Name	Ancona
Official name	Città di Ancona
Image shield	Ancona-Stemma.png
Coordinates type	region:IT-AN_type:city(101210)
Coordinates display	title
Region
Province	(AN)
Frazioni	Aspio, Gallignano, Montacuto, Massignano, Montesicuro, Candia, Ghettarello, Paterno, Casine di Paterno, Poggio di Ancona, Sappanico, Varano
Mayor party	Democratic Party
Mayor	Fiorello Gramillano
Area total km2	123.71
Population total	101210
Population as of	31 August 2007
Population demonym	Anconetani, Anconitani (English: anconitans)
Elevation m	16
Saint	Judas Cyriacus
Day	4 May
Postal code	60100, from 60121 to 60129, 60131
Area code	071
Website

Ancona (; from ) is a city and a seaport in the Marche, a region of central Italy, population 101,909 (2005). Ancona is situated on the Adriatic Sea and is the center of the province of Ancona and the capital of the region.

The city is located 280 km northeast of Rome.

The town is finely situated on and between the slopes of the two extremities of the promontory of Monte Conero, Monte Astagno, occupied by the citadel, and Monte Guasco, on which the Duomo stands (150 m). The latter, dedicated to St Judas Cyriacus, is said to occupy the site of a temple of Venus, who is mentioned by Catullus and Juvenal as the tutelary deity of the place.

History

Ancona was founded by settlers from Syracuse about 387 BC, who gave it its name: Ancona is a very slightly modified transliteration of the Greek Αγκων, meaning "elbow"; the harbor to the east of the town was originally protected only by the promontory on the north, shaped like an elbow. Greek merchants established a Tyrian purple factory here. In Roman times it kept its own coinage with the punning device of the bent arm holding a palm branch, and the head of Aphrodite on the reverse, and continued the use of the Greek language.

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When it became a Roman colony is doubtful. It was occupied as a naval station in the Illyrian War of 178 BC. Julius Caesar took possession of it immediately after crossing the Rubicon. Its harbour was of considerable importance in imperial times, as the nearest to Dalmatia, and was enlarged by Trajan, who constructed the north quay with his Syrian architect Apollodorus of Damascus. At the beginning of it stands the marble triumphal arch with a single archway, and without bas-reliefs, erected in his honour in 115 by the senate and people.

After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Ancona was successively attacked by the Goths, Lombards and Saracens, but recovered its strength and importance. It was one of the cities of the Pentapolis under the Exarchate of Ravenna, an administrative unit of the Byzantine Empire. With the Carolingian conquest of northern Italy, it became the capital of the Marca di Ancona, whence the name of the modern region. After 1000 Ancona became increasingly independent, eventually turning into an important maritime republic (together with Gaeta, Trani and Ragusa, it is one of those not appearing on the Italian naval flag), often clashing against the nearby power of Venice. An oligarchic republic, Ancona was ruled by six Elders, elected by the three terzieri into which the city was divided: S. Pietro, Porto and Capodimonte. It had a coin of its own, the agontano, and a series of laws known as Statuti del mare e del Terzenale and Statuti della Dogana. Ancona was usually allied with Ragusa and the Byzantine Empire. In 1137, 1167 and 1174 it was strong enough to push back imperial forces. Anconitan ships took part in the Crusades, and their navigators included Cyriac of Ancona. In the struggle between the Popes and the Emperors that troubled Italy from the 12th century onwards, Ancona sided with the Guelphs. Differently from other cities of northern Italy, Ancona never became a seignory. The sole exception was the rule of the Malatesta, who took the city in 1348 taking advantage of the black death and of a fire that had destroyed many of its important buildings. The Malatesta were ousted in 1383. In 1532 it definitively lost its freedom and became part of the Papal States, under Pope Clement VII. Symbol of the papal authority was the massive Citadel. Together with Rome and Avignon, Ancona was the sole city in the Papal States in which the Jews were allowed to stay after 1569, living in the ghetto built after 1555.

Pope Clement XII extended the quay, and an inferior imitation of Trajan's arch was set up; he also erected a Lazaretto at the south end of the harbor, Luigi Vanvitelli being the architect-in-chief. The southern quay was built in 1880, and the harbour was protected by forts on the heights. From 1797 onwards, when the French took it, it frequently appears in history as an important fortress, until Christophe Léon Louis Juchault de Lamoricière surrendered here on 29 September 1860, eleven days after his defeat at Castelfidardo.

