures and stage craft, all the traditions of the fine old Italian school.’

She also was a hard task master as Calvé recounts. ‘She had a truly phenomenal patience with her pupils. I remember on one occasion she made me repeat a phrase from the mad scene of Ophelia eighty separate times. I was ready to cry with nervousness and exhaustion, when she finally allowed me to rest. “That will do very nicely,” she remarked tranquilly, at the end of the ordeal. “You are worthy of being my pupil, for you are beginning to learn patience!”

Calvé also attributes great suffering and illness to bringing the required mental acuity and ability to convey her feelings to her audience which had eluded her up until then.

Her progress was rapid and after one year of study with Laborde she was reengaged to sing in Italy at San Carlo in Naples, where she sang Ophelia with Victor Maurel as Hamlet, and appeared in Bizet’s “Pecheurs de Perles” with the tenor Fernando de Lucia, with whom she was later to create Mascagni’s “Amico Fritz.

Longing to return and put her first experience right at La Scala, it was arranged for her to sing Ophelia with the celebrated Italian baritone, Mattia Battistini. After an initial cold response from the audience in the first acts she rose to the occasion, triumphantly dazzling with her cadenza literally almost mad herself with terror. In her words, ‘Determined to win a complete triumph, I attacked a cadenza which I had never before attempted in public. It was an extremely difficult piece of vocalisation, going from low A to F above high C. Once up on that dizzy pinnacle, I was like a child on a ladder, afraid to move or come down! The conductor was terrified. I held the note as long as I could; but when my breath gave out, I had to descend the chromatic scale. I did it with such brio, such perfection, that the audience burst into a thunder of applause. Seldom have I had such an ovation! I can truly say that it was the greatest moment in my operatic career. What intense, what triumphant joy filled my young heart that night !

In those years in Italy she gives great credit to the influence of the Italian actor Eleanor’s Duse, known as La Duse, to her artistic development taking on her realistic acting style that might have been the beginnings of method acting.

Calvé investigated and studied all the historical literature and artistic and cultural material pertaining to the roles she played and immersed herself where possible in situ in the culture. After my successes in Italy, I was eager to return to Paris. When Carvalho engaged me to create “Cavalleria Rusticana” at the Opera Comique, I went hack to the scene of my early endeavours, filled with ambition and enthusiasm. Yet in spite of the experience that my years in Italy had brought me, I felt myself out of place in this conventional theatre, where tradition and established customs were blindly venerated.
My interpretation of the role of Santuzza astonished my comrades. My spontaneous and apparently unstudied gestures shocked them. Even the costume which I had brought with me from Italy, the clothes of a real peasant woman, coarse shirt, worn sandals and all, was considered eccentric and ugly. I was unmercifully criticised and ridiculed. At the dress rehearsal, I heard one of the older singers pass judgment upon me.
“What a pity!” he exclaimed. “She has a lovely voice, and she has really made astonishing progress. But such acting! In this part of the world we do not bang on the table with our fists when we are singing. At the rate she is going, she will be ruined!”

Calvé is known for learning earthy Spanish dancing and wearing authentic gypsy clothing to portray the role of Carmen, which until then had been sanitised by a theatrically imagined interpretation of the subject matter, at the time accepted as represented by her predecessor Célestine Galli Marie. At first this realism was considered a step too far, but Galli Marie herself admired Calvé and gave her approval.

Then a very interesting operatic historical event occurred when Calvé was visiting the Vatican to listen to the Sistine Chapel choir under the direction of the last of the castrati, Mustapha, a Turk, She was struck by ‘his exquisite high tenor voice, truly angelic, neither masculine nor yet feminine in type deep, subtle, poignant in its vibrant intensity. He sang the classic church music admirably, especially Palestrina. He had certain curious notes which he called his fourth voice strange, sexless tones, superhuman, uncanny!
I was so much impressed by his talent that I decided to take some lessons from him. The first question I asked was how I might learn to sing those heavenly tones.
“It’s quite easy,” he answered. “You have only to practice with your mouth tight shut for two hours a day. At the end of ten years, you may possibly be able to do something with them.”
That was hardly encouraging!
“A thousand thanks!” I exclaimed. “At that rate, I will never learn! It takes too much patience!”
Nevertheless, with the tenacity which is a fundamental part of my character, I set to work. My first efforts were pitiful. My mother assured me that they sounded like the miawing (sic) of a sick cat! At the end of two years, however, I began to make use of my newly acquired skill; but it was not until the third year of study that I obtained a complete mastery of the difficult art.
These special notes, which I have used since then with great success, are rarely found in the ordinary run of voices.’

