MARIA CALLAS, THE MOST BEAUTIFUL OPERA VOICE EVER

Today, The Grandma has been reading about Maria Callas, the Greek-American soprano, and one of the most renowned and influential opera singers of the 20th century, who was born in New York City in 1923.

Maria Callas, in Greek Μαρία Κάλλας, December 2, 1923–September 16, 1977, was a Greek-American soprano, and one of the most renowned and influential opera singers of the 20th century. Many critics praised her bel canto technique, wide-ranging voice and dramatic interpretations. 

Her repertoire ranged from classical opera seria to the bel canto operas of Donizetti, Bellini and Rossini and further, to the works of Verdi and Puccini; and, in her early career, to the music dramas of Wagner. Her musical and dramatic talents led to her being hailed as La Divina.

Born in New York City and raised by an overbearing mother, she received her musical education in Greece and established her career in Italy. Forced to deal with the exigencies of wartime poverty and with myopia that left her nearly blind onstage, she endured struggles and scandal over the course of her career.

More information: Maria Callas International Archive

She turned herself from a heavy woman into a svelte and glamorous one after a mid-career weight loss, which might have contributed to her vocal decline and the premature end of her career. The press exulted in publicizing Callas's temperamental behavior, her supposed rivalry with Renata Tebaldi and her love affair with Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis. Although her dramatic life and personal tragedy have often overshadowed Callas the artist in the popular press, her artistic achievements were such that Leonard Bernstein called her the Bible of opera.

Callas made her professional debut in February 1941, in the small role of Beatrice in Franz von Suppé's Boccaccio. Callas plays Tosca, Fidelio, Cavalleria Rusticana,   Lucia di Lammermoor, La Traviata, Armida, La sonnambula, Il pirata, Il turco in Italia, Medea and Anna Bolena.

Callas spent her last years living largely in isolation in Paris and died of a heart attack at age 53 on September 16, 1977.Heart failure is a possible outcome of dermatomyositis or side effect of the steroids and immunosuppressants which she took for the disease. Another explanation offered is that Callas's death was due to heart failure brought on by, possibly unintentional, overuse of Mandrax, a sleeping aid.

A funerary liturgy was held at Agios Stephanos St. Stephen's Greek Orthodox Cathedral on rue Georges-Bizet, Paris, on September 20, 1977. She later was cremated at the Père Lachaise Cemetery and her ashes were placed in the columbarium there. After being stolen and later recovered, in the spring of 1979 they were scattered over the Aegean Sea, off the coast of Greece, according to her wish.

 

More information: Maria Callas (1923-1977)

 

 I would like to be Maria, but there is La Callas 

who demands that I carry myself with her dignity.

Maria Callas

ARISTOTLE S. ONASSIS, THE GREEK SHIPPING MAGNATE

Today, The Grandma has been reading about Aristotle Onassis, the Greek shipping magnate who was born on a day like today in 1906.

Aristotle Socrates Onassis, in Greek Αριστοτέλης Ωνάσης, (20 January 1906-15 March 1975), was a Greek Argentinian shipping magnate who amassed the world's largest privately-owned shipping fleet and was one of the world's richest and most famous men.

He was married to Athina Mary Livanos (daughter of shipping tycoon Stavros G. Livanos), had a long-standing affair with opera singer Maria Callas and was married to Jacqueline Kennedy, the widow of US President John F. Kennedy.

Onassis was born in Smyrna (modern-day İzmir in Turkey) and fled the city with his family to Greece in 1922 in the wake of the catastrophe of Smyrna.

He moved to Argentina in 1923 and established himself as a tobacco trader and later a shipping owner during the Second World War.

Moving to Monaco, Onassis fought Prince Rainier III for economic control of the country through his ownership of SBM and its Monte Carlo Casino.

In the mid-1950s, he sought to secure an oil shipping arrangement with Saudi Arabia and engaged in whaling expeditions.

In the 1960s, Onassis attempted to establish a large investment contract -Project Omega-with the Greek military junta, and he sold Olympic Airways, which he had founded in 1957.

Onassis was greatly affected by the death of his 24-year-old son, Alexander, in a plane crash in 1973, and he died two years later.

More information: Greek Reporter

Aristotle Socrates Onassis was born in 1906 in Karataş, a suburb of the port city of Smyrna (now İzmir, Turkey) in Anatolia to Socrates Onassis and Penelope Dologou.

