1.
Opera house
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An opera house is a theatre building used for opera performances that consists of a stage, an orchestra pit, audience seating, and backstage facilities for costumes and set building. While some venues are constructed specifically for operas, other houses are part of larger performing arts centers. In contrast, there was no house in London when Henry Purcell was composing. Early United States opera houses served a variety of functions in towns and cities, hosting community dances, fairs, plays, with the rise of bourgeois and capitalist social forms in the 19th century, European culture moved away from its patronage system to a publicly supported system. In the 2000s, most opera and theatre companies raise funds from a combination of government and institutional grants, ticket sales, the Teatro San Carlo in Naples introduces the plant horseshoe, the oldest in the world, a model for the Italian theater. On this model were built following theaters of Italy and Europe, among others, the theater of the Palace of Caserta. Given the popularity of opera in 18th and 19th century Europe, opera houses are large, with generally more than 1,000 seats. Modern opera houses of the century such as New Yorks Metropolitan Opera. Many operas are better suited to being presented in smaller theatres, in a traditional opera house, the auditorium is U-shaped, with the length of the sides determining the audience capacity. Around this are tiers of balconies, and often, nearer to the stage, are boxes and this is especially true of Wagners Bayreuth Festspielhaus where the pit is almost completely covered. The size of an opera orchestra varies, but for some operas, oratorios and other works, it may be large, for some romantic period works. Similarly, an opera may have a large cast of characters, chorus, dancers, therefore, a major opera house will have extensive dressing room facilities. Opera houses often have on-premises set and costume building shops and facilities for storage of costumes, make-up, masks, and stage properties, major opera houses throughout the world often have highly mechanized stages, with large stage elevators permitting heavy sets to be changed rapidly. At the Metropolitan Opera, for instance, sets are changed during the action, as the audience watches. This occurs in the Mets productions of such as Aida. Much the same happened in the remodeling of Milans La Scala opera house between 2002 and 2004, since the 1990s, however, many opera houses have begun using a subtle form of sound reinforcement called acoustic enhancement. Often, operas are presented in their languages, which may be different from the first language of the audience. For example, a Wagnerian opera presented in London may be in German, therefore, since the 1980s modern opera houses have assisted the audience by providing translated supertitles, projections of the words above or near to the stage
Opera house
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Teatro di San Carlo in
Naples, the world’s oldest working theatre.
Opera house
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Opera-Theatre of
Metz, built by
benefactor Duke de Belle-Isle during the 18th century, it is the oldest opera house working in France
Opera house
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The
Grand Theatre, Warsaw, ca. 1890
Opera house
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The
Vienna Court Opera, ca. 1898
2.
Monte Carlo Casino
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Officially named Casino de Monte-Carlo, the Monte Carlo Casino is a gambling and entertainment complex located in Monaco. It includes a casino, the Grand Théâtre de Monte Carlo, the Casino de Monte-Carlo is owned and operated by the Société des bains de mer de Monaco, a public company in which the Monaco government and the ruling family have a majority interest. The company also owns the principal hotels, sports clubs, foodservice establishments, the idea of opening a gambling casino in Monaco belongs to Princess Caroline, a shrewd, business-minded spouse of Prince Florestan I. Revenues from the venture were supposed to save the House of Grimaldi from bankruptcy. Granted the concession of 30 years to operate a bathing establishment and gaming tables, Aubert, intended to be only a temporary location, the building was a modest mansion in La Condamine. In the late 1850s, Monaco was a place for a resort to succeed. Unable to raise the capital needed to operate the enterprise, Aubert and Langlois ceded their rights to Frossard de Lilbonne. During this initial period, the casino had been moved several times, construction at this site began on 13 May 1858 to designs of the Parisian architect Gobineau de la Bretonnerie and was completed in 1863. Gobineau de la Bretonnerie also designed the neighboring Hôtel de Paris, although the casino began to make a profit in 1859, Daval was not up to the task. Just like his predecessors, he was incompetent and lacked the ability to bring the gambling enterprise to the scale envisioned by Princess Caroline. Frustrated, she dispatched her private secretary M. Eyneaud to Germany, hoping to recruit François Blanc and it took a lot of time and persuasion on the part of Princess Caroline to convince the Blancs to move to Monaco. Princess Caroline even appealed to Madame Blanc, whom she befriended during her first visit to Bad Homburg, finally, in 1863 François Blanc agreed to take over the Monacos casino business. To manage the new venture, a company—the Societe des Bains de Mer et du Cercle des Etrangers—was formed with capital of 15 million francs, among the prominent investors were Charles-Bonaventure-François Theuret, Bishop of Monaco, and Cardinal Pecci, the future Pope Leo XIII. Blanc became the majority stockholder in the company and received a 50-year concession. Blanc used his connections to quickly raise the capital. On Blancs insistence, the Spelugues area where the complex was located was renamed to make it sound more attractive to casino visitors. A few suggestions were considered, and the name Monte Carlo was chosen in Prince Charles honor. In 1878–79, the building was transformed and expanded to designs of Jules Dutrou and Charles Garnier
Monte Carlo Casino
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Casino de Monte-Carlo
Monte Carlo Casino
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Seaside facade before 1878
Monte Carlo Casino
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General plan by Garnier and Dutrou, 1879
Monte Carlo Casino
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Facade on the Place du Casino after the expansion of 1878–79
3.
Monaco
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Monaco, officially the Principality of Monaco, is a sovereign city-state and microstate, located on the French Riviera in Western Europe. France borders the country on three sides while the other side borders the Mediterranean Sea, Monaco has an area of 2.02 km2 and a population of about 38,400 according to the last census of 2015. With 19,009 inhabitants per km², it is the second smallest, Monaco has a land border of 5.47 km, a coastline of 3.83 km, and a width that varies between 1,700 and 349 m. The highest point in the country is a pathway named Chemin des Révoires on the slopes of Mont Agel, in the Les Révoires Ward. Monacos most populous Quartier is Monte Carlo and the most populous Ward is Larvotto/Bas Moulins, through land reclamation, Monacos land mass has expanded by twenty percent, in 2005, it had an area of only 1.974 km2. Monaco is known as a playground for the rich and famous, in 2014, it was noted about 30% of the population was made up of millionaires, more than in Zürich or Geneva. Monaco is a principality governed under a form of constitutional monarchy, although Prince Albert II is a constitutional monarch, he wields immense political power. The House of Grimaldi have ruled Monaco, with brief interruptions, the official language is French, but Monégasque, Italian, and English are widely spoken and understood. The states sovereignty was recognized by the Franco-Monegasque Treaty of 1861. Despite Monacos independence and separate foreign policy, its defense is the responsibility of France, however, Monaco does maintain two small military units. Economic development was spurred in the late 19th century with the opening of the countrys first casino, Monte Carlo, since then, Monacos mild climate, scenery, and gambling facilities have contributed to the principalitys status as a tourist destination and recreation center for the rich. In more recent years, Monaco has become a major banking center and has sought to diversify its economy into services and small, high-value-added, the state has no income tax, low business taxes, and is well known for being a tax haven. It is also the host of the street circuit motor race Monaco Grand Prix. Monaco is not formally a part of the European Union, but it participates in certain EU policies, including customs, through its relationship with France, Monaco uses the euro as its sole currency. Monaco joined the Council of Europe in 2004 and it is a member of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie. Monacos name comes from the nearby 6th-century BC Phocaean Greek colony, according to an ancient myth, Hercules passed through the Monaco area and turned away the previous gods. As a result, a temple was constructed there, the temple of Hercules Monoikos, because the only temple of this area was the House of Hercules, the city was called Monoikos. It ended up in the hands of the Holy Roman Empire, an ousted branch of a Genoese family, the Grimaldi, contested it for a hundred years before actually gaining control
Monaco
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Statue of
Francesco Grimaldi, " Il Malizia " ("the Cunning"), disguised as a monk with a dagger hidden under the cloak of his
habit. However, he was ousted by the Genoese just four years later. The Grimaldi family purchased Monaco from the
Crown of Aragon in 1419.
Monaco
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Flag
Monaco
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Monaco circa 1900
Monaco
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Mayor of Monaco announcing concessions ending absolute monarchy of
Prince Albert I in 1910
4.
Charles III, Prince of Monaco
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Charles III was Prince of Monaco and Duke of Valentinois from 20 June 1856 to his death. He was the founder of the casino in Monte Carlo, as his title in Monegasque. He was born in Paris Charles Honoré Grimaldi, the son of Florestan I of Monaco. Charles was married on 28 September 1846 in Brussels to Countess Antoinette de Mérode-Westerloo and he was succeeded by his son Albert I of Monaco. He was the 182nd Grand Cross of the Order of the Tower, Monte Carlo is named after Charles III. It stands for the Mount Charles in Italian, in his middle years his sight greatly weakened, and by the last decade of his life he had become almost totally blind. He died at Château de Marchais, on the 1st June 2016, fifteen thousand 2 euro coins were issued by Monaco, commemorating the 150th anniversary of the foundation of Monte Carlo by Charles III
Charles III, Prince of Monaco
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Charles III
5.
Charles Garnier (architect)
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Jean-Louis Charles Garnier was a French architect, perhaps best known as the architect of the Palais Garnier and the Opéra de Monte-Carlo. Charles Garnier was born Jean-Louis Charles Garnier on 6 November 1825 in Paris, on the Rue Mouffetard and his father was originally from Sarthe, and had worked as a blacksmith, wheelwright, and coachbuilder before settling down in Paris to work in a horse-drawn carriage rental business. He married Felicia Colle, daughter of a captain in the French Army, later in life, Garnier would all but ignore the fact that he was born of humble origins, preferring to claim Sarthe as his birthplace. Garnier became an apprentice of Louis-Hippolyte Lebas, and after that a student of the École royale des Beaux-Arts de Paris. He obtained the Premier Grand Prix de Rome in 1848, at age twenty-three, the subject of his final examination was entitled, Un conservatoire des arts et métiers, avec galerie dexpositions pour les produits de lindustrie. He became a pensioner of the Académie de France à Rome from 17 January to 31 December 1849 and he traveled through Greece which provided him the subject of his fourth year submission, presented at the Paris Salon in 1853. He visited Greece with Edmond About and Constantinople with Théophile Gautier and he worked on the Temple of Aphaea in Aegina where he insisted on polychromy. He was named, in 1874, member of the Institut de France, on 30 December 1860 the Second Empire of Emperor Napoleon III announced a competition for the design of a new, state-funded opera house. The old opera house, located on the rue Le Peletier, applicants were given a month to submit entries. There were two phases to the competition, and Garnier was one of about 170 entrants in the first phase and he was awarded the fifth-place prize and was one of seven finalists selected for the second phase. You have greatly improved your project since the first competition, whereas Ginain has ruined his, soon the thirty-five-year-old and relatively unknown Garnier began work on the building, which eventually would be named for him, the Palais Garnier. Many people had difficulty in deciding exactly what style he was trying to portray, when asked by Empress Eugénie in what style the building was to be done, he is said to have replied, Why Maam, in Napoleon Trois, and you complain. Construction began in the summer of 1861, though setbacks would delay it for fourteen years. During the first week of excavation, a stream was discovered. It required eight months for the water to be pumped out, Garniers double-walled and bitumen-sealed cement and concrete foundation proved strong enough to withstand any possible leakages, and construction continued. The defeat of the French army by the Prussians at the Battle of Sedan in 1870 resulted in the end of the Second Empire. During the Siege of Paris and the Paris Commune in 1871, the opera house was finally inaugurated on 5 January 1875. The people who entered the building, spanning nearly 119,000 square feet, were generally awed by its immense size
Charles Garnier (architect)
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Charles Garnier by
Nadar, c. 1880
Charles Garnier (architect)
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The Palais Garnier in winter.
Charles Garnier (architect)
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Seaside facade of the
Monte Carlo Casino Theatre, designed by Garnier
Charles Garnier (architect)
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Monument to Garnier at the Palais Garnier
6.