For more about the Fourth Voice we will present a specific article in High Notes, www.voicedetective.com Stay tuned!

She sang every season for many years at Covent Garden in London, ‘appearing there in all the operas of my repertoire. I also created several roles at this theatre, notably
“La Navarraise” by Massenet, in 1894, and “Amy Robsart,” the first production of its author, de Lara, whose “Messaline” I sang some years later.’

‘Each year, during my engagement in England, I was summoned to Windsor Castle to sing for Queen Victoria.’

Calvé became a favourite guest of Queen Victoria who would converse with her in perfect French and even knew and could recite many poems in the Provençal dialect. She honoured Calvé by commissioning a bust of her as Santuzza for her private collection, which after the Queen’s death, this was displayed in a room of her personal possessions.

She made her debut at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York, on November 29, 1893, in the role of Santuzza in
Cavalleria Rusticana.

“The American public did not care very much for the opera at that time. It was severely criticised in the newspapers, but I myself had a great success.
The next morning, the directors sent for me. They wished to change the bill immediately, and asked me to sing “Carmen,” not in French, as I had always sung it, but in Italian. I refused! The effect of my French dictation would be lost, and the whole opera would be thrown out of focus. It was an impossible demand. One of the directors was particularly insistent, and not entirely courteous.
“You have no choice in the matter!” he said curtly.”‘Cavalleria’ has not been the success we expected. We must make a change immediately, and there is nothing more to be said.”
I was in despair. I could not make the directors realise what I myself saw so clearly, that this work of art, conceived in the mind of a Frenchman, Prosper Merimee, put to music by a French composer, must be sung by me, a Frenchwoman, in French. In no other way could it be given its full value, its true flavour and quality. It seemed to me both inartistic and impracticable to attempt anything else. If the directors wished to replace “Cavalleria” with a success, they would not achieve their object by putting on an ineffective “Carmen.”
In my agitation and helplessness, I appealed to the elder Coquelin, who was acting in New York at the moment. I told him my troubles. He sympathised entirely with my point of view, and with his usual kindness went to the directors himself and used his influence to persuade them to give up the idea. They told him that they had no French tenor to sing the role of Don Jose, and that, therefore, I would have to sing in Italian ! Undaunted by this rebuff, he determined to succeed where they had failed. He would find a tenor. He went to Jean de Reszke, and laid the case before him. Although it was not in de Reszke’s repertoire, he promised Coquelin that he would sing the role. What a triumphant success the productions of “Carmen” were!” From then on, it was the drawing card at the Metropolitan. We gave it again and again, to packed houses. The box receipts were astounding! In the succeeding seasons, its popularity never waned. There was no further question as to how it should be sung.”

What unforgettable casts, what glorious evenings! Jean de Reszke, Melba, Plancon, and myself ! The public was wildly enthusiastic. After each performance, we would be recalled a thousand times. It was said that “Carmen” became epidemic, a joyful contagion’

