Maria Callas, daughter of Greek immigrants, was registered with the surname Kalos at birth in New York on 2 December 1923. Her father changed the original surname Kalogeropoulos to Callas in 1929. After her parents separated, Maria Callas followed her mother to Athens in 1937, where she studied singing at the local conservatory. One of the most important sopranos of the 20th century, she mastered a repertoire of 43 complete roles as well as arias from a further 34 operas. Her vocal range was almost three octaves and she mastered all the vocal tonal techniques of bel canto singing (as in operas by Rossini, Donizetti and Bellini). Her most famous interpretations include Luigi Cherubini's Medea, Violetta in Verdi's 'La traviata' and Bellini's Norma. Maria Callas was often called 'La Divina' (the Divine). In 1949 she married the Italian entrepreneur Giovanni Battista Meneghini and took Italian citizenship. However, her love affair with the Greek-Argentine shipowner and billionaire Aristotle Onassis led to the breakdown of their marriage in 1959. In 1977, Maria Callas died in Paris at the age of 53. Her ashes were scattered in the Ionian Sea off the Greek island of Skorpios, a private island owned by the Onassis family. |
