I agree with you about di Stefano. What I had meant to say was that his decline was caused by pushing himself too hard.
I have always loved Callas, partly because her Carmen was the first opera I ever heard. I personally believe that her decline was caused by taking on both high coloratura roles and heavy dramatic roles, and perhaps losing her weight made it harder to support both types of roles. It seems that the singers with the least vocal decline were the ones that had proper technique and stayed mostly within the right Fach, like Melchior (his 70th birthday concert puts most modern Heldentenors to shame) Kurt Moll, Mario del Monaco (Obviously he was more than the leather-lunged bawler he is made out to be; he seems to have been a very intelligent singer, and I would give up a hundred singers like Peter Pears for one Del Monaco) Mirella Freni and Sesto Bruscatini, along with several others. Sorry for the rant :-)
Noah, I should have mentioned that despite Corelli's iffy French, the complete recording of "Faust" is very good, as his co-singers are Ghiaurov, Sutherland and Massard (as per my second survey of the latter's recordings) - and you have no doubt already seen that you can hear that Rizzi recording on YouTube.
I would like to thank Ralph Moore for his excellent surveys. I became interested in classical music about 3 years ago (I am still a teenager, so I have not wasted my musical life!) and your excellent surveys have helped me discover some wonderful music and great recordings of it. I feel that your surveys are the best existing tool for finding recordings, and your criticism is well written and much fairer than most other sources. (I used to watch David Hurwitz's videos, as he is American like me, and found them to contain excessive ranting, and often times statements that have no basis in fact, as well as some overly strong opinions.) Thanks for your great reviews, and I hope you will write more surveys!
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