(as Lady Macbeth at La Scala, 1975) One of the more important – and, ultimately, most puzzling — operatic careers of the second half of the 20th century was that of mezzo-soprano Shirley Verrett (1931 – 2010.) Yes: I wrote mezzo-soprano. I harbor not the slightest doubt that Verrett was a mezzo, and that she’d have done well to have remembered it. She may have harbored ambitions in the soprano repertory, and she did find ways to sing several sopranoRead more