Рената Тебальди: Итальяндық опера дивасының өмірі мен мансабы

Italian opera singer (1922–2004)
Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Solo, 1959
Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording (joint), 1961
Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI
Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres, France reˈnaːta teˈbaldi; 1 February 1922 – 19 December 2004) was an Italian lirico spinto soprano popular in the post war period, and especially prominent as one of the stars of La Scala, San Carlo and, especially, the Metropolitan Opera. Often considered among the great opera singers of the 20th century, she focused primarily on the verismo roles of the lyric and dramatic repertoires. Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini called her voice "la voce d'angelo" ("the voice of an angel"), Tebaldi was the daughter of cellist Teobaldo Tebaldi and Giuseppina Barbieri, a nurse. Her parents separated before her birth and Tebaldi grew up with her mother in her maternal grandparents' home in Langhirano. Stricken with polio at the age of three, Tebaldi became interested in music and sang with the church choir in Langhirano. who took the initiative that Tebaldi study voice with Italo Brancucci at the Parma Conservatory. She was admitted to the conservatory at 17, where she studied with Brancucci and Ettore Campogalliani. She later transferred to Liceo musicale Rossini in Pesaro, taking lessons with Carmen Melis, and on her suggestion with Giuseppe Pais. She then studied with Beverley Peck Johnson in New York City.

Tebaldi made her stage debut as Elena in Boito's Mefistofele in Rovigo in 1944. Wartime conditions made for a difficult trip, with Tebaldi partly travelling by horse cart to Rovigo, and her return trip coming under machine gun fire. Her early career was also marked by a performance in Parma in La bohème, L'amico Fritz and Andrea Chénier. She caused a stir when in 1946 she made her debut as Desdemona in Verdi's Otello alongside Francesco Merli as the title role in Trieste. Her major breakthrough came in 1946 when she auditioned for Arturo Toscanini, who says she had the "voce d'angelo" (voice of an angel).

Tebaldi went on a concert tour with the La Scala ensemble in 1950, first to the Edinburgh Festival and then to London, where she made her debut as Desdemona in two performances of Otello at the Royal Opera House and in the Verdi Requiem, both conducted by Victor de Sabata.

Tebaldi made her American debut in 1950 as Aida at the San Francisco Opera; her Metropolitan Opera debut took place on 31 January 1955, as Desdemona opposite Mario Del Monaco's Otello. For some 20 years she made the Met the focus of her activities. For the 1962 1963 season, she convinced Met director Rudolf Bing to stage a revival of Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur, an opera Bing said he "detested". Unfortunately, Tebaldi was not in top form and cancelled performances; and, as Bing was quoted in 1000 Nights at the Opera, "We had to do the wretched thing without her." However, her Lecouvreur was a practical move for the Met, as she was "the greatest box office draw since Flagstad", according to Francis Robinson, then assistant manager of ticket sales. Tebaldi however returned triumphantly to the role of Adriana for the opening night of the 1968 69 season. The MET scored a box office record of $126,000. One of the public's favourite Tebaldi roles was Minnie in Puccini's La fanciulla del West of which she sang only five performances in February and March 1970. When she made her debut in the role at the Met, she was told that, as all Minnies do, she would have to enter in the 3rd act on horseback. Tebaldi, who had a lifelong fear of horses, refused to go near the animal until she was sure he was safe. At her first rehearsal, she approached him, patted his mane, and said, "Well, Mr. Horse, I am Tebaldi. You and I are going to be friends, eh?" She conquered her fear and the performances were successful. She sang more at the Met and far less elsewhere. She developed a special rapport with the Met audiences and became known as "Miss Sold Out", as her name on the marquee was considered a performance that could hardly be matched. She sang there some 270 times in La bohème, Madama Butterfly, Tosca, Manon Lescaut, La fanciulla del West, Otello, La forza del destino, Simon Boccanegra, Falstaff, Andrea Chénier, Adriana Lecouvreur, La Gioconda, and as Violetta in a production of La Traviata created specially for her. Puccini's Tosca was her most regular role there, with 45 performances. She was the Leonora in La forza del destino on the night in 1960 when Leonard Warren suddenly died mid performance; and she was Adriana Lecouvreur on the night Placido Domingo made his Met debut in 1968. She made her last appearance there on 8 January 1973 as Desdemona in Otello; it was the role in which she made her Met debut 18 years earlier, and which had become one of her signature roles. Tebaldi was widely admired by the American operatic public. She did not become a classically temperamental diva, but trusted her artistic instincts. Rudolf Bing, referring to her more assertive side, famously said of her, "She has dimples of iron".

