Page 23 - Birgit Nilsson Book

It was clear by now that she was truly on course to achieve Wagnerian stardom. By the time she came to sing Isolde at Bayreuth in 1957 she had already sung the role eighty-seven times and it was as Isolde that Nilsson made her long-awaited Metropolitan Opera debut on 18 December 1959 (she had already sung in other major American venues such as the Hollywood Bowl as well as the San Francisco Opera and Chicago Lyric Opera (Die Walküre Brünnhilde with Solti) — a debut so astonishing that it made the front page of the New York Times the following morning — complete with photograph. Throughout her career she sang at the Metropolitan Opera more than 200 times (of which there were 33 Isoldes and 52 Turandots) and appeared as a guest in gala performances including the one arranged for Sir Rudolf Bing’s retirement as General Manager on 22 April 1972. At Bing’s request the concert ended with the closing scene from Salome (conducted by Böhm and included here on CD 69) and according to Nilsson Bing said “as added excitement you can bring my head in on a silver platter.”
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