"A Callas Recording Update". .. Updated

At the time my "Callas Recording Update" (OQ, vol. 21, no. 2, spring 2005, pp. 387–91) went to press, there was one noteworthy item that had been issued too late for inclusion: the Lisbon Traviata (27 March 1958) from a "new" source — Pearl GEMS 0228. According to my information, the source is not new at all but is instead a reworking of the oldest source: the original tape made by the Radiodifusão Portuguesa (RDP). In the 1970s it was copied to a chromium dioxide tape for conservation. The RDP released a CD set in 2000, presumably made from this "safety" copy, in a very limited edition. Unfortunately, either the transfer from the original tape to the chrome duplicate, or from the chrome tape to the CD (less likely), was carried out using the wrong EQ, producing severe sonic problems: greater dynamic range and clarity were offset by unlistenably harsh high frequencies and a very thin middle register. Recently, a friend of the RDP offered engineer and opera scholar Mike Richter a copy of this "official" version with the expressed purpose of making it widely available at no cost. Richter realized that the EQ was badly off and reworked the CDs until they sounded better, a task he performed gratis. He circulates his corrected version free of charge, as stipulated by the donor, directly from his Web site, http://www.mrichter.com/, in CD-ROM format; the only fee is the nominal price of the CD-ROMs themselves. Both individuals believe strongly in preserving important musical documents while keeping them from profiteers.

One recipient of the Richter-EQed version, however, passed a copy along to a Pearl engineer, and Pearl issued it commercially, apparently doing no more than adding a few track divisions — and without crediting Richter (which he doesn't seem to mind). If true (and the information has been made public by the very honest and astute Mike Richter himself ), the fact that Pearl is selling this item — at a high price — negates the terms and intent of its original availability: so much for keeping it from profiteers. Moreover, while Richter's re-EQ tamed the abnormally harsh upper register, the "sucked-out" middle is still quite problematic. Callas's voice is often nearly unrecognizable, the recording suppressing the plush of her middle register, which, even in her darkest days, never deserted her. It is even more obvious when comparing the more natural, balanced 1980 EMI LP (Angel ZBX-3910, HMV RLS-757) and 1987 EMI CD (7 49187) versions — though not EMI's horrible, ruined 1997 "Callas Edition" remastering. EMI's source was a tape copied directly from the original for tenor Alfredo Kraus right after the performance, without any EQ errors. Evidently, Kraus first gave it to recording producer Ed Rosen, who issued it on LP in the 1970s and later sold it to EMI. Although the Kraus source has the reduced upper-frequency clarity and dynamic range typical of old analog tape copies, it is preferable. Sadly, the 1987 EMI CD set is out of print and hard to find; one should still seek it out if possible, but if one had to choose between the currently available options, I suppose the RDP-Richter(/Pearl) version would be preferable to EMI's 1997 disaster.