Thorn
Footballguy
"Without a doubt"? I disagree. Not that hard to come up with 20 ahead of them, not hard at all.
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World's Greatest Draft (2 Viewers)
- Thread starter timschochet
- Start date
John Maddens Lunchbox
Footballguy
Going to take a Wildcard, although I’ll consider this person as an Inventor or scientist depending on what else I can come up with.
One of the few females drafted so far, this one is extraordinary.
13-13 – Marie Curie – Wildcard
One of the few females drafted so far, this one is extraordinary.
13-13 – Marie Curie – Wildcard
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thatguy
Footballguy
A couple very solid picks. I've had Curie on my list for awhile now but don't really feel like taking Wild Cards yet and she's below a few of my other options anyway. Still a solid pick.
I hadn't even considered Anne Frank. I think she makes a phenomenal Celebrity or Wild Card.
I hadn't even considered Anne Frank. I think she makes a phenomenal Celebrity or Wild Card.
mad sweeney
Footballguy
I thought I was pretty clear that they are not masters at their instruments the way some are but their performances are legendary. They are nothing like Madonna. They didn't continuosly reinvent themselves to stay at the forefront of pop culture, didn't have lavishly choreographed concerts, didn't do anything to bring mainstream attention to themselves. They just played together, continuously performing in their unique phenomenon, bringing with them generations of fans and musicians. It's not about liking their music it's about recognizing the incredible force of their influence on all manner of cultural levels. I can't imagine a band's performances that were more legendary and communal with their audiences.
Upthread there was a big debate about those people who only became celebritites after they died. I'd put Anne Frank in that category with King Tut or the Blessed Virgin, she only became a "celebrity" after she was dead and gone.
Thorn
Footballguy
But is "a communal experience" really related to their music? Or is that just the niche they found among the right group of people. I mean, I've never been to a dead show so I could be wrong, but it seems like much of the draw was the 'knowing what you were going to get/community' factor, not 'wow I love their music'. Similarly, the idea that they played before the most people is kind of disingenuous -- they played before largely the same group of people over and over again. Kind of like McDonalds saying 50 billion served -- a lot of that number comes from that same fatties going 5 times a week for years.
BobbyLayne
Footballguy
Maybe it's an access issue? He posted in the signup thread (or maybe it was somewhere else) he had been having problems, was waiting on a tech coming out the next day, etc. Anyway, hopefully he'll turn up soon.He'll show up. But if he doesn't, I will be the religious judge!
Usual21
Footballguy
13.14 - W.B. Yeats - Playwright/Poet
William Butler Yeats (13 June 1865–28 January 1939) was an Irish poet and dramatist and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and English literary establishments, in his later years Yeats served as an Irish Senator for two terms. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival, and along with Lady Gregory and Edward Martyn founded the Abbey Theatre, and served as its chief during its early years. In 1923, he was awarded a Nobel Prize in Literature for what the Nobel Committee described as "inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation;" and he was the first Irishman so honored. Yeats is generally considered one of the few writers whose greatest works were completed after being awarded the Nobel Prize;such works include The Tower (1928) and The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1929)
Yeats was born and educated in Dublin, but spent his childhood in County Sligo. He studied poetry in his youth, and from an early age was fascinated by both Irish legends and the occult. Those topics feature in the first phase of his work, which lasted roughly until the turn of the century. His earliest volume of verse was published in 1889, and those slowly paced and lyrical poems display debts to Edmund Spenser and Percy Bysshe Shelley, as well as to the lyricism of the Pre-Raphaelite poets.
From 1900, Yeats' poetry grew more physical and realistic. He largely renounced the transcendental beliefs of his youth, though he remained preoccupied with physical and spiritual masks, as well as with cyclical theories of life. Over the years, Yeats adopted many different ideological positions, including, in the words of the critic Michael Valdez Moses, "those of radical nationalist, classical liberal, reactionary conservative and millenarian nihilist".
William Butler Yeats (13 June 1865–28 January 1939) was an Irish poet and dramatist and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and English literary establishments, in his later years Yeats served as an Irish Senator for two terms. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival, and along with Lady Gregory and Edward Martyn founded the Abbey Theatre, and served as its chief during its early years. In 1923, he was awarded a Nobel Prize in Literature for what the Nobel Committee described as "inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation;" and he was the first Irishman so honored. Yeats is generally considered one of the few writers whose greatest works were completed after being awarded the Nobel Prize;such works include The Tower (1928) and The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1929)
Yeats was born and educated in Dublin, but spent his childhood in County Sligo. He studied poetry in his youth, and from an early age was fascinated by both Irish legends and the occult. Those topics feature in the first phase of his work, which lasted roughly until the turn of the century. His earliest volume of verse was published in 1889, and those slowly paced and lyrical poems display debts to Edmund Spenser and Percy Bysshe Shelley, as well as to the lyricism of the Pre-Raphaelite poets.
From 1900, Yeats' poetry grew more physical and realistic. He largely renounced the transcendental beliefs of his youth, though he remained preoccupied with physical and spiritual masks, as well as with cyclical theories of life. Over the years, Yeats adopted many different ideological positions, including, in the words of the critic Michael Valdez Moses, "those of radical nationalist, classical liberal, reactionary conservative and millenarian nihilist".
FUBAR
Footballguy
Like Madonna, their show and influence vastly exceeds their musical talent. The McDonald's analogy, while over the top, is actually pretty much on target. Quality of food = quality of music, but the consumption is huge.
mad sweeney
Footballguy
I think the music and the commune are too intertwined to separate, but it sprang forth and exists because of and centered around the music/performance. I can't link it now because I am at work but look into their history of music sharing, their tech advances for concerts, the lists of musicians (many probably higher on a list of "better" bands that played with them. Not many bands can claim multiple generations of repeat fans. The Stones and Beatles had plenty of repeat audience members if you really want to break it down. I think that even with repeat appearances, over 20 years of touring almost continuously is going to garner a massive amount of listeners. I don't know about Russia, Asia or S America but they were huge in europe where drug laws were often less stringent.I thought I was pretty clear that they are not masters at their instruments the way some are but their performances are legendary. They are nothing like Madonna. They didn't continuosly reinvent themselves to stay at the forefront of pop culture, didn't have lavishly choreographed concerts, didn't do anything to bring mainstream attention to themselves. They just played together, continuously performing in their unique phenomenon, bringing with them generations of fans and musicians. It's not about liking their music it's about recognizing the incredible force of their influence on all manner of cultural levels. I can't imagine a band's performances that were more legendary and communal with their audiences.But is "a communal experience" really related to their music? Or is that just the niche they found among the right group of people. I mean, I've never been to a dead show so I could be wrong, but it seems like much of the draw was the 'knowing what you were going to get/community' factor, not 'wow I love their music'. Similarly, the idea that they played before the most people is kind of disingenuous -- they played before largely the same group of people over and over again. Kind of like McDonalds saying 50 billion served -- a lot of that number comes from that same fatties going 5 times a week for years.
larry_boy_44
Footballguy
btw, the Grateful Dead are nowhere near top 20 bands/musicians of all time... its not even close...
mad sweeney
Footballguy
The category isn't greatest band or most musically talented. Their talent working together as a group improvisationally is something I think you're overlooking. As performers they have created a legacy that transcends genres, generations and their own individual deficiencies as musicians.
BobbyLayne
Footballguy
Fair enough, pard.The Red Fort - to which Ustad Ahmad Lahauri also contributed - is a less celebrated but no less spectacular and monumental achievement. It may well be he is the genius behind both, and it is unfortunate we don't know with certainty whom to credit.As an aside, I just wanted to say I took no joy whatsoever in calling attention to this. Your calm responses, however, are immensely appreciated, and should serve as a model to everyone. Kudos for the way you handled a difficult situation with tact and graciousness.
thatguy
Footballguy
Going with my Musician/Performer here. Not sure where he'll rank, but what I do know is that he is an incredible guitar player, among the best ever, and an incredible Blues singer, and that his influence on other artists in undeniable.
