|
Luisa Tetrazzini was born in Florence in 1871. Legend has it
that she started singing at the age of three and that her sister Eva, also a
soprano, taught her everything she knew. Luisa had her debut at the age of 19 in
the role of Inez in Meyerbeer’s Africana, at the Theatro Pagliano in Florence. A
number of stories are going around regarding this famous premiere. They say that
Luisa was sitting in the audience that night when it was announced that the
prima donna was indisposed. She got up and said: “Don’t despair maestro, I know
the part by heart. I’ll sing it!” More realistically, Charles Neilson Gattey,
author of the biography entitled Luisa Tetrazzini: The Florentine Nightingale,
wrote that Luisa who was then married to Giuseppe Scalaberni, the manager of the
theatre building, would slip backstage to attend all the rehearsals, memorising
the part. When the soprano announced she was sick, she was ready to take her
place. But it doesn’t matter how it happened. That night Luisa received a huge
ovation that launched her career.
From 1891 to 1906 she sang in Italy, Eastern Europe, South America, Spain and
Mexico. In 1907, following a number of intrigues she managed the tour de force
of singing the role of Violetta (La Traviata) at Covent Garden, while the
reigning diva was on tour outside the country. Tetrazzini returned to Covent
Garden every year from 1908-1912.
Numerous legal battles punctuated her career. The management at New York’s
Metropolitan made a serious mistake by not reading her contract closely and she
quietly went off to Oskar Hammerstein I’s Manhattan Opera, to sing Lakmé,
Dinorah and Elvira (I Puritani). Luisa Tetrazzini finally sang 8 times at the
met during the 1911-1912 season in the roles of Lucia, Guilda and Violetta. In
1910 an argument broke out when banker Otto Khan helped the Met buy back
Hammerstein’s contract. The diva “ran off” to San Francisco not heeding the
injunction and feeding the gossip of the local papers. She told the press that
she was prepared to sing in the street if it came to that. True to her word,
Tetrazzini sang before a delighted crowd estimated at over 200,000 people on
Christmas Eve 1910, in front of the San Francisco Chronicle Building.
Critics at the time often praised her acting talents as well as her exceptional
voice. The diva had quite a reputation for the ease with which she interpreted
the coloratura parts and for the high bright register of her voice. Until the
end of her career she could still easily sing a high E even if the rest of her
register had somewhat deteriorated. She sang until 1934 to generate revenue,
which her numerous ex-husbands were quick to dilapidate. She died in 1940 in a
state of utter poverty. She is reported to have said a short time before her
death, “I am old, I am fat, I am ugly but I remain Tetrazzini!”.
|