Grimaldi Forum
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The Grimaldi Forum in Monaco is a conference and congress centre located on the seafront of Monacos eastern beach quartier, Larvotto. Les Ballets de Monte Carlo and the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra regularly perform there and this is also the venue of the EVER Monaco exhibition held March annually. During the renovation of Salle Garnier in the Opéra de Monte-Carlo in 2004–05, Grimaldi Forum also hosts the draw for the group stage of the UEFA Champions League, including the UEFA Best Player in Europe Award award. It also plays host to the draw for the Group Stage of the UEFA Europa League
Grimaldi Forum
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Test driving of electric sports cars in front of the Grimaldi Forum during the 2006
EVER Monaco
7.
Les Ballets de Monte Carlo
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Les Ballets de Monte Carlo is a classical ballet company established in 1985 by Her Royal Highness the Princess of Hanover in accordance with the wishes of her mother, Princess Grace of Monaco. It is the national company of the Principality of Monaco. The first performance took place on 21 December 1985, casting among others several guest stars of the Paris Opera. Directed by Ghislaine Thesmar and Pierre Lacotte, the company rehearsed in the Diaghilev studio, performing on the stage of the Salle Garnier at the Monte Carlo Opera and immediately started touring. Their repertoire includes works from the Ballets Russes and contemporary pieces from guest choreographers such as Kevin Haigen, John Clifford, Jean-Christophe Maillot, Dieter Amman, in 1989, Jean Yves Esquerre became artistic director, after the departure of Ghislaine Thesmar and Pierre Lacotte one year earlier. In 1992, Jean-Christophe Maillot joined the company, first as artistic consultant, further, in December 2000, they inaugurated their first ballet season on the huge stage of the Salle des Princes at the brand new congress center in Monaco, the Grimaldi Forum. These were two turning points in the history of the company and the beginning of a new dance era in Monaco. Official website Les Ballets de Monte Carlo in Tel Aviv, Ballet for the 21st Century
Les Ballets de Monte Carlo
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Titles by birth
8.
Palais Garnier
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The Palais Garnier is a 1, 979-seat opera house, which was built from 1861 to 1875 for the Paris Opera. The Paris Opera now mainly uses the Palais Garnier for ballet, the Palais Garnier has been called probably the most famous opera house in the world, a symbol of Paris like Notre Dame Cathedral, the Louvre, or the Sacré Coeur Basilica. This opinion is far from unanimous however, the 20th-century French architect Le Corbusier once described it as a lying art, the Palais Garnier is a building of exceptional opulence. The style is monumental and considered Second-Empire Beaux-Arts style with axial symmetry in plan and these include very elaborate multicolored marble friezes, columns, and lavish statuary, many of which portray deities of Greek mythology. The principal facade is on the side of the building, overlooking the Place de lOpéra. Fourteen painters, mosaicists and seventy-three sculptors participated in the creation of its ornamentation, the two gilded figural groups, Charles Gumerys LHarmonie and La Poésie, crown the apexes of the principal facades left and right avant-corps. They are both made of gilt copper electrotype, the facade also incorporates other work by Gumery, Alexandre Falguière, and others. On the left and right lateral returns of the front facade are busts of the librettists Eugène Scribe and Philippe Quinault, when the Empire fell, work stopped, leaving unfinished dressed stonework. It is covered by a 13.5 metre diameter dome, two pairs of obelisks marking the entrances of the Rotunda to the north and the south. The interior consists of interweaving corridors, stairwells, alcoves and landings allowing the movement of large numbers of people, rich with velvet, gold leaf, and cherubim and nymphs, the interior is characteristic of Baroque sumptuousness. The building features a ceremonial staircase of white marble with a balustrade of red and green marble. Its design was inspired by Victor Louiss grand staircase for the Théâtre de Bordeaux, the pedestals of the staircase are decorated with female torchères, created by Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse. When they were first fixed in two months before the opening of the building it was obvious to Garnier that they were too dark for the space. With the help of two of his students, Pils had to rework the canvases while they were in place overhead on the ceiling and, at the age of 61, he fell ill. His students had to finish the work, which was completed the day before the opening and this hall 18 meters high,154 meters long and 13 meters wide was designed to act as a drawing room for Paris society. Its ceiling was painted by Paul-Jacques-Aimé Baudry and represents various moments in the history of music, the foyer opens into an outside loggia at each end of which are the Salon de la Lune and Salon du Soleil. The auditorium has a traditional Italian horseshoe shape and can seat 1,979, the stage is the largest in Europe and can accommodate as many as 450 artists. The canvas house curtain was painted to represent a draped curtain, complete with tassels, the ceiling area, which surrounds the chandelier, was originally painted by Jules Eugène Lenepveu
Palais Garnier
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The façade of the Palais Garnier opera house
Palais Garnier
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Plan of the Palais Garnier
Palais Garnier
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Gumery 's L'Harmonie (1869), atop the left
avant-corps of the façade, is 7.5 metres (25 ft) of gilt copper electrotype
Palais Garnier
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Facade of the Palais Garnier with labels indicating the locations of various sculptures
9.
Sarah Bernhardt
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Sarah Bernhardt was a French stage and early film actress. She was referred to as the most famous actress the world has ever known, Bernhardt made her fame on the stages of France in the 1870s, at the beginning of the Belle Epoque period, and was soon in demand in Europe and the Americas. She developed a reputation as a dramatic actress and tragedienne. In her later career she starred in some of the earliest films ever produced, Sarah Bernhardt was born in Paris as Rosine Bernardt on October 23,1844. She was the daughter of a Dutch-Jewish courtesan, or upper-class prostitute, Judith Bernard. Four different addresses in Paris are claimed as her birthplace,125 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré,5 rue de lEcole-de-Medicine,22 rue de la Michodière and 265 rue Saint-Honoré. The father, whoever he was, left a sum of one hundred francs for her future dowry when she came of age. Sarah lived for months with the nurse and her husband in the tiny apartment of the concierge. While there, the child showed the first signs of tuberculosis. Sarah was discovered on the street by her aunt Rosine, who was passing by, when Sarahs mother finally returned to Paris, Sarah was taken to her apartment at 265 rue Saint-Honoré, where she lived, attended by servants, rarely ever seeing her mother. At the age of eight, Sarah could neither read or writer and her mother sent her away to a school for young ladies in Auteuil run by a Madame Fressard, where for the first time she was with other children her own age. The other children made fun of her appearance and curly hair. During the two years she attended the school, her mother came to see her only twice and she completely forgot all of her lines and fled the stage in tears. At the age of ten, by obtaining the sponsorship of the Duc de Morny, her mother sent Sarah to Grandchamp, at the convent, she was soon on the stage again, performing the part of the Archangel Raphael in the story of Tobias and the Angel. She received her first communion as a Roman Catholic in 1856, however, she never forgot her Jewish heritage. When asked years later by a reporter if she were a Christian, she replied, No, Im a Roman Catholic, Im waiting until Christians become better. At the age of fifteen, her mother withdrew her from the school and her mother summoned a family council, which also included the Duc de Morny, one of her friends. Morny proposed that Sarah should become an actress, an idea which horrified the young girl, Morny arranged for her to attend her first theater performance at the Comedie Française in a party which included her mother, the Duc de Morny, and his friend Alexandre Dumas
Sarah Bernhardt
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Bernhardt around 1878
Sarah Bernhardt
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Sarah Bernhardt, in 1864
Sarah Bernhardt
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Sarah Bernhardt by
Napoleon Sarony
Sarah Bernhardt
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Bernhardt photographed by
Félix Nadar 1865
10.
Robert Planquette
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Jean Robert Planquette was a French composer of songs and operettas. The son of a singer, Planquette was born in Paris and he did not finish his studies, lacking the funds to do so, and worked as a café pianist and composer and singing. A few romances that he composed brought less fame than did his song, Sambre et Meuse, first sung in 1867 by Lucien Fugère, in 1876, the director of the Théâtre des Folies-Dramatiques gave Planquette a commission to compose his first operetta, Les cloches de Corneville. It opened in Paris in 1877, running for an extremely successful 480 performances, Planquettes music has been praised for its pathos and romantic feeling. Le Chevalier Gaston was produced in 1879 with little success, in 1880 came Les Voltigeurs du 32ieme which had a long run in London in 1887 as The Old Guard, and La Cantiniére, which was translated into English as Nectarine, though never produced. In 1882 Rip Van Winkle was produced in London and subsequently given in Paris as Rip, the libretto is an adaptation by H. B. Farnie of Washington Irvings famous tale and it was followed by La Crémaillere, Surcouf, Captain Thérése, La Cocarde tricolore, Le Talisman, Panurge and Mamzelle Quatsous. The original orchestral version has been recorded by the Boston Pops Orchestra conducted by Arthur Fiedler, the Song of the Cabin Boy, a barcarolle from Planquettes Les cloches de Corneville was played on the violin by W. K. L. Dickson in the first experiment in history in synchronizing sound and motion pictures and it is viewable online as Dickson Experimental Sound Film. All operettas and all premieres in Paris, unless otherwise noted, a Dictionary of Music and Musicians. The New Grove Dictionary of Music & Musicians, obituary, Robert Planquette in The Musical Times, Vol.44, No. 721, p.177 Robert Planquette on data. bnf
Robert Planquette
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Robert Planquette (album leaf with photo portrait and autograph musical quotation)
11.
Adelina Patti
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Adelina Patti was an Italian-French 19th-century opera singer, earning huge fees at the height of her career in the music capitals of Europe and America. She first sang in public as a child in 1851, the composer Giuseppe Verdi, writing in 1877, described her as being perhaps the finest singer who had ever lived and a stupendous artist. Verdis admiration for Pattis talent was shared by numerous music critics and she was born Adelina Juana Maria Patti, in Madrid, the last child of tenor Salvatore Patti and soprano Caterina Barilli. Her Italian parents were working in Madrid, Spain, at the time of her birth, because her father came from Sicily, Patti was born a subject of the King of the Two Sicilies. She later carried a French passport, as her first two husbands were French and her sisters Amalia and Carlotta Patti were also singers. Her brother Carlo Patti was a violinist who married actress Effie Germon, in her childhood, the family moved to New York City. Patti grew up in the Wakefield section of the Bronx, where her familys home is still standing, Patti sang professionally from childhood, and developed into a coloratura soprano with perfectly equalized vocal registers and a surprisingly warm, satiny tone. Patti learned how to sing and gained understanding of technique from her brother-in-law Maurice Strakosch. Adelina Patti made her debut at age 16 on 24 November 1859 in the title role of Donizettis Lucia di Lammermoor at the Academy of Music. On 24 August 1860, she and Emma Albani were soloists in the premiere of Charles Wugk Sabatiers Cantata in Montreal which was performed in honour of the visit of the Prince of Wales. In 1861, at the age of 18, she was invited to Covent Garden, to execute the role of Amina in Bellinis La sonnambula. During an 1862 American tour, she sang John Howard Paynes Home, Sweet Home at the White House for the President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, the Lincolns were mourning their son Willie, who had died of typhoid. Moved to tears, the Lincolns requested an encore of the song, henceforth, it would become associated with Adelina Patti, and she performed it many times as a bonus item at the end of recitals and concerts. Pattis career was one of success after success and her girlish good looks gave her an appealing stage presence, which added to her celebrity status. Patti, however, turned into a singer in the final phase of her operatic. She knew what suited her aging voice to perfection and she stuck to it, typically, her recital programs during the 1890s featured an array of familiar, often sentimental, not-too-demanding popular tunes of the day, which were sure to appeal to her adoring fans. She also had been prepared to tackle quite dramatic parts in operas like LAfricaine, Les Huguenots and she never attempted to sing any verismo parts, however, because these became popular only in the twilight of her career, during the final decade of the 19th century. Many years earlier, Patti had experienced an encounter in Paris with the bel canto-opera composer Gioachino Rossini
Adelina Patti
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Adelina Patti
Adelina Patti
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Patti caricatured by the French artist
André Gill (1840-1885).
Adelina Patti
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Patti and third husband baron Cederström outside the central station in Stockholm in 1900. Patti, uncomfortable with being photographed, bends over in order to hide her face.
12.