B.B. King - Musician/Performer
B. B. King (born Riley B. King, September 16, 1925) is an African American blues guitarist and singer-songwriter known for his expressive singing and inimitable guitar playing. He "introduced a sophisticated style of soloing based on fluid string bending and shimmering vibrato that would influence virtually every electric blues guitarist that followed," (Edward M. Komara). Critical acclaim and widespread popularity have cemented his reputation as possibly the most respected,successful, and most recognized bluesman, not just in the United States, but in the world. Rolling Stone Magazine ranked him at #3 in "the 100 greatest guitarists of all time".
Over a period of 52 years, B.B. King played in excess of 15,000 performances.
Honors and awards
* On May 27, 2007, King was awarded an honorary doctorate in music by Brown University. Thirty years earlier, in May 1977, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by Yale University.
* On December 15, 2006, President George W. Bush awarded King the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
* In 2004, he was awarded an honorary Ph.D from the University of Mississippi and the Royal Swedish Academy of Music awarded him the Polar Music Prize, for his "significant contributions to the blues".
* King was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 1990.
* He was officially inducted in 1987 into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, becoming one of the first artists to be honored by the museum.
Grammy Awards
King was given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1987. As of 2009, he has won 15 Grammy Awards, of which ten have been the Grammy award for Best Traditional Blues Album: in 2009 (for One Kind Favor), 2006 (for B.B. King & Friends: 80), 2003 (for A Christmas Celebration of Hope), 2001 (for Riding with the King), 2000 (for Blues on the Bayou), 1994 (for Blues Summit), 1992 (for Live at the Apollo), 1991 (for Live at San Quentin), 1986 (for My Guitar Sings the Blues) and 1984 (for Blues 'N' Jazz). In 1982, he won the Grammy for Best Ethnic or Traditional Folk Recording (for There Must Be a Better World Somewhere). The Grammy for Best Ethnic or Traditional Folk was last given in 1986; the Grammy for Best Traditional Blues Album was first given in 1983. In 1997, he won a Grammy for Best Rock Instrumental Performance (with other artists, for "SRV Shuffle"). In 1971, he won the Grammy for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance (for "The Thrill is Gone"). A Grammy Hall of Fame Award was given to "The Thrill is Gone" in 1998, an award given to recordings that are at least 25 years old and that have "qualitative or historical significance."
B.B. King - Musician/Performer
B. B. King (born Riley B. King, September 16, 1925) is an African American blues guitarist and singer-songwriter known for his expressive singing and inimitable guitar playing. He "introduced a sophisticated style of soloing based on fluid string bending and shimmering vibrato that would influence virtually every electric blues guitarist that followed," (Edward M. Komara). Critical acclaim and widespread popularity have cemented his reputation as possibly the most respected,successful, and most recognized bluesman, not just in the United States, but in the world. Rolling Stone Magazine ranked him at #3 in "the 100 greatest guitarists of all time".
Over a period of 52 years, B.B. King played in excess of 15,000 performances.
Honors and awards
* On May 27, 2007, King was awarded an honorary doctorate in music by Brown University. Thirty years earlier, in May 1977, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by Yale University.
* On December 15, 2006, President George W. Bush awarded King the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
* In 2004, he was awarded an honorary Ph.D from the University of Mississippi and the Royal Swedish Academy of Music awarded him the Polar Music Prize, for his "significant contributions to the blues".
* King was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 1990.
* He was officially inducted in 1987 into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, becoming one of the first artists to be honored by the museum.
Grammy Awards
King was given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1987. As of 2009, he has won 15 Grammy Awards, of which ten have been the Grammy award for Best Traditional Blues Album: in 2009 (for One Kind Favor), 2006 (for B.B. King & Friends: 80), 2003 (for A Christmas Celebration of Hope), 2001 (for Riding with the King), 2000 (for Blues on the Bayou), 1994 (for Blues Summit), 1992 (for Live at the Apollo), 1991 (for Live at San Quentin), 1986 (for My Guitar Sings the Blues) and 1984 (for Blues 'N' Jazz). In 1982, he won the Grammy for Best Ethnic or Traditional Folk Recording (for There Must Be a Better World Somewhere). The Grammy for Best Ethnic or Traditional Folk was last given in 1986; the Grammy for Best Traditional Blues Album was first given in 1983. In 1997, he won a Grammy for Best Rock Instrumental Performance (with other artists, for "SRV Shuffle"). In 1971, he won the Grammy for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance (for "The Thrill is Gone"). A Grammy Hall of Fame Award was given to "The Thrill is Gone" in 1998, an award given to recordings that are at least 25 years old and that have "qualitative or historical significance."
Andy Dufresne
Footballguy
13.16 - John Williams - Composer
This pick rules. The predominant form of entertainment pre-20th century was operas & concerts, where the traditional "big names" made their mark. But in the 20th century, the media of choice was television and film and no other composer so completely dominated the genre like Williams.
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Thorn
Footballguy
Fair enough, though I don't know that they ought to get much credit for improv; any professional musician ought to be able to, (again this may be more personal preference than anything), but twenty minute jams really don't strike me as a plus. Maybe they should get some points for spawning the minimalist/punk movement, however.
Fennis
Footballguy
FUBAR
Footballguy
sure, they're the best group ever assembled. IMHO, and many seem to agree, you're overrating the band. and FWIW, I actually enjoyed the two concerts I went to.
Andy Dufresne
Footballguy
mad sweeney
Footballguy
I don't see how you can discount improv as a strength. Most
Musicians do but how many make a living doing it onstage? Not the Beatles, not the Stones. I'm not trying to offer them up as the best band. Their "greatness" comes from longevity, innovation, cultural and musical influence, uniqueness and social impact. They pioneered file sharing, even befor Gore invented the Internet, because each show they played was different and they all survive in exchangable collections. Because of their performances.
If you haven't been to a show I can understand skeptisim. I am NOT a deadhead and likely wold never have seen a show if not for hippie roommates. But the entire dead culture came about based on the performance of the band. Their influence goes well beyond most other bands. They are not the best band ever and I am not counting then towards a top spot but the phenomenon of the Dead certainly deserves high consideration. No other band or musician can claim what they do, and it's all based on their continuous performances.
Or if that doesn't illustrate my point I'll try a different route...
"Nobody's reading my posts!!!"
Musicians do but how many make a living doing it onstage? Not the Beatles, not the Stones. I'm not trying to offer them up as the best band. Their "greatness" comes from longevity, innovation, cultural and musical influence, uniqueness and social impact. They pioneered file sharing, even befor Gore invented the Internet, because each show they played was different and they all survive in exchangable collections. Because of their performances.
If you haven't been to a show I can understand skeptisim. I am NOT a deadhead and likely wold never have seen a show if not for hippie roommates. But the entire dead culture came about based on the performance of the band. Their influence goes well beyond most other bands. They are not the best band ever and I am not counting then towards a top spot but the phenomenon of the Dead certainly deserves high consideration. No other band or musician can claim what they do, and it's all based on their continuous performances.
Or if that doesn't illustrate my point I'll try a different route...
"Nobody's reading my posts!!!"
BobbyLayne
Footballguy
13.17 Herbert the Hippo - Next Selection OTC until 2:29 p.m. EST
13.18 BobbyLayne - On Deck
13.19 MisterCIA
13.20 Abrantes
14.01 Abrantes
14.02 MisterCIA
14.03 BobbyLayne
14.04 Herbert the Hippo
14.05 Andy Dufrense
14.06 thatguy
14.07 Usual21
14.08 John Madden's Lunchbox
14.09 higgins
14.10 Big Rocks
14.11 Mad Sweeney
13.18 BobbyLayne - On Deck
13.19 MisterCIA
13.20 Abrantes
14.01 Abrantes
14.02 MisterCIA
14.03 BobbyLayne
14.04 Herbert the Hippo
14.05 Andy Dufrense
14.06 thatguy
14.07 Usual21
14.08 John Madden's Lunchbox
14.09 higgins
14.10 Big Rocks
14.11 Mad Sweeney
Done. I'll PM you later or tomorrow. If you PM me a RL email address, I can email you a spread sheet.MisfitBlondes said:I can help out with this.
