This 1955 La Scala recording, with its matchless pairing of Callas and Karajan, dates from 1955.

The Callas authority Tony Locantro contributes a wide-ranging essay that considers Callas’s Puccini roles on stage and in the studio (with the odd lawsuit along the way).

As he notes, Puccini was not a composer that Maria Callas particularly favoured in her stage repertoire, and yet two of his operas – Tosca and Turandot – played a major part in her career. In the recording studio, however, Callas showed a great affinity with Puccini’s heroines and made a number of outstanding recordings of his music, including La bohème, Madama Butterfly and Manon Lescaut in addition to her stage roles of Tosca and Turandot.

Callas had never sung Butterfly on stage when she made her recording, yet the studio performance shows a complete understanding of the musical and dramatic requirements of the role. She brings the character to life so vividly that one might assume that she had honed the interpretation over many performances in the theatre.

This vintage mono recording has been newly remastered to ART standard at Abbey Road.