1906 MARIA GALVANY Titta RUFFO G&T RIGOLETTO Piangi Fanciulla MONARCH RECORD
$
30
Favourite Auctions
To save auctions to your favourites, please login
If you don't have an account, please register
Description
A series of great OPERA Records from early G&Ts to World War II recordings on 78 rpm Victrola Records
Click this link for more great Opera and Vocal Records in my other listings!
The GLory of Spain:
The great recording of MARIA Galvany with Titta Ruffo from Verdi's Rigoletto
Piangi Fanciulla
w Carlo Sabajno cond.
G&T, Milano 1906-11?23. 545i Rigoletto (Verdi): Piangi fanciulla (w. Galvany)
Please see top of the page for condition
In the first half of the 20th century there were considerably different vocal schools depending on whether a singer studied in Italy, Spain, Germany, Russia or France. The following Spanish sopranos are illustrative for their creative and imaginative singing. This becomes, in my opinion, especially important today with the complete loss of the national schools of singing and the resulting homogenization of international vocalism.
Today we have the opportunity to refer to older recordings in order to learn from the various embellishments chosen to ornament an aria, whether one agrees with those or not. When listening to the art of ornamentation of the following singers, one should not judge too harshly but rather look into the stylistic proprieties of that particular era.
SPANISH SOPRANOS:
María Galvany (1878 - 1944)
Biographical notes:
Born in Granada, she studied at the Madrid Conservatory with the renowned singing teacher Lázaro María Puig and Napoleone Verger. She made her debut as Lucia at Cartagena in 1897. Specializing in coloratura roles, she sang with great success in Spain and Italy, gaining her greatest popularity in South America. She also toured with a company that performed throughout Europe, including Russia (where she was a favorite singer), visiting London 1909, where she appeared at Drury Lane as Amina, Rosina and in the title role of Meyerbeer’s Dinorah. In Lisbon she sang uninterruptedly for 15 years at the Coliseu. She gained great success in Parma, Venice, and Genoa. It seems rather strange, however, that she never managed to appear at La Scala, the Met, the Teatro Cólon or at Covent Garden. She retired to Brazil and died there in poverty.
Comment:
Vocally, María Galvany represents an extreme case. Her virtuosity, the limpidity of her trills, roulades, and above all, her staccati lead us to think, more of an instrument than of a voice. One might get the impression to listen to a canary. Nevertheless, some of her recordings are remarkable for the sweetness of her voice. Listen to the duets she made opposite Tita Ruffo. You will hear a singer capable to adapt the musicality of her great baritone colleague. In the following title she “invented” a breathtaking cadenza.
price rating