Thorn
Footballguy
Most musicians can sight-read. Does that mean that they ought to do it endlessly on stage or get extra credit for it? I don't want to drag down the thread -- I'll just say this and be done: I get the fact that their shows and following are probably unmatched; I just don't think it's as a reulst of their music or their musical talent. Therefore, I don't get the argument that they are among the world's 20 greatest musicians or musical performers.
higgins
Footballguy
I have to imagine you took no joy from that, but it's certainly understandable (I may have done the same). If some points are deducted from me...no prob. I just have to edit my post to make a more compelling argument for the judges now. BTW: I saw no reason to argue what is in fact shrouded in a little mystery -- who do you think I am, larry_boy_44? 
, lb44.
Yankee23Fan
Fair Tax!
You sonuva..................................
krista4
Footballguy
This is an excellent pick. It's hard to say where he'll land in my rankings because of the issues of comparing playwrights and poets (and hybrids), but clearly one of the top (if not the #1) of the "pure poets" IMO.
mad sweeney
Footballguy
Fair enough Thorn, but it all started with and centers around the performance. The music begat the shows begat the following begat the tours begat the phenomonon begat continuous performances. Maybe I am going too outside the box because it seems many are using a best band measuring stick whereas I am ignoring their standing in musical competency in lieu of their unique and long standing shows which ate all based on a lifetime of performances. It's my way of looking at it differently than as a generic best band category. Maybe it's too intertwined to clearly separate the bands performance from the phenomenon but I think that all of it should count as testament to their status as great performers, not as a great band, but as great performers.
BobbyLayne
Footballguy
Not sure if Herbie is around (times out at 2:29 p.m. EST)....will post mine in a few.
AcerFC
Footballguy
Can you please list your top 5 "pure poets" TIA
krista4
Footballguy
Still haven't chosen your poet/playwright?
BobbyLayne
Footballguy
krista4
Footballguy
mad sweeney
Footballguy
I understand that. It's one of the pitfalls if hybrid categories. If it gets me ranked number twenty then so be it. I feel that the whole of the GD experience is a part of the band's "greatness" as performers. Their uniqueness of fanhood (if performance isn't fir the audience then who is it for?) along with the circus surrounding every show should factor in their favor in ways no other band or musician can claim. I weighed the options and am taking a different approach to the category.
John Maddens Lunchbox
Footballguy
Has Bobby fallen asleep while trying post?
HERBERT THE HIPPO
REAL Ultimate Power
13.17 - Giovanni Boccaccio - Novelist/short story
Giovanni Boccaccio was most probably born in Tuscany, the illegitimate son of a merchant of Certaldo, who launched him on a commercial career, during which he spent some time at Paris. As a young man, Boccaccio abandoned commerce and the study of canon law. At Naples he began to write stories in verse and prose, mingled in courtly society, and fell in love with the noble lady whom he made famous under the name of Fiammetta. Up to 1350 Boccaccio lived at Florence and at Naples, producing prose tales, pastorals, and poems. The Teseide is a version in ottava rima of the medieval romance of Palamon and Arcite, which was partly translated by Chaucer in the Knight's Tale, and is the subject of Fletcher's Two Noble Kinsmen. The Filostrato deals with the loves of Troilus and Cressida, also in great part translated by Chaucer. After 1350 Boccaccio became a diplomat entrusted with important public affairs, and a scholar devoted to the new learning. During this period, in which he formed a lasting friendship with Francesco Petrarch, Boccaccio, as Florentine ambassador, visited Rome, Ravenna, Avignon and Brandenburg.
In 1358 he completed his great work, the Decameron, begun some ten years before. During the plague at Florence in 1348, seven ladies and three gentlemen left the city for a country villa and over a period of ten days told one hundred stories. In graceful Italian, Boccaccio selected the plots of his stories from the popular fiction of his day, and especially from the fabliaux which had passed into Italy from France, the matter being medieval while the form is classical. Boccaccio's originality lay in his narrative skill and in the rich poetical sentiments which adorns his borrowed materials. The two great tendencies which run through European literature, the classical and the romantic, work together in the Decameron.
The influence of the Decameron on European literature has been lasting, not merely in Italy, but in France and England. Chaucer and Shakespeare both borrowed from it. The Decameron has also been the subject of poems by Yeats, XXXX, XXXX
During his last years Boccaccio lived principally in retirement at Certaldo, and would have entered into holy orders, moved by repentance for the follies of his youth, had he not been dissuaded by Petrarch. Boccaccio died at Certaldo, December 21, 1375.
Giovanni Boccaccio was most probably born in Tuscany, the illegitimate son of a merchant of Certaldo, who launched him on a commercial career, during which he spent some time at Paris. As a young man, Boccaccio abandoned commerce and the study of canon law. At Naples he began to write stories in verse and prose, mingled in courtly society, and fell in love with the noble lady whom he made famous under the name of Fiammetta. Up to 1350 Boccaccio lived at Florence and at Naples, producing prose tales, pastorals, and poems. The Teseide is a version in ottava rima of the medieval romance of Palamon and Arcite, which was partly translated by Chaucer in the Knight's Tale, and is the subject of Fletcher's Two Noble Kinsmen. The Filostrato deals with the loves of Troilus and Cressida, also in great part translated by Chaucer. After 1350 Boccaccio became a diplomat entrusted with important public affairs, and a scholar devoted to the new learning. During this period, in which he formed a lasting friendship with Francesco Petrarch, Boccaccio, as Florentine ambassador, visited Rome, Ravenna, Avignon and Brandenburg.
In 1358 he completed his great work, the Decameron, begun some ten years before. During the plague at Florence in 1348, seven ladies and three gentlemen left the city for a country villa and over a period of ten days told one hundred stories. In graceful Italian, Boccaccio selected the plots of his stories from the popular fiction of his day, and especially from the fabliaux which had passed into Italy from France, the matter being medieval while the form is classical. Boccaccio's originality lay in his narrative skill and in the rich poetical sentiments which adorns his borrowed materials. The two great tendencies which run through European literature, the classical and the romantic, work together in the Decameron.
The influence of the Decameron on European literature has been lasting, not merely in Italy, but in France and England. Chaucer and Shakespeare both borrowed from it. The Decameron has also been the subject of poems by Yeats, XXXX, XXXX
During his last years Boccaccio lived principally in retirement at Certaldo, and would have entered into holy orders, moved by repentance for the follies of his youth, had he not been dissuaded by Petrarch. Boccaccio died at Certaldo, December 21, 1375.
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BobbyLayne
Footballguy
scrub, rinse, repeat
BobbyLayne
Footballguy
I select the greatest singer of all-time:
13.18 (258th pick) - Enrico Caruso - Muscian/ Performer
Enrico Caruso (1873 – 1921) was an Italian opera tenor of tremendous international renown. He is considered to have been one of the most significant singers of the past 200 years in any vocal category, and a key pioneer in the field of recorded music.
His voluminous record sales and extraordinary voice, celebrated for its beauty, power and unequalled richness of tone, made him the number-one male operatic star of his era. Such was his influence on singing style, virtually all subsequent Italian and Spanish tenors (and most non-Mediterranean tenors, too) have been his heirs to a greater or lesser extent.
Caruso's musical career spanned the years 1895 to 1920 but was cut short by a serious illness which eventually killed him at the age of 48. He remains famous while few other early 20th century opera performers are still remembered by the general public. This is a remarkable achievement in itself because unlike modern-day singers, he did not have access to a sophisticated marketing and communications industry with the capacity to publicise his attainments instantly and globally via the media.
