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10 unusual facts about Maria Callas


Andrea Eckert

Her roles have included the eponymous heroines in Hebbel's Judith, Schiller's Maria Stuart, Jelinek's Clara S., Sophocles's Elektra, Kleist's Penthesilea, and Maria Callas in Terrence McNally's Meisterklasse (Master Class).

Bernard Ładysz

His recordings include Lucia di Lammermoor (with Maria Callas) and The Devils of Loudon (with Tatiana Troyanos).

Cecilia Gasdia

That same year she won the first prize in the "New Voices for Opera" competition dedicated to Maria Callas.

Doug Ischar

The artist's single-channel video works of the past ten years are more allusive and poetic, addressing political and theoretical concerns obliquely via densely constructed image-sound montages whose explicit subjects range from the relationship between Maria Callas and Pier Paolo Pasolini (Come Lontano, 2010) to the life of Charlotte Brontë (CB, 2011).

Georges Prêtre

He worked with Maria Callas on a number of occasions, and made recordings of Carmen and Tosca with her.

Gordon Getty

Aspiring to become an opera singer, Getty studied in the mid-1970s with Louise Caselotti, a mezzo soprano who had been Maria Callas' voice teacher (1946–47).

Holland Festival

The festival introduced Maria Callas in the Netherlands, and was also the first to successfully set up a large symphonic tribute to Frank Zappa with "200 motels-the suite" in 2000 (after failed attempts to have Zappa perform himself in the festival in 1981).

Johanna Rosaly

During the 1990s, she was dedicated mostly to act on stage in several theater productions acclaimed by the critics, such as her impersonation of Maria Callas in Master Class, among many others, and since 1993, Johanna's been working for WIPR-TV channel 6, Puerto Rico's Government TV channel, (Tu Universo Televisión), hosting several talk shows, among others, Mucho Gusto (It's a Pleasure).

Ludwig von 88

Some of their songs are satires on stars like Louison Bobet, Nicolae Ceauşescu, Maria Callas, Jacques Chirac, Jodie Foster or deal with more serious topics like war: "Libannais raides", "Hiroshima"; drugs: "Le Manège enchanté", "Kaliman"; and misery: "LSD for Ethiopie", "In the Ghettos" — always with irony.

Peter Elkus

As a student, he attended opera workshops at the Goldovsky Opera Workshops, Denver Colorado and Wheeling West Virginia; Mannes College of Music New York, Hunter College New York and was chosen by Maria Callas as a member of the Juilliard Opera Theater.


Edward Quinn

Amongst celebrities captured on film by Quinn were Grace Kelly, Brigitte Bardot, Marlon Brando, Sophia Loren, Aristotle Onassis, Maria Callas, Winston Churchill, and Somerset Maugham.

Eugenio Fernandi

His recording career is limited to the 1957 recording of Turandot, opposite Maria Callas and Elisabeth Schwarzkopf.

Gabriele Santini

Considered one of great Verdi conductors of his generation, he left notable recordings of Simon Boccanegra and Don Carlos, both with Tito Gobbi and Boris Christoff, as well as La traviata with Maria Callas.

Gino Sinimberghi

During his long career, Gino has interpreted various works into Italian and German languages singing along Beniamino Gigli, Tito Gobbi and Maria Callas under great conductors such as Paul Hindemith and Herbert von Karajan.

Leonie Rysanek

This little-known feat equals the more often cited accomplishment of Maria Callas, who once performed Die Walküre and Bellini's I puritani within the same week.

Renato Cioni

In 1964, he took part in two historical performances, first at Covent Garden, as Cavaradossi in Tosca, opposite Maria Callas and Tito Gobbi, and then at La Scala, as Alfredo in La traviata, opposite Anna Moffo and Mario Sereni, under Herbert von Karajan.

Rhoda Chase

opera stars Lily Pons, Maria Callas, Robert Merrill, and Beverly Sills; comedians Jack Carter, Robert Klein, Jim Stafford and Bob Hope; pop singers Teresa Brewer, Pat Boone, Gladys Knight, Connie Francis, Joey Dee and The Starlighters, and actors Ann-Margret and Raúl Juliá.

The Beautiful Person

In Italian class, a record of Maria Callas singing Lucia plays, which causes Junie to rush out crying, leaving her affairs behind.

Zoë Dominic

Dominic's work as a theatre photographer began in the Royal Court Theatre around 1957, and she became known for photographing the postwar British theatre revival, including actors Laurence Olivier, Joan Plowright and Maggie Smith and performers Maria Callas, Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev.