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Giannina Russ
Giannina Russ was born on 27 March, 1873 in Lodi. She was an Italian operatic dramatic soprano, particularly associated with the Italian repertory. She died on 28 February, 1951 in Milan. Life and career Russ studied piano and voice at the Milan Music Conservatory with Leoni. She made her debut in Bologna, as Mimi in 1903, at La Scala in 1905, as Aida, and in Florence in 1908, as Norma. She was quickly invited abroad, making debut in 1904 at both the Royal Opera House in London, and the Monte Carlo Opera, also appearing at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, and the Manhattan Opera Company in New York, in 1907. Russ performed in a wide range of roles, from bel canto to verismo, her repertory included; Semiramide, Giulia, Amaltea, Paolina, Abigail, Elvira, Leonora, Amelia, Wally, Gioconda, Santuzza, etc. She possessed a beautiful and grand voice, if somewhat uneven, and a strong dramatic temperament. She enjoyed more success in Latin countries than in Anglo-Saxon coun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mosè In Egitto
''Mosè in Egitto'' (; "''Moses in Egypt''") is a three-act opera written by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto by Andrea Leone Tottola, which was based on a 1760 play by Francesco Ringhieri, ''L'Osiride''. It premièred on 5 March 1818 at the recently reconstructed Teatro San Carlo in Naples, Italy. In 1827 Rossini revised and greatly enlarged the work to a four-act French libretto: ''Moïse et Pharaon, ou Le passage de la Mer Rouge'' (; "''Moses and Pharaoh, or The Crossing of the Red Sea''"). This was written by Luigi Balocchi and Victor-Joseph Étienne de Jouy. The première took place in the Salle Le Peletier of the Paris Opera on 26 March that year. Riccardo Muti and many scholars consider ''Moïse et Pharaon'', along with ''Guillaume Tell'', to be among Rossini's greatest achievements: :I prefer it because Rossini himself preferred it. Don't get me wrong. ''Mosè in Egitto'' is a wonderful opera, but it remains very much a mere sketch for ''Moïse et Pharaon''. An ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1951 Deaths
Events January * January 4 – Korean War: Third Battle of Seoul – Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul for the second time (having lost the Second Battle of Seoul in September 1950). * January 9 – The Government of the United Kingdom announces abandonment of the Tanganyika groundnut scheme for the cultivation of peanuts in the Tanganyika Territory, with the writing off of £36.5M debt. * January 15 – In a court in West Germany, Ilse Koch, The "Witch of Buchenwald", wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, is sentenced to life imprisonment. * January 20 – Winter of Terror: Avalanches in the Alps kill 240 and bury 45,000 for a time, in Switzerland, Austria and Italy. * January 21 – Mount Lamington in Papua New Guinea erupts catastrophically, killing nearly 3,000 people and causing great devastation in Oro Province. * January 25 – Dutch author Anne de Vries releases the first volume of his children's novel '' Journey Through the Nigh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1873 Births
Events January–March * January 1 ** Japan adopts the Gregorian calendar. ** The California Penal Code goes into effect. * January 17 – American Indian Wars: Modoc War: First Battle of the Stronghold – Modoc Indians defeat the United States Army. * February 11 – The Spanish Cortes deposes King Amadeus I, and proclaims the First Spanish Republic. * February 12 ** Emilio Castelar, the former foreign minister, becomes prime minister of the new Spanish Republic. ** The Coinage Act of 1873 in the United States is signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant; coming into effect on April 1, it ends bimetallism in the U.S., and places the country on the gold standard. * February 20 ** The University of California opens its first medical school in San Francisco. ** British naval officer John Moresby discovers the site of Port Moresby, and claims the land for Britain. * March 3 – Censorship: The United States Congress enacts the Comstock Law, making it ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Italian Operatic Sopranos
Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Italian, regional variants of the Italian language ** Languages of Italy, languages and dialects spoken in Italy ** Italian culture, cultural features of Italy ** Italian cuisine, traditional foods ** Folklore of Italy, the folklore and urban legends of Italy ** Mythology of Italy, traditional religion and beliefs Other uses * Italian dressing, a vinaigrette-type salad dressing or marinade * Italian or Italian-A, alternative names for the Ping-Pong virus, an extinct computer virus See also * * * Italia (other) * Italic (other) * Italo (other) * The Italian (other) * Italian people (other) Italian people may refer to: * in terms of ethnicity: all ethnic Italians, in and outside of Italy * i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clara Petrella
Clara Petrella (28 March 1914 in Greco Milanese – 19 November 1987 in Milan) was an Italian operatic soprano, particularly associated with the Italian repertory, an outstanding singing-actress nicknamed the "Duse of Singers". Born in a musical family, she was a descendant of composer Errico Petrella, and the niece of soprano Oliva Petrella. She studied first with her sister Micaela, and later with Giannina Russ. She made her debut in Alessandria, as Liu, in 1939. She quickly sang throughout Italy, making her debut at La Scala in 1947, as Giorgetta in Il tabarro, she sang there regularly until 1962. She was particularly admired in the verismo repertory and contemporary works. She created many roles in opera by the following composers; Lodovico Rocca, Ildebrando Pizzetti, Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari, and Renzo Rossellini. Petrella had a beautiful spinto voice, combined with an explosive dramatic temperament, and she was compared to the great Italian actress Eleonora Duse. In th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Margherita Grandi