Caruso made more than 260 extant recordings over an 18-year period and earned millions of dollars from the sale of the resulting 78-rpm discs. These discs, recorded from 1902 to 1920, chart the development of Caruso's voice from that of a lyric tenor, to that of a spinto tenor, to that of a fully-fledged dramatic tenor.
While Caruso sang at most of the world's foremost opera houses, including La Scala in Milan, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in London and the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, he is best known for being the leading tenor of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City for 17 consecutive years. The difficult to please conductor at the Met regarded him as being one of the finest artists with whom he ever worked and Caruso remains, by general consensus, the greatest all-round tenor exponent of Italian opera on disc.
Caruso appeared more than 800 times at the Met. His vocal technique and style of singing were without precedent. They uniquely combined the best aspects of the 19th-century tradition of elegant bel canto vocalism with the ardent delivery and big, exciting tenor sound demanded by 20th century composers of verismo opera. He was also a good musician who was able to invest his interpretations with an exceptional degree of emotional force. Judging by contemporary reviews of his Met performances he was an enthusiastic actor, too, if not always a terribly subtle one.
Life & singing career
Enrico Caruso came from a poor Neapolitan background (his father was a mechanic at a factory). He was baptized in the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo on February 26, 1873, having been born in his parents' adjoining flat one day earlier. Caruso sang in church choirs as a boy, took singing lessons, and made his professional debut on March 15, 1895, at the Teatro Nuovo, Naples, in a now forgotten opera. The young tenor proceeded to perform in a succession of provincial venues during the second half of the 1890s before graduating to La Scala in December 1900. Audiences in Monte Carlo, Warsaw and Buenos Aires also had an opportunity to hear him sing during this youthful phase of his career and, in 1899-1900, he performed in Russia at the Mariinsky theatre in Saint Petersburg and the Bolshoi theatre in Moscow with a visiting troupe of top-class Italian singers.
The first major role that Caruso created was Loris in Fedora, at the Teatro Lirico in Milan, on November 17, 1898. At that same theater, on November 6, 1902, he created the role of Maurizio in Adriana Lecouvreur. (He had also hoped to create the part of Cavaradossi in Tosca at the Rome Opera in 1900 but the composer, after deliberating hard, chose an older and more experienced tenor instead.)
Caruso remained at La Scala until 1902. He had yet to turn 30 and his voice was still maturing when, in April of that year, he was engaged by the Gramophone & Typewriter Company to make his first recordings (in a Milan hotel room!) for a fee of 100 pounds stirling. These discs helped to spread his fame, and he was able to make a highly successful London debut at Covent Garden's Royal Opera House on May 14 that same year. Then, with the help of his agent, the banker/impresario Pasquale Simonelli, he travelled to New York City at the conclusion of the London season, which had been followed by a sequence of engagements in Italy, Portugal and South America. On November 23, 1903, he debuted at the Metropolitan Opera as the Duke of Mantua in a new production of Rigoletto.
The next year, Caruso began a lifelong association with the Victor Talking-Machine Company. He made his first American discs on February 1, 1904, having signed a lucrative contract with Victor. Thenceforth, his stellar recording career would run in tandem with his equally stellar Met career, the one bolstering the other, until death intervened in 1921.
New York came to mean so much to Caruso, he at one stage commissioned the city's best jewellers, Tiffany & Co., to strike a commemorative medal made out of 24-carat gold. He presented the medal, which was adorned with the tenor's profile, to Simonelli as a souvenir of his many acclaimed performances at the Met. By no means, however, was Caruso's post-1903 career confined exclusively to New York. He performed often in other American cities and continued to sing widely in Europe, appearing again at Covent Garden in 1904-07 and 1913-14 and also thrilling audiences in France, Belgium, Monaco, Austria and Germany. In 1917 he toured South America and, two years later, visited Mexico City.
In April 1906, Caruso and leading members of the Metropolitan Opera company came to San Francisco to give a series of performances at the Tivoli Opera House. The night after Caruso's appearance as Don Jose in Carmen, he was awakened in the early morning in his Palace Hotel suite by a strong jolt. San Francisco had been hit by a major earthquake, which led to a series of fires that destroyed most of the city. The Met lost all of the sets and costumes that it had brought on tour. Clutching an autographed photo of the President of the United States as a talisman, Caruso made an effort to flee the city, first by boat and then by train. He vowed never to return to San Francisco; he kept his word.
Caruso became embroiled in a scandal in November 1906, when he was charged with an indecent act committed in the monkey house of New York's Central Park Zoo. Police accused him of pinching the bottom of a woman described by press reporters as being "pretty and plump". Caruso claimed that a monkey did the bottom-pinching. He was found guilty as charged, however, and fined 10 dollars, although suspicions linger that he may have been entrapped by the alleged victim and the arresting officer. Members of New York's opera-going high society were outraged initially by the incident, but they soon forgave Caruso.
On December 10, 1910, Caruso starred at the Met as **** Johnson in the world premiere of La fanciulla del West. The composer had written the music for the principal tenor's role in the opera with Caruso's voice specifically in mind. In 1917, Caruso was elected an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, the national fraternity for men involved in music, by the fraternity's Alpha chapter at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.
Caruso wed in 1918. His 25-year-old bride, Dorothy Park Benjamin, was the product of a respected New York family. They had one daughter, Gloria Caruso (born 1919). Dorothy published two books about Caruso, one in 1928, the other in 1945, which include many of his touching letters to her. Prior to his marriage to Dorothy Benjamin, Caruso had been romantically tied to an Italian soprano, Ada Giachetti, who was older than he. Though already married, Giachetti bore Caruso four sons during their 11-year relationship (1897-1908). Two of these offspring survived infancy: Rodolfo Caruso (born 1898) and singer/actor Enrico Caruso, Jr. (1904). Ada left her husband and an existing son to cohabit with the tenor. However, she later ran off with her chauffeur. Giachetti's subsequent attempts to sue Caruso for damages were dismissed by the courts.
Premature death
In September 1920, Caruso recorded several discs for Victor at Camden's Trinity Church; these recordings were to be his last. On December 11, 1920, during the performance of L'elisir d'amore at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, he suffered a throat haemorrhage and the audience was dismissed at the end of Act 1. Following this incident, a clearly unwell Caruso gave only three more performances at the Met, the final one being in the role of Eléazar in Halévy's La Juive, on Christmas Eve 1920. Caruso's state of health deteriorated further during the new year due to a lung ailment and he experienced episodes of intense pain. He died in Naples on August 2, 1921, while recuperating from a surgical operation on his chest which had led to part of a rib being removed. The cause of death was most likely peritonitis arising from a burst abscess. Caruso received an elaborate funeral, and his embalmed body was preserved in a glass sarcophagus for his fans to see. A few years later, however, his remains were sealed permanently in an ornate stone tomb at a Naples cemetery.
Honors
During his lifetime, Caruso received many orders, decorations, testimonials and other kinds of honors from the monarchs, governments and cultural organizations of the various nations in which he sang. More recently, in 1987, Caruso was awarded, posthumously of course, the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. On February 27 of that same year, the United States Postal Service issued a 22-cent postage stamp in his honor.
Repertoire
Caruso's operatic repertoire consisted overwhemingly of Italian and French works. He performed only one opera by Richard Wagner, namely Lohengrin, and that was early in his career. Listed below in chronological order are the first known performances by Caruso of each of the different operas that he undertook on stage.
