Beverly Sills Passes

July 3, 2007 in Culture, Music, Opera | 1 comment

Coloratura soprano Beverly Sills passed away yesterday; she was 78 and died of cancer.

Playbill:

During the height of Sills’s stardom in the 1970s, she appeared regularly on television talk shows and variety specials with such personalities as Mike Douglas, Dick Cavett, Dinah Shore, Carol Burnett (a good friend with whom she sang duets) and even the Muppets. She was particularly associated with Johnny Carson and his Tonight Show, even filling in for Carson as guest host on occasion. Her warm and unpretentious personality made her very popular with the general public, and she used that renown to popularize opera.

In recent years, as chairman of the Metropolitan Opera’s board, she raised the money to save the company’s Saturday afternoon radio broadcasts after longtime sponsor Chevron Texaco withdrew its support.

Adieu.

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