Word: scala
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Musicians great & small, obscure impresarios, shabby maestros, raffish editors, theatrical agents, garrulous critics: these compose a group which congregates in the Caffè Biffi in the great Galleria (Arcade) Vittorio Emanuele near Milan's La Scala Opera. Drinking vermouth con seltz by the hour, the clique finds much to gossip about. In July 1930, its conversation might have run like this: "So! So! A woman in La Scala. . . . Our Colombo, per l'amor di dio, our dove! What will become of the opera, with her in charge? That professoressa? Shocking...
...Galleria watched La Scala under a woman's direction for more than a year. Some finally lent grudging approval. But most did not. Jealously they were satisfied last week, for Anita Colombo, first female director of the old opera, had resigned. The dove was going to fly away...
...which baptized the Stadium (TIME, July 13). Associate stage director, who helped design with simple grandeur the sets used on the six nights, was Laurence Higgins, a 25-year-old native son. Directing his work with the Stadium Grand Opera Co. was Ernst Lert, longtime stage director at La Scala in Milan, dropped from the Metropolitan this year after two seasons. A facile lighting technician, Lert worked for sweeping effects in great patches of contrasted colors. His sister-in-law is Vicki Baum, playwright of famed Grand Hotel...
...week of Aïda in 1917. At Cleveland he planned to give three Aïdas. Sandwiched in between were three "prize packages" from La Gioconda, Carmen, Die Meistersinger, The Bartered Bride and Cavalleria Rusticana. Director Golterman gathered a goodly company of principals: Soprano Alida Vane (La Scala); Soprano Anne Roselle (Metropolitan) ; Contraltos Coe Glade and Constance Eberhart (Chicago); Tenor Paul Althouse (Metropolitan); Pasquale Amato, oldtime Metropolitan Baritone trying for a comeback; Contralto Dreda Aves (Metropolitan) for whom a horticulturist in her hometown of Norwalk, Ohio, has named a giant yellow snapdragon...
First-night audiences had already been bowled over by the sheer bulk of the production. In the pit was Conductor Cesare Sodero (formerly with La Scala, now opera conductor of NBC) surrounded by an orchestra of 90 men, most of them from the Cleveland Orchestra. Three operators regulated a $25,000 amplification system which used horns six ft. long.* Anne Roselle was Aïda. Paul Althouse, Rhadames, Pasquale Amato was Amonasro. Critics credited them with "signal ability . . . abundant breadth and vigor . . . impressive operatic authority...