When - more than a decade ago - I made my first, curious, determined and charmingly clumsy steps into the world of classical music, I immediately realised that whatever records I hear first, usually determines how do I feel about other artists. In classical music there is really a 1001 way to interpret music and its truly a never-ending task (and I don't even want to go into subject is it really close to authentic composer's idea, which is besides the point) but I quickly found out that it would upset me if another singer did not use the same frills & trills I heard previously. Once I wrapped my head around this phenomenon, I made conscious decision I will NOT listen to most celebrated classical diva of all times, because I want to find out what other people did first, so I could compare. So I started with truly ancient recordings from 1900 upwards and love them so much that in a way I'm still stuck there with Caruso, Melba and other wonderful people from before WW2 era. But I did check out some other voices as well and grew to like and distinguished them from each other: magical sounds of Marian Anderson, Aafje Heynis, Kathleen Ferrier, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Zinka Milanov, Joan Sutherland, Marilyn Horne, Lentyne Price, Montserrat Caballé, Lucia Popp and Kathleen Battle to name just few that I collected trough the years.
Now, some 14 years later I found myself actually familiar with repertoire enough to approach "La Divina" and hear what's the fuss all about. Her albums were never out of print but I stumbled upon LP recorded in 1954 (so before that famous vocal decline) and very cautiously gave it a listen. I know music well enough and was curious and open minded about it. The first thing that struck me was a very particular colour of the voice - its definitely not a beautiful sound in a standard, accepted kind of way but more like highly individual, instantly recognisable sound that only one person can produce, which in my eyes makes her a definition of a great singer - someone who we can quickly tell part from thousands of others. Second, the woman was a human fireball - even in a field crowded with dramatic, theatrical and hair-pulling attitudes, Callas was flamethrower like no other. I wouldn't go so far to say she didn't have sense of humour, but music she was singing here was heavy drama, misery and apocalyptic enough to blow unexpected listener out of the chair, yes she was very intense. Just when I started to think her gift was being "drama mama", she gleefully jumps into completely coquettish (and perfectly spotless) "Una voce poco fa" where that huge, massive voice going all over the place in a manner that would make any coloratura faint with envy. I thought that Joan Sutherland was the top when it comes to chandelier attack, but my God Callas is a killer - she laughs, pouts, goes all girlish and seductive, hits those high notes and than in finale unleashes her real, true weapon, I mean she kills. Truly I wonder how did other of her contemporaries felt because honestly I wouldn't even dream of singing the same song after her, this was extremely hard to follow act.
The rest of the album is more or less showcase for extremely gifted singer who could easily go any way she had chosen.
If there is one truly outstanding peace for me here, its "Ebben? Ne andrò lontana" which is deliriously intense in such way that it attacks my senses, listener actually feels intoxicated from the sound Callas created. I understand that for many people she means different things but from simply musical point of view this is really remarkable and yes, she deserves all the accolades, laureates and adoration because it seems her complete being burned in the middle of Tornado, I have never encountered another voice so completely and passionately inside the music.
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