Main Operatic Career
After returning to the United States and reuniting with her father in September 1945, Callas made the round of auditions. In December of that year, she auditioned for Edward Johnson, general manager of the Metropolitan Opera, and was favourably received: "Exceptional voice—ought to be heard very soon on stage". Callas maintained that the Met offered her Madama Butterfly and Fidelio, to be performed in Philadelphia and sung in English, both of which she declined, feeling she was too fat for Butterfly and did not like the idea of opera in English. Although no written evidence of this offer exists in the Met's records, in a 1958 interview with The New York Post, Johnson corroborated Callas's story: "We offered her a contract, but she didn't like it—because of the contract, not because of the roles. She was right in turning it down—it was frankly a beginner's contract."
Read more about this topic: Maria Callas
Famous quotes containing the words operatic career, main, operatic and/or career:
“You have promise, Mlle. Dubois, but you must choose between an operatic career and what is usually called “a normal life.” Though why it is so called is beyond me.”
—Eric Taylor, Leroux, and Arthur Lubin. M. Villeneuve (Frank Puglia)
“Many women are reluctant to allow men to enter their domain. They don’t want men to acquire skills in what has traditionally been their area of competence and one of their main sources of self-esteem. So while they complain about the male’s unwillingness to share in domestic duties, they continually push the male out when he moves too confidently into what has previously been their exclusive world.”
—Bettina Arndt (20th century)
“Even an extraordinary policeman seems a strange suitor for an operatic soprano. Does he sing?”
—Eric Taylor, and Leroux. Arthur Lubin. M. Villeneuve (Frank Puglia)
“Like the old soldier of the ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty. Goodbye.”
—Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964)