Maria Callas (1924-1977)
Giuseppe Di Stefano (b. 1921)
Tito Gobbi (b. 1915)

Act II Trio Un ballo in maschera Giuseppe Verdi
Scene from Act II of Tosca Giacomo Puccini

Maria Callas was generally considered a witch, nasty with just about everybody around her. Although Greek by birth, she was Italian prima donna through and though (in both the good and the bad sense of the term). Her voice was sometimes spectacular, sometimes downright awful, but always Callas. As Lon Chaney was known as the “Man of a Thousand Faces”, Callas might be known as the “Soprano of a Thousand Registers”. One undeniable attribute of a Callas performance: it packed dramatic punch. The two selections here highlight two of the diva’s admirable performance qualities. Her singing in Masked Ball is superb. Her voice is under control, with only a whiff of the wild wobble, and the sound is pure gold. As usual with Callas, the line is flawless. In the Tosca excerpt (from the earlier of two recordings with this cast), the singing is so dramatically charged that it makes one’s hair stand on end.

Giuseppe Di Stefano possessed one of the most beautiful tenor voices of his time (or any time).

Tito Gobbi, on the other hand, had a rather nasty sounding voice—which he used to great effect as Scarpia and Iago. I saw him playing Iago to Jon Vickers’ Otello and was riveted by the performance. His Baron Scarpia in the Tosca excerpt is quite the match to Callas’ Floria Tosca.