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RENATA TEBALDI by Victor Seroff

RENATA TEBALDI

By

Pub Date: Feb. 17th, 1960
Publisher: Appleton-Century-Crofts

A sympathetic life of the young Italian opera singer who has become, while still in her thirties, one of the most acclaimed divas in the world today. The book opens with Tebaldi's audition for Toscanini in Milan in 1946, when she was chosen to sing in the gala concert that reopened the famous opera house, La Scala, after the ravages of World War II. Her triumphs, first in Italy and later in the opera houses of Vienna, Rio, San Francisco, Chicago, and New York, are detailed here, together with accounts of her early training and some of her theories on singing and operatic acting. On the personal side, Mr. Seroff (who was told by Tebaldi in the course of his research for this book that he now knows her better than anyone else in the world) gives us a description of her impoverished and difficult childhood, of her youth in war-torn Italy, and of her close relationship with her mother, who died in late 1957. Information is also given on the so-called ""feud"" with Maria Callas, in which Tebaldi has taken little part. Apart from a few flirtations, there is not only no scandal but little romance in the singer's life. Although this may mean that her story cannot compete with more colorful personal histories, it should gain an additional audience of young people who will admire her incentive and achievement, for Tebaldi is a remarkable talented, dedicated and hardworking woman.