June 11, 1864    Richard Strauss born!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

June 11, 1913       Rise Stevens born!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  The Gods were good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I knew Rise and we had our Rise club meetings at her home every year.

  She loved Lotte Lehmann....and imagine that they sang in Rosenkavalier together!

       My tears flow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Giuseppe di Stefano, affectionately known as "Pippo" had one of the most glorious tenor voices in opera history. Sadly, he made some poor choices, and the career did not last as long as it should have,but what a voice! Just that high C diminuendo in theFaust aria tells you he could do. Here are some arias as sung (mostly live) by this fabulous tenor.

Turandot,Tosca,Ballo,Faust,Mignon, Aida, Forza (with Bastianini),Boheme

Here is the end of the Verrett Macbeth. I had forgotten to add two tracks.

SO SORRY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Shirley Verrett, one of my all-time favorite singers, in a Scala 1975 performance of Macbeth under Claudio Abbado. The magnificent Piero Cappuccilli, Franco Tagliavini, and (not to be oudone), Nicolai Ghiaurov complete the cast.

Arias  by Gian Giacomo Guelfi from Nabuco, Macbeth,Luisa Miller, Jerusalem,Wally, Zaza, Fanciulla, Andrea Chenier, and I even found the clip of the Amonasro scene where the conductor lets the audience goes insane, and  never stops so the poor diva can be heard!!!!

Giangiacomo Guelfi (21 December 1924 – 8 February 2012)^[1] was an operatic baritone, particularly associated with Verdi and Puccini.^[2]

Born in Rome, Guelfi studied law before turning to vocal studies in Florence with baritone Titta Ruffo. He made his stage debut in Spoleto, as Rigoletto in 1950. He made his debut in 1952 at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, also appearing in Venice, Florence, Rome, Naples, Palermo, Catania, and becoming a regular guest at the Arena di Verona. Outside Italy he appeared in Berlin, Lisbon, London, Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, and Cairo. He made his American debut in 1954 at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and at the Metropolitan Opera of New York in 1970.^[2] He took part in the creation of contemporary works including Lazzaro in Pizzetti's La figlia di Jorio, Naples, 1954. He was mostly known for his Verdi portrayals in operas such as Nabucco, I due Foscari, Attila, Macbeth, Il trovatore, I vespri siciliani, La forza del destino, and Aida. He also appeared in verismo operas such as Cavalleria rusticana, Andrea Chénier, Tosca, and La fanciulla del West.

Guelfi had a large, powerful voice and yet was able to perform more classical works such as Guglielmo Tell, Lucia di Lammermoor, La favorite, L'Africaine, and Spontini's Agnes von Hohenstaufen.

He sang the role of Rance in La fanciulla del West in a recording with Renata Tebaldi, conducted by Arturo Basile, and was in the 1961 Tokyo's performances of Tosca, also with Tebaldi, on DVD.

He died on 8 February 2012 in Bolzano, after a week's hospitalization.^[1]

I mentioned in my narration my love for that glorious voice of Daniele Barioni. That is not exactly fair to the marvelous Dorothy Kirsten in the title role, but sometimes you just have special memories of a particular singer. In this 1960 New Orleans performance under Renato Cellini we also hear a fine baritone, Richard Torigi (why was he never at the Met?) and Suzuki is Rosalind Nadell.

I tried to narrate a bit of information about the way singers approach the passaggio (or "change in registers). Please feel free to e-mail me at Placido 21@aol.com if you think I don't know what I'm talking about!.

Martinelli, Corelli, Carreras, Bjoerling,Gigli, Di Stefano, Baum Del Monaco 1952, Del Monaco 1961. Roswaenge, Svanholm.  (The Vinay clip did not come out.)

Passaggio is a term used in classical singing to describe the pitch ranges in which vocal registration events occur. Beneath passaggio is the chest voice where any singer can produce a powerful sound, and above it lies the head voice, where a powerful and resonant sound is accessible, but usually only through training. The historic Italian school of singing describes a primo passaggio and a secondo passaggio connected through a zona di passaggio in both the male and female voice. A major goal of classical voice training in classical styles is to maintain an even timbre throughout the passaggio. Through proper training, it is possible to produce a resonant and powerful sound.

From a concert performance from NYC 1974 under Eve Queler, we hear Montserrat Caballe,Placido Domingo, Justino Diaz, and Franco Bordoni in Verdi's "I Vespri Siciliani."

(Note the way Caballe sings "Arrigo, ah parla a un core" in act four as an example of truly amazing singing.)

Under Eugen Jochum, I bring you a Tristan und Isolde from Bayreuth, 1953 featuring Astrid Varnay, Ramon Vinay, Gustav Neidlinger, Ira Milaniuk, and my favorite basso of that era, Ludwig Weber.

(I know you missed my mellifluous voice before the podcast, but it was too noisy in my hall. Sorry!)

Scenes from two performances of Turandot:

New Orleans, 1966 under Knud Andersson featuring Birgit Nilsson and Giuseppe Gismondo.

Rome, 1987 under Daniel Oren featuring Diana Soviero and Corneliu Murgu.