Enrico di Giuseppe

Enrico di Giuseppe (born on October 14, 1932; died on December 31, 2005, in Voorhees, New Jersey) was a celebrated American operatic tenor. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he studied at the Curtis Institute of Music. He made his formal debut in the summer of 1959, as the Chevalier des Grieux in "Manon", with The Experimental Opera Theatre of America (affiliated with the New Orleans Opera Association), conducted by Renato Cellini and directed by Armando Agnini.

He first sang with the New York City Opera in 1965, as Michele, in the company premiere of Menotti's "The Saint of Bleecker Street". The tenor returned in 1967 for what was possibly his greatest success, the difficult, "tenor-altino" role of the Astrologue in Rimsky-Korsakov's "Le coq d'or", opposite Norman Treigle and Beverly Sills, conducted by Julius Rudel and directed by Tito Capobianco. He went on to perform for that company in "Il barbiere di Siviglia", "Die Zauberflöte", "Der Rosenkavalier", "Cavalleria rusticana", "Tosca", "Manon", "Gianni Schicchi", "Madama Butterfly", "Faust", "Capriccio", "La traviata", "La bohème", "La cenerentola", "Lucia di Lammermoor", "Rigoletto", "Un ballo in maschera", "Roberto Devereux", "Don Giovanni" (directed by Frank Corsaro), "Maria Stuarda", "Anna Bolena", "I puritani", "La fille du régiment", "Attila", "The Makropulos Case", and "Mefistofele".

The tenor first sang at the Metropolitan Opera house in 1970, in "Madama Butterfly". He was seen there, until 1986, in "Cavalleria", "Il barbiere", "Werther" (replacing Franco Corelli), "Rigoletto", "La fille du régiment" (opposite Dame Joan Sutherland), "La bohème", "La traviata", "Un ballo in maschera", "La sonnambula", "Faust", "L'elisir d'amore", "L'italiana in Algeri" (with Marilyn Horne), "Der Rosenkavalier", "Don Pasquale", "Così fan tutte", "Le siège de Corinthe", "Adriana Lecouvreur" (opposite Renata Scotto), "Samson" (as The Philistine Man, with Jon Vickers in the name part), and "Rigoletto".

Following his retirement, di Giuseppe taught at Florida State University and The Juilliard School. He can be heard as Pollione in Bellini's "Norma" (1973), on ABC Records, with Sills, Shirley Verrett, Paul Plishka, and James Levine conducting his first operatic recording. At the age of 73, the tenor succumbed to cancer.

References

* "The Metropolitan Opera Encyclopedia", edited by David Hamilton, Simon and Schuster, 1987. ISBN 0-671-61732-X

External links

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v20EEY_Scl4] YouTube: Enrico di Giuseppe in an excerpt from "Macbeth" (1984).