Raoul Gunsbourg
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Raoul Samuel Gunsbourg was a Jewish-Romania-born opera director, impresario, composer and writer. Gunsbourg is best known for being the director of the Opéra de Monte-Carlo. Raoul Gunsbourg acquired his education and its comprehensive knowledge in language. He attended Medical School in Bucharest which he finished in 1875, in 1877-78 he served as a medic in the Russian army during the Russian-Turkish war. In 1881-83 he created and managed the Gunsbourgs French Opera Stage in Moscow, in Moscow Gunsbourg met German composer Richard Wagner. After returning to France, Gunsbourg directed the Grand Théâtre de Lille during the 1888/89 season, empowered by Princess Alices encouragement and support, Gunsbourg transformed the Opéra de Monte-Carlo into a world-class cultural venue. He was the first opera director to stage Berliozs La damnation de Faust, Gunsbourgs work in Monte Carlo was briefly interrupted during World War II. After the war was over, Gunsbourg returned to Monaco where he continued directing the Opéra de Monte-Carlo until 1951
Raoul Gunsbourg
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Costume design for "Ivan le Terrible" by
Leon Bakst (1911)
Raoul Gunsbourg
13.
Alice Heine
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Marcel Proust used her as a model for the Princesse de Luxembourg in his novel, In Search of Lost Time. She was born Marie Alice Heine at 900 Rue Royale, in the French Quarter of New Orleans and her French father, Michel Heine, was a scion of a prominent German-rooted Berlin and Paris banking Jewish family. His brother was Armand Heine, and both were cousins of poet Heinrich Heine and he was born in Bordeaux, France, and moved to New Orleans in 1843, and become a successful financier and real-estate developer. She has two brothers, Paul Henri and Isaac Georges. The American Civil War sent the family back to France, where the teenaged Alices youth and beauty and her familys wealth, a & M Heine, her fathers firm, helped finance Napoleon III’s war with Prussia. They had one son and one daughter, Marie Odet Jean Armand Chapelle de Jumilhac and he became the 8th and last Duke of Richelieu, as well as the Duke of Aiguillon and Marquis of Jumilhac, upon the death of his father in Athens on June 28,1880. In 1913, he married Eleanor Douglas Wise of Maryland, United States, odile Marie Auguste Septimanie Chapelle de Jumilhac. In 1905, by marriage with Gabriel Marie François Hippolyte Ferri Eugène de La Rochefoucauld, she first became Countess de La Rochefoucauld and they had a daughter, Anne Alice Elisabeth Amélie de La Rochefoucauld, who married twice and had no issue. Alices second marriage, to Prince Albert I of Monaco, Sovereign Prince of Monaco, the prince, whose first wife had been a daughter of a Scottish duke, was an oceanographer. During his long journeys at sea, Alice took a great interest in the Monegasque opera season and she brought a strong business acumen, showing an understanding far beyond her years. Her affair with composer Isidore de Lara resulted in Prince Albert slapping her in view of an audience at the Salle Garnier, the Prince and Princess of Monaco separated judicially on May 30,1902 and June 3,1902, but remained married. Upon the princes death 20 years later, Alice became the Dowager Princess of Monaco and her former home in New Orleans is now the Café Amelie and advertises itself as a setting for weddings, receptions, special parties and the like
Alice Heine
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Alice Heine (c. 1890)
14.
Albert I, Prince of Monaco
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Albert I was Prince of Monaco and Duke of Valentinois from 10 September 1889 until his death. He devoted much of his life to oceanography, alongside his expeditions, Albert I made reforms on political, economic and social levels, bestowing a constitution on the Principality in 1911. As a young man, Prince Albert served in the Spanish Navy, during the Franco-Prussian War, the Grimaldi Man found in the Baousse-Rousse cave was named in his honour. Alberts intellectual achievements gained him recognition and in 1909, the British Academy of Science made him a member. The couple met for the first time in August 1869 at a ball hosted by the Emperor and Empress of France, their marriage had been arranged by Alberts grandmother Caroline. Caroline had tried to make a match between Albert and Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge, the first cousin of Queen Victoria, and sought the help of Napoléon III and his wife, Empress Eugénie. The Emperor convinced Caroline that Queen Victoria would never allow a relative of hers to marry into a family who were making an out of gambling. He then suggested Mary, his cousin and sister of his good friend. Mary was not royalty, but the Hamiltons, the ducal house of Scotland, were seen as noble, ancient. The Hamiltons were well-aware of the extent of Monacos estate, which was no bigger than theirs, the couple married at Château de Marchais on 21 September 1869. Within a year of their marriage, the only child was born. While Albert was away fighting in the Franco-Prussian war, she left Monaco permanently, civilly, the marriage was dissolved on 28 July 1880 by the Order of Prince Charles III. That same year, the former Princess of Monaco remarried in Florence, Italy, to a Hungarian nobleman, on 10 September 1889, Albert ascended the throne of Monaco on the death of his father. That same year in Paris, on 30 October, he married the Dowager Duchess de Richelieu, née Marie Alice Heine. The American daughter of a New Orleans building contractor of German-Jewish descent, Alice Heine had married the Duc de Richelieu but had been widowed by age 21 and left with a young son, Armand. Her marriage to Prince Albert proved a blessing for him. Despite the initial success of the marriage of Prince Albert and Princess Alice, in 1902, they separated legally, without issue, according to Anne Edwards book The Grimaldis of Monaco, this was due to the Princesss friendship with the composer Isidore de Lara. Princess Alice had La Belle Otero banned from the province in 1897 for being seen with her husband, in March 1910, there were mass protests against his rule
Albert I, Prince of Monaco
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Albert ǀ
Albert I, Prince of Monaco
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A statue of Albert as a seafarer in
Monaco-Ville 's
St Martin Gardens.
Albert I, Prince of Monaco
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Scale model of Hirondelle II. On display at the
Oceanographic Museum.
15.
Hector Berlioz
–
Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts. Berlioz made significant contributions to the orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works, and he also composed around 50 songs. His influence was critical for the development of Romanticism, especially in composers like Richard Wagner, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Franz Liszt, Richard Strauss. Hector Berlioz was born in France at La Côte-Saint-André in the département of Isère, Louis was an agnostic, with a liberal outlook, his mother, Marie-Antoinette, was a devout Roman Catholic. He had five siblings in all, three of whom did not survive to adulthood, the other two, Nanci and Adèle, remained close to Berlioz throughout his life. Berlioz was not a prodigy, unlike some other famous composers of the time, he began studying music at age 12, writing small compositions. As a result of his fathers discouragement, he never learned to play the piano and he became proficient at guitar, flageolet and flute. He learned harmony from textbooks alone—he was not formally trained, the majority of his early compositions were romances and chamber pieces. While yet at age twelve, as recalled in his Mémoires, he experienced his first passion for a woman and he also began to visit the Paris Conservatoire library, seeking out scores of Glucks operas and making personal copies of parts of them. He recalled in his Mémoires his first encounter with Luigi Cherubini, Cherubini attempted to throw the impetuous Berlioz out of the library since he was not a formal music student at that time. Berlioz also heard two operas by Gaspare Spontini, a composer who influenced him through their friendship, and whom he later championed when working as a critic, from then on, he devoted himself to composition. He was encouraged in his endeavors by Jean-François Le Sueur, director of the Royal Chapel, in 1823, he wrote his first article—a letter to the journal Le corsaire defending Spontinis La vestale. Despite his parents disapproval, in 1824 he formally abandoned his studies to pursue a career in music. This work was rehearsed and revised after the rehearsal but not performed until the following year, Berlioz later claimed to have burnt the score, but it was re-discovered in 1991. Later that year or in 1825, he began to compose the opera Les francs-juges, the work survives only in fragments, the overture has been much recorded and is sometimes played in concert. In 1826 he began attending the Conservatoire to study composition under Jean-François Le Sueur and he also submitted a fugue to the Prix de Rome, but was eliminated in the primary round. Winning the prize would become an obsession until he won it in 1830
Hector Berlioz
–
Crop of a
carte de visite photo of Hector Berlioz by Franck, Paris, c. 1855
Hector Berlioz
–
Drawing of
Harriet Smithson as
Ophelia in Shakespeare's
Hamlet
Hector Berlioz
–
Lithograph of Berlioz by
August Prinzhofer, Vienna, 1845. Berlioz considered this to be a good likeness.
Hector Berlioz
–
Painting of a young Berlioz by
Émile Signol, 1832.
16.
La damnation de Faust
–
La damnation de Faust, Op.24 is a work for four solo voices, full seven-part chorus, large childrens chorus and orchestra by the French composer Hector Berlioz. He called it a légende dramatique and it was first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 6 December 1846. The French composer was inspired by a translation of Goethes dramatic poem Faust and produced a work that, like the masterpiece on which it is based. Conceived at various times as an oratorio and as an opera its travelogue form. Berlioz himself was eager to see the work staged, but once he did, most of the works fame has come through concert performances. Berlioz read Goethes Faust Part One in 1828, in Gérard de Nervals translation, I read it incessantly, at meals, in the theatre, in the street. He was so impressed that a suite entitled Eight Scenes from Faust became his Opus 1, the Metropolitan Opera premiered it first in concert and then on stage and revived it in concert at Carnegie Hall on 10 November 1996. Filmmaker Terry Gilliam made his debut at Londons English National Opera in May 2011. Three instrumental passages, the Marche Hongroise, Ballet des sylphes, hearing peasants sing and dance, he realizes that their simple happiness is something he will never experience. An army marches past in the distance, Faust doesnt understand why the soldiers are so enthusiastic about glory and fame. Depressed, Faust has returned to his study, even the search for wisdom can no longer inspire him. Tired of life, he is about to commit suicide when the sound of bells and an Easter hymn remind him of his youth. Suddenly Méphistophélès appears, ironically commenting on Fausts apparent conversion and he offers to take him on a journey, promising him the restoration of his youth, knowledge, and the fulfillment of all his wishes. Méphistophélès and Faust arrive at Auerbachs tavern in Leipzig, where Brander, the other guests offer an ironic Amen, and Méphistophélès continues with another song about a flea that brings his relatives to infest a whole royal court. Disgusted by the vulgarity of it all, Faust demands to be somewhere else. On a meadow by the Elbe, Méphistophélès shows Faust a dream vision of a woman named Marguerite. He calls out her name, and Méphistophélès promises to lead Faust to her, together with a group of students and soldiers, they enter the town where she lives. Faust and Méphistophélès hide in Marguerites room, Faust feels that he will find in her his ideal of a pure and innocent woman
La damnation de Faust
–
Hector Berlioz
17.
Francesco Tamagno
–
Francesco Tamagno was an Italian operatic tenor who sang with enormous success throughout Europe and America. On 5 February 1887, he sang Otello in the first performance of Giuseppe Verdis opera and he is also the earliest Italian tenor of note to have left a sizeable body of recordings of his voice. As a man, he was one of the first international public figures to admit in the fact that he was the single parent and carer of a daughter. The most famous tenor of his age, Tamagno performed in a total of 26 countries, gaining renown for the power of his singing. Critics likened the sound of his voice to that of a trumpet or even a cannon and he participated, too, in the premiere of Verdis Italian-language version of Don Carlos when it was staged at La Scala in 1884, singing the eponymous role of the Infante of Spain. He excelled in the newer parts of Radames in Aida, Samson in Samson et Dalila, Alim in Le roi de Lahore. Yet, in his days, before his voice grew too robust, he was able to negotiate a role as light. Interestingly enough, with one exception, Tamagno largely eschewed verismo opera. That notable exception was Umberto Giordanos Andrea Chénier and he studied the score of Chénier with Giordano in 1898 and earned accolades for his magisterial delivery of the tenor leads four showpiece solos at ensuing productions of the work. He was on terms, too, with Giordanos rival Giacomo Puccini. Like all singers, however, he had his vocal shortcomings and he was not an adroit sight-reader, justifying this limitation by insisting that he was an emotional person who preferred to deliver his music from the heart rather than from the head. Critics occasionally reprimanded him for striving to maximise the excitement factor of his performances by holding on to top notes longer than necessary and he was also chided intermittently for getting behind or ahead of the conductors beat. Tamagno pursued a busy and highly acclaimed career that lasted for more than three decades, during that time, he appeared in more than 50 different operas and sang at almost every important theatre in Europe, South America and the United States. He also had the distinction of participating in eight performances of new or substantially refashioned operatic works by significant composers such as Verdi, Ponchielli. Born into a family in the northern Italian city of Turin in 1850. Tamagno embarked on a series of singing engagements in Ferrara, Rovigo, Venice and Barcelona which raised his profile further. La Scala was Italys principal opera theatre, and Tamagno became a member of its company of singers. His voice continued to mature at La Scala, reaching its potential after a few years of spirited use in a variety of operas
Francesco Tamagno
–
Contents
18.
