# Late Callas Performances I Love



## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

This is one of my favorite “discoveries” of the last few years on YouTube: _Ocean Thou Mighty Monster _from Carl Maria Von Weber’s *Oberon*. This was one of Callas’s appearances in London in 1962. It was recorded (by his own admission) by one Michael Scott, who smuggled a tape recorder into the hall and recorded most of the arias she sang.

What I love about this particular piece is the way Callas sings the aria, fearlessly and with a freedom that is practically unknown in other recordings of this aria. She just lets the voice out in luxurious long phrases as if she herself is, like the character she portrays, addressing the mighty ocean. You can’t be timid here. Even in her flawed 1962 vocal state, she shirks nothing. She sings in imperious accents, the voice in enormous utterances; her breath control here is magnificent. Her top is less strident than in some other instances this late in her career; and if the recording is much less than ideal, I wouldn’t want to be without this performance, as I find it better sung that her studio ones.

She sings the aria in the original English, rather than German, which other singers prefer, but I find it impedes the flow of the voice somehow. Unfortunately, her diction suffers in this most unsingable language (in my opinion).






Do you have a favorite Callas late-career performance?


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## Shaughnessy (Dec 31, 2020)

Your thread participants may enjoy having access to this YouTube page which is a compendium of a variety of live performances and curated playlists -



https://www.youtube.com/user/mariacallaslive



Examples - Recitals - Live in Turin ('52), Stuttgart ('59), San Remo ('54), Milan ('56), London ('62), Hamburg ('59), and Paris ('63)

There are also three different versions of "Il Trovatore" - Mexico City ('50), Napoli ('51), and Milan ('53).


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## Shaughnessy (Dec 31, 2020)

Maria Callas - Live in Paris 1963
Giacomo Puccini La Boheme -
Quando m' en vo
Maria Callas as Musetta
Orchestre Philharmonique de la RTF
Conductor: Georges Pretre
Theatre des Champs Elysees,
Paris, June 5, 1963

The sound on these recordings found on the YouTube page listed in post # 2 is superb - I've sampled over a dozen and they are consistently first-rate. I was particularly impressed with this recording of_ Quando 'en vo_ - Listened to it three times so far over the course of the day.

Great thread idea -


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Shaughnessy said:


> Maria Callas - Live in Paris 1963
> Giacomo Puccini La Boheme -
> Quando m' en vo
> Maria Callas as Musetta
> ...


@Shaughnessy, is this your favorite late-career Callas aria?


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## Viardots (Oct 4, 2014)

MAS said:


> This is one of my favorite “discoveries” of the last few years on YouTube: _Ocean Thou Mighty Monster _from Carl Maria Von Weber’s *Oberon*. This was one of Callas’s appearance in London in 1962. It was recorded (by his own admission) by one Michael Scott, who smuggled a tape recorder into the hall and recorded most of the arias she sang.
> 
> What I love about this particular piece is the way Callas sings the aria, fearlessly and with a freedom that is practically unknown in other recordings of this aria. She just lets the voice out in luxurious long phrases as if she is, like the character she portrays, addressing the mighty ocean. You can’t be timid here. Even in her flawed 1962 vocal state, she shirks nothing. She sings in imperious accents, the voice in enormous utterances; her breath control here is magnificent. Her top is less strident than in some other instances this late in her career; and if the recording is much less than ideal, I wouldn’t want to be without this performance, as I find it better sung that her studio ones.
> 
> ...


I have this live recording on *Melodram 36513*, which is long out of print and the sole copy available now from a third-party seller on Amazon is priced exorbitantly at $76. Glad I made up my mind to get the set almost ten years ago when the price was still bearable.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

I've always loved this late (1965) French TV performance. She also sang the whole of the recit before the aria (which I have on a DVD) but I can only find the aria on youtube. She was in frail voice, but, elegantly dressed and coiffed as she is, she simply becomes the sweet, poor, wronged Amina before your very eyes. She hardly moves a muscle but she is mesmerising.






The other arias were _O mio babbino caro _and _Adieu, notre petite table_. Apparently she also sang Duparc's _I'invitation au voyage _but it was omitted for reasons of time and there is no surviving tape. How I would love to have heard that!


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

I love early Callas but rarely like late Callas BUT as mentioned earlier her Samson arias are really really wonderful as is this which I have played many times: 




I don't usually like her singing in her video concerts but I really like this and it will be in a contest soon:




In all of these she does not need to sing much in the upper part of the voice which I dislike in her last decade.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Then there's this 1962 _O don fatale_. There may be a couple of off centre high notes but she mines the aria for every ounce of emotion and sings with blazing conviction.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Seattleoperafan said:


> I love early Callas but rarely like late Callas BUT as mentioned earlier her Samson arias are really really wonderful as is this which I have played many times:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


The aria from *I Vespri Siciliani *fits into the desert island category.


