Music: The Flagstad Case

In Boston this week, the great Wagnerian Soprano Kirsten Flagstad made her first U.S. concert appearance since the war. It was easy for Boston, as it had been for London, Paris and Milan, to succumb to the persuasion of Flagstad's magnificent singing. She had shrewdly chosen an Easter program of Beethoven, Grieg and Brahms—and five U.S. composers. But the audience had not forgotten the roles that had made her famous, and shouted for Wagner. On the fifth encore she gave in.*

Wagner was a reminder of what Flagstad was trying to forget. She had...

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