During World War II, in July 1944, the city was taken by the Polish II Corps as part of an Allied operation to gain access to a seaport closer to the Gothic Line in order to shorten their lines of communication for the advance into northern Italy.

Demographics

In 2007, there were 101,480 people residing in Ancona (the greater area has a population more than four times its size), located in the province of Ancona, Marche, of whom 47.6% were male and 52.4% were female. Minors (children ages 18 and younger) totalled 15.54 percent of the population compared to pensioners who number 24.06 percent. This compares with the Italian average of 18.06 percent (minors) and 19.94 percent (pensioners). The average age of Ancona resident is 48 compared to the Italian average of 42. In the five years between 2002 and 2007, the population of Ancona grew by 1.48 percent, while Italy as a whole grew by 3.56 percent. The current birth rate of Ancona is 8.14 births per 1,000 inhabitants compared to the Italian average of 9.45 births.

As of 2006, 92.77% of the population was Italian. The largest immigrant group came from other European nations (particularly those from Albania, Romania and Ukraine): 3.14%, followed by the Americas: 0.93%, East Asia: 0.83%, and North Africa: 0.80%. Currently, 1 in 6 babies born in Ancona has at least one foreign parent, among whom an Eastern European background is most prevalent.

Main sights

Cathedral church of S. Ciriaco

The beautiful Cathedral, dedicated to St. Ciriaco, was consecrated in 1128 and completed in 1189. Some writers suppose that the original church was in the form of a Latin cross and belonged to the 8th century. An early restoration was completed in 1234. It is a fine Romanesque building in grey stone, built in the form of a Greek cross, with a dodecagonal dome over the center slightly altered by Margaritone d'Arezzo in 1270. The façade has a Gothic portal, ascribed to Giorgio da Como (1228), which was intended to have a lateral arch on each side. The interior, which has a crypt under each transept, in the main preserves its original character. It has ten columns which are attributed to the temple of Venus, and there are good screens of the 12th century, and other sculptures. The church was carefully restored in the 1980s.

Other sights

The marble Arch of Trajan, 18 m high, was erected in 114/115 as an entrance to the causeway atop the harbor wall in honor of the emperor who had made the harbor, is one of the finest Roman monuments in the Marche. Most of its original bronze enrichments have disappeared. It stands on a high podium approached by a wide flight of steps. The archway, only 3 m wide, is flanked by pairs of fluted Corinthian columns on pedestals. An attic bears inscriptions. The format is that of the Arch of Titus in Rome, but made taller, so that the bronze figures surmounting it, of Trajan, his wife Plotina and sister Marciana, would figure as a landmark for ships approaching Rome's greatest Adriatic port.

The Lazzaretto (Laemocomium or "Mole Vanvitelliana"), planned by architect Luigi Vanvitelli in 1732 is a pentagonal building covering more than 20,000 m², built to protect the military defensive authorities from the risk of contagious diseases eventually reaching the town with the ships. Later it was used also as a military hospital or as barracks; it is currently used for cultural exhibits.

The Episcopal Palace was the place where Pope Pius II died in 1464.

The church of Santa Maria della Piazza, with an elaborate arcaded façade (1210).

The Palazzo del Comune, with its lofty arched substructures at the back, was the work of Margaritone d'Arezzo, but has been restored twice.

Church of San Francesco alle Scale

Church of Sant'Agostino, built by the Augustinians in 1341 as Santa Maria del Popolo, and enlarged by Luigi Vanvitelli in the 18th century and turned into a palace after 1860. It has maintained the Gothic portal by Giorgio da Sebenico, with statues portraying St. Monica, St. Nicola da Tolentino, St. Simplicianus and bless Agostino Trionfi.

Church of the Santi Pellegrino e Teresa (18th century)

Church of the Santissimo Sacramento (16th and 18th century)

There are also several fine late Gothic buildings, including the Palazzo Benincasa, the Palazzo del Senato and the Loggia dei Mercanti, all by Giorgio da Sebenico, and the prefecture, which has Renaissance additions.

The archaeological museum contains pre-Roman (Piceni) objects from tombs in the district, and two Roman beds with fine decorations in ivory.

