I have to beg Robert Peters's pardon but he wrote: >Yes, Maria Callas. Her voice is not always ugly but to me it is never >beautiful. And she is not afraid to sound ugly: listen to her Lady >Macbeth. This is a great artist to me. Never beautiful? May I suggest any of her recordings of "Qui la voce" (I Puritani) will settle that extraordinary comment once and for all and with a single aria? The beauty is truly exquisite. Then try the La Scala/Giulini "Traviata". After that the exploration for more revelations should continue unimpeded. And I agree, the Macbeth scenes are a sensation. Dave Lampson wrote regarding Lloyd-Webber: >>Millions disagree, including me, though I know that's de rigueur in >>classical music circles. His music is exactly what it needs to be for >>what it is, and that's why it's so successful. And Robert commented: >I think his music is shallow because it contains nothing of our dissonant >world. (And popularity was never a good measure for artistic success...) ALW writes music which, for me, is like watching paint dry. Friends keep telling me to try to listen more carefully - and I have done - but after about 15 minutes I can find no reason to continue. And surely if there were beauty to be found in it there would be even just a little of the "tingle factor"? Whereas, for me, there is none. When I was in my late 20s, a senior executive at EMI told me, pompously at a meeting, that "The Sound of Music" *is* the greatest musical achievement of the 20thC *because* the public have said so (in record sales and theatre takings - film and stage). To this day I am appalled by the remark. On top of which I find it musically one of the weakest of the many R&H masterpieces; indeed the Broadway reviews at the time were less than enthusiastic. John G. Deacon Home page: www.ctv.es/USERS/j.deacon