From 2007:
Perhaps more than any other American classical musician of her generation, she did her best to communicate to ordinary Americans the idea that the making of high art is a normal human activity, one whose fruits are accessible to all who make a good-faith effort to understand them. That’s not quite true, of course, but it’s a noble and ennobling lie, and I wouldn’t be greatly surprised if Beverly Sills is remembered for telling it long after the particulars of her performing career are forgotten….
Read the whole thing here.