L'Amico Francesco (Morelli) - Teatro Nuovo, Napoli, 15 March 1895 (Creation);
Faust - Caserta, 28 March 1895;
Cavalleria Rusticana - Caserta, April 1895;
Camoens (Musoni)- Caserta, May 1895;
Rigoletto - Napoli, 21 July 1895;
La Traviata - Napoli, 25 August 1895;
Lucia di Lammermoor - Cairo, 30 October 1895;
La Gioconda - Cairo, 9 November 1895;
Manon Lescaut - Cairo, 15 November 1895;
I Capuleti e i Montecchi - Napoli, 7 December 1895;
Malia - Trapani, 21 March 1896;
La sonnambula - Trapani, 24 March 1896;
Marriedda - Napoli, 23 June 1896;
I puritani - Salerno, 10 September 1896;
La Favorita - Salerno, 22 November 1896;
A San Francisco - Salerno, 23 November 1896;
Carmen - Salerno, 6 December 1896;
Un Dramma in vendemmia - Napoli, 1 February 1897;
Celeste - Napoli, 6 March 1897 (Creation);
Il Profeta Velato - Salerno, 8 April 1897;
La Bohème - Livorno, 14 August 1897;
La Navarrese - Milano, 3 November 1897;
Il Voto - Milano, 10 November 1897 (Creation);
L'Arlesiana - Milano, 27 November 1897 (Creation);
Pagliacci - Milano, 31 December 1897;
La bohème (Leoncavallo) - Genova, 20 January 1898;
The Pearl Fishers - Genova, 3 February 1898;
Hedda - Milano, 2 April 1898 (Creation);
Mefistofele - Fiume, 4 March 1898;
Sapho - Trento, 3? June 1898;
Fedora - Milano, 17 November 1898 (Creation);
Iris - Buenos Aires, 22 June 1899;
La regina di Saba (Goldmark) - Buenos Aires, 4 July 1899;
Yupanki - Buenos Aires, 25 July 1899;
Aida - St. Petersburg, 3 January 1900;
Un ballo in maschera - St. Petersburg, 11 January 1900;
Maria di Rohan - St. Petersburg, 2 March 1900;
Manon - Buenos Aires, 28 July 1900;
Tosca - Treviso, 23 October 1900;
Le Maschere - Milano, 17 January 1901 (Creation);
L'elisir d'amore - Milano, 17 February 1901;
Lohengrin - Buenos Aires, 7 July 1901;
Germania - Milano, 11 March 1902 (Creation);
Don Giovanni - London, 19 July 1902;
Adriana Lecouvreur - Milano, 6 November 1902 (Creation);
Lucrezia Borgia - Lisboa, 10 March 1903;
Les Huguenots - New York, 3 February 1905;
Martha - New York, 9 February 1906;
Carmen - San Francisco, 17 April 1906 (the night before the great earthquake);
Madama Butterfly - London, 26 May 1906;
L'Africana - New York, 11 January 1907;
Andrea Chénier - London, 20 July 1907;
Il Trovatore - New York, 26 February 1908;
Armide - New York, 14 November 1910;
La fanciulla del West - New York, 10 December 1910 (Creation);
Julien - New York, 26 December 1914;
Samson et Dalila - New York, 24 November 1916;
Lodoletta - Buenos Aires, 29 July 1917;
Le Prophète - New York, 7 February 1918;
L'amore dei tre re - New York, 14 March 1918;
La forza del destino - New York, 15 November 1918;
La Juive - New York, 22 November 1919.
Note: At the time of his death, Caruso was preparing to perform the title role in Otello in a planned Met production. Though he never had an opportunity to perform the part, he made two records of extracts from the opera: Otello's aria, "Ora e per sempre addio"; and the duet with Iago, "Sì, pel ciel marmoreo, giuro".
Caruso also had a repertory of more than 520 songs. They ranged from classical compositions to traditional Italian melodies and popular tunes of the day.
Recordings
Caruso possessed a "phonogenic" voice and he became one of the first star vocalists to make numerous recordings. He and the disc phonograph (also known as the gramophone) did much to promote each other in the first two decades of the 20th century. His 1907 acoustic recording of Vesti La Giubba from Pagliacci was the first gramophone record to sell a million copies. (Caruso's searing rendition of the aria would inspire Freddie Mercury to quote its melody in the first section of Queen's hit It's a Hard Life.) Some of Caruso's recordings have remained continuously available since their original issue around a century ago, and every one of his surviving discs (including unissued takes) has been re-engineered and re-released on CD in recent years.
His first recordings, cut in separate sessions in Milan in April and November 1902, were made with piano accompaniments for the Gramophone & Typewriter Company. Two years later, he began recording exclusively for the Victor Talking Machine Company in the United States. While most of Caruso's American recordings would be made in boxy studios in New York and Camden, New Jersey, Victor also recorded him occasionally in Camden's Trinity Church, which could accommodate a larger 'orchestra'. (In February 1904, however, Victor had elected to use Room 826 at Carnegie Hall as the recording venue for its initial batch of Caruso discs.)
Caruso's final records were produced in New Jersey in September 1920. The last items that the doomed tenor recorded consisted, fittingly enough, of two pieces of religious music from Petite Messe Solennelle.
Caruso's earliest American records of operatic arias and songs, like their Italian-made predecessors, were accompanied by piano. Later, instrumental accompaniments became the norm. When RCA acquired Victor in 1929, it re-issued some of the old discs with the accompaniment over-dubbed by a more modern sounding, electronically recorded orchestra. In 1950, RCA re-published a number of the fuller-sounding Caruso recordings on vinyl 78-rpm discs. Then, as LPs became popular, many of the recordings were electronically enhanced for release on this format. Some of these recordings, remastered by RCA Victor on the 45-rpm format, were re-released in the early 1950s as companions to the same selections by Mario Lanza in the "Red Seal" series. Interestingly, however, the labels for the Caruso versions, although designated "Red Seal", were printed on a lighter (gold) background to distinguish them from the Lanza records. Many of both were also pressed on translucent red vinyl.
Researchers at the University of Utah utilized an early digital reprocessing technique called "Soundstream" to remaster Caruso's Victor recordings for RCA. These early digitised versions of Caruso's complete recordings were partly issued on LP, beginning in 1976. They were issued complete by RCA twice on Compact Disc, in 1990 and 2004. Other complete sets of Caruso's restored recordings have been issued on CD by the Pearl label and, most recently, in 2004 by Naxos. The 12-disc Naxos set was remastered by the noted American audio-restoration engineer Ward Marston. Pearl also released in 1993 a CD set devoted to RCA's electrically over-dubbed versions of Caruso's original acoustic discs. RCA/BMG (now Sony) also has issued three CD sets of Caruso material with modern, digitally-recorded orchestral accompaniments added. Caruso's records are now available, too, as digital downloads. The best-selling downloads of Caruso at iTunes have been the popular Italian songs "Santa Lucia" and "O Sole Mio".
Note: Caruso died before the introduction of higher fidelity, electrical recording technology (in 1925). Consequently, all his discs were made by the more primitive acoustic process, which required the recording artist to sing into a metal horn or funnel rather than a microphone. This process was incapable of capturing the full range of overtones and nuances present in Caruso's voice. The duration of a 12-inch, Red Seal Caruso disc was restricted to a maximum of about 4:30 minutes. As a result, many items of vocal music recorded by Caruso had to be trimmed or sung at a quicker-than-normal tempo. For more information about Caruso's records, see Enrico Caruso recordings.
Incidental information
Caruso was the third of seven children born to the same parents and one of only three to survive infancy. The myth of 17 or 18 dead Caruso siblings promulgated by biographers such as Francis Robinson and Pierre Key was proved false some years ago. It may have been the result of a mistranscription when Caruso dictated his memoirs to Key for his authorised biography.
When he was 18, Caruso used the fees he earned by singing at an Italian resort to buy his first pair of shoes. He is pictured wearing a bedsheet, draped like a toga, in his first publicity photograph because his only shirt was in the laundry.
Caruso's birthplace in Naples, Via San Giovanella agli Ottocalli 7, still stands next to the church where he was baptized.
His remains lie interred in a mausoleum at the cemetery of Santa Maria del Pianto.
Caruso owned a palatial residence, the Villa Bellosguardo, near Florence, which he purchased in 1904 and subsequently beautified. It served as his retreat away from the operatic stage and the grind of travel.
At a performance in Naples, early in his career, Caruso was booed by the audience because he ignored the custom of hiring a claque to cheer for him. Afterwards, he said he would never again go to his native city to sing, but "only to eat spaghetti".