Giuseppe Verdi
–
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian opera composer. Verdi was born near Busseto to a family of moderate means. Verdi came to dominate the Italian opera scene after the era of Bellini, Donizetti and Rossini, whose works influenced him. In his early operas Verdi demonstrated a sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy and he also participated briefly as an elected politician. He surprised the world by returning, after his success with the opera Aida. The baptismal register, prepared on 11 October 1813, lists his parents Carlo, additionally, it lists Verdi as being born yesterday, but since days were often considered to begin at sunset, this could have meant either 9 or 10 October. Verdi himself, following his mother, always celebrated his birthday on 9 October, Verdi had a younger sister, Giuseppa, who died aged 17 in 1833. From the age of four, Verdi was given lessons in Latin and Italian by the village schoolmaster, Baistrocchi. After learning to play the organ, he showed so much interest in music that his parents provided him with a spinet. Verdis gift for music was apparent by 1820–21 when he began his association with the local church, serving in the choir, acting as an altar boy for a while. After Baistrocchis death, Verdi, at the age of eight, Carlo Verdi was energetic in furthering his sons education. something which Verdi tended to hide in later life. He picture emerges of youthful precocity eagerly nurtured by a father and of a sustained, sophisticated. Verdi returned to Busseto regularly to play the organ on Sundays, at age 11, Verdi received schooling in Italian, Latin, the humanities, and rhetoric. By the time he was 12, he began lessons with Ferdinando Provesi, maestro di cappella at San Bartolomeo, director of the music school. This information comes from the Autobiographical Sketch which Verdi dictated to the publisher Giulio Ricordi late in life, in 1879, written, understandably, with the benefit of hindsight, it is not always reliable when dealing with issues more contentious than those of his childhood. The other director of the Philharmonic Society was Antonio Barezzi, a grocer and distiller. The young Verdi did not immediately become involved with the Philharmonic, by June 1827, he had graduated with honours from the Ginnasio and was able to focus solely on music under Provesi. By 1829–30, Verdi had established himself as a leader of the Philharmonic, none of us could rival him reported the secretary of the organisation, Giuseppe Demaldè
Giuseppe Verdi
–
Giuseppe Verdi Portrait by
Giovanni Boldini, 1886
Giuseppe Verdi
–
Verdi's childhood home at Le Roncole.
Giuseppe Verdi
–
Antonio Barezzi, Verdi's patron and later father-in-law
Giuseppe Verdi
–
Margherita Barezzi, Verdi's first wife.
19.
Otello
–
Otello is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Shakespeares play Othello. It was Verdis penultimate opera, and was first performed at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, when it finally premiered in Milan on 5 February 1887, it proved to be a resounding success, and further stagings of Otello soon followed at leading theatres throughout Europe and America. Thus a plot of sorts was hatched in order to coax the composer out of retirement to write another opera, because of the importance of the dramatic aspects of opera to the composer, Verdi was especially selective in his choice of subjects. Consequently, if he were to agree to another opera after a decade of retirement. Verdis refusals continued as the 1870s progressed, but she confessed defeat yet again. Clara Maffei also tried, unsuccessfully, in March 1878 to interest Verdi, what would I succeed in doing. Boito, Verdi, and revisions of Simon Boccanegra While he was attempting to get Verdi involved a new opera, persisting with further attempts to convince the composer, Ricordi had also broached the idea of a collaboration with Boito for a new opera based on Shakespeares Othello. Because of its relatively straightforward story, the play Othello was selected as a likely target, collaborations with Boito in the revision of the 1857 opera Simon Boccanegra helped to convince Verdi of Boitos ability as a librettist. Verdi visited Milan on 30 June 1879, and conducted his Requiem Mass in a performance at La Scala. He received the acclaim of the public, which included the La Scala orchestra playing outside his hotel. Walker assumes that it was both Ricordi and Faccio who stage managed the effects to give the composer the sense of being welcome and respected in Milan. Finally, after some plotting, Ricordi, in conjunction with Verdis friend, during a dinner at Verdis Milan residence during the summer of 1879, Ricordi and Faccio guided the conversation towards Shakespeares play Othello and to the librettist Arrigo Boito. At the mention of Othello I saw Verdi fix his eyes on me, with suspicion and he had certainly understood, he had certainly reacted. I believed the time was ripe, suggestions were made, despite initial skepticism on the part of the composer, that Boito would be interested in creating a new libretto based upon the play. Within several days, Ricordi approached Verdi with the request that he would like to visit Sant Agata with a friend in September, Verdis reaction was clearly non-committal, I wish absolutely to avoid committing myself The best thing. Is for him to me the finished poem. Meanwhile, Boito began work on the libretto in spite of illness and, after appealing to Giuseppina, Ricordi was told that the Verdis would be coming to Milan and that he would meet privately with Boito. However, she noted in her letter of 7 November, Between ourselves, what Boito has so far written of the African seems to please him, and is very well done
Otello
–
Otello and Desdemona by Alexandre-Marie Colin, 1829
Otello
–
Giuseppe Verdi c. 1870
Otello
–
Boito and Verdi at Sant'Agata
Otello
–
Francesco Tamagno as Otello in a costume designed by
Alfred Edel for the original production
20.
Arturo Vigna
–
Arturo Vigna was an Italian opera conductor who was particularly associated with the operas of Giuseppe Verdi. Born in Turin, Vigna was trained at the Turin Conservatory and he served as music director of the Opéra de Monte-Carlo from 1895 to 1903. He then worked as a conductor at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City where he conducted nearly 250 performances from 1903-1907, at the Met, he notably conducted the United States premieres of Umberto Giordanos Fedora and Hector Berliozs La damnation de Faust in 1906. He also led performances of new productions of Verdis Aida, Donizettis Don Pasquale, Ponchiellis La Gioconda, Bellinis La sonnambula, Meyerbeers LAfricaine, from 1917-1922 Vigna was a conductor with the Paris Opera. He also conducted operas in Bergamo, Berlin, Dresden, Madrid, Prague and he died at the age of 63 in Milan
Arturo Vigna
–
Arturo Vigna, 1905
21.
Nellie Melba
–
Dame Nellie Melba GBE, born Helen Porter Mitchell, was an Australian operatic soprano. She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian era and she was the first Australian to achieve international recognition as a classical musician. She took the pseudonym Melba from Melbourne, her home town, Melba studied singing in Melbourne and made a modest success in performances there. After a brief and unsuccessful marriage, she moved to Europe in search of a singing career, failing to find engagements in London in 1886, she studied in Paris and soon made a great success there and in Brussels. Returning to London she quickly established herself as the lyric soprano at Covent Garden from 1888. She soon achieved success in Paris and elsewhere in Europe. Her repertoire was small, in her career she sang no more than 25 roles and was closely identified with only ten. She was known for her performances in French and Italian opera, during the First World War, Melba raised large sums for war charities. She returned to Australia frequently during the 20th century, singing in opera and concerts and she was active in the teaching of singing at the Melbourne Conservatorium. Melba continued to sing until the last months of her life and her death, in Australia, was news across the English-speaking world, and her funeral was a major national event. Melba was born in Richmond, Victoria, the eldest of seven children of the builder David Mitchell, Mitchell, a Scot, had emigrated to Australia in 1852, becoming a successful builder. Melba was taught to play the piano and first sang in public around age six and she was educated at a local boarding school and then at the Presbyterian Ladies College. She studied singing with Mary Ellen Christian and Pietro Cecchi, an Italian tenor, in her teens, Melba continued to perform in amateur concerts in and around Melbourne, and she played the organ at church. Her father encouraged her in her studies, but he strongly disapproved of her taking up singing as a career. Melbas mother died suddenly in 1881 at Richmond, Melbas father moved the family to Mackay, Queensland, where he built a new sugar mill. Melba soon became popular in Mackay society for her singing and piano-playing, on 22 December 1882 in Brisbane, she married Charles Nesbitt Frederick Armstrong, the youngest son of Sir Andrew Armstrong. They had one child, a son, George, born on 16 October 1883, the marriage was not a success, Charles reportedly beat his wife more than once. The couple separated after just over a year, and Melba returned to Melbourne determined to pursue a singing career, debuting professionally in concerts in 1884
Nellie Melba
–
Nellie Melba, 1902, by
Henry Walter Barnett
Nellie Melba
–
Melba, drawn by Frank Haviland
Nellie Melba
–
Philippe, Duke of Orléans
Nellie Melba
–
Melba as Marguerite in
Faust
22.
Enrico Caruso
–
Enrico Caruso was an Italian operatic tenor. He sang to acclaim at the major opera houses of Europe. Caruso also made approximately 260 commercially released recordings from 1902 to 1920, all of these recordings, which span most of his stage career, remain available today on CDs and as downloads and digital streams. Enrico Caruso came from a poor but not destitute background, born in Naples in the Via San Giovannello agli Ottocalli 7 on 25 February 1873, he was baptised the next day in the adjacent Church of San Giovanni e Paolo. His parents originally came from Piedimonte dAlife in the Province of Benevento, in the Province of Caserta in Campania, called Errico in accordance with the Neapolitan language, he would later adopt the formal Italian version of his given name, Enrico. This change came at the suggestion of a singing teacher, Caruso was the third of seven children and one of only three to survive infancy. There is a story of Carusos parents having had 21 children,18 of whom died in infancy. However, on the basis of research, biographers Pierre Key, Francis Robinson. Caruso himself and his brother Giovanni may have been the source of the exaggerated number, Carusos widow Dorothy also included the story in a memoir that she wrote about her husband. She quotes the tenor, speaking of his mother, Anna Caruso, twenty boys and one girl – too many. Carusos father, Marcellino, was a mechanic and foundry worker, initially, Marcellino thought his son should adopt the same trade, and at the age of 11, the boy was apprenticed to a mechanical engineer who constructed public water fountains. Caruso later worked alongside his father at the Meuricoffre factory in Naples, at his mothers insistence, he also attended school for a time, receiving a basic education under the tutelage of a local priest. He learned to write in a script and studied technical draftsmanship. During this period he sang in his church choir, and his voice showed enough promise for him to contemplate a career in music. Caruso was encouraged in his musical ambitions by his mother. To raise cash for his family, he work as a street singer in Naples. Aged 18, he used the fees he had earned by singing at an Italian resort to buy his first pair of new shoes and his progress as a paid entertainer was interrupted, however, by 45 days of compulsory military service. He completed this in 1894, resuming his voice lessons upon discharge from the army
Enrico Caruso
–
The medal that Enrico Caruso gave to
Pasquale Simonelli, his New York City impresario Obverse: Caruso facing left. Lower right: Salanto, medal maker's signature.
Enrico Caruso
–
Enrico Caruso, c. 1907
Enrico Caruso
–
Reverse:
Muse of music with lyre over PER RICORDO (memento). Around the rim:
TIFFANY & Co. 24 CARAT GOLD Y (27 mm).
Enrico Caruso
–
Enrico Caruso, c. 1910
23.