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

Tsaraslondon said:


> Then there's this 1962 _O don fatale_. There may be a couple of off centre high notes but she mines the aria for every ounce of emotion and sings with blazing conviction.


O Madre de Dios! I only heard it before, but never seen.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Though this is from 1963 and the voice is slightly compromised, no one has ever inhabited this character as Callas does in this aria - she makes Charlotte into an interesting person. The opportunities are there for the singer, but very very few take them up.


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## niknik (Oct 4, 2014)

I love to hear Callas a Paris I & II and Rossini & Donizetti Arias specially for the Rossini part


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## Shaughnessy (Dec 31, 2020)

MAS said:


> @Shaughnessy, is this your favorite late-career Callas aria?


I was working my way through the selections on the page that I posted as these live recital selections are completely unknown to me and found that the '65 Paris _Quando m' en vo _in particular merited a second listen. I still haven't completed the listening project that I've set up for the two box sets which make up the remastered complete studio and live performance recordings.


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

Did she ever sing Cassandra or Dido in _Les Troyens_?


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

ColdGenius said:


> Did she ever sing Cassandra or Dido in _Les Troyens_?


Unfortunately, no. The only Berlioz she sang was _D’amour l’ardente flamme _from *La damnation de Faust. *I think that many of us would’ve loved her singing the roles you mention; she would’ve indeed made a fabulous Cassandre and would surely have illuminated Didon.


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## Op.123 (Mar 25, 2013)

I like that rendition of "Ocean! Thou mighty monster" too. 
The latest Callas performance I consider a masterpiece of theatrical singing is the Dallas Medea though I like her Pirata from the following year too its just not on the same level. After that there's less I care for. The arias from Samson and Dalila are good, but mostly I don't really care for it.


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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

MAS said:


> Unfortunately, no. The only Berlioz she sang was _D’amour l’ardente flamme _from *La damnation de Faust. *I think that many of us would’ve loved her singing the roles you mention; she would’ve indeed made a fabulous Cassandre and would surely have illuminated Didon.


How sad! I watched _Les Troyens _recently, our Cassandra and Dido were gorgeous. But I thought how wonderfully Callas would perform this roles, a Greek tragedy as it is. ("Greek tragedy" doesn't relate to Greece only here; it's rather a special quality of a tragedy).


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## Viardots (Oct 4, 2014)

Callas in Tebaldi territory. Of all late Callas recordings, this is my favourite. She never sang Desdemona on stage and never even programmed the Willow Song and Ave Maria in her concerts, yet her sole recording of this scene is full of pleasant surprises and is a deeply moving and at the same time stirring one. Many would think that she does not have the natural vocal endowment suited for this role, yet through her miraculous musicianship, her chameleon-like adjustment of vocal colours and tonal shadings, close and scrupulous observations of Verdi's markings and dynamics she makes the role work beautifully in her voice and captures all of Desdemona's doom-laden moods and forebodings. Remarkable is the variety of vocal colouring she achieves in the repeated "salce"s and she manages the ethereal ending of "Ave Maria" in the best tradition of recorded versions of the piece.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Viardots said:


> Callas in Tebaldi territory. Of all late Callas recordings, this is my favourite. She never sang Desdemona on stage and never even programmed the Willow Song and Ave Maria in her concerts, yet her sole recording of this scene is full of pleasant surprises and is a deeply moving and at the same time stirring one. Many would think that she does not have the natural vocal endowment suited for this role, yet through her miraculous musicianship, her chameleon-like adjustment of vocal colours and tonal shadings, close and scrupulous observations of Verdi's markings and dynamics she makes the role work beautifully in her voice and captures all of Desdemona's doom-laden moods and forebodings. Remarkable is the variety of vocal colouring she achieves in the repeated "salce"s and she manages the ethereal ending of "Ave Maria" in the best tradition of recorded versions of the piece.


Oh, I would think this would play to her strengths. It doesn't go too high and is mostly in the middle voice and where she can milk meaning.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Yet another treasure for me on that mythical night in 1962 is _Pleurez, pleurez mes yeux _from Massenet’s *Le Cid*, which fits her like a glove - I love this aria, especially in her voice! I think she goes one better than her other performances of the piece, though she curtails the high note at _toutes mes larmes _at the end.


