In the early 1970s Cathy Berberian extended her vocal art towards what may well be understood and appreciated as “camp.” Even though, in retrospect, her whole Beatles project with the release of Beatles Arias (1967)1 and her own piece Stripsody2 may be regarded as camp acts, the epitome of Berberian’s camp was her recital program “À la recherche de la musique perdue / Une soirée chez madame Verdurin,” which had its first night in Berlin in 1971 with Bruno Canino at the piano.3 Among the compositions included were songs by Saint-Saëns, Delibes, Offenbach and Rossini, as well as the occasional Victorian parlor song. She toured with more or less the same program to many European cities, including her adopted hometown of Milan, as well as Paris, Bordeaux, Madrid and Edinburgh where her performances were recorded.4 Using similar repertoire she planned a further recital program with a slightly different emphasis and the name Second Hand Songs. This was to become yet another box office success for her.5 Berberian toured Second Hand Songs to Lugano and Florence, and eventually Frankfurt-amMain; with the latter event being recorded in front of a live audience with Harold

Lester at the piano.6 Despite the fact that some of the pieces in Second Hand Songs were from À la recherche de la musique perdue, their aesthetic intentions were different, as will be demonstrated below.7 A further project in the same vein is exemplified by her double LP “Wie einst in schöner’n Tagen.” Salonmusik der Gründerzeit (1976).8