Two of the world’s greatest opera stars, Italian soprano Renata Tebaldi and tenor Franco Corelli, thrilled Manila audiences in a concert held in October 1973. Their voices, solo and duet, soared at the CCP on Oct. 23 and 27, and at the Araneta Coliseum on Oct. 31.
The operatic duet was for the benefit of the youth development program of the First Lady, Mrs. Imelda Marcos.
The CCP Philharmonic Orchestra, with Prof. Luis Valencia as conductor, assisted Tebaldi and Corelli.
They sang arias from great and popular operas.
Tebaldi and Corelli have performed all over the world, including La Scala di Milan, Covent Garden of London, San Francisco Opera and Metropolitan Theater of New York.
Tebaldi was billed ‘The Queen of the Sopranos.’ Harold Schonberg of New York Times wrote: ‘Miss Tebaldi is your darling, my darling, everybody’s darling.’
Corelli’s meteoric rise to fame, all the more remarkable in that he did not begin to study singing until he was 20, resulted in his being christened the ‘sputnik tenor.’ — RKC