Rigoletto
–
Rigoletto is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The Italian libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi samuse by Victor Hugo. Despite serious initial problems with the Austrian censors who had control over northern Italian theatres at the time and it is considered by many to be the first of the operatic masterpieces of Verdis middle-to-late career. Its tragic story revolves around the licentious Duke of Mantua, his court jester Rigoletto. The operas original title, La maledizione, refers to the placed on both the Duke and Rigoletto by a courtier whose daughter had been seduced by the Duke with Rigolettos encouragement. The curse comes to fruition when Gilda likewise falls in love with the Duke, Verdi was commissioned to write a new opera by the La Fenice opera house in Venice in 1850. By this time he was already a composer and had a degree of freedom in choosing the works he would prefer to set to music. He then asked Francesco Maria Piave to examine the play Kean by Alexandre Dumas, père, Verdi soon stumbled upon Victor Hugos five-act play Le roi samuse. He later explained that The subject is grand, immense, and there is a character that is one of the greatest creations that the theatre can boast of, in any country and in all history. It was a controversial subject, and Hugo himself had already had trouble with censorship in France. As Austria at that time controlled much of Northern Italy. Hugos play depicted a king as an immoral and cynical womanizer, from the beginning, Verdi was aware of the risks, as was Piave. In a letter which Verdi wrote to Piave, Use four legs, run through the town, correspondence between a prudent Piave and an already committed Verdi followed, but the two underestimated the power and the intentions of Austrians and remained at risk. Even the friendly Guglielmo Brenna, secretary of La Fenice, who had promised them that they would not have problems with the censors, was wrong, at the beginning of the summer of 1850, rumours started to spread that Austrian censorship was going to forbid the production. The censors considered the Hugo work to verge on lèse majesté, in August, Verdi and Piave prudently retired to Busseto, Verdis hometown, to continue the composition and prepare a defensive scheme. They wrote to the theatre, assuring them that the doubts about the morality of the work were not justified but since very little time was left. Verdi was completely against this solution and preferred instead to have direct negotiations with censors, arguing over each. At this point, Brenna, La Fenices secretary, showed the Austrians some letters and articles depicting the bad character but the value of the artist
Rigoletto
–
Set design by Philippe Chaperon.
Rigoletto
–
Francesco Maria Piave, the librettist of Rigoletto
Rigoletto
–
La Fenice 's poster for the world premiere of Rigoletto
Rigoletto
–
Felice Varesi, the first Rigoletto
24.
Feodor Chaliapin
–
Feodor Ivanovich Chaliapin was a Russian opera singer. He himself spelled his surname, French-style, Chaliapine in the West, in English texts, his given name is most usually rendered as Feodor or Fyodor, and his surname is most usually seen as Chaliapin. This spelling also better reflects the fact that the name is pronounced with three syllables, not four, Feodor Chaliapin was born into a peasant family on February 1,1873 in Kazan, in the wing of merchant Lisitzins house on Rybnoryadskaya Street 10. This wing no longer exists, but the house with the yard where the wing was situated is still there, the next day, Candlemas, he was baptized in Epiphany Church on Bolshaya Prolomnaya street. His godparents were his neighbors, the shoemaker Nikolay Tonkov and Ludmila Kharitonova and his vocal teacher was Dmitri Usatov. Chaliapin began his career at Tbilisi and the Imperial Opera, St. Petersburg in 1894 and he was then invited to sing at the Mamontov Private Opera, his first role there was as Mephistopheles in Gounods Faust, in which he was a considerable success. At Mamontov he also met Sergei Rachmaninoff, who was serving as an assistant conductor there, with Rachmaninoff he learned the title role of Mussorgskys Boris Godunov, which became his signature character. Chaliapin returned the favor by showing Rachmaninoff how he built each of his interpretations around a culminating moment or point, Rachmaninoff put this approach to considerable use when he became a full-time concert pianist after World War I. On the strength of his Mamontov appearances, the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow engaged Chaliapin, during the First World War, Chaliapin also appeared regularly at the Zimin Private Opera in Moscow. At the end of his career, Toscanini observed that the Russian bass was the greatest operatic talent with whom he had ever worked. In 1925, while performing in New York, his piano accompanist was a young Harry Lubin, Chaliapin toured Australia in 1926, giving a series of recitals which were highly acclaimed. Privately, Chaliapins personal affairs were in a state of disarray as a consequence of the Russian Revolution of 1917, at first he was treated as a revered artist of the newly emerged Soviet Russia. He still maintained, however, that he was not anti-Soviet, Chaliapin initially moved to Finland and later lived in France. Cosmopolitan Paris, with its significant Russian émigré population, became his base, and ultimately and he was renowned for his larger-than-life carousing during this period, but he never sacrificed his dedication to his art. Chaliapins attachment to Paris did not prevent him pursuing a international operatic and concert career in England, the United States. In May 1931 he appeared in the Russian Season directed by Sir Thomas Beecham at Londons Lyceum Theatre and his most famous part was the title role of Boris Godunov. Chaliapin made one film for the director G. W. Pabst. The film was made in three different versions – French, English, and German, as was sometimes the prevailing custom, Chaliapin starred in all three versions, each of which used the same script, sets, and costumes, but different supporting casts
Feodor Chaliapin
–
Feodor Ivanovich Chaliapin
Feodor Chaliapin
Feodor Chaliapin
–
Chaliapin and
Rachmaninoff
Feodor Chaliapin
–
Chaliapin as
Mephisto. Photograph by
Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky
25.
Jules Massenet
–
Jules Émile Frédéric Massenet was a French composer of the Romantic era best known for his operas, of which he wrote more than thirty. The two most frequently staged are Manon and Werther and he also composed oratorios, ballets, orchestral works, incidental music, piano pieces, songs and other music. While still a schoolboy, Massenet was admitted to Frances principal music college, there he studied under Ambroise Thomas, whom he greatly admired. After winning the top musical prize, the Prix de Rome, in 1863, he composed prolifically in many genres. Massenet had a sense of the theatre and of what would succeed with the Parisian public. Despite some miscalculations, he produced a series of successes that made him the composer of opera in France in the late 19th. Like many prominent French composers of the period, Massenet became a professor at the Conservatoire and he taught composition there from 1878 until 1896, when he resigned after the death of the director, Ambroise Thomas. Among his students were Gustave Charpentier, Ernest Chausson, Reynaldo Hahn, by the time of his death, Massenet was regarded by many critics as old-fashioned and unadventurous although his two best-known operas remained popular in France and abroad. After a few decades of neglect, his works began to be favourably reassessed during the mid-20th century, Massenet was born at Montaud, then an outlying hamlet and now a part of the city of Saint-Étienne, in the Loire. He was the youngest of the four children of Alexis Massenet and his second wife Eléonore-Adelaïde née Royer de Marancour, Massenet senior was a prosperous ironmonger, his wife was a talented amateur musician who gave Jules his first piano lessons. By early 1848 the family had moved to Paris, where settled in a flat in Saint-Germain-des-Prés. Massenet was educated at the Lycée Saint-Louis and, from either 1851 or 1853 and his biographer Demar Irvine dates the audition and admission as January 1853. Both sources agree that Massenet continued his education at the lycée in tandem with his musical studies. At the Conservatoire Massenet studied solfège with Augustin Savard and the piano with François Laurent and he pursued his studies, with modest distinction, until the beginning of 1855, when family concerns disrupted his education. Alexis Massenets health was poor, and on advice he moved from Paris to Chambéry in the south of France. On his return he lodged with relations in Montmartre and resumed his studies, the familys finances were no longer comfortable, and to support himself Massenet took private piano students and played as a percussionist in theatre orchestras. His work in the pit gave him a good working knowledge of the operas of Gounod and other composers, classic. He gained some work as a piano accompanist, in the course of which he met Wagner who, in 1861 Massenets music was published for the first time, the Grande Fantasie de Concert sur le Pardon de Ploërmel de Meyerbeer, a virtuoso piano work in nine sections
Jules Massenet
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Massenet photographed by
Pierre Petit, 1880
Jules Massenet
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Massenet's birthplace in Montaud, photographed c. 1908
Jules Massenet
–
Massenet in the early 1860s
Jules Massenet
–
Auditorium of the
Opéra-Comique
26.
Don Quichotte
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Don Quichotte is an opera in five acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Henri Caïn. It was first performed on 19 February 1910 at the Opéra de Monte-Carlo, massenets comédie-héroïque, like so many other dramatized versions of the story of Don Quixote, relates only indirectly to the great novel Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes. The immediate inspiration was Le chevalier de la longue figure, a play by the poet Jacques Le Lorrain first performed in Paris in 1904. In this version of the story, the farm girl Aldonza of the original novel becomes the more sophisticated Dulcinée. In order to concentrate on new work, he interrupted composition of his other opera. Despite its five acts, there is two hours of music in the opera. Massenet identified personally with his comic-heroic protagonist, as he was in love with Lucy Arbell who sang Dulcinée at the first performance and he was then 67 and died just two years later. The role of Don Quichotte was one of the most notable achievements of the Russian bass Feodor Chaliapin, the opera was one of six commissioned from Massenet by Raoul Gunsbourg for the Opéra de Monte-Carlo. Don Quichotte was premiered in Monte Carlo on 19 February 1910, followed by stagings in Brussels, Marseille and Paris, in 1912 it was presented at the French Opera House in New Orleans, and the London Opera House. On 15 November 1913 the work was presented in Philadelphia, the Chicago premiere of the work took place at the Auditorium Theatre on 27 January 1914 and featured Vanni Marcoux and Mary Garden in the lead roles. Marcoux reprised the role in Chicago with Coe Glade during the inaugural season of the Chicago Civic Opera House in December 1929. Don Quichotte received its premiere in Budapest in 1917, and the Opéra-Comique in Paris presented it in 1924 with Marcoux in the role, Arbell and Fugère. The Metropolitan Opera in New York City performed it nine times in 1926, besides frequent and periodic revivals of it at Monte Carlo and in France, it was also shown with great success in Italy. The Polish premiere was at the Kraków Opera in 1962, nicolai Ghiaurov sang the title role to great acclaim at Lyric Opera of Chicago in 1974 and again in 1981. Lyric Opera of Chicago mounted the work again in 1993 with Samuel Ramey, Jean-Philippe Lafont, the first revival in Britain since 1912 was given by English National Opera in October 1994, with Richard van Allan as Quixote. The production was presented again in 1996, the opera was performed at the Seattle Opera in February/March 2011 with John Relyea in the title role. In 2012 the Mariinsky Theatre of St Petersburg staged a new production and it is also being put on by Chicagos Lyric Opera in 2016. Place, Spain A square in front of Dulcinées house A festival is being celebrated, four hopeful admirers of Dulcinée serenade her from the street
Don Quichotte
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Jules Massenet
Don Quichotte
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Poster for the first Paris production, at the
Gaîté-Lyrique in 1910.
Don Quichotte
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Feodor Chaliapin as Don Quichotte by
Alexandre Jacovleff
Don Quichotte
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Lucien Fugère as Sancho, Paris 1910.
27.
Titta Ruffo
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Titta Ruffo, born as Ruffo Titta Cafiero, was an Italian operatic baritone who had a major international singing career. Maurel said that the notes of Ruffos upper register were the most glorious baritone sounds he had ever heard, indeed Walter Legge, the prominent classical record producer, went so far as to call Ruffo a genius. Born Ruffo Titta in Pisa, Ruffo was the son of an engineer and he studied voice with several teachers. I studied four months at the Santa Cecilia Conservatory in Rome under Signor Persichini and was told that I possessed neither voice nor musical talent, I remained his faithful pupil for six years and am the living proof of his scientific method of voice production. All those asserting that they have been my teacher and therefore responsible for my success arrogate to themselves false, Ruffo made his operatic debut in 1898 at the Teatro Constanzi in Rome as the Herald in Wagners Lohengrin. After a slow start, his career took off in the early 1900s and he achieved international renown due to the power and ardency of voice. His other major debuts occurred in the venues and years, Buenos Aires, London, Milan, Lisbon. Ruffo made his American debut in Philadelphia in 1912 and sang extensively in Chicago and he reached the New York Metropolitan Opera relatively late in his career, in 1922, as Figaro in The Barber of Seville, having enlisted in the Italian army during World War I. He would give a total of 46 performances at the Met from 1922 through to 1929, both of them also favored a virile interpretive style and even shared a teacher in Venceslao Persichini. Legge said that, From the his first phrase the audience was vanquished by the beauty of his voice—manly, broad, sympathetic. Such ease of production, such abundance of ringing high Gs, but more, Ruffos infinite subtlety, variety of tone-colour, interpretive insight and sincerity, his magnificent control, stupendous breathing powers, and impeccable phrasing stamped him as a genius. Ruffo was a recording artist. Then upon arriving in the United States in 1912 he began his association with the Victor Talking Machine Company which concluded in 1929. As was the case with Caruso, Ruffos voice recorded exceptionally well and it was so rich and resonant that even via the primitive acoustic recording process, much glory remains to be heard. As Steane and Pleasants mention, Ruffo made records at his peak of two arias which stand-out as exemplars of his voice and style, the first example is the Brindisi from Hamlet, the cadenza of which demonstrates his astounding élan and breath control. The second is the unaccompanied Allerta, marinar, from Meyerbeers LAfricaine, which exhibits the resonance, power and brilliance of his upper register. For examples of his agility, his early discs of Largo al factotum from Il barbiere di Siviglia stand out. All these recordings can be heard on CD compendiums issued by the Pearl, Ruffo was never a house baritone or a resident singer with any opera company, he was a nomadic star in his own right and received top billing—and top fees—wherever he sang
Titta Ruffo
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Titta Ruffo early in his career
Titta Ruffo
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Ruffo as
Rigoletto
Titta Ruffo
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Titta Ruffo, circa 1910–1915
28.
