Luisa Tetrazzini

Luisa Tetrazzini (June 29, 1871 - April 28, 1940) was an Italian dramatic coloratura soprano.

Tetrazzini's voice was remarkable for its phenomenal flexibility, thrust and thrilling tone. She enjoyed a tremendously successful operatic and concert career in Europe and America from the 1890s through to the 1920s. Sadly, however, her final years were marred by poverty and ill-health.

Biography

Tetrazzini was born in Florence. Reportedly, she began singing at the age of three. Her first voice teacher was her elder sister, Eva Tetrazzini (1862-1938), who also became a successful singer. Tetrazzini later studied at the Instituto Musicale in Florence. She made her operatic debut in Florence in 1890 as Inez in Meyerbeer's "L'Africaine" when the scheduled soprano canceled on short notice. The first part of her career was spent mainly in the Italian provincial theaters and touring in Russia, Spain and South America. Her repertory consisted primarily of lyric-coloratura parts like Violetta, Philine, Oscar, Gilda and Lucia. Tetrazzini made her American debut in San Francisco in 1905. The Metropolitan Opera's general manager, Heinrich Conried, took an option on her services at that time but unaccountably failed to engage her. After great success, she went on to New York where she was a sensation, eventually working under contract to Oscar Hammerstein.

After some legal difficulties in New York that blocked her from performing, she held a press conference and declared, "I will sing in San Francisco if I have to sing there in the streets, for I know the streets of San Francisco are free." This line became famous. She won her legal case, and her agent announced she would sing in the streets of San Francisco. On a crystal clear Christmas Eve in 1910, at the corner of Market and Kearney near Lotta's Fountain, Tetrazzini climbed a stage platform in a sparkling white gown, surrounded by a throng of an estimated two to three-hundred thousand San Franciscans, and serenaded the city she loved.

In 1907 Tetrazzini made a sensational debut as Violetta in "La Traviata" at Covent Garden in London, where she was completely unknown, and from that point on she was an international operatic superstar, commanding the highest fees and selling out opera houses and concert halls wherever she performed. In 1908 Tetrazzini finally appeared in New York, not at the Metropolitan, but at Oscar Hammerstein's Manhattan Opera Company, again as Violetta and again with great success. She remained loyal to Hammerstein and appeared at the Met for only one season, in 1911-12 (giving just eight performances, in the roles of Lucia, Violetta, and Gilda).

Tetrazzini possessed a phenomenal vocal technique that enabled her to surmount any vocal challenge with almost insolent ease. She had complete mastery of runs, trills, staccati and vocal ornaments of all kinds. She also had a brilliant upper register, extending to E above high C. Unlike many other coloratura sopranos, such as Amelita Galli-Curci, Tetrazzini's high notes were not thin and delicate, but full, powerful and ringing. On the debit side of the ledger, her vocal registers were not as well-integrated as those belonging to her direct soprano rival, Nellie Melba. Also, although her lower register was strong, her middle voice was comparatively 'white' in tone, with a quality which some American and English critics described as "infantile". The Irish tenor John McCormack even compared it, using hyperbole, to the "the wailing of a cross infant". With age, however, Tetrazzini's middle register filled out to some extent; and it should be noted that the way that her mid-voice sounded, even when younger, does not seem to have troubled Mediterranean critics, going by the written record.

Tetrazzini was short and stout and a limited actress. But she was a good musician and she possessed a zestful, vivacious personality. These extra-vocal qualities come through on the many records which she made. She recorded extensively for Victor and HMV. Her best recordings include a spectacular rendition of "Io son Titania" from Ambroise Thomas' "Mignon" and "Saper vorreste" from Verdi's "Un ballo in maschera", in which Tetrazzini's personality virtually jumps out of the grooves at the listener. On a different note, her recording of "Addio del passato" from "La Traviata" is very moving and also demonstrates her fine legato, as is her "Ah non credea mirarti" from "La Sonnambula". Her "Una voce poco fa," and "Ah non giunge," made for the Victor label, remain, after all these years, unequalled for their sheer joy, easy virtuosity and spectacular ornamentation.

Tetrazzini had a bitter feud with Nellie Melba at Covent Garden but was generally well-liked by other colleagues, including Enrico Caruso and Frieda Hempel. Adelina Patti, the premiere soprano of an earlier generation, and not known for generosity towards other singers, was a fan of Tetrazzini's singing, and made it a point to attend and loudly applaud the younger soprano's performances.

After World War One, Tetrazzini largely abandoned the opera stage for the concert platform. She was less fortunate in her marriages (three of them) than in her career, and her third husband dissipated the considerable fortune she had amassed, forcing her to continue to give concerts long after her voice had gone. Her last years were spent in financial difficulty and physical decline. However, the soprano remained cheerful and lovable, despite her reduced circumstances. She would often say, "I am old, I am fat, but I am still Tetrazzini." In 1932, when she was retiring, she was filmed listening to a recording of Caruso's rendition of "M'appari, Tutt'Amor"," and began to sing along with the record showing that her voice still had plenty of power (this video can been seen from the link below under the "External Links" section). Tetrazzini died in Milan on April 28, 1940. ["Year by Year 1941" -- History Channel International] The state paid for her funeral.

Trivia

Luisa is thought to be eponymous of the popular American dish chicken Tetrazzini, which is widely believed to have originated in San Francisco, where she resided for years.She also features in E.M. Forster's first novel 'Where Angels Fear to Tread' as a perspiring Italian lady who insists on keeping the windows open in a train, causing one of the characters to get a smut in her eye. She then turns up as Lucia di Lammermoor on the stage in the Monteriano Opera House. The incidents apparently happened to Forster and his mother while they were making the trip that inspired the book.

ources

*Gattey, Charles Neilson, "Luisa Tetrazzini: The Florentine Nightingale" (Amadeus Press, Portland 1995)
*Pleasants, Henry, "The Great Singers" (Simon & Schuster, New York 1966).
*Scott, Michael, "The Record of Singing" Vol I (Duckworth, London 1977), 159-161 and passim.

Writings

*"My Life of Song" (Dorrance & Co, Philadelphia 1922).
*"How to Sing" (C. Arthur Pearson, London 1923).

CDs

*Luisa Tetrazzini: The Complete London Recordings (boxed set); EMI
*Luisa Tetrazzini: The Complete Zonophone (1904) and Victor Recordings(1911-20); Romophone.
*Luisa Tetrazzini: The Complete Known Recordings (5 volumes); Pearl.
*Luisa Tetrazzini, 2 volumes; Nimbus.

References

External links

* [http://www.sfmuseum.org/bio/luisa.html San Francisco Virtual Museum]
* [http://www.cantabile-subito.de/Sopranos/Tetrazzini__Luisa/hauptteil_tetrazzini__luisa.htm Biographical notes]
* [http://www.rfwilmut.clara.net/opera/xtetrazzini.html Luisa Tetrazzini] - includes her 1912 recording of 'Ombra Leggera' from 'Dinorah' (Meyerbeer)
* [http://texashistory.unt.edu/search/?q=tetrazzini&t=fulltext Images of Luisa Tetrazzini] from the [http://texashistory.unt.edu/ Portal to Texas History]
*YouTube|yBCwVCocENo|Tetrazzini Luisa Tetrazzini singing along to a Caruso record of "M'appari, Tutt'Amor" when she retired in 1932.
*" [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/20069 Caruso and Tetrazzini on the Art of Singing] ", 1909, by Enrico Caruso and Luisa Tetrazzini, from Project Gutenberg