TEATRO ALLA SCALA, MILANO 09 SEP 1956
STUDIO REMASTERED 2014
2CD 0825646340873 – DIGITAL
Verdi: Un ballo in maschera
ORCHESTRA E CORO DEL TEATRO ALLA SCALA DI MILANO
ANTONINO VOTTO
Callas’s first stage appearances in Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera came at La Scala in 1957, a year in which Milan also saw her in La sonnambula and Anna Bolena. As in this recording, made the year before, she shared Verdi’s most spectacular soprano-tenor duet (in Act II) with Giuseppe di Stefano. This was the last time Callas and Di Stefano appeared together in opera, though they reunited in the 1970s to direct I vespri siciliani in Turin and to give a series of joint concerts in Europe, the USA, Canada, South Korea and Japan. Gramophone judged this recording of Ballo to be ‘one of Callas’s most compelling assumptions’.
AMELIA: MARIA CALLAS
RICCARDO: GIUSEPPE DI STEFANO
RENATO: TITO GOBBI
ULRICA: FEDORA BARBIERI
OSCAR: EUGENIA RATTI
SILVANO: EZIO GIORDANO
SAMUEL: SILVIO MAIONICA
TOM: NICOLA ZACCARIA
UN GIUDICE/UN SERVO: RENATO ERCOLANI