Geraldine Farrar
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Geraldine Farrar was an American soprano opera singer and film actress, noted for her beauty, acting ability, and the intimate timbre of her voice. She had a following among young women, who were nicknamed Gerry-flappers. Farrar was born Alice Geraldine Farrar in Melrose, Massachusetts, the daughter of baseball player Sidney Farrar, at 5 she began studying music in Boston and by 14 was giving recitals. Later she studied voice with the American soprano Emma Thursby in New York City, in Paris and she appeared in the title roles of Ambroise Thomas Mignon and Jules Massenets Manon, as well as Juliette in Gounods Roméo et Juliette. Her admirers in Berlin included Crown Prince Wilhelm of Germany, with whom she is believed to have had a beginning in 1903. After three years with the Monte Carlo Opera, she made her debut at the New York Metropolitan Opera in Romeo et Juliette on November 26,1906. She appeared in the first Met performance of Giacomo Puccinis Madama Butterfly in 1907 and remained a member of the company until her retirement in 1922 and she developed a great popular following, especially among New Yorks young female opera-goers, who were known as Gerry-flappers. According to a New York Tribune review of the first performance and she recorded extensively for the Victor Talking Machine Company and was often featured prominently in that firms advertisements. She was one of the first performers to make a radio broadcast and she also appeared in silent movies, which were filmed between opera seasons. Farrar starred in more than a dozen films from 1915 to 1920, De Milles 1915 adaptation of Georges Bizets opera Carmen, for which she was extensively praised. Miss Farrars Carmen in the films is the greatest triumph the motion picture has yet achieved over the speaking stage, for her performance, she came in fourth place in the 1916 Screen Masterpiece contest held by Motion Picture Magazine, ahead of any other actress. Theda Baras performance of the same role received 9,150 votes, one of her other notable screen roles was as Joan of Arc in the 1917 film Joan the Woman. According to her biographer, In 1960 Farrar was awarded two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, in the music and film categories. However, the Los Angeles Times, which has documented and photographed every star as part of its ongoing Hollywood Star Walk project, was unable to locate the star honoring her film career, Farrar had a seven-year love affair with the Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini. Her ultimatum, that he leave his wife and children and marry her, Farrar was close friends with the star tenor Enrico Caruso and there has been speculation that they too had a love affair, but no conclusive evidence of this has surfaced. It is said that Caruso coined her motto, Farrar farà and her marriage to cinema actor Lou Tellegen on February 8,1916 was the source of considerable scandal. The marriage ended, as a result of her husbands numerous affairs, the circumstances of the divorce were brought again to public recollection by Tellegens bizarre 1934 suicide in Hollywood. Farrar reportedly said Why should that interest me, Farrar retired from opera in 1922 at the age of 40
Geraldine Farrar
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Farrar in
Julien in 1914
Geraldine Farrar
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Geraldine Farrar
Geraldine Farrar
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Geraldine Farrar as the Goosegirl,
Metropolitan Opera, 1910. Farrar trained her own flock of live geese for the World Premiere, expressing hope that future performers would do the same.
Geraldine Farrar
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Farrar as
Manon
29.
Mary Garden
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Mary Garden, was a Scottish operatic soprano with a substantial career in France and America in the first third of the 20th century. Described as the Sarah Bernhardt of opera, Garden was an actress as well as a talented singer. She was particularly admired for her performances which employed interesting uses of vocal color. Possessing a beautiful voice that had a wide vocal range and considerable amount of flexibility. She became the soprano at the Opéra-Comique, notably portraying roles in several world premieres. She worked closely with Jules Massenet, in whose operas she excelled, Massenet notably wrote the title role in his opera Chérubin for her. In 1907, Oscar Hammerstein convinced Garden to join the Manhattan Opera House in New York where she became an immediate success. By 1910 she was a name in America and Garden appeared in operas in several major American cities, including performing with the Boston Opera Company. Between 1910 and 1932 Garden worked in opera houses in Chicago. She first worked with the Chicago Grand Opera Company and then joined the Chicago Opera Association in 1915, although director for only one year, Garden was notably responsible for staging the world premiere of Sergei Prokofievs The Love for Three Oranges before the company went bankrupt in 1922. Shortly thereafter she became the director of the Chicago Civic Opera where she commissioned the opera Camille by 28-year-old composer Hamilton Forrest and she sang roles at the Civic Opera until 1931, notably in several United States and world premieres. Additionally, Garden appeared in two silent films made by Samuel Goldwyn, after retiring from the opera stage in 1934, Garden worked as a talent scout for MGM. She also gave lectures and recitals, mostly on the life and works of Claude Debussy and she retired to Scotland and in 1951 published a successful autobiography, Mary Gardens Story. Her voice is preserved on a number of made for the Gramophone Company, Edison Records, Pathé, Columbia Records. Mary Garden was one of four daughters, she and two others were born in Aberdeen, Scotland, while another was born in the United States and they then moved to Hartford, Connecticut a few years later, thence Chicago in 1888 when Mary was 14. She showed promise as a singer, and studied with Sarah Robinson-Duff in Chicago under the financial support of wealthy patrons David. In 1896 she pursued studies in Paris, chiefly with Trabadelo and Lucien Fugère. She also studied some under Jacques Bouhy, Jules Chevalier, in 1899 Garden lost the backing of her benefactors, and she began to study singing with the American soprano Sibyl Sanderson
Mary Garden
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Mary Garden
Mary Garden
Mary Garden
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Mary Garden, 1908
Mary Garden
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Mary Garden as Mélisande in Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande
30.
Tito Schipa
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Tito Schipa was an Italian tenore di grazia. Schipa was born Raffaele Attilio Amedeo Schipa in Lecce into an Arbëreshë family and he studied in Milan and made his operatic debut at age 21 in 1910 at Vercelli. He subsequently appeared throughout Italy and in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1917, he created the role of Ruggiero in Puccinis La rondine. In 1919, Schipa traveled to the United States, joining the Chicago Opera Company and he remained with the Chicago company until 1932, whereupon he appeared at the New York Metropolitan Opera from 1932 to 1935, and again in 1941. He also sang at the San Francisco Opera, beginning in 1924, from 1929 to 1949 he performed regularly in Italy, including at La Scala, Milan and the Rome Opera. He returned to Buenos Aires to sing in 1954, in 1957, he toured the Soviet Union. Schipas artistry is preserved on film, for example, in 1929 he appeared in a Vitaphone movie short, singing Mappari tuttamor from Flotows opera Martha. In concert, Schipa performed an array of lyrical operatic arias and songs, including Neapolitan. Schipa made numerous recordings of arias and songs during his career. His recorded output included a famous 78-rpm set of Donizettis Don Pasquale and this is still in circulation on CD. He also recorded several tangos, some of which were composed by him in Spanish, mostly in Buenos Aires, thanks to his early Latin American tours, Schipa was a very popular tenor in Latin America. Like his contemporary Richard Tauber, Tito Schipa was also a conductor, although a few contemporary critics considered Schipas voice to be small in size, restricted in range and slightly husky in timbre, he was still extremely popular with the public. Yet it has often noted that this is probably the worst recording Schipa ever made. Although he undertook concert engagements until 1962, Schipa retired from the stage in 1958 to teach voice. He died from diabetes in 1965 at the age of 77 in New York City and he was a National Patron of Delta Omicron, an international professional music fraternity. His son Tito Schipa Jr. is a composer, singer-songwriter, producer, writer, three Lucky Fools To Live Mad About Opera Tito Schipa - Opera Vivràs biography on Schipa. TitoSchipa. it - English version of the Italian site run by the Schipa family, Tito Schipa at the Internet Movie Database. Tito Schipa sings Una furtiva lagrima from Lelisir Damore on YouTube - A1929 video of Schipa singing the aria Una furtiva lagrima from Gaetano Donizettis Lelisir Damore, history of the Tenor - Sound Clips and Narration Илка Попова
Tito Schipa
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Tito Schipa
31.
Beniamino Gigli
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Beniamino Gigli was an Italian opera singer. The most famous tenor of his generation, he was renowned internationally for the beauty of his voice. Music critics sometimes took him to task, however, for what was perceived to be the over-emotionalism of his interpretations, nevertheless, such was Giglis talent, he is considered to be one of the very finest tenors in the recorded history of music. Gigli was born in Recanati, in the Marche, the son of a shoemaker who loved opera and his parents did not, however, view music as a secure career. Beniaminos brother Lorenzo became a famous Italian painter, in 1914, he won first prize in an international singing competition in Parma. His operatic debut came on October 15,1914, when he played Enzo in Amilcare Ponchiellis La Gioconda in Rovigo, Gigli rose to true international prominence after the death of the great Italian tenor Enrico Caruso in 1921. Such was his popularity with audiences he was often called Caruso Secondo, in fact, the comparison was not valid as Caruso had a bigger, darker, more heroic voice than Giglis sizable yet honey-toned lyric instrument. Gigli left the Met in 1932, ostensibly after refusing to take a pay cut, giulio Gatti-Casazza, the Mets then general manager, was furious at his companys most popular male singer, he told the press that Gigli was the only singer not to accept the pay cut. After leaving the Met, Gigli returned again to Italy, and sang in houses there, elsewhere in Europe and he was criticised for being a favourite singer of the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, having recorded the Fascist anthem Giovinezza in 1937. Toward the end of World War II, he was able to give few performances, however, he immediately returned to the stage when the war ended in 1945, and the audience acclaim was greater and more clamorous than ever. In addition to his performances, Gigli appeared as an actor in over twenty films from 1935 to 1953. In the last few years of his life, Gigli gave concert performances more often than he appeared on stage, before his retirement in 1955, Gigli undertook an exhausting world tour of farewell concerts. This impaired his health in the two years that remained to him, during which time he helped prepare his memoirs, Gigli died in Rome in 1957. Like many artists, Gigli was a man of contradictions, on one hand, he gave more fund-raising concerts and raised more money than any other singer in history, with close to one thousand benefit concerts. He was deeply devoted to Padre Pio, his confessor, to whom he donated an amount of money. Also, Gigli sang an unusual amount of sacred music, atypical of an operatic tenor. Additionally, he was throughout his life devoted to the sacred music of Don Lorenzo Perosi. On the other hand, Giglis relationships with women were often tainted by scandal and he lied in his memoirs, saying that he was married six months earlier than he really was
Beniamino Gigli
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Beniamino Gigli in an image from 1914
32.
