Rolando Panerai
Encyclopedia
Rolando Panerai Italian baritone
, particularly associated with the Italian repertory, he enjoyed a long and distinguished career in both comic and dramatic roles.
Rolando Panerai was born in Campi Bisenzio
, near Florence
, Italy.
He studied with Frazzi in Florence and Armani and Giulia Tess in Milan
. Panerai made his debut as the pharaon in Rossini's Mosè in Egitto
at the Teatro di San Carlo
of Naples
in 1947.
Other important debuts, both in 1951, were as Simon Boccanegra in Simon Boccanegra
in Bergamo
and as Sharpless in Madama Butterfly
at La Scala
in Milan. He sang in many rarely performed Verdi opera's on radio broadcast for RAI
in 1951 (to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Verdi's death), such as Giovanna d'Arco
, La battaglia di Legnano
, and Aroldo
.
Later roles included most of the great Verdi baritone roles, particularly as the title character in Rigoletto
, The Count of Luna in Il trovatore
, Giorgio Germont in La traviata
, Marquis of Posa in Don Carlos
, Amonasro in Aida
.
Rolando Panerai has more than 150 operas in his repertory. He is best-known for comic roles: Ford in Falstaff
(his signature role), Figaro in Nozze di Figaro, Leporello in Don Giovanni
, and both Guglielmo and Alfonso in Così fan tutte
; also, Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia, both Belcore and Dulcamara in Elisir d'amore, and Malatesta and the title role in Don Pasquale
.
He possesses a warm, appealing voice, with a very comfortable, relaxed technique and effortless, ringing high notes. He has enjoyed a remarkably long and distinguished career singing Germont as recently as the year 2000 in a French televised production of La traviata, next to José Cura
and Eteri Gvazava, his voice in very good shape for a man of 76. His acting skills and stage charisma were appreciated by great directors such as Giorgio Strehler
, Franco Zeffirelli
and Luchino Visconti
.
He has been one of the best-known exponents of Gianni Schicchi
by Giacomo Puccini
for many years, singing the role in Florence as recently as 2006, at the age of 82. Recently Rolando Panerai has sung at the Paris Opera, in the Staatsoper, Frankfurt and at the Glyndebourne Festival.
Panerai left an impressive discography, often partnering with Maria Callas
and Giuseppe di Stefano
, as in: Il Trovatore
, Cavalleria Rusticana
, Pagliacci
and La bohème
. He also recorded a notable Sharpless in Madama Butterfly
, opposite Renata Scotto
and Carlo Bergonzi, and Germont La Traviata, opposite Beverly Sills
and Nicolai Gedda
. He plays Ford in four different recordings of Verdi's Falstaff
, opposite such famous interpreters of the title role as Tito Gobbi
, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
, and Giuseppe Taddei
(the latter on video, under Herbert von Karajan
). He also recorded the title role. Perhaps his strangest, most atypical recorded role is Amfortas in an Italian performance of Parsifal
, with Maria Callas
and Boris Christoff
.
He can be seen on video as Ford; Figaro in The Barber of Seville
; and in Concert on the
A Bolshoi Opera Night (DVD).
Baritone
Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...
, particularly associated with the Italian repertory, he enjoyed a long and distinguished career in both comic and dramatic roles.
Rolando Panerai was born in Campi Bisenzio
Campi Bisenzio
Campi Bisenzio is a comune in the Province of Florence in the Italian region Tuscany, located about 10 km northwest of Florence.-History:...
, near Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
, Italy.
He studied with Frazzi in Florence and Armani and Giulia Tess in Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
. Panerai made his debut as the pharaon in Rossini's Mosè in Egitto
Mosè in Egitto
Mosè in Egitto is a three-act opera written by Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Andrea Leone Tottola, which was based on a play by Francesco Ringhieri, L'Osiride, of 1760....
at the Teatro di San Carlo
Teatro di San Carlo
The Real Teatro di San Carlo is an opera house in Naples, Italy. It is the oldest continuously active such venue in Europe.Founded by the Bourbon Charles VII of Naples of the Spanish branch of the dynasty, the theatre was inaugurated on 4 November 1737 — the king's name day — with a performance...
of Naples
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...
in 1947.
Other important debuts, both in 1951, were as Simon Boccanegra in Simon Boccanegra
Simon Boccanegra
Simon Boccanegra is an opera with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on the play Simón Bocanegra by Antonio García Gutiérrez....
in Bergamo
Bergamo
Bergamo is a town and comune in Lombardy, Italy, about 40 km northeast of Milan. The comune is home to over 120,000 inhabitants. It is served by the Orio al Serio Airport, which also serves the Province of Bergamo, and to a lesser extent the metropolitan area of Milan...
and as Sharpless in Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. Puccini based his opera in part on the short story "Madame Butterfly" by John Luther Long, which was dramatized by David Belasco...
at La Scala
La Scala
La Scala , is a world renowned opera house in Milan, Italy. The theatre was inaugurated on 3 August 1778 and was originally known as the New Royal-Ducal Theatre at La Scala...
in Milan. He sang in many rarely performed Verdi opera's on radio broadcast for RAI
RAI
RAI — Radiotelevisione italiana S.p.A. known until 1954 as Radio Audizioni Italiane, is the Italian state owned public service broadcaster controlled by the Ministry of Economic Development. Rai is the biggest television company in Italy...
in 1951 (to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Verdi's death), such as Giovanna d'Arco
Giovanna d'Arco
Giovanna d'Arco is an operatic dramma lirico with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera....