The Pinacoteca Civica Francesco Podesti is housed in the Palazzo Bosdari, reconstructed in 1558 - 1561 by Pellegrino Tibaldi. Works in the gallery include:

Madonna with Child, panel by Carlo Crivelli

Sacra Conversazione by Lorenzo Lotto

Portrait of Francesco Arsilli by Sebastiano Del Piombo

Circumcision by Orazio Gentileschi

Immaculate Conception and St. Palazia by Guercino

Four Saints in Ecstasis and Musician Angels by Andrea Lillio

Gozzi Altarpiece by Titian

Other artists present include Carlo da Camerino (late 15th- early 16th century) and Arcangelo di Cola (fl. 1416-1429). Modern artists featured are Bartolini, Bucci, Campigli, Cassinari, Cucchi, Levi, Sassu, Tamburi, Trubbiani, Podesti and others.

Transportation

Shipping

The Port has regular ferry links to the following cities with the following operators:

Adria Ferries (Durrës)

Blue Line International (Split, Stari Grad, Vis)

Jadrolinija (Split, Zadar)

SNAV (Split) (seasonal)

Superfast Ferries (Igoumenitsa, Patras)

ANEK Lines (Igoumenitsa, Patras)

Minoan Lines (Igoumenitsa, Patras)

Marmara Lines (Cesme)

Airport

Ancona is served by Ancona Airport (IATA: AOI, ICAO: LIPY), an airport located in Falconara Marittima and named after Raffaello Sanzio.

Railways

Ancona "Centrale" is the main railway station of the city and is served by regional and long distance trains. The other stations are Ancona Marittima, Ancona Torrette, Palombina and Varano.

Roads

The A14 motorway serves the city with the exits "Ancona Nord" (An. North) and "Ancona Sud" (An. South).

Twin towns - sister cities

Ancona is twinned with: Izmir, Turkey Galaţi, Romania Split, Croatia Ribnica, Slovenia Svolvær, Norway Castlebar, Ireland

See also

Maritime republics

Biblioteca comunale Luciano Benincasa

Notes

References

Notes

External links

Official Site

Marche Tourism site

Photos: sauromarini.it, antoniomucherino.it

Bill Thayer's site

Ancona, a breed of chicken named after the Italian city

Site with photo, guides and forum

Wine and Fish in the city of Ancona

The Jewish Community of Ancona

Category:Cities and towns in the Marche Category:Coastal cities and towns in Italy Category:Populated places established in the 4th century BC Category:Maritime Republics Category:Port cities and towns of the Adriatic Sea Category:Mediterranean port cities and towns in Italy Category:Ancient Greek cities

Birthdate	July 04, 1968
Birthplace	Troon, Ayrshire, Scotland
Occupation	Actress, impressionist, author
Spouse	Gerard Hall

Ronni Ancona (born 4 July 1968, Troon, Ayrshire) is a Scottish actress, impressionist and author. Ancona won the Best TV Comedy Actress award at the 2003 British Comedy Awards for her work in Big Impression.

Career

She made a one-off appearance on Blue Peter in 1986 while she was still at school, but only became a household name as a result of appearing in the BBC's Big Impression alongside Alistair McGowan.

Her comedy career started on the comedy circuit and she won the Time Out Hackney Empire New Act of the Year in 1993. She worked extensively in radio and television before becoming a household name in the BAFTA award winning The Big Impression for which she won a British Comedy Award and Variety Club Award.

As part of BBC's Big Read she promoted The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Before Big Impression, Ancona had featured in films and TV shows, such as Fist of Fun, for many years, as well as performing stand-up comedy. She also appeared in the first series of The Sketch Show.

In 2005 she played Barbara, opposite Miranda Richardson and Bill Nighy, in Stephen Poliakoff's Gideon's Daughter on BBC One.

She was Beline in Molière's The Hypochondriac at the Almeida Theatre.

She has appeared four times on the BBC celebrity panel show QI. She won episode four of series four ('Dictionaries') in October 2006, won again in the first episode of series six in November 2008 ('Family'), and also won on the women's team with Sandi Toksvig in January 2010. In November 2006 she was a guest presenter of Have I Got News For You. She has also appeared on the Channel 4 comedy show TV Heaven, Telly Hell discussing her preferences in television shows.

In December 2006 she revealed herself as a fan of Strictly Come Dancing and appeared on .

In 2007, following a successfully received pilot, the BBC commissioned a new comedy sketch series titled Ronni Ancona & Co consisting of her own material and co-starring Phil Cornwell, Jan Ravens and John Sessions. The show initially aired on 25 May 2007 and had three episodes.

In 2008 Ancona appeared in the film Penelope as Wanda.

Ancona appeared as the mother of Katie and Emily Fitch in the third and fourth series of Skins.

