Maria Callas:
Today's Google Doodle celebrates what would have been
the 90th
birthday
of
soprano
Maria Callas.
Maria Callas - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Maria Callas, (December 2, 1923 – September 16, 1977), was an American-born Greek soprano and one of the most renowned and influential opera singers of the 20th century. Critics praised her bel canto technique, wide-ranging voice and dramatic gifts. Her repertoire ranged from classical opera seria to the bel canto operas of Donizetti, Bellini and Rossini; 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. 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 allegedly temperamental behavior, her supposed rivalry with Renata Tebaldi and her love affair with Aristotle Onassis. Her dramatic life and personal tragedy have often overshadowed Callas the artist in the popular press. However, her artistic achievements were such that Leonard Bernstein called her "the Bible of opera"; and her influence was so enduring that, in 2006, Opera News wrote of her: "Nearly thirty years after her death, she's still the definition of the diva as artist—and still one of classical music's best-selling vocalists."
DETERIORATING RELATIONSHIP WITH HER MOTHER
Callas's relationship with Evangelia continued to erode during the years in Greece, and in the prime of her career, it became a matter of great public interest, especially after a 1956 cover story in Time magazine which focused on this relationship and later, by Evangelia's book My Daughter – Maria Callas. In public, Callas blamed the strained relationship with Evangelia on her unhappy childhood spent singing and working at her mother's insistence, saying,
DETERIORATING RELATIONSHIP WITH HER MOTHER
Callas's relationship with Evangelia continued to erode during the years in Greece, and in the prime of her career, it became a matter of great public interest, especially after a 1956 cover story in Time magazine which focused on this relationship and later, by Evangelia's book My Daughter – Maria Callas. In public, Callas blamed the strained relationship with Evangelia on her unhappy childhood spent singing and working at her mother's insistence, saying,
My sister was slim and beautiful and friendly, and my mother always preferred her. I was the ugly duckling, fat and clumsy and unpopular. It is a cruel thing to make a child feel ugly and unwanted... I'll never forgive her for taking my childhood away. During all the years I should have been playing and growing up, I was singing or making money. Everything I did for them was mostly good and everything they did to me was mostly bad.
In 1957, she told Norman Ross, "Children should have a wonderful childhood. I have not had it - I wish I had." On the other hand, biographer Petsalis-Diomidis asserts that it was actually Evangelia's hateful treatment of George in front of their young children which led to resentment and dislike on Callas's part.
EDUCATION
In 1968, Callas told Lord Harewood,
Elvira De Hildalgo had the real great training, maybe even the last real training of the real bel canto. As a young girl—thirteen years old—I was immediately thrown into her arms, meaning that I learned the secrets, the ways of this bel canto, which of course as you well know, is not just beautiful singing. It is a very hard training; it is a sort of a strait-jacket that you're supposed to put on, whether you like it or not. You have to learn to read, to write, to form your sentences, how far you can go, fall, hurt yourself, put yourself back on your feet continuously. De Hidalgo had one method, which was the real bel canto way, where no matter how heavy a voice, it should always be kept light, it should always be worked on in a flexible way, never to weigh it down. It is a method of keeping the voice light and flexible and pushing the instrument into a certain zone where it might not be too large in sound, but penetrating. And teaching the scales, trills, all the bel canto embellishments, which is a whole vast language of its own.
De Hidalgo later recalled Callas as "a phenomenon... She would listen to all my students, sopranos, mezzos, tenors... She could do it all." Callas herself said that she would go to "the conservatoire at 10 in the morning and leave with the last pupil ... devouring music" for 10 hours a day. When asked by her teacher why she did this, her answer was that even "with the least talented pupil, he can teach you something that you, the most talented, might not be able to do."
***
“If I have to listen to a diva,
this is the one I want to hear making noise
in
my apartment.”
Callas fit the classic definition of “diva” in the Etymology Dictionary Online: "distinguished woman singer, prima donna”; "goddess, fine lady”; "divine (one).” Callas was, in many ways, “divine” in the way she transformed her operatic roles into beings of such depth and beauty that they will live forever. To hear her sing was to touch grace.
However, today, the Urban Dictionary defines diva as, among other things “hustler," "princess," "vixen.” That second definition is what young women and teens emulate today.
When I was a little girl growing up in New York City, my mother broke me of my little diva ways using Callas.
Whenever I threw one of my monumental temper tantrums, my mother used to counter them by putting Callas records on and playing them louder than I could wail.