, La battaglia di Legnano
La battaglia di Legnano
La battaglia di Legnano is an opera in four acts, with music by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian-language libretto by Salvadore Cammarano. It was based on the play La Bataille de Toulouse by Joseph Méry. The opera received its first performance on 27 January 1849, at the Teatro Argentina, Rome...
, and Aroldo
Aroldo
Aroldo is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on and adapted from their earlier 1850 collaboration, Stiffelio...
.
Later roles included most of the great Verdi baritone roles, particularly as the title character in Rigoletto
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 s'amuse by Victor Hugo. It was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on March 11, 1851...
, The Count of Luna in Il trovatore
Il trovatore
Il trovatore is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Salvadore Cammarano, based on the play El Trovador by Antonio García Gutiérrez. Cammarano died in mid-1852 before completing the libretto...
, Giorgio Germont in La traviata
La traviata
La traviata is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La dame aux Camélias , a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The title La traviata means literally The Fallen Woman, or perhaps more figuratively, The Woman...
, Marquis of Posa in Don Carlos
Don Carlos
Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
, Amonasro in Aida
Aida
Aida sometimes spelled Aïda, is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette...
.
Rolando Panerai has more than 150 operas in his repertory. He is best-known for comic roles: Ford in Falstaff
Falstaff (opera)
Falstaff is an operatic commedia lirica in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi, adapted by Arrigo Boito from Shakespeare's plays The Merry Wives of Windsor and scenes from Henry IV. It was Verdi's last opera, written in the composer's ninth decade, and only the second of his 26 operas to be a comedy...
(his signature role), Figaro in Nozze di Figaro, Leporello in Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
, and both Guglielmo and Alfonso in Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte, ossia La scuola degli amanti K. 588, is an opera buffa by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart first performed in 1790. The libretto was written by Lorenzo Da Ponte....
; also, Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia, both Belcore and Dulcamara in Elisir d'amore, and Malatesta and the title role in Don Pasquale
Don Pasquale
Don Pasquale is an opera buffa, or comic opera, in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. The librettist Giovanni Ruffini wrote the Italian language libretto after Angelo Anelli's libretto for Stefano Pavesi's Ser Marcantonio ....
.
He possesses a warm, appealing voice, with a very comfortable, relaxed technique and effortless, ringing high notes. He has enjoyed a remarkably long and distinguished career singing Germont as recently as the year 2000 in a French televised production of La traviata, next to José Cura
José Cura
José Cura is a prominent operatic tenor known for his intense and original interpretations of his characters, notably Verdi’s Otello and Saint-Saëns’ Samson, as well as for his unconventional and innovative concert performances. He is also able to perform high baritone roles with the extended...
and Eteri Gvazava, his voice in very good shape for a man of 76. His acting skills and stage charisma were appreciated by great directors such as Giorgio Strehler
Giorgio Strehler
Giorgio Strehler was an Italian opera and theatre director.-Biography:Strehler was born in Barcola, Trieste to an Austrian father and a Franco-Slovene mother; he grew up speaking Italian but spoke French well and his German was passable. He became suddenly fatherless at the age of three, his...
, Franco Zeffirelli
Franco Zeffirelli
Franco Zeffirelli KBE is an Italian director and producer of films and television. He is also a director and designer of operas and a former senator for the Italian center-right Forza Italia party....
and Luchino Visconti
Luchino Visconti
Luchino Visconti di Modrone, Count of Lonate Pozzolo was an Italian theatre, opera and cinema director, as well as a screenwriter. He is best known for his films The Leopard and Death in Venice .-Life:...
.
He has been one of the best-known exponents of Gianni Schicchi
Gianni Schicchi
Gianni Schicchi is a comic opera in one act by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Giovacchino Forzano, composed in 1917–18. The libretto is based on an incident mentioned in Dante's Divine Comedy. The work is the third and final part of Puccini's Il trittico —three one-act operas with...
by Giacomo Puccini
Giacomo Puccini
Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian composer whose operas, including La bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, and Turandot, are among the most frequently performed in the standard repertoire...
for many years, singing the role in Florence as recently as 2006, at the age of 82. Recently Rolando Panerai has sung at the Paris Opera, in the Staatsoper, Frankfurt and at the Glyndebourne Festival.
Panerai left an impressive discography, often partnering with Maria Callas
Maria Callas
Maria Callas was an American-born Greek soprano and one of the most renowned opera singers of the 20th century. She combined an impressive bel canto technique, a wide-ranging voice and great dramatic gifts...
and Giuseppe di Stefano
Giuseppe Di Stefano
Giuseppe Di Stefano was an Italian operatic tenor who sang professionally from the late 1940s until the early 1990s. He was known as the "Golden voice" or "The most beautiful voice", as the true successor of Beniamino Gigli...
