Word: diva
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First, massive Tenor Lauritz Melchior publicly denounced Leinsdorf's wayward tempos and lack of experience, found him "not yet ready to be senior conductor of the finest department of the greatest opera house in the world." Next, famed Diva Kirsten Flagstad, who was staying away from the opera house with grippe, hinted to friends that she might not go back unless Conductor Leinsdorf was replaced. It was no secret to the Manhattan music world that Diva Flagstad was backing a favorite young maestro of her own: U. S.-born Conductor Edwin McArthur, who had been conducting all her performances...
...week's end it looked as though General Manager Johnson had quelled the mutiny. It was announced that Diva Flagstad would be back to sing Walkure on Feb 8. Massive Tenor Melchior had apologized. Said Impresario Johnson: "The Metropolitan Opera is bigger than any individual. . . . Let's not bother with a tempest in a teapot...
...greatest lovers, and to thousands of U. S. listeners Melchior and Flagstad are their incarnation. Though that incarnation is only limelight-deep (in private life Melchior and Flagstad are never more than polite, between eruptions of professional jealousy), operagoers are treasuring it while it lasts. For last month Diva Flagstad announced that she would retire at the end of this season. Soon this mortal pair of immortals will be offstage forever...
Last week the memory of these Stockbridge bravos brought a sold-out house to Dorothy Maynor's first public recital, at Manhattan's Town Hall. Bronze, cherub-faced Diva Dorothy soon showed that her Stockbridge judges had not been far wrong, but had been a little premature. When she was through, Manhattan's critics huddled in the lobby, agreed that the Voice had a rough edge here & there, prophesied a sensational future...
...night last week Chicago's elegant Goodman Theatre was packed to its heavy oak doors. What drew this throng was no thunder-rousing maestro or pudding-fed diva, but a pair of pale, genteel young men who plunked softly on 18th-Century-model harpsichords. Before a silver backdrop, gently lit by amber lights, they joined in deft pluck-a-pluck duets by Mozart and Bach. Occasionally they were joined by two lush lady harpsichordists in 18th-Century lace and velveteen. To all this harpsichordery their audience listened reverently, applauded with loud smacks. For they were listening...