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Within these boundaries the protagonists play out the drama of saintly endeavor and human fear like dancers in a dream of both life and death. Stage Director Dexter can take credit for that too, although he has been given some splendid singing actresses to work with — Régine Crespin, Shirley Verrett, Betsy Norden, Maria Ewing. As Blanche, the rich-voiced Ewing emerges as a genuine comer in her blend of inner anguish and, at the end, heroic resolve. In the pit, French Conductor Michel Plasson shapes the music with enough loving deftness to underscore the fact that Dialogues is one of the few masterpieces of 20th century opera .