Revisiting her early leanings towards spirituality she was introduced to Swami Vivekananda at a time in her life when as she says ‘she was greatly depressed in mind and body.’ It has been my good fortune and my joy to know a man who truly “walked with God,” a noble being, a saint, a philosopher, and a true friend. His influence upon my spiritual life was profound. He opened up new horizons before me, enlarging and vivifying my religious ideas and ideals, teaching me a broader understanding of truth. My soul will bear him an eternal gratitude.
This extraordinary man was a Hindu monk of the order of the Vedantas. He was called the Swami Vivekananda, and was widely known in America for his religious teachings. He was lecturing in Chicago one year when I was there; and as I was at that time greatly depressed in mind and body, I decided to go to him, having seen how greatly he had helped some of my friends.
An appointment was arranged for me, and when I arrived at his house I was immediately ushered into his study. Before going, I had been told not to speak until he addressed me. When I entered the room, therefore, I stood before him in silence for a moment. He was seated in a noble attitude of meditation, his robe of saffron yellow falling in straight lines to the floor, his head, swathed in a turban, bent forward, his eyes on the ground. After a brief pause, he spoke without looking up.
“My child,” he said, “what a troubled atmosphere you have about you! Be calm! It is essential.”
Then in a quiet voice, untroubled and aloof, this man, who did not even know my name, talked to me of my secret problems and anxieties. He spoke of things that I thought were unknown even to my nearest friends. It seemed miraculous, supernatural!
“How do you know all this?” I asked at last. “Who has talked of me to you?”
He looked at me with his quiet smile, as though I were a child who had asked a foolish question.
“No one has talked to me,” he answered gently. “Do you think that is necessary? I read in you as in an open book.”
Finally it was time for me to leave.
“You must forget ” he said, as I rose. “Become gay and happy again. Build up your health. Do not dwell in silence upon your sorrows. Transmute your emotions into some form of external expression. Your spiritual health requires it. Your art demands it!”
I left him, deeply impressed by his words and his personality. He seemed to have emptied my brain of all its feverish complexities, and placed there instead his clear and calming thoughts.
I became once again vivacious and cheerful, thanks to the effect of his powerful will. He did not use any of the ordinary hypnotic or mesmeric influences. It was the strength of his character, the purity and intensity of his purpose, that carried conviction. It seemed to me, when I came to know him better, that he lulled one’s chaotic thoughts into a state of peaceful quiescence, so that one could give complete and undivided attention to his words.

The Swami taught me a sort of respiratory prayer. He used to say that the forces of the deity, being spread everywhere throughout the ether, could be received into the body through the indrawn breath.

After her last performance at the Metropolitan Opera in 1904 she turned to the concert stage and embarked like so many of her colleagues of the time on a world concert tour. She also travelled extensively before this time with Swami Vivekananda’s entourage. Her travels took her, as the title of her book suggests, ‘I have sung under every sky’ to all four corners of the world where she dazzled, was honoured and adored.
In Melbourne, Australia, she was overwhelmed by the crowd that turned up at a welcoming reception.

‘When the day came, I was conducted to a hall where I expected to find not more than a couple of hundred people. What was my alarm when I found myself in a huge, barn-like place, where at least four thousand of Melbourne’s citizens had gathered to greet me!’

Her tales of her travels and the wonders she saw and experienced make fascinating reading, as is her life story where she recounts her career path and anecdotes so vividly. It is a glimpse into the bygone years of opera, where the stars were paid lavishly and were accorded godlike status by the public. The type of interest they generated was akin to Beatlemania.

What comes across in her autobiography though is Calve’s humility, kindness, and keen intelligence, which never ceases to explore, learn, and break boundaries.

She was known as the ultimate interpreter of Carmen and Santuzza. There are recordings made between 1902-1920 available, to try and imagine what must have been an incredible artist.

In America and France she gave benefit concerts for the war effort during the First World War, and tended, nursed and consoled the wounded soldiers in France.

‘In 1915 and 1916 I went again to America, and sang in over forty concerts for the benefit of the Lafayette Fund and other war organisations. One night, in June, 1916, I sang at the Bazar des Allies in New York. There must have been ten thousand people in the great hall of the Armory. A platform had been built in one corner, and the orchestra and chorus of the Metropolitan Opera House were engaged to accompany me. I remember that the platform was very high and that I had to climb up to it on a ladder a rather alarming proceeding!
As I looked out over that mass of people, I was deeply moved. Never before had I sung for such an assembly. I was almost frightened, but, summoning my courage, I began the “Marseillaise.” The refrain was supposed to be taken up by the opera chorus, but suddenly the whole huge audience burst into thunderous song.’
‘I do not know whether I was any better as a nurse than as a farmer. At any rate, I did what I could and served a certain length of time in the hospitals. It is all so terrible, so cruel a memory, that even now I cannot bear to dwell upon it.’

