Victor de Sabata

Maria Callas, Orch del Teatro alla Scala di Milano, Victor de Sabata – Puccini: Tosca (1953/2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:48:54 minutes | 1,07 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Warner Classics

This Tosca, made in 1953 with the forces of La Scala, is a landmark in recording history. Conducted with searing intensity by Victor de Sabata, it teams Callas with two of her closest colleagues, the tenor Giuseppe di Stefano and the baritone Tito Gobbi – a performer who could rival Callas in dramatic finesse and power. Tosca’s aria ‘Vissi d’arte’ (I lived for art) has come to be seen as Callas’ personal manifesto.

Tosca,’ Giacomo Puccini’s ‘shabby little shocker,’ had its premiere in 1900. The libretto, by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, was based on the Sardou drama of the same name. The opera has come to be associated with Maria Callas, the most celebrated interpreter of the title role. This recording, which dates from 1953, is THE classic performance, one of two ‘official’ recordings, as it were. It is a must-have for all Callas fans. (There is another official recording, made in 1964, with a different conductor, Georges Prêtre, and a different Cavaradossi, Carlo Bergonzi, but as the years passed, so did the quality of Callas’s voice.) This earlier version is far superior.

Tradition mandates that we hear Callas sing with her fabled partner, the honey-voiced Di Stefano. Here, his sweetness is a wonderful counterpoint to Callas’s dramatic, covered voice. Tito Gobbi provides a crafty Scarpia, and De Sabata’s conducting is considered by many to be the ultimate reading of this work. But Callas is the diva here, and the listener is treated to the full amalgam of her emotional range. This performance is the myth-making one!

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