Friday, June 13, 2008

Recently abaout Eleanor Steber

Listening to the great great Eleanor Steber on Sirius as Rosalinda..Despite a hilarious (unintentional) final D natural in the Czardas...I remember standing on the line 1/23/54 for a Boris and we all JUMPED when she let out the geschrei..but meanwhile she was a fabulous lady....I wish I had heard her even more.....She gave 1000% always..and I bet NO ONE EVER could sing Fiordiligi like that...Better in the Mozart,Strauss, and other music rather than Puccini..but the lady was nso special....I am glad that we have Sirius to remind us of the greats....Speaking of the D natural..they gave her one Manon in 1954..and she took a D at the end of the Gambling Scene that was like NILSSON!!!!!!! R.I.P

Eleanor Steber, to me, was a trouper. She always seemed to hang in there even when things didn't go just right. She'd just "pick herself up, dust herself off and start all over again."I have a "Traviata" with her and di Stefano where they are singing the "Brindisi" together and at the end he goes completely off key but she kept on keepin' on.I recall someone sending me a concert someone persuaded her to do in a former NY steambath. How well she related to the guys there and sang her heart out.And wasn't it she who Corelli left abandoned while he exited the stage in a snit in the last act of "Tosca?"That lady had one helluva voice and guts to match it. Hers was not an easy life. She struggled with issues, not the least of them being Mr. Bing who "used" her at his will but never really appreciated her worth.She's in my top 5.

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