QUOTES
On her early
career...
My recording debut was sad indeed and there is
little I can say about it, just the memory of a bitter disappointment. These
were difficult years and I was all alone in the world, any engagement was very
important. They called me for the part of
Lola in Mascagni's Cavalleria
Rusticana. It was the edition to mark the opera's 50th anniversary in
1940...I arrived at the rehearsals and was dumbfounded when the repetiteur
began with a piece I did not recognise, it was Mamma Lucia's little part! I
was staggered. They told me in Rome they had insisted on giving the part to
another singer. (apparently on the orders of Musssolini himself who had a
personal interest in the singer).
Program notes to Fono, Simionato:
The Colour of a Voice
On nerves...
I always appeared smiling and relaxed and not at
all nervous, but I was often terrified. I also never really liked hearing
myself sing.
I learned to put up with myself when people started organizing
public interviews with musical examples from my recordings. Throughout my
career, particularly from 1952 onwards, I suffered from terrible headaches
every time I had a new set of performances. And people backstage marveled
-- 'Up to now she has done nothing but vomit. How can she sing like that?'
It was as if I was on automatic pilot.
Hasting, 'Spirit of Giulietta',
OperaNews
Demands of a
career...
I sang thirteen performances on consecutive
nights, commuting between Milan, where I was singing [Adalgisa] in Norma
at La Scala and Il Matrimonio Segreto at the Piccolo Scala, and Rome,
where I was singing Rosina in Il Barbiere di Siviglia. At the end of
each performance I rushed to the station, where the guard was already waiting
to give the signal for departure. I would take off my makeup in the train and
eat my usual dinner -
an apple and a couple of biscuits -
before settling down for eight hours' sleep!
Hasting, 'Spirit of Giulietta',
OperaNews
On
repertoire...
I
have always felt like Mignon, a little girl who has been abducted, traveled
around the world, dancing even though she was ashamed of herself since they beat
her. I was down and out and had to stand up for myself.
Program notes to Fono, Simionato: The Colour of a Voice
I would never have defined myself as a Rossini
singer. I never studied the Rossini style. I sang the parts largely as
written, without additional embellishment - I simply tried to be
faithful to the psychology of the character I was playing
Hasting, 'Spirit of Giulietta',
OperaNews
I
have...loved singing Rossini. I felt an instinctive need to sing Rossini
following my instincts.
Program notes to Fono, Simionato: The Colour of a
Voice
I
shall be grateful to Verdi and his music all my life, for it was through him
that I finally understood what I was to give with my voice, what I had to do.
This is the music that I define as 'sanguine'. I had to give more than I had,
everything came from the breathing, expression in the diction, in gesture.
Program notes to Fono, Simionato: The Colour of a Voice
[On her first
Amneris]...I was timid and afraid of giving too much, and kept within my
own limits. Years later, speaking with her
(Maria Callas') husband in London about a performance of Aida, Maria
said that my Amneris had been overwhelming: the audience rose to their feet
for Amneris. Maria...said to me jokingly: "Just look Giulia!...Here I am all
dirty and black, and I haven't got this incredible success; I shall never sing
this opera again!" Program
notes to Fono, Simionato: The Colour of a Voice
On Stage-direction...
I was always a good observer, but I never studied
acting, I did everything by instinct. I remember that after a performance of
Cavalleria Rusticana I found I had terrible bruises on my hands, and it was
only after speaking to a doctor that I realized that I had been clutching them
too tightly when imploring Turiddu. Directors understood that they couldn't
just say to me, 'Do this, do that,' but had to bring out my own instinctive
feelings about the role. In preparing Anna Bolena with Visconti, we spent more
time talking than rehearsing. And with Karajan, who directed and conducted my
Carmen at La Scala in 1955, we discussed alternative solutions for each scene,
and he let me choose the one I felt most comfortable with.
Hasting, 'Spirit of
Giulietta', OperaNews
On
technique...
