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Havin' a Ball. But Leontyne also has a fierce professional pride and a temper to match. Told not long ago that a male singer was unable to make a rehearsal, she raged: "I don't give a hoot about him or any other singer. He's lucky to be in this with me, dear. That jerk—he can't sing because he hasn't got any vocal technique, that's why!" After such an out burst she is likely to shrug her shoulders, smile and murmur, "I don't know why I get so excited."
Occasionally she expresses her professional grievances with a gag. Once she overheard a tenor telling an admirer that his "lovely, pure, full and beautiful" voice moved Miss Price to tears. "I hate to bring this up," said Leontyne, "but it is my voice so warm, full and beautiful that moves me to tears." Of a well-known soprano who decided to get married and retire, Leontyne asked: "Retire from what?" She has a great, saving capacity for laughing at herself, too. Back home last Christmas, she made a joke of helping at table at the Chisholms when the maids were away: "I'm keepin' my hand in," she said. "The first flat C and I'll be back here."
Leontyne can sometimes play the grand diva sprinkling her conversation with Italianisms, rolling her r's across the room. After taking a college course in elementary French, Brother George recalls, she suddenly stopped spelling her name Leontine, replacing the i with the y that she still uses. Says a friend: "Sometimes she can be all mink and ermine, and the next minute she'll be plain old southern Mississippi." But the southern Mississippi usually pops out first. After her Met debut she encountered Metropolitan General Manager Rudolf Bing backstage. He asked how she was. "Mr. Bing," said Leontyne, "I'm havin' a ball." Later that night, at a party in her honor, a guest asked her to sing something. "Nobody's gonna leave this party unhappy," said Leontyne. She broke into Summertime.
A Silver Shield. Leontyne has not taken a vacation in years, rarely sees her twelve-room house in Manhattan's Greenwich Village. With a six-figure income, the only luxury she finds time for is buying dresses (in Rome) and hats and suits (in Vienna). She has also completely refurnished the Price home in Laurel, built a room to accommodate Big Auntie. She now has a considerable entourage, including a personal manager, a concert manager, an accompanist, a pressagent, a male secretary and a housekeeper, all of whom, as Teacher Kimball once put it, "would like to put a silver shield around her to protect her."