Margherita Grandi (10 October 1892Some sources give her birthdate as 4 October 1894.29 January 1972) was an Australian-born Italian soprano. Life and career Margherita Grandi was born Margaret Gard in Harwood Island, Clarence River, near Maclean, in the Northern Rivers area of New South Wales, Australia. When she was ten, her family moved to Tasmania and she went to school in Hobart. She left Australia in 1911 to study at the Royal Conservatory of Music in London. She also studied with Mathilde Marchesi and Jean de Reszke; and later in Paris with Emma Calvé. She made her professional debut in Paris, as a mezzo-soprano under the stage name of Djéma Vécla (Vecla being an anagram of Calvé)Not to be confused with the French singer Emma Vecla who adopted that stage name for the same reason (student of Calvé) and whose biography has many parallels. singing Charlotte in Massenet's ''Werther''. In 1922, she created Massenet's '' Amadis'' in Monte Carlo. Kutsch, Karl-Josef; Riemens ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cavalleria Rusticana
''Cavalleria rusticana'' (; Italian for "rustic chivalry") is an opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, adapted from an 1880 short story of the same name and subsequent play by Giovanni Verga. Considered one of the classic ''verismo'' operas, it premiered on 17 May 1890 at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome. Since 1893, it has often been performed in a so-called ''Cav/Pag'' double-bill with ''Pagliacci'' by Ruggero Leoncavallo. Composition history In July 1888 the Milanese music publisher Edoardo Sonzogno announced a competition open to all young Italian composers who had not yet had an opera performed on stage. They were invited to submit a one-act opera which would be judged by a jury of five prominent Italian critics and composers. The best three would be staged in Rome at Sonzogno's expense. Mascagni heard about the competition only two months before the closing date and asked his friend Giovanni Targioni-Tozze ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Gioconda (opera)
''La Gioconda'' is an opera in four acts by Amilcare Ponchielli set to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito (as Tobia Gorrio), based on '' Angelo, Tyrant of Padua'', a 1835 play in prose by Victor Hugo (the same source Gaetano Rossi had used for his libretto for Mercadante's '' Il giuramento'' in 1837). First performed in 1876, ''La Gioconda'' was a major success for Ponchielli, as well as the most successful new Italian opera between Verdi's ''Aida'' (1871) and ''Otello'' (1887). It is also a famous example of the Italian genre of ''Grande opera'', the equivalent of French '' Grand-Opéra''. Ponchielli revised the work twice; the third and final version (that is used to this day) was first performed in 1880. There are several complete recordings of the opera, and it is regularly performed, especially in Italy. It is one of only a few operas that features a principal role for each of the six major voice types. The opera also includes the famous ballet ''Dance of the Hours'', oft ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Wally
''La Wally'' is an opera in four acts by composer Alfredo Catalani, to a libretto by Luigi Illica, first performed at La Scala, Milan, on 20 January 1892. The libretto is based on a hugely successful ' by Wilhelmine von Hillern (1836–1916), ' (''The Vulture Wally: A Story from the Tyrolean Alps''). Wally, short for Walburga, is a girl with some heroic attributes. The story is based on an episode in the life of Tyrolean painter Anna Stainer-Knittel, whom von Hillern met. She gets her epithet "Geier" (vulture) from once stealing a vulture's hatchling from her nest. Von Hillern's piece was originally serialized in ''Deutsche Rundschau'' and was reproduced in English as "A German Peasant Romance" [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Un Ballo In Maschera
''Un ballo in maschera'' ''(A Masked Ball)'' is an 1859 opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The text, by Antonio Somma, was based on Eugène Scribe's libretto for Daniel Auber's 1833 five act opera, '' Gustave III, ou Le bal masqué''. The plot concerns the assassination in 1792 of King Gustav III of Sweden who was shot, as the result of a political conspiracy, while attending a masked ball, dying of his wounds thirteen days later. It was to take over two years between the commission from Naples, planned for a production there, and its premiere performance at the Teatro Apollo in Rome on 17 February 1859. In becoming the ''Un ballo in maschera'' which we know today, Verdi's opera (and his libretto) underwent a significant series of transformations and title changes, caused by a combination of censorship regulations in both Naples and Rome, as well as by the political situation in France in January 1858. Based on the Scribe libretto and begun as ''Gustavo III'' set in Stockho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Il Trovatore
''Il trovatore'' ('The Troubadour') is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto largely written by Salvadore Cammarano, based on the play ''El trovador'' (1836) by Antonio García Gutiérrez. It was García Gutiérrez's most successful play, one which Verdi scholar Julian Budden describes as "a high flown, sprawling melodrama flamboyantly defiant of the Aristotelian unities, packed with all manner of fantastic and bizarre incident." The premiere took place at the Teatro Apollo in Rome on 19 January 1853, where it "began a victorious march throughout the operatic world," a success due to Verdi's work over the previous three years. It began with his January 1850 approach to Cammarano with the idea of ''Il trovatore''. There followed, slowly and with interruptions, the preparation of the libretto, first by Cammarano until his death in mid-1852 and then with the young librettist Leone Emanuele Bardare, which gave the composer the opportunity to propose signifi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
