Great opera singers have always enjoyed appearing in a popular repertory. Golden Age heroes like Caruso and Gigli touched hearts and purse strings with their renditions of Italian folk songs both real and spurious. Ezio Pinza sang his way to fame on Broadway in South Pacific, a fame that had eluded him at the Metropolitan Opera House just a few blocks away. Helen Traubel supplemented her career as Brünnhilde and Isolde with another one performing light material in nightclubs. And in our own time the woods are full of tenor songbirds like Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, and Peter Hofmann doing crossover material ranging from folk songs and middle-of-the-road pop to soft rock.

Of late the pickings haven’t seemed so good for prima donnas. Even the career of Leontyne Price, with its obvious crossover potential, has seemed irrevocably bound to a serious operatic and song repertory. But now there’s a new diva’s hat in the pop market. In December, around the time of the release of her “with-the-help-of” autobiography,[1] mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne appeared on nationwide television in a two-hour program of American songs. The concert was transmitted live from Avery Fisher Hall and featured the accompanying services of conductor Leonard Slatkin, the New York Choral Artists, and members of the American Symphony Orchestra. Presented by PBSin prime time under the “Live From Lincoln Center” seal of approval, the program was supported by, among others, Exxon, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the National Endowment for the