‘I sang a great deal for the convalescent soldiers. They loved the old French ballads, the folksongs of Brittany and the Pyrenees, and of my own part of the country. One day I was in a hospital that cared for German as well as French wounded. After I had sung several songs to the French soldiers, one of the Poilus asked if I would permit the door to be opened into the prisoners’ ward.
“The poor fellows in there ought to have the chance of hearing your heavenly voice!” he said.
“No! No!” I exclaimed. “I could not sing for them! They have hurt us too much!”
The boy looked up in surprise. I noticed, for the first time, that his right arm was missing.
“How about me?” he asked. “Don’t you suppose that they have hurt me, too?”
I was shamed by such generosity, and told the orderly to open the door. I sang, after that, standing on the threshold between the two wards, but I kept my eyes tight shut. I could not bring myself to look at them!’

After retiring from the stage she returned to her beloved Midi in France where she would open her Chateau’s doors to young singers to pass on her knowledge to future generations.

She died in Montpellier on January 6, 1942

Swarmi Vivekananda wrote of Calvé.

‘She was born poor but by her innate talents, prodigious labour and diligence, and after wrestling against much hardship, she is now enormously rich and commands respect from kings and emperors. … The rare combination of beauty, youth, talents, and “divine” voice has assigned Calve the highest place among the singers of the West. There is, indeed, no better teacher than misery and poverty. That constant fight against the dire poverty, misery, and hardship of the days of her girlhood, which has led to her present triumph over them, has brought into her life a unique sympathy and a depth of thought with a wide outlook.’

GIUSEPPE DI STEFANO, TENOR, JULY 24TH, 1921

The golden voice of Giuseppe di Stefano, so admired and hero-worshipped by his tenor successors such as Luciano Pavarotti, and Jose Carreras, was born in the little village of Motte Sant’Anastasia on the outskirts of Catania in Sicily.

His family moved to Milan when Giuseppe was six years old. Here, he spent his formative years, and even for a brief period of time, he considered entering the priesthood whilst he was being educated in a Jesuit College.

It was during a card game at age 16, when Giuseppe spontaneously burst into song after losing, that his opponent commented that he should get his voice trained. It took two years before his vocal training started in earnest, but his two teachers both baritones Luigi Montesanto and Mariano Stabile instilled in him the importance of clear diction. The clarity these teachers emphasised, became a hallmark of di Stefano’s singing throughout his career. This clear diction combined with the beautiful vocal sweetness, his natural musicality and a generous interpretative style, ensured that di Stefano enraptured fans. As a singer, Di Stefano was admired for his excellent diction, unique timbre, passionate delivery and, in particular, for the sweetness of his soft singing. He was considered the natural successor to Beniamino Gigli, who was Giuseppe’s favourite tenor growing up .

Fate stepped in once again as di Stefano was drafted into the army during the second world war. His commanding officer declared him the worst soldier ever, but recognised the great singer within him. Not wanting to deprive the world of this great gift, the officer decided he would better serve his country by leaving the forces and singing.This scenario may have been the inspiration, or at least is similar to that in the Mario Lanza film ‘Because You Are Mine,’ where Lanza encounters an opera loving army commander who helps the famous ‘operatic soldier’ sing rather than do his training when he is drafted into the army.
During the war years di Stefano performed under the name of Nino Florio. When Italy was defeated he was able flee to Switzerland. After a period of internment he was eventually allowed to perform on Radio Lausanne. He gave the first of many Nemorinos in l’elisir d’amore in a broadcast from Lausanne. His voice was also captured on recordings with interpretations of his native Sicilian songs which began to arouse the attention of discerning ears from outside of Italy in the late 1940s.