I would stop the tantrum because I started to listen to Callas and the music. You can’t listen to something that pure and be a brat at the same time.
While Callas had a temper, she also had a voice, drive, ambition, and natural beauty. It’s sad that so much of her legacy is tied to her temper and lost love.
Being a diva is great for the stage, but when it comes to life in your home or plastered as a label on the front of a child's shirt, it’s time to pay attention to the plot line we are writing for our kids and change our tune.
As much as I've might have wanted taking this class,
Why did it have to be so hard learning the principle behind the internal combustion engine...
Once we made it to the hands on part where we actually worked on cars, pretty much nothing useful was learned within the amount of time left.
Changing the oil and radiator fluid I already knew how to do...kinda.
Easy enough learning how to do just reading the manual that came with my sister's old yellow Chevrolet Vega. Drove this car for the first year or two right after getting my driver's license. Considering this car had no air conditioning, no power steering, no nothing...
there wasn't much left under that hood one could mess up if didn't know what he was doing.
So I just dove in and taught myself these two simple but messy auto maintenance routines, on a car no one cared about, until receiving the brand new Mustang guaranteed getting my senior year of high school. Until getting this Mustang, suggested to my sister and her husband I'd be willing to pay the property tax and insurance on this vehicle they weren't using anyway.
I do credit my sister, being first born, having had the tough job of having to be the one doing all
the
grovelling/breaking in/training
of
our father into the starting of our family traditions.
That's why her first car had no air conditioning, power steering, no nothing pretty much. Our father was pretty tight/frugal with his money.
Have never cared looking back since the day I left home for college,
so
finding this idea more and more appealing each time giving it more thought.
"JIM!
YOU CAN BE SO SMART,
but
YOU CAN BE SO DUMB!"
~(Kim Ridling)~
But it would be worth it,
That look of mischief about them.
What
Heard Kim was following behind him in her car when this accident happened.
Suppose me and Penny should thank Kim for this.
Bumped me into graduating fourth instead of fifth.
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Although me and Mark Brown were never friends, do remember him all the way back to the first grade.
BUT...
I do owe Mark one;
Would not have been able one upping Kim Riddling and Penny Waddle that day without it.
They just don't know the whole story..
yet.
"Is it wrong...
that
I don't want my son to be gay?"
~(My Mother)~
As I'm now wanting to believe it was the girls who rejected me first,
maybe I should have taken
that
HOME ECONOMIC CLASS,
instead?
Would have been interesting seeing what I chose doing as my project...
for
SEWING.
A dress instead, my mother felt she had to wear in order not to offend me, probably would have done the trick.
But here's the deal.
Only as an adult looking back...
am I now aware how she unfairly played me against my father.
Then again,
my father pretty much turned us (or at least me) completely over to our mother to raise.
Didn't seem to have much care in him...
fighting it...
that's how I would now describe my father looking back.
Honestly,
do not believe my mother did this intentionally,
but
she was an extremely important part/reason behind the negative impressions I had of my father growing up.
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I am able seeing how my mother was very much in charge of her life's decisions up until she met my dad,
"Had I known I was going to live this long....
would have taken better care of myself."
Just about as frugal a neo-conservative Republican one could be. One who got more enjoyment over how much taxes he was able keeping the government from getting their hands on through careful investing and estate planning; at the same time a workaholic ignoring his own health as a diabetic who's days were numbered.
"MOTHER!
Now that's dad's gone,
YOUR MY BITCH NOW!
And as much as I'VE had to put up with,
pretty obvious to me,
YOU'VE MUST HAVE DONE SOMETHING RIGHT!"
Something now tells me he knew exactly what he was doing
when
instructing the trust fund be split evenly three ways when our mother died.
Didn't understand this in the beginning.
Wasn't expecting this.
Was definitely expecting the will favoring my sister and her two daughters,
his only two grandchildren.
How it seemed unfair,
considering it was my sister who was always over and beyond playing the role of the good daughter; while both me and my brother preferred keeping contact with our father to the bare minimum.
Didn't like how it made me question the lack of guilt I felt,
when
didn't care enough returning home, at my mother's request, seeing my father one last time.
But honestly do believe he would have found this situation
just as awkward as I would have. Definitely would have been the wrong time for either one of us feeling the need forcing ourselves into saying stupid things; the kind of stuff that just seem to come automatically as well as thoughtlessly by others. Nor the right time for us having a serious father/son talk; one that could never have been finished as this would have been our first.
