Adelina Patti ~ Ah Non Credea Mirarti ~ La Sonnambula ~ RESTORED ~ BY MARSTON ~ 1906

This is the latest in my series of uploads from the Marston restorations. This has been wonderfully restored into G-sharp minor. It has been nearly a century since Madame Adelina Patti last filled her glorious lungs with a breath of fresh air. Yet, her immortal voice and ever enchanting, mysterious legend escape and defy time and the grave. While, as we know, these seemingly ancient recordings, do not fully capture the voice, and that being said - the voice of a 63 year old prima donna. But...... What more can we as human beings ask for? Patti is like a slab of marble, lying in the middle of a vast, fast flowing stream. The fast flowing water symbolizes time, which is always trying to erode and wither away anything and everything in it's path, but Patti, like the marble, defies time and only becomes more polished, and exceedingly beautiful with each passing year. The years spanning from 1859 to 1906, should be remembered as " The Reign Of Patti." during which, she gave her name, voice and legend to an era of music never before or since rivaled. Patti's records were made well after her prime, but they capture a perfect, clear, telling and surprisingly natural, human voice. Patti was not Earth-bound, like the rest of us. Her voice could soar her to the heavens and back. The recordings made in 1905 and 1906 are but faint, warped, scratchy reminders of a glorious singer, past her prime, singing into infant technology that is now over a century old. Adelina Patti was not only a money earning , beautiful-faced, golden-voiced Prima Donna, but she was also a kind, gentle, caring woman with a heart of gold. The legend of and voice of Adelina Patti can be compared to a never-ending strand of large, iridescent diamonds , so perfect and luminous that when the many moons of the many nights that are to come shine over them, they will never dull, nor will they ever wither away, they will only shine brighter. The perfect diamonds will forever gleam, glimmer, shimmer, shine and sparkle in the sun beams that will light the many days to come, and the many days past. The sun beams it's life-giving light upon the diamonds, which in turn shine brighter than the sun it's self and give back the light and life to all of those who love and cherish the memory of the great woman that was and always be Adelina Patti. I shall leave the last words to Luisa Tetrazzini, " She was a fine lady who's name was known all over the world as having the most wonderful voice. There are many queens, one in every country, but there was the only one " Queen Of Song" everywhere she went there were huge crowds of people, who used to stand in the streets just to hear her sing. She had lovely horses, lovely jewels, lovely palaces and all the world loved and envied her. When she sang she made the people forget everything that was nasty and bad, and think only of the sweet and beautiful. Everyone who loved singing dreamed of being like Patti, To have a voice like Patti was to walk about with Heaven inside."