Claudia Muzio
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Claudia Muzio was an Italian operatic soprano, whose international career was among the most successful of the early 20th century. Her mother was a singer, Giovanna Gavirati. Muzio then continued her studies in Milan with Elettra Callery-Viviani. She was invited to the Met in New York in December 1916 and was so successful that she continued to appear there during six successive years. It was at the Metropolitan that Muzio created the role of Giorgetta in Il tabarro, in the world première of Puccinis triple bill, Il trittico and she established a special relationship with audiences at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, where she first appeared in June 1919. From then until 1934 she sang there in 23 different operas, between 1922 and 1932, she appeared regularly in Chicago. On 15 October 1932, she performed the role of Tosca to inaugurate the new War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco. Her last and according to some critics her greatest role was in Rome in 1934 as Cecilia in the opera of that name written for her by Licinio Refice and her most popular role, however, was Violetta, in which she was considered unsurpassed throughout the Latin opera world. Muzio was noted for the beauty and warmth of her voice and her performances were sometimes criticised for excessive use of dynamic extremes, including her exquisitely expressive pianissimo singing. She remained modest and even reclusive despite her fame and wealth. In her later years, Muzio experienced some financial anxiety after losing money through the extravagance of a manager/rumoured lover, in 1929 she married Renato Liberati, seventeen years her junior. In 1930 she started to experience health problems, but continued singing and recording. On 24 May 1936, after an illness, she died in a Rome hotel of what was officially described as heart failure. She is buried in the Cimitero del Verano in Rome, Muzio is represented by recordings from various stages of her career, but few of them are from the period of her greatest successes in the late 1920s and early 1930s. She also recorded primarily for two companies whose distribution was limited and erratic, Pathé and Edison and she was aided at Edison by chief recordist Walter Miller and staff conductor Cesare Sodero. Muzio recorded two arias, including Sì, mi chiamano Mimì from La bohème, when she was only 22 and her voice and technique were still relatively immature. In October, Muzio appeared in the production of Tosca at the San Francisco War Memorial Opera House, the opening night was recorded for radio. Muzio personally produced and financed a set of 26 recordings for Columbia in 1934 and 1935, by 1935, there is some noticeable weakening of the top of her voice but her expressive powers are well-displayed, especially in Addio del passato from Verdis La traviata
Claudia Muzio
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Muzio in 1916
33.
Lily Pons
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Lily Pons was a French-American operatic soprano and actress who had an active career from the late 1920s through the early 1970s. As an opera singer she specialized in the soprano repertoire and was particularly associated with the title roles in Lakmé. She also had a successful and lucrative career as a singer which continued until her retirement from performance in 1973. From 1935–37 she made three films for RKO Pictures. She also made appearances on radio and on television, performing on variety programs like The Ed Sullivan Show, The Colgate Comedy Hour. In 1955 she topped the bill for the first broadcast of what became a television series. She made dozens of records, recording both classical and popular music and she was awarded the Croix de Lorraine and the Légion dhonneur by the Government of France. Pons was also savvy at making herself into a cultural icon. Her opinions on fashion and home decorating were frequently reported in womens magazines, a town in Maryland named itself after her, and thereafter the singer contrived to have all her Christmas cards posted from Lilypons, Maryland. Pons was born as Alice Joséphine Pons in Draguignan near Cannes, to a French father, Léonard Louis Auguste Antoine Pons, and she first studied piano at the Paris Conservatory, winning the First Prize at the age of 15. On October 15,1930, Pons married her first husband, August Mesritz, a successful publisher, the marriage would end in divorce on December 7,1933. In 1925, encouraged by soprano Dyna Beumer and Mesritz, who agreed to fund her singing career and she later studied singing with Alice Zeppilli in New York. Pons successfully made her debut in the title role of Léo Delibes Lakmé at Mulhouse in 1928. She was discovered by the dramatic tenor/impresario Giovanni Zenatello, who took her to New York where she auditioned for Giulio Gatti-Casazza, the Met needed a star coloratura after the retirement of Amelita Galli-Curci in January,1930. Gatti-Casazza engaged Pons immediately and she signed a recording contract with RCA Victor. On January 3,1931, Pons, unknown in the U. S. made an unheralded Met debut as Lucia in Donizettis Lucia di Lammermoor and she became a star and inherited most of Galli-Curcis important coloratura roles. Her career after this point was primarily in the United States and she became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1940. From 1938 to 1958, she was married to conductor André Kostelanetz, in 1955 they built a home in Palm Springs, California
Lily Pons
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Lily Pons
Lily Pons
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Lily Pons at
CKAC,
Montreal
Lily Pons
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Pons in 1935
34.
Pietro Mascagni
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Pietro Antonio Stefano Mascagni was an Italian composer most noted for his operas. His 1890 masterpiece Cavalleria Rusticana caused one of the greatest sensations in opera history, Mascagni said that at one point, Iris was performed in Italy more often than Cavalleria. Mascagni wrote fifteen operas, an operetta, several orchestral and vocal works, as well as songs and he enjoyed immense success during his lifetime, both as a composer and conductor of his own and other peoples music. Mascagni was born in Livorno, Tuscany, the son of Domenico. His father owned and operated a bakery, giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti was born the same year in the same city and became Mascagnis lifelong friend and collaborator. In 1876, at the age of 13, Mascagni began musical studies with Alfredo Soffredini, the older man had just completed his musical studies in Milan. Also a native of Livorno, Soffredini was a composer, teacher, the youth started composing rapidly, and between 1879 and 1880, he composed several works, Sinfonia in do minore, Prima sinfonia in fa maggiore, Elegia, Kyrie, Gloria and Ave Maria. The premiere of Mascagnis first cantata, In Filanda, took place at the Istituto Cherubini on 9 February 1881, performed at a musical contest in Milan, the cantata won the first prize. In the same year Mascagni met the musicians Arrigo Boito and Amilcare Ponchielli in Milan, in 1882, he composed his Cantata alla gioia from a text by Gustav Schiller, followed by La stella di Garibaldi for voice and piano, and La tua stella. On 6 May Mascagni left Livorno for Milan and he passed the admission examination of the Milan Conservatory on 12 October. In Milan, Mascagni met the noted composer Giacomo Puccini, on 9 January 1883, Mascagnis sister, Maria, died. The cantata In Filanda became Pinotta, and was proposed for the musical contest of the Conservatorio, in 1884, he composed Ballata for tenor and piano, Mama non mama, scherzo for soprano and piano, Messagio damore, and Alla luna. In 1885, Mascagni composed Il Re a Napoli in Cremona and he left Milan without completing his studies. That year, he began touring as a conductor in the companies of Vittorio Forlì, Alfonso and Ciro Scognamiglio, and, in Genova. Mascagni met the impresario Luigi Maresca in 1886 and started working with him and that December, Mascagni arrived in Cerignola with Marescas company. He was accompanied by Argenide Marcellina Carbognani, his future wife, helped by the mayor Giuseppe Cannone, Mascagni soon left the company of Maresca, not without problems. He was appointed as the master of music and singing of the new philharmonia of Cerignola, in February 1888, he began work on the Messa di Gloria. In July, Casa Sonzogno announced in the Teatro Illustrato its second competition for a one-act opera, the following year, Mascagni completed his composition of Cavalleria rusticana on 27 May and sent the manuscript to Milan
Pietro Mascagni
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Pietro Mascagni in 1903
Pietro Mascagni
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Original Amica poster (1905)
Pietro Mascagni
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Mascagni caricatured by WH for
Vanity Fair, 1912
Pietro Mascagni
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Plaque dedicated to Mascagni in Rome
35.
Amica (opera)
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Amica is an opera in two acts by Pietro Mascagni, originally composed to a libretto by Paul Bérel. The only opera by Mascagni with a French libretto, it was a success with both the audience and the critics on its opening night at the Théâtre du Casino in Monte-Carlo on 16 March 1905. The opera had its Italian premiere on 13 May 1905 at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome, however, like many of Mascagnis operas apart from Cavalleria rusticana, the work then fell into obscurity. One of its few revivals in modern times was on 4 August 2007 at the Festival della Valle dItria, in October 2008, Opera di Roma used the Italian libretto for a new production of Amica in collaboration with Opéra de Monte-Carlo and the Teatro Carlo Goldoni in Livorno. Set in the mountains of Savoy around 1900, Amica is a classic verismo drama and it recounts a domestic tragedy involving two brothers and the woman they both love. In Italian, Katia Ricciarelli, Fabio Armiliato, Walter Donati, Elia Padovan, Hungarian Radio, DVD version, Dynamic, distributed by Naxos, filmed at the Palazzo Ducale, Martina Franca, Italy, 4–6 August 2007. ISBN 1-55553-524-0 Libretto in Italian at Mascagni. org Opera di Roma website
Amica (opera)
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Poster for Amica published by
Casa Ricordi in 1905
36.
Giacomo Puccini
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Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian opera composer who has been called the greatest composer of Italian opera after Verdi. Puccinis early work was rooted in traditional late-19th-century romantic Italian opera, later, he successfully developed his work in the realistic verismo style, of which he became one of the leading exponents. Puccinis most renowned works are La bohème, Tosca, and Madama Butterfly, Puccini was born Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini in Lucca in Tuscany, in 1858. He was one of nine children of Michele Puccini and Albina Magi, the Puccini family was established in Lucca as a local musical dynasty by Puccinis great-great grandfather – also named Giacomo. This first Giacomo Puccini was maestro di cappella of the Cattedrale di San Martino in Lucca and he was succeeded in this position by his son, Antonio Puccini, and then by Antonios son Domenico, and Domenicos son Michele. Each of these men studied music at Bologna, and some additional musical studies elsewhere. Domenico Puccini studied for a time under Giovanni Paisiello, each composed music for the church. In addition, Domenico composed several operas, and Michele composed one opera, Puccinis father Michele enjoyed a reputation throughout northern Italy, and his funeral was an occasion of public mourning, at which the then-famed composer Giovanni Pacini conducted a Requiem. However, when Michele Puccini died in 1864, his son Giacomo was only six years old, as a child, he nevertheless participated in the musical life of the Cattedrale di San Martino, as a member of the boys choir and later as a substitute organist. Puccini was given an education at the seminary of San Michele in Lucca. One of Puccinis uncles, Fortunato Magi, supervised his musical education, Puccini got a diploma from the Pacini School of Music in Lucca in 1880, having studied there with his uncle Fortunato, and later with Carlo Angeloni, who had also instructed Alfredo Catalani. Puccini studied at the conservatory for three years, sharing a room with Pietro Mascagni, in 1880, at the age of 21, Puccini composed his Mass, which marks the culmination of his familys long association with church music in his native Lucca. Puccini wrote a piece called the Capriccio sinfonica as a thesis composition for the Milan Conservatory. Puccinis teachers Ponchielli and Bazzini were impressed by the work, and it was performed at a student concert at the conservatory on 14 July 1883, conducted by Franco Faccio. Puccinis work was reviewed in the Milanese publication Perseveranza. After the premiere of the Capriccio sinfonica, Ponchielli and Puccini discussed the possibility that Puccinis next work might be an opera, Ponchielli invited Puccini to stay at his villa, where Puccini was introduced to another young man named Fernando Fontana. Puccini and Fontana agreed to collaborate on an opera, for which Fontana would provide the libretto, the work, Le Villi, was entered into a competition sponsored by the Sozogno music publishing company in 1883. Although it did not win, Le Villi was later staged at the Teatro Dal Verme, G. Ricordi & Co. music publishers assisted with the premier by printing the libretto without charge
Giacomo Puccini
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Giacomo Puccini
Giacomo Puccini
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Puccini's birthplace, seen in 1984
Giacomo Puccini
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Original poster for Puccini's
Tosca
Giacomo Puccini
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Puccini photographed in 1908
37.