Caruso performed in Carmen in San Francisco in front of thousands of opera patrons the night before the great San Francisco earthquake of 1906. Caruso was staying at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco when the earthquake struck.
During a performance of La Bohème in Philadelphia in 1913, the bass playing Colline lost his voice on stage. Caruso sang Colline's aria "Vecchia zimarra" with his back to the audience, while the bass mouthed the words. His performance of the aria was so admired that he even recorded it later as a private novelty. Fortunately, the recording has survived and has been included in CD collections of Caruso's complete recordings.
Caruso's vocal range extended up to the High C in his prime but this note never came easily to him because of the almost baritonal timbre of his voice. Accordingly, his recordings of the aria "Che gelida manina", from Act I of La Bohème are transposed down, allowing the High C to be replaced by a High B. (There are, however, a couple of examples of him hitting the High C on other discs.)
He raised large amounts of money for charities during the First World War by giving concerts and making personal appearances.
Privately, Caruso was a jovial if rather sensitive person who worked hard to perfect his art and master new roles. He dressed fastidiously and liked good food and convivial company. He sketched for relaxation and the quality of his numerous surviving caricatures suggest that he could have made an alternative living as a professional cartoonist.
Caruso appeared in a 1919 silent movie, My Italian Cousin, released by Paramount Studios.
He was portrayed by motion-picture tenor Mario Lanza in MGM's highly fictionalized 1951 film biography, The Great Caruso. But Caruso's potent voice, with its dark-amber coloring, bore little resemblance to Lanza's lighter, brighter instrument.
Caruso was a heavy smoker. This deleterious habit, together with a lack of healthy exercise and the punishing schedule of appearances which Caruso willingly undertook each season at the Met, may have contributed to his final illness.
13.18 (258th pick) - Enrico Caruso - Muscian/ Performer
Enrico Caruso (1873 – 1921) was an Italian opera tenor of tremendous international renown. He is considered to have been one of the most significant singers of the past 200 years in any vocal category, and a key pioneer in the field of recorded music.
His voluminous record sales and extraordinary voice, celebrated for its beauty, power and unequalled richness of tone, made him the number-one male operatic star of his era. Such was his influence on singing style, virtually all subsequent Italian and Spanish tenors (and most non-Mediterranean tenors, too) have been his heirs to a greater or lesser extent.
Caruso's musical career spanned the years 1895 to 1920 but was cut short by a serious illness which eventually killed him at the age of 48. He remains famous while few other early 20th century opera performers are still remembered by the general public. This is a remarkable achievement in itself because unlike modern-day singers, he did not have access to a sophisticated marketing and communications industry with the capacity to publicise his attainments instantly and globally via the media.
Caruso made more than 260 extant recordings over an 18-year period and earned millions of dollars from the sale of the resulting 78-rpm discs. These discs, recorded from 1902 to 1920, chart the development of Caruso's voice from that of a lyric tenor, to that of a spinto tenor, to that of a fully-fledged dramatic tenor.
While Caruso sang at most of the world's foremost opera houses, including La Scala in Milan, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in London and the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, he is best known for being the leading tenor of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City for 17 consecutive years. The difficult to please conductor at the Met regarded him as being one of the finest artists with whom he ever worked and Caruso remains, by general consensus, the greatest all-round tenor exponent of Italian opera on disc.
Caruso appeared more than 800 times at the Met. His vocal technique and style of singing were without precedent. They uniquely combined the best aspects of the 19th-century tradition of elegant bel canto vocalism with the ardent delivery and big, exciting tenor sound demanded by 20th century composers of verismo opera. He was also a good musician who was able to invest his interpretations with an exceptional degree of emotional force. Judging by contemporary reviews of his Met performances he was an enthusiastic actor, too, if not always a terribly subtle one.
Life & singing career
Enrico Caruso came from a poor Neapolitan background (his father was a mechanic at a factory). He was baptized in the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo on February 26, 1873, having been born in his parents' adjoining flat one day earlier. Caruso sang in church choirs as a boy, took singing lessons, and made his professional debut on March 15, 1895, at the Teatro Nuovo, Naples, in a now forgotten opera. The young tenor proceeded to perform in a succession of provincial venues during the second half of the 1890s before graduating to La Scala in December 1900. Audiences in Monte Carlo, Warsaw and Buenos Aires also had an opportunity to hear him sing during this youthful phase of his career and, in 1899-1900, he performed in Russia at the Mariinsky theatre in Saint Petersburg and the Bolshoi theatre in Moscow with a visiting troupe of top-class Italian singers.
The first major role that Caruso created was Loris in Fedora, at the Teatro Lirico in Milan, on November 17, 1898. At that same theater, on November 6, 1902, he created the role of Maurizio in Adriana Lecouvreur. (He had also hoped to create the part of Cavaradossi in Tosca at the Rome Opera in 1900 but the composer, after deliberating hard, chose an older and more experienced tenor instead.)
Caruso remained at La Scala until 1902. He had yet to turn 30 and his voice was still maturing when, in April of that year, he was engaged by the Gramophone & Typewriter Company to make his first recordings (in a Milan hotel room!) for a fee of 100 pounds stirling. These discs helped to spread his fame, and he was able to make a highly successful London debut at Covent Garden's Royal Opera House on May 14 that same year. Then, with the help of his agent, the banker/impresario Pasquale Simonelli, he travelled to New York City at the conclusion of the London season, which had been followed by a sequence of engagements in Italy, Portugal and South America. On November 23, 1903, he debuted at the Metropolitan Opera as the Duke of Mantua in a new production of Rigoletto.
The next year, Caruso began a lifelong association with the Victor Talking-Machine Company. He made his first American discs on February 1, 1904, having signed a lucrative contract with Victor. Thenceforth, his stellar recording career would run in tandem with his equally stellar Met career, the one bolstering the other, until death intervened in 1921.
New York came to mean so much to Caruso, he at one stage commissioned the city's best jewellers, Tiffany & Co., to strike a commemorative medal made out of 24-carat gold. He presented the medal, which was adorned with the tenor's profile, to Simonelli as a souvenir of his many acclaimed performances at the Met. By no means, however, was Caruso's post-1903 career confined exclusively to New York. He performed often in other American cities and continued to sing widely in Europe, appearing again at Covent Garden in 1904-07 and 1913-14 and also thrilling audiences in France, Belgium, Monaco, Austria and Germany. In 1917 he toured South America and, two years later, visited Mexico City.
In April 1906, Caruso and leading members of the Metropolitan Opera company came to San Francisco to give a series of performances at the Tivoli Opera House. The night after Caruso's appearance as Don Jose in Carmen, he was awakened in the early morning in his Palace Hotel suite by a strong jolt. San Francisco had been hit by a major earthquake, which led to a series of fires that destroyed most of the city. The Met lost all of the sets and costumes that it had brought on tour. Clutching an autographed photo of the President of the United States as a talisman, Caruso made an effort to flee the city, first by boat and then by train. He vowed never to return to San Francisco; he kept his word.
Caruso became embroiled in a scandal in November 1906, when he was charged with an indecent act committed in the monkey house of New York's Central Park Zoo. Police accused him of pinching the bottom of a woman described by press reporters as being "pretty and plump". Caruso claimed that a monkey did the bottom-pinching. He was found guilty as charged, however, and fined 10 dollars, although suspicions linger that he may have been entrapped by the alleged victim and the arresting officer. Members of New York's opera-going high society were outraged initially by the incident, but they soon forgave Caruso.
On December 10, 1910, Caruso starred at the Met as **** Johnson in the world premiere of La fanciulla del West. The composer had written the music for the principal tenor's role in the opera with Caruso's voice specifically in mind. In 1917, Caruso was elected an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, the national fraternity for men involved in music, by the fraternity's Alpha chapter at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.
