Maria Callas sings the Casta Diva air

Few artists of the twentieth century, and in whatever an artistic domain, have caused as much enthusiasm as Maria Callas, especially - it must be said - after her premature death. Maria Kalogeropoùlo born in New York in 1923, in modest surroundings. She studied piano and singing in Athens and her career began in 1947 thanks to the conductor Tullio Serafin. For nearly 20 years, Maria Callas sang on the great stages of the world, causing a stir with her temperament, and her much covered rivalry with Renata Tebaldi, until her 1959 the liaison with Aristotle Onassis. From 1965, she devoted herself to teaching and gave a few recitals but she isolated herself more and more and died in 1977. Maria Callas marks a deep rift in the art of opera singing in the twentieth century. With her, there were no more obese and inexpressive sopranos singing on stage. For Callas, opera was also theatre for which she would undergo a slimming treatment to incarnate the heroines whose beauty could be seen at the cinema.

Her voice with a very a wide range allowed her to sing the heroines of Bellini (and musician that she helped to revive), Donizetti, Rossini, Verdi, Puccini... but also the heavier roles of Wagner or Carmen de Bizet. The quality and power of her voice but especially her ability to incarnate characters let her live on in many recordings sought after by amateurs with manic fervour.