FEDORA
BARBIERI
(b.
Trieste 1920 d. Firenze 2003)
Life
Fedora
Barbieri was born in Trieste
in 1920. As a young girl, she made it successfully to the
Municipal Theatre, Firenze, which was run by Mario Labroca,
where she received a scholarship and studied under Giulia
Tess.
On
4 November 1940, she debuted at the age of 20 as Fidalma in
Il matrimonio segreto by Cimarosa. It was so successful that
the next day she stepped in for an indisposed Gianna Pederzini.
This double triumph opened the door to the most prestigious
theatres in Italy. For such a young singer, the roles came
very fast. In almost no time she became Azucena, Ulrica, Eboli,
Quickly, Carmen, Amneris, Santuzza and Dalila.
In
1942 she made her debut at La Scala in the Beethoven's Ninth
Symphony, conducted by Victor de Sabata, followed by the role
of Mag Page in Falstaff. After this new triumph, she toured
not only Italy but also Germany, Belgium and Holland. Fedora
decided then to get married and retire. She married Luigi
Barlozzetti, a music director, who had managed her career
but soon after she had decided to retire, Fedora re-emerged.
The year was 1945.
In
1947 she was a sensation at the Terme di Caracalla as Amneris.
The Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires was another theatre that
witnessed her triumphs. There she sang in Aida with Sara Menkes,
Beniamino Gigli, Angel Matiello, Giulio Neri and Joachin Alsina.
At the same theatre, she sang Un ballo in Maschera with fellow
artists Delia Rigal, Koloman von Pataky, Leonard Warren, Juan
Zanin and again with Joachin Alsina.
Carmen
(Carmen)
|
Azucena
(Il
Trovatore)
|
After
the first season at the Met, she regularly returned for nine
seasons. She performed in 11 roles, including Azucena, Amneris,
Laura, Carmen, Adalgisa, Quickly in 1967 and in the ‘70s Suor
Angelica and Zita from Gianni Schicchi. Her repertoire included
109 roles. In 1953 came another triumph at the Teatro dell'Opera
of Rome and a century celebration of Il Trovatore with Maria
Callas, Giacomo Lauri-Volpi and Paolo Silveri.
She
aooeared at Covent Garden with La Scala Company soon after
her American triumph in 1950 and returned there in 1957 and
1958. In 1964, she sang in a memorable production of Don Carlo,
directed by Carlo Maria Giulini and staged by Luchino Visconti.
Fedora Barbieri also performed in all major theatres in Easter
Europe and worked with such conductors as Toscanini, Furtwangler,
De Sabata, Mitropoulos, Rodzinski, Bernstein, Gui, Giulini,
Serafin, Santini, Gavazzeni, Maazel, Levine and Abbado.
She
never quite retired from singing (her career spanned over
five decades) and became also a great teacher. She always
emphasized the importance of a proper breath support and stressed
that the words must be pronounced clearly. She added, ‘Toscanini
insisted that the words must be sculpted in bronze'. She sang
‘dal cuore' (from the heart).
In
November 2000, aged 80, she returned to Firenze to celebrate
the 60 th anniversary of her debut at the Teatro del Maggio,
singing the role of Mamma Lucia in Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana.
In addition to all her artistic triumphs, she received Italy's
highest honor, the ‘Cavaliere di Gran Croce' from President
Ciampi in 2001.Fedora
Barbieri died on 4
March 2003
in Firenze
at the age of 83.
Anecdotes
In
1950 she first appeared at the Met in Don Carlo (Princess
Eboli). Incidentally, Fedora was supposed to sing her first
Eboli there and Rudolf Bing as a new general manager of the
Met was due to face the audience for the first time. Days
before the curtain rose, the Immigration and Naturalization
Service confined shiploads of arriving aliens, Miss Barbieri,
Boris Christoff and Zinka Milanov among them, to Ellis Island
on the ground that they could be a threat to the USA.
In
the end, all the artists were released just in time for the
show to go on. That night, Jussi Bjorling sang the title role
of Don Carlo and Cesare Siepi made his debut as Philip II.
The next morning, the newspapers wrote, ‘Miss Barbieri is
a superb mezzo from Italy with a rekindling dramatic temperament'.
Of her many roles by Verdi, she favoured Eboli then Amneris
and Azucena, which become her signature roles.
Fedora
Barbieri proudly recalled a thrilling double header in 1951.
At 5:30 PM she sang in a Verdi Requiem under Arturo Toscanini
broadcast across the US by NBC. Three hours later, she was
on the stage at the MET, singing Azucena in Il Trovatore.
She
frequently sang with Maria Callas, whom she called ‘a mystery'.
Callas made her Met debut in 1956 in Bellini's Norma. She
recalled how Callas was greeted with silence after her entrance
aria. After their first duet, the audience erupted with shouts
of ‘Barbieri! Barbieri!‘
Voice
Few
mezzo-sopranos have commanded such consistent power and tone
from bottom to top registers as Barbieri did. She never forced
the bottom and her top was never flat. She had a free, unstrained
emission, perfect singing technique and sang easily with great
strength and clarity in all her performances. When she sang
Azucena, in 'Condotta' she always looked and lived the role.
She
added superior musical intelligence to her richly coloured
voice with extraordinary versatility. Her Fedora, Azucena
and other characters opened big floods of tone and a full
bodied voice, which were so characteristic of her singing.
Her Azucena will undoubtedly linger in most listeners' memories.
Her
Azucena, Amneris ( Aida ) and Eboli ( Don Carlo
) were most famous and always greeted with thunderous
ovations lasting several minutes. She added charisma, great
personality and emotional intensity to her every role. Her
tone was always focused and one could hear the ping and steadiness
in her exceptionally magnificent and huge voice.
Audio
files (to
be published and kept for one month after release)
Audio
4 Il Trovatore – Stride
la vampa sung by Fedora Barbieri in 1952
Audio
5 Il Trovatore – Se m_ami ancora duet sung by Del Monaco
and Barbieri in 1957
(l.s.)
|
”There
is one thing to be said for glory - you can take glory
with you, when it is your time to go”