Her Greatest Verdi Roles (maria Callas)

The fame and legacy of Maria Callas are nearly unsurpassed in the modern history of opera. Her fame has transcended the usual boundaries of classical music, and she has been the inspiration for several movies as well as the successful Broadway play "Master Class." Her extensive catalogue of recordings remains among the most coveted and controversial for both her fans and detractors. Though American by birth, Callas (born Maria Anne Sofia Cecilia Kalogeropoulos) was born of Greek parents, and at age 13 her mother took her back to Greece because of financial difficulties caused by the Great Depression.

Maria Callas was born to a Greek family in New York in 1923. Her vocal training took place in Athens, where her teacher was the coloratura soprano Elvira de Hidalgo, who had sung with Enrico Caruso and Feodor Chaliapin. After early performances in Greece, Callas’s international career was launched in 1947 when she performed the title role in Ponchielli’s La Gioconda at the Arena di Verona in Italy. Her voice defied simple classification and her artistic range was extraordinary. In her early twenties she sang such heavy dramatic roles as Gioconda, Turandot, Brünnhilde and Isolde, but over the course of her career her most famous roles came to be: Bellini’s Norma and Amina (La sonnambula); Verdi’s Violetta (La traviata); Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor and Anna Bolena, Cherubini’s Medea and Puccini’s Tosca. Though her timbre was not always conventionally beautiful, Callas’s musicianship and phrasing were in a class of their own. She brought characters to vivid life with her skill in colouring her tone and making insightful use of the text.

Maria Callas’s recital discs occupy a central place in her recorded legacy, alongside her complete opera recordings. The Verdi featured three roles she had sung in the opera house: Abigaille, brimming with youthful and impressive vocal grandeur at the San Carlo in Naples in 1949 (her earliest complete live opera recording to have survived); Lady Macbeth at the opening of the 1952–3 La Scala season, one of her greatest triumphs (the live recording was reissued by EMI); and Elisabetta (Élisabeth de Valois) at La Scala in 1954 (of which we have no recording), a character whose aria ‘Tu che le vanità’ would become a central feature of the concerts she gave between 1959 and 1962.

Violetta, the most complex and fully-rounded of Verdi's heroines, was one of the roles that defined Maria Callas as an artist. She performed it more than 60 times between 1951 and 1958, most famously in Luchino Visconti's production at La Scala in 1955/56. It is often said that the role demands a different kind of voice for each act, and, when she made this recording for the Cetra label in 1953, Callas offered youthful, ringing power complemented by coloratura prowess and the capacity for great delicacy. More than 60 years on, her characterisation, in its subtlety and truth, still sets the standard for La traviata.

As this recital amply demonstrates, Maria Callas encompassed an extraordinary range of roles. She is as convincing in the pinpoint coloratura of Lakmé's 'Bell Song' ('Her chromatic scale is beautifully done and she sails up to the region known as in alt with the greatest ease,' said Gramophone) as in the sweeping, richly coloured lines of Maddalena's 'La mamma morta' from Andrea Chénier, famously and movingly featured on the soundtrack of the 1993 Hollywood film Philadelphia.'There is great tenderness and simplicity, deep emotion,and the most lovely moulding of the vocal phrases,' wrote Gramophone, 'Madame Callas's characterizations… are nothing less than superb, and altogether there is some of her finest singing yet recorded'.

The Ukrainian soprano Olga Mykytenko has won numerous international awards, including the Grand Prix at the Maria Callas International Singing Contest in Athens. Her extraordinary musicality, solid vocal technique, easy coloraturas, and strong expression allow her to sing major roles, from Iolanta, Mimì, and Nedda to Gilda, Violetta, and Lucia. Engaged for many years as a soloist at the National Opera of Ukraine in Kiev, where she made her debut, Olga has performed in opera houses and concert halls around the world.

The Ukrainian soprano Olga Mykytenko has won numerous international awards, including the Grand Prix at the Maria Callas International Singing Contest in Athens. Her extraordinary musicality, solid vocal technique, easy coloraturas, and strong expression allow her to sing major roles, from Iolanta, Mimì, and Nedda to Gilda, Violetta, and Lucia. Engaged for many years as a soloist at the National Opera of Ukraine in Kiev, where she made her debut, Olga has performed in opera houses and concert halls around the world.