“She brought Greek culture to the world, which is why the Athens Opera is keen to pay tribute to Maria Callas, the greatest singer of all time. It is in these terms that Giorgos Koumendakis, director of the Athens Opera, justifies the ambitious programming of the Callas year that his institution devotes to the diva. “Thanks to her, lyrical art has found its place in Greece and it is because we are grateful to her that we pay her this tribute today,” continues Panaghis Pagoulatos, artistic director of the institution.
Created in French in 1797, before being adapted into German, then into Italian, Médée occupies a unique place in the career of Maria Callas, who played this role in Italy from 1953, from La Scala in Milan to the Teatro dell ‘Opera in Rome, before performing it in Greece in 1961.
“The performance she delivered at the ancient theater of Epidaurus has gone down in history. The 15,000 spectators came from all over the country to come and hear it in this magical place. This evening has become legendary,” explains Sofia Kobotiati. This musicologist is preparing an exhibition on the Callas which will be presented in the National Library of Greece housed, like the National Opera, in the Stavros-Niarchos cultural center. A glass and metal building inaugurated in 2017 in Kallithea, on the outskirts of the Greek capital.
This retrospective will begin on November 26 and will be held until January 2024 in this impressive architectural ensemble by Renzo Piano. There will be presented various archival documents, sketches, staging books, but also costumes and decorative elements taken from the shows given by the diva on Greek soil.
While waiting for the inauguration of this exhibition, which will also include an educational workshop proposing to discover the specificities of the voice timbre of the Callas thanks to a digital device under construction at the Polytechnic Institute of Athens, a gala evening will be given on site on September 16, the anniversary of his death, in 1977. It will take place in the Odeon Hérode Atticus, at the foot of the Acropolis.
Four singers will take turns that evening to take over the main roles (Leonora, Lucia, Isolde and Ophélie) that have marked the career of the one nicknamed here “La Divina”. The program of the recital that the singer had given on the spot in 1957 will also be taken up. A show that the Athens Opera will broadcast on its Internet platform. From Tosca and Cavalleria Rusticana in Greek to La Paloma, all of the works she sang in Greece will be performed for the occasion.
This film will also be broadcast on the opera’s multimedia channel (GNO TV). It will evoke, beyond the years of training of the singer and her conservatory exams, her first auditions when she was only 17 years old!
“It was during these eight years, very little known, that Maria, who was still called Kalogeropoulos at the time, forged the character that we know. Without these moments, crossed by the war, she might not have had this inner power that allowed her to overcome so many headwinds,” says Vasilis Louras. What reconcile the Greek public with the diva? Local critics have not always been kind to the Callas.
The country gives the feeling of having completely reconciled with the singer. He even seems to forgive her for the harsh words she sometimes used about her homeland. Proof ? A gleaming statue of the diva was installed at the foot of the Acropolis two years ago. Made by the sculptor Aphrodite Liti, this metal sculpture almost two meters high was entirely financed by private donations, via an association created to perpetuate the memory of the singer.
A museum dedicated to Callas and supported by the town hall, this time, should see the light of day in Athens in the coming months. Located in a former palace on Mitropoleos Street, closed since 1969, the project was delayed with the economic crisis that hit the country. But the elected officials want to complete it as soon as possible, because, as has often been repeated during the city council, “Maria Callas is an excellent ambassador for Athens, likely to bring in a new category of music-loving tourists”.
No one knows, at this time, when the Callas Academy, also announced several years ago, will open. Supported by an association created in 2000 on the initiative of the soprano Vasso Papantoniou, the establishment, which aims to bring out the Callas of tomorrow, should invest in the former house of the diva, at number 61 rue Patission. The renovation of the building has started, but no completion date has been communicated at this stage.
“The Callas Year”, full program from the National Opera of Greece website.