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## Revitalized Classics (Oct 31, 2018)

I particularly enjoy this recording of Butterfly's death scene from Paris in 1963


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

MAS said:


> Yet another treasure for me on that mythical night in 1962 is _Pleurez, pleurez mes yeux _from Massenet’s *Le Cid*, which fits her like a glove - I love this aria, especially in her voice! I think she goes one better than her other performances of the piece, though she curtails the high note at _toutes mes larmes _at the end.


If Sutherland can make this emotional you know Callas can be Meryl Streep.


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## Viardots (Oct 4, 2014)

Seattleoperafan said:


> Oh, I would think this would play to her strengths. It doesn't go too high and is mostly in the middle voice and where she can milk meaning.


True. Yet in terms of _natural_ vocal colour and temperament, Desdemona is not quite in Callas's territory, and that most likely explains why the role was never in her stage and concert repertoire and makes her chameleon-like musicianship in this scene all the more impressive.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Revitalized Classics said:


> I particularly enjoy this recording of Butterfly's death scene from Paris in 1963


I love that unstinting outpouring of tone - the _tessitura _suits her at this point.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

MAS said:


> This is one of my favorite “discoveries” of the last few years on YouTube: _Ocean Thou Mighty Monster _from Carl Maria Von Weber’s *Oberon*. This was one of Callas’s appearance in London in 1962. It was recorded (by his own admission) by one Michael Scott, who smuggled a tape recorder into the hall and recorded most of the arias she sang.
> 
> What I love about this particular piece is the way Callas sings the aria, fearlessly and with a freedom that is practically unknown in other recordings of this aria. She just lets the voice out in luxurious long phrases as if she is, like the character she portrays, addressing the mighty ocean. You can’t be timid here. Even in her flawed 1962 vocal state, she shirks nothing. She sings in imperious accents, the voice in enormous utterances; her breath control here is magnificent. Her top is less strident than in some other instances this late in her career; and if the recording is much less than ideal, I wouldn’t want to be without this performance, as I find it better sung that her studio ones.
> 
> ...


This "Ocean" was clearly impressive heard live, but for home listening I prefer the studio recording, uncomfortable high notes notwithstanding. First of all, we can actually hear the nuances of her interpretation and make out the words, but second, the music moves along and hangs together better at sensible tempi. Only a little less intense in the studio than live, Callas still delivers my favorite performance of this.


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## damianjb1 (Jan 1, 2016)

It's not a live performance, but Callas singing the last 10 minutes of Act 1 of La Gioconda (in her later recording) is possibly for me the greatest thing she ever did. If I want to expose someone to Callas I use that or Dormono entrambi from the later Norma studio recording. They've never fail to amaze.


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

damianjb1 said:


> It's not a live performance, but Callas singing the last 10 minutes of Act 1 of La Gioconda (in her later recording) is possibly for me the greatest thing she ever did. If I want to expose someone to Callas I use that or Dormono entrambi from the later Norma studio recording. They've never fail to amaze.


Hmm, what an atypical choice. I will listen more carefully to that Dormono entrambi mext time.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> This "Ocean" was clearly impressive heard live, but for home listening I prefer the studio recording, uncomfortable high notes notwithstanding. First of all, we can actually hear the nuances of her interpretation and make out the words, but second, the music moves along and hangs together better at sensible tempi. Only a little less intense in the studio than live, Callas still delivers my favorite performance of this.


When it comes to studio recordings of _Ocean thou mighty monster _it can get a little complicated, as with a lot of these arias, because she recorded some of them more than once and EMI, desperate to cash in on her commercial value, released some of these other takes in a release of _Rarities. _This would appear to be from the previously unreleased sessions under Antonio Tonini rather than the later 1963 ones under Nicola Rescigno, which were issued on _Maria Callas sings Mozart, Beethoven and Weber._


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Tsaraslondon said:


> When it comes to studio recordings of _Ocean thou mighty monster _it can get a little complicated, as with a lot of these arias, as she recorded some of them more than once and EMI, desperate to cash in on her commercial value, released some of these other takes in a release of _Rarities. _This would appear to be from the previously unreleased sessions under Antonio Tonini rather than the later 1963 ones under Nicola Rescigno, which were issued on _Maria Callas sings Mozart, Beethoven and Weber._


Yes, EMI made a muddle with some of their unauthorized recordings.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

BBSVK said:


> Hmm, what an atypical choice. I will listen more carefully to that Dormono entrambi mext time.