His official debut was in Reggio Emilia in 1946 as Des Grieux in Massenet’s Manon. The following year he repeated the role at the Rome Opera. A major recording contract with EMI was forthcoming.

In 1948 he made his Metropolitan Opera debut as the Duke in Rigoletto, and he subsequently captured the hearts of the Met audience with his beautiful tone, musicality and exuberance in the roles of Faust, Alfredo, Nemorino, Des Grieux and later Cavaradossi and Rodolfo.

In his Metropolitan debut in Faust, he attacked the high C forte and then softened to pianissimo. Sir Rudolf Bing said in his memoirs, “The most spectacular single moment in my observation year had come when I heard his diminuendo on the high C in “Salut! demeure” in Faust: I shall never as long as I live forget the beauty of that sound”.

His recording with Maria Callas in the 1953 Tosca with Victor de Sabato conducting, has become a benchmark interpretation. The 1955 live recording in Berlin of Lucia di Lammermoor with Herbert von Karajan conducting captured both artists at the peak of their powers.

Ten complete operas with Maria Callas were recorded for EMI between1953 and 1957 and they were the other dream team of the time to rival Renate Tebaldi and Mario Del Monaco on the stage, in fame as celebrities, and in recording sales.

Di Stefano certainly lived life to the fullest. Just as in his roles, he didn’t hold back his generosity, warm-heartedness and zest for life. He was seen as maybe enjoying the finer things of life a little too much, and later his voice lost some of its glory. Di Stefano insisted this was because his vocal cords were being damaged and inflamed due to an allergy to synthetic fibres.

In later years he lived in Kenya. During an attempted robbery he was badly bloodied, battered and left unconscious by the assailants, as he was defiant in not releasing the medal he wore around his neck given to him by Arturo Toscanini in appreciation for his talent.

“He adored me,” says the tenor without a trace of pomposity. “His supposed rigidity was nonsense. He told me once, ‘I’ll follow you, but you’d better sing well.’ And I did.”
The injuries proved to be far worse than originally thought and despite three operations, being transferred to Milan and eventually waking up from a coma, his health never recovered and he died three months after the attack.
But to help us recover from and dispel this horrible story of the end of such a great man and singer we leave you with a few quotes from the man himself from the LA Times interview of 1988 with Walter Price.

‘Asked which singers he admired, he smiles with a wicked charm that has surely gotten him into trouble in the past and replies, “Only the great ones.”
In the same interview asked if he would retire, he responded, ‘I don’t know. I told you I have never made plans. Del Monaco told me once he would kill himself when he couldn’t sing anymore. I told him I’d kill myself if I couldn’t stop.’
Grazie Giuseppe!