La rondine
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La rondine is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Giuseppe Adami, based on a libretto by Alfred Maria Willner and Heinz Reichert. It was first performed at the Grand Théâtre de Monte Carlo in Monte Carlo on 27 March 1917, in autumn 1913, the directors of Viennas Carltheater commissioned Puccini to compose a Viennese operetta. After confirming that it could take the form of an opera with no spoken dialogue in the style of Der Rosenkavalier, only more entertaining and more organic. The work proceeded for two years, sometimes intensely, sometimes with difficulty, and in spring 1916 the opera was finished. A feature of the music is Puccinis use of dance rhythms, such as the tango. At the premiere in Monte Carlo in 1917 the initial reception by the public, however, despite the artistic value of the score, La rondine has been one of Puccinis less successful works, In box office terms, was the poor cousin to the other great hits. At the end of this version, Magda is left alone with Lisette, the third version was not heard until 1994 in Turin. Moreover, a fire at Casa Sonzogno archives caused by Allied bombing during the war destroyed parts of the score which had to be restored based on the surviving vocal-piano arrangements. As part of a 1958 celebration marking the centenary of Puccinis birth, the revival was well-received, with audiences and critics deeming it a success. 2012 Teatro Nacional de Sao Carlos, Portuguese Symphony Orchestra, marta Domingos production of La rondine in Bonn in 1995 used the third version, but added to the tragedy by having Magda commit suicide by drowning in the final bars of the opera. This version of the opera has since been staged by the Washington National Opera, on 31 December 2008, again with Gheorghiu as Magda, the Met in New York gave the companys first staging in 70 years. The matinée performance on 10 January 2009 was broadcast in HD to movie theaters and this opera also was performed by Des Moines Metro Opera in July 2012, starring Joyce El-Khoury. Place, Paris and the French Riviera, Magdas salon, Paris At a cocktail party hosted by the courtesan Magda, the poet Prunier expounds his theories on love. Magdas friends Yvette, Bianca and Suzy playfully mock him, while Lisette, Magdas maid, Prunier takes offence and Magda orders Lisette to leave. Prunier maintains that no one is immune to love and sings the first verse of his latest song about Doretta. He does not know how to finish the song, so Magda takes over and provides the second verse, Magdas guests are charmed by her performance and her long-term protector Rambaldo gives her a pearl necklace. Lisette enters to announce the arrival of a young man – the son of an old friend of Rambaldo. Lisette is ordered by Rambaldo to bring in the guest, suddenly nostalgic, Magda recalls her life as a young working girl and happy evenings spent dancing at Bulliers, where she first experienced love
La rondine
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Giacomo Puccini
La rondine
38.
Prince Albert II
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Albert II is the reigning monarch of the Principality of Monaco and head of the princely house of Grimaldi. He is the son of Prince Rainier III and the American actress Grace Kelly, Prince Alberts sisters are Caroline, Princess of Hanover, and Princess Stéphanie. In July 2011, Prince Albert married Charlene Wittstock, Prince Albert II is one of the wealthiest royals in the world, with assets valued at more than $1 billion, which include land in Monaco and France. Albert was born in the Princes Palace of Monaco and he has ancestry from Ireland, Britain, the United States, Germany, France, Belgium, and Monaco. His godmother was the Spanish queen Victoria Eugenia of Battenberg, Albert graduated with distinction from the Lycee Albert Premier, in 1976. He was a camper and later a counselor for six summers at Camp Tecumseh, on Lake Winnipesaukee, Moultonborough, New Hampshire and he speaks French, English, German, and Italian. He spent the summer of 1979 touring Europe and the Middle East with the Amherst Glee Club, Albert also undertook an exchange program with the University of Bristol, at the Alfred Marshall School of Economics and Management in 1979. Albert was a sportsman, participating in cross country, javelin throwing, handball, judo, swimming, tennis, rowing, sailing, skiing, squash. He is a patron of Monacos football teams, Albert competed in the bobsleigh at five consecutive Winter Olympics for Monaco, taking part in both the two-man and four-man events. In the two-man bobsleigh Albert finished 25th at the 1988 games in Calgary, 43rd at the 1992 games in Albertville, and 31st at the 2002 games. In the four-man bobsleigh Albert finished 27th in 1992, 26th at the 1994 games in Lillehammer, Albert was Monacos flag bearer at the 1988,1994, and 1998 Winter Olympics. Albert took part in the 1985 Paris–Dakar Rally, but did not finish it and he also became a judo black belt. On 7 March 2005, Alberts father was admitted to a hospital in the principality, the Prince was being treated for breathing, kidney, and heart trouble. This decision was reached by the Crown Council of Monaco, a made up of notable local figures with residual powers to make judgments about certain constitutional matters. On 6 April 2005, Ranier III died and Albert succeeded him as Albert II, the first part of Prince Albert IIs enthronement as ruler of the Principality was on 12 July 2005, after the end of the three-month mourning period for his father. A morning mass at Saint Nicholas Cathedral presided over by the Archbishop of Monaco, afterward Albert II returned to the princely palace to host a garden party for 7,000 Monégasques born in the principality. In the courtyard, the Prince was presented with two keys of the city as a symbol of his investiture, the evening ended with a spectacular fireworks display on the waterfront. The second part of his investiture was on 19 November 2005, Albert was enthroned at Saint Nicholas Cathedral
Prince Albert II
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Albert II
Prince Albert II
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Prince Albert with his mother
Grace in 1972.
Prince Albert II
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Princess Caroline and Albert, then Hereditary Prince of Monaco, with
Ronald and
Nancy Reagan in
Washington D.C. on 28 March 1983.
Prince Albert II
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Prince Albert with
Russian President Vladimir Putin on 4 October 2013.
39.
Princess Charlene
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Charlene, Princess of Monaco, is a former Olympic swimmer for South Africa and wife of Prince Albert II. Princess Charlene was born in Rhodesia, the daughter of Michael and Lynette Wittstock, Princess Charlene represented South Africa at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, with her team finishing fifth in the 4 ×100 metre medley relay. Princess Charlene retired from swimming in 2007. Princess Charlene met Prince Albert at the Mare Nostrum swimming competition in Monte Carlo and they were first seen together in 2006, and Princess Charlene has accompanied Prince Albert on many of his official duties since then. They announced their engagement in June 2010, and were married on 1 July 2011, Princess Charlenes pregnancy was announced on 30 May 2014. On 10 December 2014, The Princess of Monaco gave birth to Princess Gabriella, Princess Charlene was born on 25 January 1978 in Bulawayo, Rhodesia, the daughter of Michael Kenneth Wittstock, a sales manager, and Lynette Wittstock, a former competitive diver and swimming coach. Two brothers were born over the five years, Gareth, a computer technician, and Sean. The family relocated to South Africa in 1989, when Charlene was 11 years old and she attended Tom Newby Primary school in Benoni, near Johannesburg, from 1988 to 1991. In South Africa, the Wittstocks worked as handyworkers and unsuccessfully prospected for diamonds, gottliebs son, Heinrich Carl Wittstock would marry Olive Florence Caldwell, of English origin. Their son Dudley Kenneth Wittstock, Charlenes paternal grandfather, married Sylvia Fagan Nicolson, Charlene was given a certificate in 2014 which verified her Irish ancestry. Michael Wittstock announced in April 2011 that he was considering moving the family from Benoni to Monaco because of the crime rate. Charlene won three medals and a silver medal at the 1999 All-Africa Games in Johannesburg. She represented South Africa at the 1998 and 2002 Commonwealth Games and she also was a member of the South African womens 4×100 m medley team at the 2000 Summer Olympics, which finished fifth. Charlene finished sixth at the 2002 FINA Short Course World Championships for the 200 m breaststroke and she left her Durban-based team to join the Tuks Swimming Club at the High Performance Centre of the University of Pretoria. The Club sponsored her by providing her with access to their pools, free coaching, accommodations. Over the years she has won national titles. She planned to compete in the 2008 Summer Olympics in China, which she said would be her swansong, previously she had been out of competitive swimming for 18 months with a shoulder injury. Charlene said she would be swimming in Europe in the near future, I have a year left of competitive swimming, and I just want to be the best I can be in that time
Princess Charlene
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Charlene at the
wedding of Princess Madeleine of Sweden in June 2013
Princess Charlene
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The Prince and Princess at the "Cinema Against AIDS" Gala with
Karl Lagerfeld (right)
40.
Naked Heart Foundation
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The Naked Heart Foundation is a charity that aims to ensure that every child in Russia has a loving family and a safe and stimulating place to play. It is the essence of play that a new relation is created… between situations in thought and real situations, the organisation built its first Play Park in 2006 in Nizhny Novgorod as part of its Play with Purpose programme. It has since built over 158 Play Parks and Playgrounds, architect and artist Adam Kalkin provided the design for the parks recreation centres, which are constructed using shipping containers. In 2011 the Naked Heart Foundation launched a new programme - Every Child Deserves a Family and it focuses on supporting families raising children with special needs. The Naked Heart Foundation gives financial and administrative aid to professionals working for NGOs that assist families of children who have special developmental needs, there have been several events to raise funds for the Foundation - most notably the Love Ball. The 2008 Love Ball in Moscow was organised as a three-day event culminating with the Love Ball on Valentine’s evening, the 2010 Love Ball was held in London and supported by De Beers. The evening involved a charity auction of various pieces by De Beers and was attended by people from the worlds of fashion, art. The 2011 Love Ball was a event held in the grounds of Valentino Garavanis 17th century Chateau de Wideville near Paris. The theme of the event was White Fairy Tale, with most guests dressing in white or silver in keeping with the fairytale theme, the 2013 Love Ball RIVIERA was held in Monte-Carlo on 27 July under the High Patronage of H. S. H. Prince Albert II and the Presidencies of H. S. H, the organisation has offices in Nizhny Novgorod, Moscow and London. The Foundations accounts are available under its entry on the Charity Commissions website, the Naked Heart website Naked Heart Foundation at the Charity Commission
Naked Heart Foundation
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Naked Heart Foundation logo
Naked Heart Foundation
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Founder
41.
The New York Times
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The New York Times is an American daily newspaper, founded and continuously published in New York City since September 18,1851, by The New York Times Company. The New York Times has won 119 Pulitzer Prizes, more than any other newspaper, the papers print version in 2013 had the second-largest circulation, behind The Wall Street Journal, and the largest circulation among the metropolitan newspapers in the US. The New York Times is ranked 18th in the world by circulation, following industry trends, its weekday circulation had fallen in 2009 to fewer than one million. Nicknamed The Gray Lady, The New York Times has long been regarded within the industry as a newspaper of record. The New York Times international version, formerly the International Herald Tribune, is now called the New York Times International Edition, the papers motto, All the News Thats Fit to Print, appears in the upper left-hand corner of the front page. On Sunday, The New York Times is supplemented by the Sunday Review, The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Magazine and T, some other early investors of the company were Edwin B. Morgan and Edward B. We do not believe that everything in Society is either right or exactly wrong, —what is good we desire to preserve and improve, —what is evil, to exterminate. In 1852, the started a western division, The Times of California that arrived whenever a mail boat got to California. However, when local California newspapers came into prominence, the effort failed, the newspaper shortened its name to The New-York Times in 1857. It dropped the hyphen in the city name in the 1890s, One of the earliest public controversies it was involved with was the Mortara Affair, the subject of twenty editorials it published alone. At Newspaper Row, across from City Hall, Henry Raymond, owner and editor of The New York Times, averted the rioters with Gatling guns, in 1869, Raymond died, and George Jones took over as publisher. Tweed offered The New York Times five million dollars to not publish the story, in the 1880s, The New York Times transitioned gradually from editorially supporting Republican Party candidates to becoming more politically independent and analytical. In 1884, the paper supported Democrat Grover Cleveland in his first presidential campaign, while this move cost The New York Times readership among its more progressive and Republican readers, the paper eventually regained most of its lost ground within a few years. However, the newspaper was financially crippled by the Panic of 1893, the paper slowly acquired a reputation for even-handedness and accurate modern reporting, especially by the 1890s under the guidance of Ochs. Under Ochs guidance, continuing and expanding upon the Henry Raymond tradition, The New York Times achieved international scope, circulation, in 1910, the first air delivery of The New York Times to Philadelphia began. The New York Times first trans-Atlantic delivery by air to London occurred in 1919 by dirigible, airplane Edition was sent by plane to Chicago so it could be in the hands of Republican convention delegates by evening. In the 1940s, the extended its breadth and reach. The crossword began appearing regularly in 1942, and the section in 1946
The New York Times
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Cover of The New York Times (November 15, 2012), with the headline story reporting on
Operation Pillar of Defense.
The New York Times
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First published issue of New-York Daily Times, on September 18, 1851.
The New York Times
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The Times Square Building, The New York Times ' publishing headquarters, 1913–2007
The New York Times
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The New York Times newsroom, 1942
42.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
Geographic coordinate system
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Longitude lines are perpendicular and latitude lines are parallel to the equator.
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