1957, ORIGINAL, Theater Program, Festival Athinon, Maria Callas

In 1957, Callas agreed to give two concerts for the Athens Festival, on August 1 and 5, 1957, with Antonino Votto of Milan’s La Scala conducting. Initially, Callas proposed to donate her fee in favor of the Athens Festival, however its organizers rejected her proposal emphatically, citing the financial self-sufficiency of the institution. As a result, the single requested a fee of 9,000 dollars—about 270,000 dirhams—, a fact that was instrumentalized by the opposition at the time and presented as an excessive waste of an already financially burdened state. The press gave great dimensions to the issue targeting Callas in particular, who, furthermore, canceled the first concert, finally appearing only on August 5. At the recital, he performed arias from Italian, German and French operatic works, receiving a warm response from the Athenian audience, which included the then government and prominent artists and personalities. In an interview she had given in Greek to the theater critic and journalist Achillea Mamakis on August 4, 1957, Callas referred to the postponement of the concert which, officially, she attributed to the fatigue of her voice and, among other things, to her Greek identity, which she described as inalienable