In 2009 Ancona appeared in Hope Springs on BBC 1. She was one of eight main cast members.

On 24 July 2009, Ancona appeared on The One Show, and she appeared on it again, with Alistair McGowan, on 16 October 2009.

In April 2010, Ancona appeared on A Comedy Roast, celebrating Sharon Osbourne's life.

In 2009 her first book A Matter Of Life And Death: How To Wean A Man Off Football was published by Faber & Faber.

Appearances

Television

{| class="wikitable sortable" ! Title ! Channel ! Year |- | QI (Series H, Episode 15) | BBC | 2011 |- | Skins | Channel 4 / E4 | 2009/2010 |- | Bremner, Bird & Fortune | Channel 4 | 2009 |- | Hope Springs | BBC | 2009 |- | QI (Series F, Episode 1) | BBC | 2008 |- | Ronni Ancona & Co. | BBC | 2007 |- | Agatha Christie's Marple | ITV Nicholas Winding Refn | 2007 |- | Hotel Babylon | BBC | 2007 |- | QI (Series D, Episode 4) | BBCFour | 2006 |- | The Secret Policeman's Ball | BBC | 2006 |- | Gideon's Daughter | BBC Stephen Poliakoff | 2005 |- | Sven and Nancy's Big Impression | BBC |- | Posh and Becks' Big Impression (Christmas Special) | BBC |- | The Big Impression (4 series, 3 specials) | BBC | 1999-2005 (BAFTA, British Comedy Award, Royal Variety Club Award) |- | The Key | Key Films Ltd / BBC | 2003 |- | The Big Impression Christmas Special | BBC |- | The Sketch Show | Baby Cow / Avalon | 2001 (BAFTA) |- | Dr Terrible's House of Horrible | BBC / Baby Cow Productions | 2001 |- | Holby City | BBC | 2000 |- | Mark Lamarr Leaving 20th Century | BBC | 1999 |- | Comedy Nation | BBC | 1998 |- | Pulp Video | BBC Scotland | 1995 |- | Rory Bremner, Who Else? | Vera / Channel 4 | 1993 |- | Fist of Fun | BBC | 1995–1996 |- | Scratchy and Co. | Carlton | 1995 |- | The Geeks | ITV |- | The Imaginatively Titled Punt and Dennis Show | BBC | 1994 |- | Ben Elton: The Man from Auntie | BBC | 1994 |- | The Full Monty | Granada |- | Standing Room Only | BBC | 1991 |- | The Comedy Store | BBC |- | Live at Jongleurs | ITV |- | The Staggering Stories of Ferdinand de Bargos | BBC2 | 1989 |}

Film In the programme "Comedy Map of Britain", she returned to her old school in Troon and talked about her earliest comedy performing experience as part of an improvisation group called "Pots People". She had a seven-year relationship with Alistair McGowan which ended shortly before they started working together professionally. Ancona is married with two daughters and lives in west London.

References

External links

Category:1968 births Category:British impressionists (entertainers) Category:Scottish people of Italian descent Category:Living people Category:Alumni of the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design Category:Scottish Jews Category:Sephardi Jews Category:People from Troon

Name	Alistair McGowan
Birth date	November 24, 1964
Birth place	Evesham, Worcestershire, England
Active	1980s-present
Genre	Impressions, sketch comedy
Notable work	The Big Impression (1999-2004)

Alistair McGowan (born 24 November 1964) is a British impressionist, stand-up comic, actor, singer and writer best known to British audiences for The Big Impression (formerly Alistair McGowan's Big Impression), which was, for four years, one of BBC1's top-rating comedy programmes - winning numerous awards, including a BAFTA in 2003. He has also worked extensively in theatre and appeared in the West End in Art, Cabaret, The Mikado and Little Shop of Horrors (for which he received an Laurence Olivier Award nomination.).) As an actor on television he played the lead role in BBC1's Mayo. He wrote the play Timing (nominated as Best New Comedy at the whatsonstage.com awards) and the book A Matter of Life and Death or How to Wean Your Man off Football with former comedy partner Ronni Ancona. He also provided voices for Spitting Image.

Personal life and Education

McGowan was born in Evesham to Marion and George McGowan. Although aware his father was born in Calcutta, India, Alistair and his sister, Kay, were unaware of the fact that their father had an Anglo-Indian background until Alistair explored his ancestry on BBC One's Who Do You Think You Are? in the 26 October 2007 episode four years after his father's death. Alistair attended the Simon de Montfort Middle School in Evesham and took lead roles in school productions. He went on to attend Evesham High School,. He graduated from the University of Leeds with a BA English degree in 1986. He then went to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, graduating in 1989.