Caruso wed in 1918. His 25-year-old bride, Dorothy Park Benjamin, was the product of a respected New York family. They had one daughter, Gloria Caruso (born 1919). Dorothy published two books about Caruso, one in 1928, the other in 1945, which include many of his touching letters to her. Prior to his marriage to Dorothy Benjamin, Caruso had been romantically tied to an Italian soprano, Ada Giachetti, who was older than he. Though already married, Giachetti bore Caruso four sons during their 11-year relationship (1897-1908). Two of these offspring survived infancy: Rodolfo Caruso (born 1898) and singer/actor Enrico Caruso, Jr. (1904). Ada left her husband and an existing son to cohabit with the tenor. However, she later ran off with her chauffeur. Giachetti's subsequent attempts to sue Caruso for damages were dismissed by the courts.
Premature death
In September 1920, Caruso recorded several discs for Victor at Camden's Trinity Church; these recordings were to be his last. On December 11, 1920, during the performance of L'elisir d'amore at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, he suffered a throat haemorrhage and the audience was dismissed at the end of Act 1. Following this incident, a clearly unwell Caruso gave only three more performances at the Met, the final one being in the role of Eléazar in Halévy's La Juive, on Christmas Eve 1920. Caruso's state of health deteriorated further during the new year due to a lung ailment and he experienced episodes of intense pain. He died in Naples on August 2, 1921, while recuperating from a surgical operation on his chest which had led to part of a rib being removed. The cause of death was most likely peritonitis arising from a burst abscess. Caruso received an elaborate funeral, and his embalmed body was preserved in a glass sarcophagus for his fans to see. A few years later, however, his remains were sealed permanently in an ornate stone tomb at a Naples cemetery.
Honors
During his lifetime, Caruso received many orders, decorations, testimonials and other kinds of honors from the monarchs, governments and cultural organizations of the various nations in which he sang. More recently, in 1987, Caruso was awarded, posthumously of course, the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. On February 27 of that same year, the United States Postal Service issued a 22-cent postage stamp in his honor.
Repertoire
Caruso's operatic repertoire consisted overwhemingly of Italian and French works. He performed only one opera by Richard Wagner, namely Lohengrin, and that was early in his career. Listed below in chronological order are the first known performances by Caruso of each of the different operas that he undertook on stage.
L'Amico Francesco (Morelli) - Teatro Nuovo, Napoli, 15 March 1895 (Creation);
Faust - Caserta, 28 March 1895;
Cavalleria Rusticana - Caserta, April 1895;
Camoens (Musoni)- Caserta, May 1895;
Rigoletto - Napoli, 21 July 1895;
La Traviata - Napoli, 25 August 1895;
Lucia di Lammermoor - Cairo, 30 October 1895;
La Gioconda - Cairo, 9 November 1895;
Manon Lescaut - Cairo, 15 November 1895;
I Capuleti e i Montecchi - Napoli, 7 December 1895;
Malia - Trapani, 21 March 1896;
La sonnambula - Trapani, 24 March 1896;
Marriedda - Napoli, 23 June 1896;
I puritani - Salerno, 10 September 1896;
La Favorita - Salerno, 22 November 1896;
A San Francisco - Salerno, 23 November 1896;
Carmen - Salerno, 6 December 1896;
Un Dramma in vendemmia - Napoli, 1 February 1897;
Celeste - Napoli, 6 March 1897 (Creation);
Il Profeta Velato - Salerno, 8 April 1897;
La Bohème - Livorno, 14 August 1897;
La Navarrese - Milano, 3 November 1897;
Il Voto - Milano, 10 November 1897 (Creation);
L'Arlesiana - Milano, 27 November 1897 (Creation);
Pagliacci - Milano, 31 December 1897;
La bohème (Leoncavallo) - Genova, 20 January 1898;
The Pearl Fishers - Genova, 3 February 1898;
Hedda - Milano, 2 April 1898 (Creation);
Mefistofele - Fiume, 4 March 1898;
Sapho - Trento, 3? June 1898;
Fedora - Milano, 17 November 1898 (Creation);
Iris - Buenos Aires, 22 June 1899;
La regina di Saba (Goldmark) - Buenos Aires, 4 July 1899;
Yupanki - Buenos Aires, 25 July 1899;
Aida - St. Petersburg, 3 January 1900;
Un ballo in maschera - St. Petersburg, 11 January 1900;
Maria di Rohan - St. Petersburg, 2 March 1900;
Manon - Buenos Aires, 28 July 1900;
Tosca - Treviso, 23 October 1900;
Le Maschere - Milano, 17 January 1901 (Creation);
L'elisir d'amore - Milano, 17 February 1901;
Lohengrin - Buenos Aires, 7 July 1901;
Germania - Milano, 11 March 1902 (Creation);
Don Giovanni - London, 19 July 1902;
Adriana Lecouvreur - Milano, 6 November 1902 (Creation);
Lucrezia Borgia - Lisboa, 10 March 1903;
Les Huguenots - New York, 3 February 1905;
Martha - New York, 9 February 1906;
Carmen - San Francisco, 17 April 1906 (the night before the great earthquake);
Madama Butterfly - London, 26 May 1906;
L'Africana - New York, 11 January 1907;
Andrea Chénier - London, 20 July 1907;
Il Trovatore - New York, 26 February 1908;
Armide - New York, 14 November 1910;
La fanciulla del West - New York, 10 December 1910 (Creation);
Julien - New York, 26 December 1914;
Samson et Dalila - New York, 24 November 1916;
Lodoletta - Buenos Aires, 29 July 1917;
Le Prophète - New York, 7 February 1918;
L'amore dei tre re - New York, 14 March 1918;
La forza del destino - New York, 15 November 1918;
La Juive - New York, 22 November 1919.
Note: At the time of his death, Caruso was preparing to perform the title role in Otello in a planned Met production. Though he never had an opportunity to perform the part, he made two records of extracts from the opera: Otello's aria, "Ora e per sempre addio"; and the duet with Iago, "Sì, pel ciel marmoreo, giuro".
Caruso also had a repertory of more than 520 songs. They ranged from classical compositions to traditional Italian melodies and popular tunes of the day.
Recordings
Caruso possessed a "phonogenic" voice and he became one of the first star vocalists to make numerous recordings. He and the disc phonograph (also known as the gramophone) did much to promote each other in the first two decades of the 20th century. His 1907 acoustic recording of Vesti La Giubba from Pagliacci was the first gramophone record to sell a million copies. (Caruso's searing rendition of the aria would inspire Freddie Mercury to quote its melody in the first section of Queen's hit It's a Hard Life.) Some of Caruso's recordings have remained continuously available since their original issue around a century ago, and every one of his surviving discs (including unissued takes) has been re-engineered and re-released on CD in recent years.
His first recordings, cut in separate sessions in Milan in April and November 1902, were made with piano accompaniments for the Gramophone & Typewriter Company. Two years later, he began recording exclusively for the Victor Talking Machine Company in the United States. While most of Caruso's American recordings would be made in boxy studios in New York and Camden, New Jersey, Victor also recorded him occasionally in Camden's Trinity Church, which could accommodate a larger 'orchestra'. (In February 1904, however, Victor had elected to use Room 826 at Carnegie Hall as the recording venue for its initial batch of Caruso discs.)
Caruso's final records were produced in New Jersey in September 1920. The last items that the doomed tenor recorded consisted, fittingly enough, of two pieces of religious music from Petite Messe Solennelle.
Caruso's earliest American records of operatic arias and songs, like their Italian-made predecessors, were accompanied by piano. Later, instrumental accompaniments became the norm. When RCA acquired Victor in 1929, it re-issued some of the old discs with the accompaniment over-dubbed by a more modern sounding, electronically recorded orchestra. In 1950, RCA re-published a number of the fuller-sounding Caruso recordings on vinyl 78-rpm discs. Then, as LPs became popular, many of the recordings were electronically enhanced for release on this format. Some of these recordings, remastered by RCA Victor on the 45-rpm format, were re-released in the early 1950s as companions to the same selections by Mario Lanza in the "Red Seal" series. Interestingly, however, the labels for the Caruso versions, although designated "Red Seal", were printed on a lighter (gold) background to distinguish them from the Lanza records. Many of both were also pressed on translucent red vinyl.
