This is one of the most thrilling duets ever recorded. I do think that di Stefano has been surpassed by Pavarotti, but no one has accomplished half of what Callas does here. Even her studio effort a year ago pales in comparison. Every utterance is invested with spontaneous fire. Listen, for example, to her pleas of 'pieta, pieta' around 00:37; the way she follows the score's accents shortly after the minute mark; and the tremendous phrasing leading up to 'sangue di te' at 3:15. Of course, the crowning moment of the entire scene is how she changes the mood of the aria with the tender hesitation, vulnerability, resolve, and abandonment before and up to the celebrated 't'amo!' at 4:10. No other soprano that I have heard has managed to observe Verdi's 'forte' there with the appropriate 'scatto,' or declamation. Listen, then, to how liquid her phrasing becomes subsequent, with what utter abandonment she repeats the tenor's lines, and with what tender inwardness she phrases 7:45. The high notes do show the infamous wobble, but could she could have sung with such artistry in 1952, when her voice was rock solid, or even 1955? Those performances - imaginary - would have been thrilling, but the artistic maturity that engenders such abandonment (even with a compromised voice), such contrasts of inward and outward singing, needed 1957 to develop. Therefore the wobble in the voice is a very small price to pay, indeed.

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