_Dormono entrambi _lies mostly in the middle of the voice and I too think the performance from the 1960 studio recording is the most moving of all them.


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## PaulFranz (May 7, 2019)

MAS said:


> She sings the aria in the original English, rather than German, which other singers prefer, but I find it impedes the flow of the voice somehow. Unfortunately, her diction suffers in this most unsingable language (in my opinion).


Any language that can be spoken can be sung. And, go figure, English is by a mile the most popular language to sing in around the world. Turns out people just like what they're used to.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

PaulFranz said:


> Any language that can be spoken can be sung. And, go figure, English is by a mile the most popular language to sing in around the world. Turns out people just like what they're used to.


Yes, for some reason English seems easier to manage in pop music or musical theater than in opera - is it because the way the voice is produced in opera differently?


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

MAS said:


> Yes, for some reason English seems easier to manage in pop music or musical theater than in opera - is it because the way the voice is produced in opera differently?


I think it might have more to do with the composer. I don't know how good Weber's English was, or even if he spoke the language, but the words of _Ocean! Thou mighty monster! _don't scan particularly well. On the other hand I've heard plenty of singers make the music of Purcell and Britten sound perfectly natural and understandable. That said, diction these days isn't as good as it was a few years ago.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Callas sang *Don Carlo *at La Scala in 1954, newly slim, but there is no recording of it, as it was not broadcast. In photographs, she looks the very picture of the unhappy queen. I wish the opera had been broadcast, but as if in compensation, her last Act aria “_Tu che le vanità“ _was featured in a few of her late-career concerts and there is a studio recording of it in 1958 as part of her LP *Verdi Heroines*. Here, however, is a video of her singing the aria in London, 1962, looking very soignée and shy, until the music starts and she gets into it, as one reviewer said: “gloriously lost.”
She is in characteristic 1962 voice, but seeing her sing it is a joy.






The transfer is rather poor and it makes her top seem more shrill than others.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

MAS said:


> Callas sang *Don Carlo *at La Scala in 1954, newly slim, but there is no recording of it, as it was not broadcast. In photographs, she looks the very picture of the unhappy queen. I wish the opera had been broadcast, but as if in compensation, her last Act aria “_Tu che le vanità“ _was featured in a few of her late-career concerts and there is a studio recording of it in 1958 as part of her LP *Verdi Heroines*. Here, however, is a video of her singing the aria in London, 1962, looking very soignée and shy, until the music starts and she gets into it, as one reviewer said: “gloriously lost.”
> She is in characteristic 1962 voice, but seeing her sing it is a joy.
> 
> 
> ...


This has ben colorised. The broadcast was in black & white and sounds much better in the Warner BluRay included in the Callas Live Remastered box.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Tsaraslondon said:


> This has ben colorised. The broadcast was in black & white and sounds much better in the Warner BluRay included in the Callas Live Remastered box.


Not well colorized, either. The Warner is not available on YT.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

Though a late recording, this brought Callas’s singing of French opera arias superlatives from critics, as if she had discovered (more properly uncovered) new music to sing. With her uncanny ability to sing arias as if newly-minted, _J’ai perdu mon Eurydice _was given new life, and Orphee comes alive. One of the critics said (I paraphrase) that she’s the only singer who when she cries: “Eurydice! Eurydice!,” seems to expect an answer.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

MAS said:


> Though a late recording, this brought Callas’s singing of French opera arias superlatives from critics, as if she had discovered (more properly uncovered) new music to sing. With her uncanny ability to sing arias as if newly-minted, _J’ai perdu mon Eurydice _was given new life, and Orphee comes alive. One of the critics said (I paraphrase) that she’s the only singer who when she cries: “Eurydice! Eurydice!”, she seems to expect an answer.


And the blank despairing tone on _Mortel silence _that follows is so poignant. According to Max Loppert, when comparing recordings of Gluck operas in _Opera on Record, _she was " a Gluck soprano of the highest order." It is such a shame that the La Scala *Alceste *is in such awful sound. *Ifigenia in Tauride *is much better sonically, but the supporting cast and conductor are not so good.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

This is one of my very favorite Gluck arias. Callas sang *Iphigenia en Tauride *at La Scala in 1957 in Italian and recorded the aria _O malhereuse Iphigenie _in French six years later. The voice at that point was ragged, the top precarious and strained; even so it is my favorite version of the aria, though I can’t always listen to it without ambivalence. Other versions with singers with healthier voices don’t always sound easy, either. 





Callas in 1963

Callas herself, in the La Scala production, 1957, sounds a bit stressed in the higher regions.





Callas in 1957


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