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I think he knew; understood.
***
“If I have to listen to a diva,
this is the one I want to hear making noise
in
my apartment.”
Today’s Google Doodle celebrates Maria Callas, who left behind not only an
amazing body of operatic work but also the perfect template for a classic diva
on a collision course with misery, reminding us that a “Diva in training” shirt
on a little one isn’t really a good label.
Callas fit the classic definition of “diva” in the Etymology Dictionary Online: "distinguished woman singer, prima donna”; "goddess, fine lady”; "divine (one).” Callas was, in many ways, “divine” in the way she transformed her operatic roles into beings of such depth and beauty that they will live forever. To hear her sing was to touch grace.
However, today, the Urban Dictionary defines diva as, among other things “hustler," "princess," "vixen.” That second definition is what young women and teens emulate today.
When I was a little girl growing up in New York City, my mother broke me of my little diva ways using Callas.
Whenever I threw one of my monumental temper tantrums, my mother used to counter them by putting Callas records on and playing them louder than I could wail.
“If I have to listen to a diva, this is the one I want to hear making noise
in my apartment,”
Mom would tell me.
I would stop the tantrum because I started to listen to Callas and the music. You can’t listen to something that pure and be a brat at the same time.
While Callas had a temper, she also had a voice, drive, ambition, and natural beauty. It’s sad that so much of her legacy is tied to her temper and lost love.
Being a diva is great for the stage, but when it comes to life in your home or plastered as a label on the front of a child's shirt, it’s time to pay attention to the plot line we are writing for our kids and change our tune.
***
Found the above article cute.
Except for one thing.
With my mother,
definitely felt like she was trying to train me into being the kind of husband she didn't get!
What was she thinking,
suggesting I take HOME ECONOMICS as one of my electives...
while
still in high school?
As much as I've might have wanted taking this class,
HELL,
even I knew better than that!
Would have been complete suicide.
Would have been complete suicide.
Took AUTO MECHANIC SHOP instead.
Considering how the rest of this class had already spent a good portion of their lives
under
the hoods of cars and trucks with their fathers;
how
I made an"A" in AUTO MECHANIC the rest of these guys still couldn't...
never made any sense to me.
I took this class expecting to look really stupid in front of these guys;
but
was also expecting to learn a lot of stuff that would have been...immediately...practical.
but
was also expecting to learn a lot of stuff that would have been...immediately...practical.
"INTAKE-COMPRESSION-FIRING-EXHAUST!"
Why did it have to be so hard learning the principle behind the internal combustion engine...
FIRST?
Once we made it to the hands on part where we actually worked on cars, pretty much nothing useful was learned within the amount of time left.
Changing the oil and radiator fluid I already knew how to do...kinda.
Easy enough learning how to do just reading the manual that came with my sister's old yellow Chevrolet Vega. Drove this car for the first year or two right after getting my driver's license. Considering this car had no air conditioning, no power steering, no nothing...
there wasn't much left under that hood one could mess up if didn't know what he was doing.
So I just dove in and taught myself these two simple but messy auto maintenance routines, on a car no one cared about, until receiving the brand new Mustang guaranteed getting my senior year of high school. Until getting this Mustang, suggested to my sister and her husband I'd be willing to pay the property tax and insurance on this vehicle they weren't using anyway.
I do credit my sister, being first born, having had the tough job of having to be the one doing all
the
grovelling/breaking in/training
of
our father into the starting of our family traditions.
That's why her first car had no air conditioning, power steering, no nothing pretty much. Our father was pretty tight/frugal with his money.
Weighted the pros and cons of taking this AUTO MECHANIC SHOP real hard before making my final decision.
The intention was never impressing the girls...
just damage control.
Not wanting to look as stupid and naive to them
(who am I kidding/why limit this just to the girls)
when
a grown man.
GUYS ARE SUPPOSE TO KNOW CARS!
Girls weren't.
So the trick here was just knowing more about cars than the girls.
But my God!
"INTAKE-COMPRESSION-FIRING-EXHAUST!"
Not only have I've found no use for this knowledge during the course of my lifetime...
what are they even teaching in AUTO MECHANIC SHOPS in high schools these days?
With climate change deniers around every corner;
can just see one screaming,
"INDOCTRINATION!" "INDOCTRINATION!"
GUYS ARE SUPPOSE TO KNOW CARS!
Girls weren't.
So the trick here was just knowing more about cars than the girls.
But my God!
"INTAKE-COMPRESSION-FIRING-EXHAUST!"