McGowan is a supporter of football club Leeds United - even claiming that he decided to study at Leeds partly because of its proximity to Elland Road a part-memoir and part-comedy self-help manual, which he co-wrote with Ronni Ancona (during the book tour, they revealed they had once lived together).

Career

McGowan found work as a stand-up comedian, and did some of the voices for the ITV television series Spitting Image. His sporting impressions were showcased on the BBC 2 football magazine programme Sick as a Parrot. He also appeared as the recycling man in the BBC show Think about Science.

Later he took over from Stephen Tompkinson playing Spock in the Tim Firth comedy drama, Preston Front. In his early career, McGowan had minor roles in shows such as Children's Ward, and in the pilot episode of Jonathan Creek. He also starred in the first series of Dead Ringers.

McGowan also appeared in the Scottish Football sketch show Only an Excuse? from 1996 to 1998. He also hosted and starred in a sporting impressions show on Radio 5 live called The Scoop in the late 1990s.

The Big Impression

He is best known for his work with Jan Ravens and Ronni Ancona on The Big Impression, formerly Alistair McGowan's Big Impression. McGowan has a repertoire of well over one hundred impersonations many of which have been covered on Alistair McGowan's Big Impression.

The most popular and regular include David Beckham, Sven-Göran Eriksson, Gary Lineker, Nicky Campbell, Richard Madeley, Tony Blair, Prince Charles, Robert Kilroy-Silk, Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen, Angus Deayton, Terry Wogan and the fictional characters Ross Geller (from Friends) and Dot Cotton (from EastEnders).

McGowan and Ronni Ancona are probably best known for their portrayal of Posh and Becks with McGowan exaggerating David Beckham's perceived lack of intelligence and Ancona exaggerating the role of "Posh Spice" (Victoria Beckham) with pouting lips. As the Beckhams' style of dress regularly changed - in particular David's changing haircuts - McGowan adapted his costumes and style accordingly. In later years he developed his portrayal of Beckham into a brainiac infuriated by Posh's lack of intelligence.

Return to acting and radio work (2005)

He made a return to dramatic acting in 2005, appearing in the BBC's adaptation of Charles Dickens's novel Bleak House. In 2006 he starred in the detective series Mayo. He also presented an episode of Have I Got News For You on 20 October 2006. He joined the Royal Shakespeare Company for the Christmas 2006 season playing Mr Page in Merry Wives: the Musical (a version of The Merry Wives of Windsor) opposite Judi Dench, Simon Callow and Haydn Gwynne.

Despite his acting commitments, he has still continued a successful career of celebrity impersonator on the BBC Radio and also did re-voicing of video footages of 'The Sports Review of the Year' and Match of the Day which has turned him into a sideline sporting celebrity. Two releases of 'Alistair McGowan's Football Backchat' were best sellers in both comedy and sports video charts.

In 2007 McGowan starred as the dentist (and other, smaller characters) in the West End transfer of the Menier Chocolate Factory's revival of Little Shop of Horrors, and filmed My Life in Ruins, an American comedy film set in the ruins of ancient Greece.

In 2008 McGowan made his directing debut at Guildhall School of Music and Drama with Noël Coward's classic comedy Semi-Monde.

In January and February 2008, McGowan starred as the eponymous protagonist of The Mikado by Gilbert and Sullivan, in a revival by Carl Rosa Opera Company. On 21 April 2008 he took over the role of Emcee in Cabaret (musical) at the Lyric Theatre, London. In July of that year he appeared in a revival of They're Playing Our Song at the Menier Chocolate Factory.

In March 2009, McGowan starred as The Duke in the stage version of Shakespeare's Measure for Measure.

Alistair appeared as a host on one episode of the fifth series of 'Live At The Apollo', which aired on 1 January 2010.

Environmental work

McGowan serves as an ambassador to WWF-UK, part of the global World Wide Fund for Nature, and campaigns on a number of environmental issues. In 2004 he launched 'the BIG recycle' national campaign urging public to reduce rubbish by recycling it.

On 2 August 2006, he appeared on BBC Radio 2 on Steve Wright's show to appeal to listeners to be more energy aware. More recently, he appeared on the James Whale Show on Talksport on 20 June 2007 on this issue.

McGowan is a patron of the urban tree-planting charity Trees for Cities.