, as in: Il Trovatore
Il trovatore
Il trovatore is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Salvadore Cammarano, based on the play El Trovador by Antonio García Gutiérrez. Cammarano died in mid-1852 before completing the libretto...
, Cavalleria Rusticana
Cavalleria rusticana
Cavalleria rusticana is an opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, adapted from a play written by Giovanni Verga based on his short story. Considered one of the classic verismo operas, it premiered on May 17, 1890 at the Teatro...
, Pagliacci
Pagliacci
Pagliacci , sometimes incorrectly rendered with a definite article as I Pagliacci, is an opera consisting of a prologue and two acts written and composed by Ruggero Leoncavallo. It recounts the tragedy of a jealous husband in a commedia dell'arte troupe...
and La bohème
La bohème
La bohème is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions quadro, a tableau or "image", rather than atto . by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger...
. He also recorded a notable Sharpless in Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. Puccini based his opera in part on the short story "Madame Butterfly" by John Luther Long, which was dramatized by David Belasco...
, opposite Renata Scotto
Renata Scotto
Renata Scotto is an Italian soprano and opera director.Recognized for her sense of style, musicality and as a remarkable singer-actress, Scotto is considered one of the preeminent singers of her generation, specializing in the bel canto repertoire with excursions into the verismo and Verdi...
and Carlo Bergonzi, and Germont La Traviata, opposite Beverly Sills
Beverly Sills
Beverly Sills was an American operatic soprano whose peak career was between the 1950s and 1970s. In her prime she was the only real rival to Joan Sutherland as the leading bel canto stylist...
and Nicolai Gedda
Nicolai Gedda
Nicolai Gedda is a Swedish operatic tenor. Having made some two hundred recordings, Gedda is said to be the most widely recorded tenor in history...
. He plays Ford in four different recordings of Verdi's Falstaff
Falstaff (opera)
Falstaff is an operatic commedia lirica in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi, adapted by Arrigo Boito from Shakespeare's plays The Merry Wives of Windsor and scenes from Henry IV. It was Verdi's last opera, written in the composer's ninth decade, and only the second of his 26 operas to be a comedy...
, opposite such famous interpreters of the title role as Tito Gobbi
Tito Gobbi
Tito Gobbi was an Italian operatic baritone with an international reputation.-Biography:Tito Gobbi was born in Bassano del Grappa and studied law at the University of Padua before he trained as a singer. Giulio Crimi, a well-known Italian tenor of a previous generation, was Gobbi's teacher in Rome...
, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau is a retired German lyric baritone and conductor of classical music, one of the most famous lieder performers of the post-war period and "one of the supreme vocal artists of the 20th century"...
, and Giuseppe Taddei
Giuseppe Taddei
Giuseppe Taddei was an Italian baritone, who performed mostly the operas of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Giuseppe Verdi....
(the latter on video, under Herbert von Karajan
Herbert von Karajan
Herbert von Karajan was an Austrian orchestra and opera conductor. To the wider world he was perhaps most famously associated with the Berlin Philharmonic, of which he was principal conductor for 35 years...
). He also recorded the title role. Perhaps his strangest, most atypical recorded role is Amfortas in an Italian performance of Parsifal
Parsifal
Parsifal is an opera in three acts by Richard Wagner. It is loosely based on Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, the 13th century epic poem of the Arthurian knight Parzival and his quest for the Holy Grail, and on Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval, the Story of the Grail.Wagner first conceived the work...
, with Maria Callas
Maria Callas
Maria Callas was an American-born Greek soprano and one of the most renowned opera singers of the 20th century. She combined an impressive bel canto technique, a wide-ranging voice and great dramatic gifts...
and Boris Christoff
Boris Christoff
Boris Christoff was a Bulgarian opera singer...
.
He can be seen on video as Ford; Figaro in The Barber of Seville
The Barber of Seville
The Barber of Seville, or The Futile Precaution is an opera buffa in two acts by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Cesare Sterbini. The libretto was based on Pierre Beaumarchais's comedy Le Barbier de Séville , which was originally an opéra comique, or a mixture of spoken play with music...
; and in Concert on the
A Bolshoi Opera Night (DVD).
Sources
- Alain Pâris, Dictionnaire des interprètes et de l'interpretation musicale au XX siècle (2 vols), Ed. Robert Laffont (Bouquins, Paris 1982, 4th Edn. 1995, 5th Edn 2004). ISBN 2-221-06660-X
- D. Hamilton (ed.),The Metropolitan Opera Encyclopedia: A Complete Guide to the World of Opera (Simon and Schuster, New York 1987). ISBN 0-671-16732-X
- Roland Mancini and Jean-Jacques Rouveroux, (orig. H. Rosenthal and J. Warrack, French edition), Guide de l’opéra, Les indispensables de la musique (Fayard, 1995). ISBN 2-213-01563-6