Not only have I've found no use for this knowledge during the course of my lifetime...
what are they even teaching in AUTO MECHANIC SHOPS in high schools these days?
With climate change deniers around every corner;
can just see one screaming,
"INDOCTRINATION!" "INDOCTRINATION!"
Debating going home one of these years, just to attend my high school reunion.
Have never cared looking back since the day I left home for college,
so
finding this idea more and more appealing each time giving it more thought.
YOU CAN BE SO SMART,
but
YOU CAN BE SO DUMB!"
~(Kim Ridling)~
But it would be worth it,
only
if Kim Riddling and Penny Waddle were both to be there.
Have never been able to forget that day during high school,
while
sitting alone one lunchtime watching intramural basketball,
while
sitting alone one lunchtime watching intramural basketball,
how
these two approached me out of nowhere and sat down beside me;
these two approached me out of nowhere and sat down beside me;
sandwiching me tightly between them.
That look of mischief about them.
Be interesting to see how they react to hearing
the complete story;
hearing
the voice of a ghost from the past...
that
of
Mark Brown's.
Knew exactly what I was doing that day
these two jumped up as quickly as they had just sat down beside me,
then
turning around and storming off after Kim finishes blurting out the only thing said between the three of us that day.
then
turning around and storming off after Kim finishes blurting out the only thing said between the three of us that day.
Not only was I unable explaining to these two my action they just witnessed; no one else ever asked me about this incident between me, Kim, and Penny, either.
Can't help but wonder if they told anyone else.
Can't help but wonder if they told anyone else.
Did tell my mother what Kim said to me that day at school. Mother thought it funny and forever since. Only just recently, told her the whole story in front of my sister during one of their visits. Mother didn't find it so amusing this time around.
It's always been my understanding, Mark would have been class valedictorian had he graduated with us.
But he got hit and killed by a train driving over tracks trains pass daily through the center of our town.
What
a
DUMB ASS!
Heard Kim was following behind him in her car when this accident happened.
Suppose me and Penny should thank Kim for this.
Bumped Penny into graduating third instead of fourth our class of 1980.
Bumped me into graduating fourth instead of fifth.
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Still feels like I graduated fifth.
BUT...
I do owe Mark one;
sharing a "Kiss and Tell" story of his
with
me.
Would not have been able one upping Kim Riddling and Penny Waddle that day without it.
They just don't know the whole story..
yet.
"Is it wrong...
that
I don't want my son to be gay?"
~(My Mother)~
As I'm now wanting to believe it was the girls who rejected me first,
maybe I should have taken
that
HOME ECONOMIC CLASS,
instead?
Would have been interesting seeing what I chose doing as my project...
for
SEWING.
A dress instead, my mother felt she had to wear in order not to offend me, probably would have done the trick.
But here's the deal.
Only as an adult looking back...
am I now aware how she unfairly played me against my father.
Then again,
my father pretty much turned us (or at least me) completely over to our mother to raise.
Didn't seem to have much care in him...
fighting it...
that's how I would now describe my father looking back.
Honestly,
do not believe my mother did this intentionally,
but
she was an extremely important part/reason behind the negative impressions I had of my father growing up.
But leave it up to me to figure this all out without any help from her.
Only now am I learning the hard way, how it is my mother who has such deep seated issues/resentment of men being in control of her...she cannot even allow her own son (me) any credit for understanding her far better than she's willing to understands herself and/or me. How it is she needs for once, just once, listening to me unconditionally for a change as to what I need her to do in order for me (us) moving on with my our lives.
Even if this means the two of us finally agreeing to shake hands and going our own separate ways from this point on. Been willing doing this for a long time now; but I need my mother's understanding and admission of her part in all this before it can happen.
She cannot keep insisting on believing herself the rights being kept informed of any issues regarding me without my consent, although as her son she does bear some responsibility for me. She still doesn't understand why Georgia Regional Hospital will not share my medical records with her when she was the one who had me involuntarily committed in the first place. She has got to resist allowing herself being used again as nothing more than a signature signing off on decisions made by other parties here in Atlanta regarding my health concerns/interests. If truly belonged in Georgia Regional Hospital in the first place, these other parties should have been able accomplishing this themselves without her help. That by allowing DeKalb Country taking advantage of a 51 year old self avowed practicing homosexual, as well as an atheist, complicated relationship with his 80 year old rural Arkansan mother, she only made my problems even more complicated/harder to explain. She cannot be part of the solution to my drug addiction and supposedly "bipolar" disorder without being a huge part of the my problems with all of her denials Has to stop allowing herself (and my sister as well) being seen by others as being supportive of me in spite of me constantly reminding them they have yet to consider any suggestions of mine as ways in which I would consider them being supportive of me.