Researchers at the University of Utah utilized an early digital reprocessing technique called "Soundstream" to remaster Caruso's Victor recordings for RCA. These early digitised versions of Caruso's complete recordings were partly issued on LP, beginning in 1976. They were issued complete by RCA twice on Compact Disc, in 1990 and 2004. Other complete sets of Caruso's restored recordings have been issued on CD by the Pearl label and, most recently, in 2004 by Naxos. The 12-disc Naxos set was remastered by the noted American audio-restoration engineer Ward Marston. Pearl also released in 1993 a CD set devoted to RCA's electrically over-dubbed versions of Caruso's original acoustic discs. RCA/BMG (now Sony) also has issued three CD sets of Caruso material with modern, digitally-recorded orchestral accompaniments added. Caruso's records are now available, too, as digital downloads. The best-selling downloads of Caruso at iTunes have been the popular Italian songs "Santa Lucia" and "O Sole Mio".
Note: Caruso died before the introduction of higher fidelity, electrical recording technology (in 1925). Consequently, all his discs were made by the more primitive acoustic process, which required the recording artist to sing into a metal horn or funnel rather than a microphone. This process was incapable of capturing the full range of overtones and nuances present in Caruso's voice. The duration of a 12-inch, Red Seal Caruso disc was restricted to a maximum of about 4:30 minutes. As a result, many items of vocal music recorded by Caruso had to be trimmed or sung at a quicker-than-normal tempo. For more information about Caruso's records, see Enrico Caruso recordings.
Incidental information
Caruso was the third of seven children born to the same parents and one of only three to survive infancy. The myth of 17 or 18 dead Caruso siblings promulgated by biographers such as Francis Robinson and Pierre Key was proved false some years ago. It may have been the result of a mistranscription when Caruso dictated his memoirs to Key for his authorised biography.
When he was 18, Caruso used the fees he earned by singing at an Italian resort to buy his first pair of shoes. He is pictured wearing a bedsheet, draped like a toga, in his first publicity photograph because his only shirt was in the laundry.
Caruso's birthplace in Naples, Via San Giovanella agli Ottocalli 7, still stands next to the church where he was baptized.
His remains lie interred in a mausoleum at the cemetery of Santa Maria del Pianto.
Caruso owned a palatial residence, the Villa Bellosguardo, near Florence, which he purchased in 1904 and subsequently beautified. It served as his retreat away from the operatic stage and the grind of travel.
At a performance in Naples, early in his career, Caruso was booed by the audience because he ignored the custom of hiring a claque to cheer for him. Afterwards, he said he would never again go to his native city to sing, but "only to eat spaghetti".
Caruso performed in Carmen in San Francisco in front of thousands of opera patrons the night before the great San Francisco earthquake of 1906. Caruso was staying at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco when the earthquake struck.
During a performance of La Bohème in Philadelphia in 1913, the bass playing Colline lost his voice on stage. Caruso sang Colline's aria "Vecchia zimarra" with his back to the audience, while the bass mouthed the words. His performance of the aria was so admired that he even recorded it later as a private novelty. Fortunately, the recording has survived and has been included in CD collections of Caruso's complete recordings.
Caruso's vocal range extended up to the High C in his prime but this note never came easily to him because of the almost baritonal timbre of his voice. Accordingly, his recordings of the aria "Che gelida manina", from Act I of La Bohème are transposed down, allowing the High C to be replaced by a High B. (There are, however, a couple of examples of him hitting the High C on other discs.)
He raised large amounts of money for charities during the First World War by giving concerts and making personal appearances.
Privately, Caruso was a jovial if rather sensitive person who worked hard to perfect his art and master new roles. He dressed fastidiously and liked good food and convivial company. He sketched for relaxation and the quality of his numerous surviving caricatures suggest that he could have made an alternative living as a professional cartoonist.
Caruso appeared in a 1919 silent movie, My Italian Cousin, released by Paramount Studios.
He was portrayed by motion-picture tenor Mario Lanza in MGM's highly fictionalized 1951 film biography, The Great Caruso. But Caruso's potent voice, with its dark-amber coloring, bore little resemblance to Lanza's lighter, brighter instrument.
Caruso was a heavy smoker. This deleterious habit, together with a lack of healthy exercise and the punishing schedule of appearances which Caruso willingly undertook each season at the Met, may have contributed to his final illness.
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Mister CIA
Footballguy
Posting from my phone and no time for a write up, but seriously, befitting of a celebrity pick, no write up is required. Also, by selecting this person as a celebrity it is not meant to diminish him as a leader, as I understand it is done within certain talking points; rather it's acknowledgement that in my 43 years of life, I've never seen any one as immensley well-known and written about...
13.19 - Barack Obama - celebrity.
Hopefully not a honda pick. It's difficult to keep up on the mobile.
Tim, please shuffle Cleopatra to wildcard.
13.19 - Barack Obama - celebrity.
Hopefully not a honda pick. It's difficult to keep up on the mobile.
Tim, please shuffle Cleopatra to wildcard.
Fennis
Footballguy
Not who I would have taken, but a great pick nonetheless. Finally someone went down the right path.
BobbyLayne
Footballguy
13.20 Abrantes - Next Selection OTC until 4:47 p.m. EST
14.01 Abrantes - On Deck
14.02 MisterCIA - In the Hole
14.03 BobbyLayne
14.04 Herbert the Hippo
14.05 Andy Dufrense
14.06 thatguy
14.07 Usual21
14.08 John Madden's Lunchbox
14.09 higgins
14.10 Big Rocks
14.11 Mad Sweeney
14.12 Doug B
14.13 DC Thunder
14.14 Thorn
14.01 Abrantes - On Deck
14.02 MisterCIA - In the Hole
14.03 BobbyLayne
14.04 Herbert the Hippo
14.05 Andy Dufrense
14.06 thatguy
14.07 Usual21
14.08 John Madden's Lunchbox
14.09 higgins
14.10 Big Rocks
14.11 Mad Sweeney
14.12 Doug B
14.13 DC Thunder
14.14 Thorn
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John Maddens Lunchbox
Footballguy
Usually when Abrantes is up there's a big fight going on in the thread.
Mister CIA
Footballguy
After Abrantes picks, I can be skipped at 14.02. I'm not sure what direction I want to go.
Also, if somebody does not mind, please PM Abrantes that he is up. Too much of a pita on the phone.
Also, if somebody does not mind, please PM Abrantes that he is up. Too much of a pita on the phone.
Abrantes
Footballguy
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BobbyLayne
Footballguy
Guess I'll have to settle for best in the last 175 years then.
Going back as far as you are alluding to is simply asking for a rhetorical argument with no resolution.
There are definitely tenors from the pre-recording era who could be drafted; we'll see if anyone wants to take that risk.
mad sweeney
Footballguy
I made that point yesterday. It's impossible to judge or rank singers/musicians from pre-recording days.Guess I'll have to settle for best in the last 175 years then.
Going back as far as you are alluding to is simply asking for a rhetorical argument with no resolution.
There are definitely tenors from the pre-recording era who could be drafted; we'll see if anyone wants to take that risk.
Abrantes
Footballguy
13.20 Wassily Kandinsky Artist (Painter)
Not sure how to properly boil down the numerous changes his art went through, but Kandinsky has been incredibly influential for a number of schools of painting, and his theoretical writings on the aesthetics of painting are fascinating. Should've been taken by now.
Not sure how to properly boil down the numerous changes his art went through, but Kandinsky has been incredibly influential for a number of schools of painting, and his theoretical writings on the aesthetics of painting are fascinating. Should've been taken by now.
Fennis
Footballguy
I bet there is a caveman somewhere that could sing like an angel.Guess I'll have to settle for best in the last 175 years then.
Going back as far as you are alluding to is simply asking for a rhetorical argument with no resolution.
There are definitely tenors from the pre-recording era who could be drafted; we'll see if anyone wants to take that risk.
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