A new deluxe box of Maria Callas’s recordings will be released by specialist classical music label Warner Classics on 22 September. The box set comprises her studio recordings, live recordings, masterclasses, videos and a bonus CD of previously unheard recordings.
2 December 2023 marks the 100th anniversary of Callas’s birth. This limited-edition box set celebrates her centenary year. It is the most comprehensive collection of her works ever released.
Maria Callas is credited with changing the history of opera. Known to the world as ‘La Divina’, she continues to fascinate as a supreme artist, but also as a female idol and style icon. Her voice, with its extraordinary range, was as distinctive as her infallible sense for a phrase.
A magnetic presence, she brought operatic heroines to vivid life, magically shaping and colouring her tone and making insightful interpretations of the libretto.
Comprising 131 CDs, three Blu-ray discs and a DVD, ‘La Divina, Maria Callas in all her roles’ is the most comprehensive box of her recordings ever released, presenting Callas in all 74 roles for which audio documents exist.
It includes her complete studio recordings, an extensive collection of her best live recordings, the masterclasses she gave at the Juilliard School, videos and a bonus CD of world premiere releases: alternate takes and working sessions from studio recordings of the 1960s.
The collection features such composers as Vincenzo Bellini, Georges Bizet, Gaetano Donizetti, Ruggero Leoncavallo, Pietro Mascagni, Giacomo Puccini, Gioachino Rossini, Giuseppe Verdi, Christoph Willibald Gluck and Richard Wagner.
It includes music from Norma (1831, Bellini), Carmen (1875, Bizet), Lucia di Lammermoor (1835, Donizetti), La bohème (1896, Puccini), Madama Butterfly (1904, Puccini), Manon Lescaut (1893, Puccini), Tosca (1900, Puccini), Turandot (1926, Puccini), Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville, 1816, Rossini), Aïda (1871, Verdi), La forza del destino (The Power of Fate, 1862, Verdi), Rigoletto (1851, Verdi), La traviata (The Fallen Woman, 1853, Verdi) and much more.
The box set can be ordered from PrestoMusic for £320 (on offer for £290 at time of writing) or Amazon for £357.99.
Warner Classics has also released a series of digital recordings of Callas’s performances on its YouTube channel.
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A new deluxe box set to celebrate Maria Callas’s centenary year will be the most comprehensive collection of her recordings available.