On 13 January 2009, it was announced that McGowan in partnership with three other Greenpeace activists, including actress Emma Thompson, had bought land near Sipson, a village under threat from the proposed third runway for Heathrow Airport. It is hoped that the area of ground, half the size of a football pitch, will prevent the government from carrying through its plan to expand Heathrow. The field, bought for an undisclosed sum from a local land owner, will be split into small squares and sold across the globe. When interviewed Mr McGowan said: "BAA were so confident of getting the Government's go ahead, but we have cunningly bought the land they need to build their runway."

In 2009, he attended the Bromley Environmental Awards and was the celebrity guest at Bromley Civic Centre where the awards were presented to various schools in the borough.

References

External links

Alistair McGowan credits - BBC Comedy Guide

Alistair McGowan's Big Impression - BBC Comedy Guide

Category:1964 births Category:Alumni of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama Category:Alumni of the University of Leeds Category:Anglo-Indian people Category:English comedians Category:English film actors Category:English impressionists (entertainers) Category:English musical theatre actors Category:English people of Indian descent Category:English television actors Category:Living people Category:People from Evesham Category:Royal Shakespeare Company members Category:English environmentalists

Mario Ancona (February 28, 1860 – February 23, 1931), was a leading Italian baritone and master of bel canto singing. He appeared at some of the most important opera houses in Europe and America during what is commonly referred to as the "Golden Age of Opera".

Career

Ancona was born into a middle-class Jewish family at Livorno, Tuscany, on February 28, 1860. After embarking on a business career he decided to study voice with Maestro Matteini in his native city of Livorno. Later, he took lessons from Giuseppe Cima in Milan.

Ancona is reputed to have made his debut as an amateur singer as far back as 1880; but according to The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Opera—from which many of the ensuing appearance dates, venues and career highlights are taken—his earliest known professional appearance in an opera did not occur until 1889, when he sang the role of Scindia in Massenet's Le roi de Lahore in Trieste. Not long afterwards, he appeared in another Massenet opera, Le Cid, at Italy's principal theatre—La Scala, Milan. His arrival at La Scala so soon after his debut reflects the excellence of the technical grounding that he must have received as an amateur performer.

On May 21, 1892, Ancona was asked to create the part of Silvio in the first performance of Leoncavallo's Pagliacci, which took place at Milan's Teatro Dal Verme with Arturo Toscanini conducting. The next year, he appeared in the first London performance of Pagliacci at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. On this occasion, however, he sang the role of Tonio. (Nellie Melba and Fernando De Lucia were also in the cast.)

Ancona appeared regularly at Covent Garden until 1901, being held in high esteem by London audiences. He sang also as a guest artist in Cairo, Lisbon, Madrid, Warsaw, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Chicago, Boston and Buenos Aires.

The New York Metropolitan Opera first engaged him in 1893. He sang successfully at the Met until 1897, when he went back to Europe. In 1906-1908, he returned to New York—this time to join the Manhattan Opera Company, where he would be paid a generous fee. He became a special favourite of this company, which had been established by Oscar Hammerstein I in direct rivalry to the Met. His suave interpretation of Mozart's Don Giovanni was singled out for particular praise in the press and by the Manhattan's audiences.

Ancona sang in Paris in 1908 and again in 1914 at the Sarah Bernhardt theatre, earning compliments from Bernhardt herself for his impressive singing. The great French actress was not alone in her admiration for Ancona's vocal artistry. Music critics on both sides of the Atlantic commended Ancona on his elegant singing style and beautiful voice, with its easy top register and open-throated emission of homogenous tone. Indeed, the great tenor Jean de Reszke called him the best-schooled Italian baritone of his era. His histrionic skills were less developed however, and he was not considered to be an especially imaginative or exciting interpretive artist. Physically, he was said to resemble King Edward VII of England because of his pointed beard and ample waistline.

The fact that Ancona was able to establish himself as a major singer in the face of intense competition from a host of other first-class baritones is a testament to his sheer quality as a vocalist. His main Italian rivals in the period between his debut in 1889 and the outbreak of World War One were: Mattia Battistini, Antonio Scotti, Giuseppe Pacini, Antonio Magini-Coletti, Giuseppe Campanari and Giuseppe Kaschmann (born Josip Kasman)—and, from a younger generation of verismo opera-influenced baritones, Titta Ruffo, Riccardo Stracciari, Pasquale Amato, Giuseppe De Luca, Eugenio Giraldoni, Mario Sammarco, Domenico Viglione-Borghesi and the promising newcomer Carlo Galeffi.