She cannot keep insisting on believing herself the rights being kept informed of any issues regarding me without my consent, although as her son she does bear some responsibility for me. She still doesn't understand why Georgia Regional Hospital will not share my medical records with her when she was the one who had me involuntarily committed in the first place. She has got to resist allowing herself being used again as nothing more than a signature signing off on decisions made by other parties here in Atlanta regarding my health concerns/interests. If truly belonged in Georgia Regional Hospital in the first place, these other parties should have been able accomplishing this themselves without her help. That by allowing DeKalb Country taking advantage of a 51 year old self avowed practicing homosexual, as well as an atheist, complicated relationship with his 80 year old rural Arkansan mother, she only made my problems even more complicated/harder to explain. She cannot be part of the solution to my drug addiction and supposedly "bipolar" disorder without being a huge part of the my problems with all of her denials Has to stop allowing herself (and my sister as well) being seen by others as being supportive of me in spite of me constantly reminding them they have yet to consider any suggestions of mine as ways in which I would consider them being supportive of me.
Betty Jo Wolfe
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High School Class Valedictorian
Banks, Arkansas
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(Warren, Arkansas)
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(New Orleans Charity Hospital Graduation Class)
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Charles Densen Avery, M.D.,
while she was working as a nurse at North Little Rock Hospital.
How she had been born the eighth child out of ten children into a family so poor,
they weren't even affected by the depression.
How she worked as a waitress nearby Warren, Arkansas up until accepted for nurses training
at
Charity Hospital New Orleans, Louisiana.
at
Charity Hospital New Orleans, Louisiana.
How, after my sister being born here in North Little Rock, she then gives up her career as a nurse; becoming full time housewife.
But this decision was 100% my mother's decision.
My father, her husband, did not try swaying my mother one way or the other with this decision.
But this decision was 100% my mother's decision.
My father, her husband, did not try swaying my mother one way or the other with this decision.
(I'm the only one immediate family with blue eyes)
Thought it out very carefully before asking my mother these questions;
before accusing her of having no right expecting others pitying her for whatever reasons she wanting to believe she should be pitied.
before accusing her of having no right expecting others pitying her for whatever reasons she wanting to believe she should be pitied.
No one made her marry my father. No one made her have his children.
No one made her give up her career.
For a woman of her times to be this much in control the direction her life took,
that's pretty damn fortunate!
And this is before even getting to the part where her husband dies 1999 due to complications from his poorly controlled diabetes. Should have seen how dramatically my mother's health improves after my father dies. There is no denying how faithful the role of wife/caregiver my mother played as my father became more and more demanding of her during the last few years of his life as his health deteriorated rapidly but his mind remaining sharp right up to the very end.
She could have insisted on them hiring extra help.
"Had I known I was going to live this long....
would have taken better care of myself."
Just about as frugal a neo-conservative Republican one could be. One who got more enjoyment over how much taxes he was able keeping the government from getting their hands on through careful investing and estate planning; at the same time a workaholic ignoring his own health as a diabetic who's days were numbered.
"MOTHER!
Now that's dad's gone,
YOUR MY BITCH NOW!
And as much as I'VE had to put up with,
pretty obvious to me,
YOU'VE MUST HAVE DONE SOMETHING RIGHT!"
Something now tells me he knew exactly what he was doing
when
instructing the trust fund be split evenly three ways when our mother died.
Didn't understand this in the beginning.
Wasn't expecting this.
Was definitely expecting the will favoring my sister and her two daughters,
his only two grandchildren.
How it seemed unfair,
considering it was my sister who was always over and beyond playing the role of the good daughter; while both me and my brother preferred keeping contact with our father to the bare minimum.
Didn't like how it made me question the lack of guilt I felt,
when
didn't care enough returning home, at my mother's request, seeing my father one last time.
But honestly do believe he would have found this situation
just as awkward as I would have. Definitely would have been the wrong time for either one of us feeling the need forcing ourselves into saying stupid things; the kind of stuff that just seem to come automatically as well as thoughtlessly by others. Nor the right time for us having a serious father/son talk; one that could never have been finished as this would have been our first.
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(Father, Son, Holy Ghost)
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