100th Birthday of Maria Callas

Portrait of the celebrated Greek soprano Maria Callas (1923–1977), facing right. The commemorative inscription "100 XPONIA APO ΓENNHΣH THΣ MAPIAΣ KAΛΛAΣ" runs along the upper edge, with the issuing state "ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΗ ΔΗΜΟΚΡΑΤΙΑ" below. To the right, the palmette of the Greek mint and the year 2023; to the lower left beside the portrait, the coin designer's initials "ΣTAM".

Maria Callas was born in 1923 in New York to Greek immigrant parents and returned to Greece as a teenager, where she trained at the Athens Conservatory under soprano Elvira de Hidalgo. Her voice type, dramatic coloratura soprano, was unusual for the 20th century: Callas combined technical precision in coloratura passages with a dramatic expressive power that turned roles such as Norma, Lucia di Lammermoor and Violetta into reference interpretations. Her career, spanning from Milan's La Scala to New York's Met and Covent Garden, left a lasting mark on the international opera world of the postwar decades and redefined the concept of the prima donna assoluta.

The Greek singer's influence extends far beyond her active years on stage. The systematic rediscovery of the early 19th-century bel canto repertoire — Donizetti, Bellini, early Verdi — is largely attributable to her interpretations; operas that were rarely performed before she took them on are now part of the standard repertoire. Callas died in Paris in 1977, her fame as La Divina undiminished. Greece honoured her in 2023 with a 2-euro commemorative coin marking her 100th birthday, affirming the Greek identity of an artist born in the United States, trained in Athens and made famous in Italy.