A Norma comeback
Maria Callas fulfilled the last contract arranged by her husband/manager, Meneghini, on 21 November 1959, in Dallas as Medea. Due to the change in her personal circumstances, she took a break from performing until July 1960, when she attempted to record some arias for a recital disc with EMI in place of the expensively aborted La traviata project. Some of these recordings, undertaken in London with Antonio Tonini, have only recently come to light and after almost eight months off the scene, she sounds somewhat vocally ill at ease through the lack of use. A month later, she embarked on a new production of Norma at the magnificent Greek amphitheatre, Epidavros. This was the first time that opera rather than drama had been performed there and there were considerable problems in reaching agreement to allow it to be presented.
Certainly, a fair amount of drama surrounded the performances. A sudden change in the weather meant that the premiere on 21 August had to be cancelled, so Callas appeared in public for the first time in 1960 on 24 August. At the second performance on the 26th, an announcement was made that she was unwell but would sing, and the third one, scheduled for 28 August, was cancelled.
A couple of weeks later, in September, she was back at La Scala, Milan to record her stereo re-make of Norma with her old mentor, Tullio Serafin as conductor, Franco Corelli as Pollione, Christa Ludwig as Adalgisa, and Nicola Zaccaria as Oroveso. The recording was met with mixed reviews and while most acknowledged the deepening of her interpretation, her voice was found to have become more unsteady and lacking the fire that she had previously brought to the role. The German mezzo Christa Ludwig was an odd choice for Adalgisa. She admitted that she knew little about bel canto and that Callas was a great help to her, but her rich, luscious voice and German technique were not ideally suited to the role. The recording was the last Callas made with Serafin.
However, after the unexpected hiatus in her career Callas, if somewhat briefly, was back in the game.
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