Re: Franco Corelli, opera's most thrilling voice, dies at age 82

Here is a Nilsson story that has to do with Wagner.

She recorded WALKURE w/Leinsdorf for RCA.  After they had finished
recording a section, they were listening to the playback with the
sound engineer who said:

- Isn't it just a wonder of wonders that with this LIVING STEREO
process, one can hear the sound of the triangle amidst Wagner's
massive orchestral texture?

Nilsson replied:

- Nobody cares about the triangle when I am singing Brunnhilde. 

Derrick Everett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
> On Mon, 24 Nov 2003 12:35:25 -0800, Canyon Rick wrote:
> 
> >> I just thought I would mention that Corelli did record one Wagner item:
> >>  Der Engel from the Wesendonck Lieder:
> >> 
> >> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/wesendoncklieder
> > 
> > There is actually a group dedicated to the Wesendonck Lieder?
> > 
> > Corelli, however, did have a bit of a spat with everybody's favorite
> > Wagnerian, Birgit Nilsson.  In the early 60s, the Met mounted a
> > production of Turandot with Nilsson, Price, Corelli, and Stokowski on
> > the podium.  I have to admit to little knowledge of Turandot.  I know
> > "Nessun dorma", that its Chinese, that there's a riddle, and there's
> > these Ping, Pang, and Pong dudes.  During the Met's (then) annual spring
> > tour, in Boston, Nilsson and Corelli ended an act or a scene with a
> > duet.  For one reson or another, Corelli was unable to hold the final
> > note of the duet for very long while Miss Nilsson continued to hold hers
> > in full cry.
> > Sir Rudolf Bing in his memoirs quotes: "...and he just walked off the
> > stage.  I was not in the hall:  an emissary came to me in the lobby and
> > said, 'Mr. Bing, we are losing our tenor.'  I went backstage, and even 
> > before I neared Corelli's door I heard him screaming, his wife
> > screaming, the dog barking.  He had slammed his hand on the dressing
> > table, and had picked up a miniscule splinter.  There was a drop of
> > blood on the table, and Mrs. was calling for an ambulance.  I calmed
> > them down as much as I could, and suggested to Corelli that in the love
> > scene in the next act he could get even with Miss Nilsson by biting her
> > ear.  That cheered him a great deal; in fact, he liked the idea so much
> > that he told Miss Nilsson about it, which gave him all the satisfaction
> > of actually biting her without doing it, thank God."
> > 
> > 
> According to *her* memoirs ("La Nilsson", 1995, Stockholm), after hearing
> about Bing's advice to Corelli, Ms Nilsson sent Bing, who had left the
> next performance early, the following telegram:
> 
> "Must cancel next performance badly bitten stop Birgit".
> 
> Among many other stories, some of which concern Corelli, she tells of a
> tour on which Corelli discovered that Nilsson had a piano in her dressing
> room, while there was none in his.  Corelli appealed to Bing, who went to
> Nilsson and asked whether she would mind allowing him to have the piano
> transferred to Corelli's dressing room.  "By all means", said Ms. Nilsson,
> "but unfortunately I do not have the time to teach him to play".