Repertoire

According to the critic Michael Scott, author of The Record of Singing, Ancona's smooth, fluent and refined method of singing pre-dated the verismo movement. His style and technique were particularly well suited to the operas of Verdi, and to the bel canto works composed by Bellini and Donizetti (such as I Puritani, Lucia di Lammermoor and La favorite). Ancona's repertoire of Verdi parts included Germont, Di Luna, Rigoletto, Amonasro and Iago, as well as Don Carlos in Ernani.

Ancona also undertook roles composed by Leoncavallo (Silvio and Tonio), Puccini (Lescaut and Marcello), Mascagni (Alfio and David in L'amico Fritz), Giordano (Gerard in Andrea Chénier), Mozart (Don Giovanni and Figaro) and Wagner (Wolfram, Telramund and even, on occasion, Hans Sachs). He appeared, too, in French operas written by Meyerbeer, Gounod, Bizet and, as we have seen, Massenet, performing such parts as Nevers, Hoël, Scindia, Escamillo, Zurga and Valentin.

Retirement, death and recorded legacy

Ancona was still in good vocal shape when he elected to retire from the stage in 1916. World War One was then reaching its height in Europe, and Ancona was singing with the Chicago opera company at the time. In retirement, he devoted himself to teaching. He died of lung cancer in Florence, Italy, on February 23, 1931. An extensive collection of documents, photographs and other items relating to Ancona's career is preserved at Stanford University's Archive of Recorded Sound in California.

Fortunately, however, Ancona's thoroughbred voice lives on in a series of gramophone recordings which he made during the first decade of the 20th century for Pathé in 1905-06 and, more rewardingly, for the Victor Talking Machine Company in 1907-08. Twenty of his Victor recordings are now available on CD transfers (see below). They consist of several songs as well as operatic arias and duets by Verdi, Bellini, Donizetti, Meyerbeer, Gounod, Bizet, Leoncavallo and Giordano.

References

Scott, Michael, The Record of Singing, volume one, (Duckworth, London, 1977)

Steane, John, The Grand Tradition: 70 Years of Singing on Record, (Duckworth, London, 1974)

Rosenthal, Harold and Warrack, John, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Opera, 2nd edition, (Oxford University Press, London, 1980)

Miller, Jeffery, liner notes for Mario Ancona: the complete Victor recordings (1907-08), Romophone CD 82013-2, produced by Ward Marston (England, 1999)

Category:Italian opera singers Category:Operatic baritones Category:Italian baritones Category:People from Livorno Category:1860 births Category:1931 deaths Category:Deaths from lung cancer

Name	Penélope Cruz
Caption	Penélope Cruz in 2008
Alt	The photo shows a close-up of a Hispanic woman with her brown highlight hair clipped behind her ears. The female is wearing eyeliner and lipgloss as well as pink and white colored dangling earrings on both her ears. She is wearing a strapless black dress with black feathers. In the background, a blonde female can be seen as well as a red curtain.
Birth name	Penélope Cruz Sánchez
Birth date	April 28, 1974
Birth place	Alcobendas, Community of Madrid, Spain
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1992–present
Spouse	Javier Bardem (m. 2010–present)

Penélope Cruz Sánchez (born April 28, 1974), better known as Penélope Cruz, is a Spanish actress. At 15, she was signed by an agent. She made her acting debut at 16 on television, and her feature film debut the following year in Jamón, jamón (1992), to critical acclaim. Her subsequent roles in the 1990s and 2000s included Open Your Eyes (1997), The Hi-Lo Country (1999), The Girl of Your Dreams (2000) and Woman on Top (2000). Cruz achieved recognition for her lead roles in Vanilla Sky and Blow. Both films were released in 2001 and were commercially successful worldwide.

In the 2000s, she has appeared in films from a wide range of genres, including the comedy Waking Up in Reno (2002), the thriller Gothika (2003), the Christmas movie Noel (2004), the action adventure Sahara (2005), the animated G-Force and the musical drama Nine. Her most notable films to date are Volver (2006), for which she earned Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations, and Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), for which she received an Academy Award. She was the first Spanish actress in history to receive an Academy Award, and the sixth Hispanic actor overall.

Cruz has modeled for companies such as Mango, Ralph Lauren and L'Oréal. Cruz and her younger sister Mónica Cruz have designed items for Mango. She has donated both her time and money to charities. Cruz has volunteered in Uganda and India, where she spent one week working for Mother Teresa; she donated her salary from The Hi-Lo Country to help fund the late nun's mission.