In 1923, Onassis returned to Constantinople with $250 in his pocket.

In August of that year, he arrived in Buenos Aires, Argentina, by Nansen passport, and got his first job as a telephone operator with the British United River Plate Telephone Company, while following studies in commerce and port-duty administration at Aduanas Argentinas.

He later became an entrepreneur, creating an Argentine import-export company, going into business for himself and making a fortune importing English-Turkish tobacco to Argentina. He obtained Argentine citizenship in 1929. Eventually he established his first shipping trading company in Buenos Aires, Astilleros Onassis.

After gaining his first fortune in Argentina, he expanded his shipping business worldwide and relocated to New York City, United States, where he built up his shipping businesses empire while keeping offices in Buenos Aires and Athens.

His legacy in Buenos Aires was the creation of a shipping empire and a Hellenic Culture Fund providing youth scholarships and an academic international exchange program between Argentina, Greece, Monaco and the United States; the programs are funded and administered by the Onassis Foundation and were eventually under the managing direction of his daughter Christina Onassis.

Onassis died at age 69 on 15 March 1975 at the American Hospital of Paris in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France.

Onassis was buried on his island of Skorpios in Greece, alongside his son, Alexander.

Onassis's will established a charitable foundation in memory of his son, the Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation, which received 45% of Onassis's estate. The remainder of his estate was left to his daughter, Christina.

More information: Onassis

To succeed in business it is necessary
to make others see things as you see them.

Aristotle Onassis

MARIA CALLAS, THE MOST BEAUTIFUL OPERA VOICE

Maria Callas in the Metropolitan Opera in NYC

Today, The Grandma has been reading about Maria Callas, the Greek-American soprano, and one of the most renowned and influential opera singers of the 20th century, who was born on a day like today in 1923.

 

Maria Callas, in Greek Μαρία Κάλλας, December 2, 1923 – September 16, 1977, was a Greek-American soprano, and one of the most renowned and influential opera singers of the 20th century. Many critics praised her bel canto technique, wide-ranging voice and dramatic interpretations. 

Her repertoire ranged from classical opera seria to the bel canto operas of Donizetti, Bellini and Rossini and further, to the works of Verdi and Puccini; and, in her early career, to the music dramas of Wagner. Her musical and dramatic talents led to her being hailed as La Divina.

Born in New York City and raised by an overbearing mother, she received her musical education in Greece and established her career in Italy. Forced to deal with the exigencies of wartime poverty and with myopia that left her nearly blind onstage, she endured struggles and scandal over the course of her career.

More information: Maria Callas International Archive

She turned herself from a heavy woman into a svelte and glamorous one after a mid-career weight loss, which might have contributed to her vocal decline and the premature end of her career. The press exulted in publicizing Callas's temperamental behavior, her supposed rivalry with Renata Tebaldi and her love affair with Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis. Although her dramatic life and personal tragedy have often overshadowed Callas the artist in the popular press, her artistic achievements were such that Leonard Bernstein called her the Bible of opera.

Callas made her professional debut in February 1941, in the small role of Beatrice in Franz von Suppé's Boccaccio. Callas plays Tosca, Fidelio, Cavalleria Rusticana,   Lucia di Lammermoor, La Traviata, Armida, La sonnambula, Il pirata, Il turco in Italia, Medea and Anna Bolena.

Callas spent her last years living largely in isolation in Paris and died of a heart attack at age 53 on September 16, 1977.Heart failure is a possible outcome of dermatomyositis or side effect of the steroids and immunosuppressants which she took for the disease. Another explanation offered is that Callas's death was due to heart failure brought on by, possibly unintentional, overuse of Mandrax, a sleeping aid.

More information: Maria Callas (1923-1977)

A funerary liturgy was held at Agios Stephanos St. Stephen's Greek Orthodox Cathedral on rue Georges-Bizet, Paris, on September 20, 1977. She later was cremated at the Père Lachaise Cemetery and her ashes were placed in the columbarium there. After being stolen and later recovered, in the spring of 1979 they were scattered over the Aegean Sea, off the coast of Greece, according to her wish.

 I would like to be Maria, but there is La Callas 

who demands that I carry myself with her dignity.

Maria Callas