My technique was natural, all based on breathing
and diction. I studied hard but learned quickly. My maestro would say to me:
"Why bother? You can pick it up by ear faster! You don't need the music, you
are the music!" This is how I learned all my roles. Program notes to Fono,
Simionato:
The Colour of a Voice
On her exit from the
stage...
It was the only way of doing it. I could not have
gone through a prepared farewell; I am a very emotional person. I slipped out
if my career almost a quietly as I entered it.
Rasponi, The Last
Prima Donnas
I've never looked back...I wanted to enjoy to the
fullest his [her husband, Prof. Cesare
Frugoni] stimulating company. He was a phenomenon really, of a species
that no longer exists.
Rasponi, The Last Prima Donnas
Colleagues...
[On meeting Toscanini for the first time]...I could neither eat nor sleep at the thought of auditioning with Toscanini who everyone said was so exacting, so harsh, so moody that he actually seemed to scorch singers, anyway, so here I was before him and my voice trembled, trembled for the first time...the Maestro made me stop and said to me: "I understand. Perhaps you have been told that I scalp singers? Not so! I demand musicality, I demand preparation, I demand seriousness...Good, now this is what we will do: I will turn the light onto myself this time so it is I who are illuminated and you who are in the dark". Gradually I calmed down...I had understood what I had to do... Toscanini's engaged Simionato to sing at the 30th anniversary of his friend Boito's death...his reaction to hearing Simionato in rehearsal ... The maestro turned towards the window and was drying tears with his handkerchief. He turned to Votto and said: "This is how Arrigo would have wanted it sung." Votto's glasses clouded over.
[On Callas]...There is no doubt that Callas brought something new to the profession- another dimension so to speak. Not only did Maria behave perfectly with me, but she was very fair. When we sang Norma together, I always sang, as was my custom, the C in the duet, without having transposed it as so many do. In an interview Maria expressed surprise that the critics never gave me credit for this. I always found her interpretations intensely dramatic but never moving. Rasponi, The Last Prima Donnas
[On Callas]...There was no competition between us. In duets, our voices complemented each other perfectly. When necessary, she was happy to go onstage with me without rehearsal, while offstage we would laugh and joke together like two girls. The first time we sang together was in Mexico in 1950, where she sang the top E-flat in the second-act finale of Aida. I can still remember the effect of that note in the opera house - it was like a star! [After she lost] weight, she asked me once, 'Can you explain why my high A-flat and high A-natural develop a wobble? I went to [Elvira] de Hidalgo and others about it, but no one has succeeded in steadying those notes.' I suggested that since she had sung roles like Santuzza and Tosca - which are notoriously dangerous for voices that are incompletely trained - when she was still a teenager, she had probably forced the diaphragm, which revealed its weakness in that point in the scale. 'No one has ever told me that!,' she replied. From me, she would take all sorts of criticism. When I told her that in Il Barbiere di Siviglia she looked a bit like a carabiniere (an Italian military policeman) dressed up as Rosina, she couldn't stop laughing. Hasting, 'Spirit of Giulietta', OperaNews
[On Favero]...Mafalda Favero, with that curiously diaphanous voice of hers, bought tears to my eyes. There was an animal sensuality about her that was spellbinding...and she gave herself, even too much for her own good. But the result was heartbreaking. Rasponi, The Last Prima Donnas
[On Bastianini]...Ettore Bastianini, whose untimely death upset me deeply, was the greatest baritone of my generation. His instrument was a mixture of bronze and velvet. And he was a great human being. Rasponi, The Last Prima Donnas
[On Siepi]...Cesare Siepi was for me the king of bassos, a grand seigneur on the stage, a rare thing these days. His voice was pure gold, so effortless and all enveloping Rasponi, The Last Prima Donnas
On the following generation...
For me the greatest living singer is Caballe. Rasponi, The Last Prima Donnas