During the early 1950s, controversy arose regarding a supposed rivalry between Tebaldi and the great Greek American soprano Maria Callas. The contrast between Callas's often unconventional vocal qualities and Tebaldi's classically beautiful sound resurrected an argument as old as opera itself, namely, the beauty of sound versus the expressive use of sound. In 1951, Tebaldi and Maria Callas were jointly booked for a vocal recital in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Although the singers supposedly agreed that neither would perform encores, Tebaldi took two, and Callas was reportedly incensed. This incident began the rivalry, which reached a fever pitch in the mid 1950s, at times even engulfing the two women themselves, who were said by their more fanatical followers to have engaged in verbal barbs in each other's direction. Tebaldi was quoted as saying, "I have one thing that Callas doesn't have: a heart" However, witnesses to the interview stated that Callas only said "champagne with cognac", and it was a bystander who quipped, "No, with Coca Cola", but the Time reporter attributed the latter comment to Callas. According to John Ardoin, however, these two singers should never have been compared. According to Time magazine, when Callas quit La Scala, "Tebaldi made a surprising maneuver: she announced that she would not sing at La Scala without Callas. 'I sing only for artistic reasons; it is not my custom to sing against anybody', she said." Callas visited Tebaldi after a performance of Adriana Lecouvreur at the Met in 1968, and the two were reunited. In 1978, Tebaldi spoke warmly of her late colleague and summarized this rivalry:
This rivality [sic] was really building from the people of the newspapers and the fans. But I think it was very good for both of us, because the publicity was so big and it created a very big interest about me and Maria and was very good in the end. But I don't know why they put this kind of rivality [sic], because the voice was very different. She was really something unusual. And I remember that I was very young artist too, and I stayed near the radio every time that I know that there was something on radio by Maria.

Tebaldi enjoyed a beloved relationship with her mother, who helped nurture her and was devoted to her career and well being from an early age. Her mother's death in 1957 was a huge blow to Tebaldi, whose grief was unbearable and it took effort to go back to the stage. In January 1976, she retired from giving recitals, making her last one in New York's Carnegie Hall where she was overcome with emotion and had to return to perform after a few weeks in a successful but shaky performance. She received six curtain calls and standing ovations from the audience. She then moved out of her New York apartment, her home for many years during her stint in the Met and returned to Italy, where she gave her final public appearance in a vocal recital in La Scala in May 1976. She also made recitals around the globe, in one recital held in Manila with a frequent partner Franco Corelli, Tebaldi's voice cracked in a Manon Lescaut aria, she then massaged her throat and genuflected to great applause from the audience. Regarding her decision to retire, Tebaldi said that she stopped singing while she still had a powerful voice to avoid "the mortifying season of decline." She was also made a Commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres from France.

From February 2010 until 2013, the 15th century Castle of Torrechiara – Langhirano – hosted within its rooms an exhibition dedicated to Renata Tebaldi. This “Castle for a Queen” unveils the many sides of this great diva, whose artistic and personal life remains on display. The items showcased followed her over the arc of time as she spread the world class tradition of Italian lyrical art, all the way from the beginning of her career and throughout her artistic achievements. The exhibition is presented by the Renata Tebaldi Committee in collaboration with the Superintendence of Environmental Heritage and Landscape of the province of Parma and Piacenza, the Regio Theatre Foundation of Parma and the Municipality of Langhirano and with the patronage of the province of Parma. On 7 June 2014, the museum dedicated to Renata Tebaldi was inaugurated in the stables of Villa Pallavicino in Busseto. Tebaldi was awarded a star for recording in 1960 in Hollywood Walk of Fame in 6628 Hollywood Boulevard, Hollywood, California.