KIRSTEN FLAGSTAD, SOPRANO, JULY 12, 1895

Kirsten Flagstad was born in Hamar, Norway. Like so many outstanding singers, she grew up in a musically gifted family and indeed this soprano would be hailed the ‘voice of the century.’ Raised and nurtured in Oslo by her father Michael a conductor, her mother Maja a pianist and with her future musician siblings, brothers Ole a conductor and Lasse a pianist and her sister Karen- Marie also a Wagnerian soprano.
Flagstad made her debut in 1913 as Nuri in Eugen d’Albert’s Tiefland at the National Theatre in Oslo. Early recordings of her voice were taken at this young age between 1913 and 1915.
After singing opera and operetta at the Opera Comique for over a decade, which interestingly was co-directed by Alexander Varnay, the father of another Wagnerian soprano Astrid Varnay. It is also worth noting that at this time, Flagstad sang Desdemona to Leo Slezak’s Otello. As her career progressed she gravitated towards the heavier more dramatic soprano roles. Apparently it was the role of Aïda that unleashed the potential to ultimately find her true calling when she took on the role of Isolde in Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde in 1932.
A fellow Scandinavian soprano Ellen Gulbranson brought Flagstad’s voice to the attention of Winifred Wagner who hired Flagstad to initially sing minor roles at Bayreuth in 1933. In the following season she sang Sieglinde in Die Walküre and Gutrune in Die Götterdammerung opposite Frida Leider as Brünnhilde.
A year later she was auditioned and engaged immediately by the Metropolitan Opera in New York who were looking for a replacement to sing the same repertoire as Frida Leider. Her svelte youthful appearance was an added bonus to her obvious vocal abilities and talent.
Her Metropolitan debut was a sensation, and almost overnight she had established herself as the pre-eminent Wagnerian soprano of the era. Her sometimes three or four performances a week in early days at the Met sold out weeks in advance and donations from her nationwide radio appeals during the intermission at Saturday matinees helped the Metropolitan Opera coffers from impending bankruptcy at this time. In 1935 she performed the three Brünnhildes in the Ring Cycle for San Francisco Opera. In 1936 and 1937 she performed the Wagnerian roles of Senta, Isolde and Brünnhilde at Covent Garden where she achieved the same fame and respect as she did in New York
Despite advice from friends and colleagues and even pleas from former President Herbert Hoover she returned to German occupied Norway in 1941 before the United States entered World War Two. TShe took this step to be reunited with her husband. The decision was certainly made more difficult as her 20 year old daughter was married to an American and living in Montana.
During this time she only sang in the non-occupied countries of Switzerland and Sweden. But the tide of public opinion damaged her reputation and she fell out of favour with the public.
After it reopened in 1947, Covent Garden despite being in dire financial straits, hired Flagstad for four consecutive seasons from 1948 to 1952, where she performed her Wagnerian roles, including Kundry and Sieglinde.
Back in America, public sentiment had not changed towards her. The new director of the Met, Rudolf Bing was lambasted for his decision to re-hire Flagstad in for the 1950-1951 season: “The greatest soprano of this century must sing in the world’s greatest opera house”, he retorted.
Well into her fifties, and feeling that she no longer possessed her previous stamina or health for the arduous Wagnerian roles, these appearances at the Met were to be her last. She gave her farewell performance at the Met in April 1952, though not as a Wagnerian heroine, but in the title role of Gluck’s Alceste. Her final public performance in the role of Purcell’s Dido from Dido and Aeneas was in London on the 5 July 1953.
She was a guest on the BBC’s radio show Desert Island Discs in 1952 and chose knitting needles and wool as her luxury items. Not dissimilar to another grand voice prima donna, Joan Sutherland who occupied herself with embroidery backstage.
Kirsten Flagstad’s vast recording catalogue and existing live recordings from the Metropolitan continue to be classic benchmarks and pay tribute to her greatest roles, even though some of her most enduring recordings were recorded after her prime. She immortalised Richard Strauß’ Vier Letzte Lieder (Four Last Songs) which Strauß himself had intended her to premiere, although he did not live long enough to hear the performance.
The recording label Decca had plans to record her singing the mezzo-soprano Wagnerian repertoire of both Fricka roles in Das Rheingold and Die Götterdämmerung. Brahms Alto Rhapsody and Vier Ernste Lieder (Four Serious Songs) were also planned to be recorded, before she died in 1962, giving testament to her recording company’s respect for her and quality of a still consistent and extraordinary voice.
In his obituary, the New York Times opera critic, Harold C. Schonberg, wrote, “That voice! How can one describe it?” “It was enormous, but did not sound enormous because it was never pushed or out of placement. It had a rather cool silvery quality, and was handled instrumentally, almost as though a huge violin was emitting legato phrases.”
Incredibly, Flagstad sang the role of Isolde 70 times on the Met stage from 1935 to 1941, making Tristan and Isolde one of the greatest box office attractions in Metropolitan Opera history .
( Nine of those performances were Saturday matinee radio broadcasts.not cited)

The Kirsten Flagstad Museum in Hamar, Norway (https://kirsten-flagstad.no/en), contains a private collection of opera artifacts. Her costumes draw special attention, and include several examples on loan from the Metropolitan Opera Archives. Her portrait appeared on the Norwegian 100 kroner bill and on the tail section of Norwegian Air Shuttle planes.

Kirsten Flagstad painted on a Norwegian Air Shuttle airliner.