Early life

Penélope Cruz Sánchez was born in Alcobendas, Community of Madrid, Spain, the daughter of Encarna Sánchez, a hairdresser and personal manager, and Eduardo Cruz, a retailer and auto mechanic. Throughout her childhood, Cruz lived in Alcobendas, a working-class city, although she spent "a lot" of time at her grandmother's apartment. Cruz is the oldest of three siblings;

When Cruz was a teenager, she began having an interest in acting after seeing the film Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! by Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar. She began doing casting calls for an agent, but was rejected multiple times because the agent felt that she was too young. In 1999, Katrina Bayonas, Cruz's agent, commented, "She was absolutely magic [at the audition]. It was obvious there was something very impressive about this kid. [...] She was very green, but there was a presence. There was just something coming from within." Jamón, jamón received broadly favorable reviews, with Chris Hicks of the Deseret News describing Cruz's portrayal of Silvia as "enchanting". Writing for the Chicago Sun-Times, film critic Roger Ebert wrote "[The film] stars actors of considerable physical appeal, most particularly Penelope Cruz as Silvia". For her performance, Cruz was nominated for a Spanish Actors Union Newcomer Award and a Goya Award for Best Actress. The same year she appeared in the Academy-Award winning Belle Epoque as the virginal Luz.

Early critical success, 1997–2000

.]] In 1997, Cruz appeared in the Spanish comedy film Love Can Seriously Damage Your Health. She portrays Diana, a fan of The Beatles band member John Lennon; she tries unsuccessfully to meet him. Years later, after multiple failed relationships, Diana re-unites with an acquaintance under unusual circumstances. Also in 1997, she appeared in the opening scene of Pedro Almodóvar's Live Flesh as a prostitute who gives birth on a bus but was not commercially successful, grossing $370,000 in the United States. Kevin N. Laforest of the Montreal Film Journal commented in his September 2002 review that Cruz "has been getting some really bad reviews for her recent American work, but I personally think that she's a more than decent actress, especially here, where she's charming, moving and always believable. [...] There's one shot in particular, where Cruz enters a room in a greenish glow, which is right out of Hitchcock's picture [Vertigo]."

The following year, Cruz appeared in her first American film as Billy Crudup's consolation-prize Mexican girlfriend in Stephen Frears' western film, The Hi-Lo Country. Kevin Lally of the Film Journal International commented in his review for the film that "in an ironic casting twist, the Spanish actress Penelope Cruz [...] is much more appealing as Josepha [than in her previous roles]". For her performance in the film, she was nominated for an ALMA Award for Best Actress. Also in 1998, Cruz appeared in Don Juan and The Girl of Your Dreams. In The Girl of Your Dreams, Cruz portrayed Macarena Granada, a singer who is in an on and off relationship with Antonio Resines's character, Blas. They are part of a movie troupe moved from Spain to Berlin (Germany) for a joint production with UFA during the years of Nazis. Cruz's performance in the film was praised by film critics, with Jonathan Holloland of Variety magazine writing "if confirmation is still needed that Cruz is an actress first and a pretty face second, then here it is." A writer for Film4 commented that "Cruz herself is the inevitable focus of the film" but noted that overall the film "looks great". Cruz's role as Macerna has been viewed as her "largest role to date". and was commercially successful, grossing over $67 million worldwide, although it performed better at the box office internationally than domestically.

In 2000, she appeared in Woman on Top in the lead female role as Isabelle, a world-class chef who has suffered from motion sickness since birth, her first American lead role. BBC film critic Jane Crowther said that "Cruz is wonderfully ditzy as the innocent abroad" but remarked that "it's Harold Perrineau Jr as Monica who pockets the movie". Annlee Ellingson of Box Office magazine wrote "Cruz is stunning in the role—innocent and vulnerable yet possessing a mature grace and determined strength, all while sizzling with unchecked sensuality". Also in 2000, she played Alejandra Villarreal, who is Matt Damon's love interest in Billy Bob Thornton's film adaptation of the western bestselling novel, All the Pretty Horses. However, Bob Longigo of the Atlanta Journal Constitution was less enthusiastic about Cruz and Damon's performance, saying that their "resulting onscreen chemistry would hardly warm a can of beans."

Breakthrough, 2001–2005

2001 marked a turning point when Cruz starred in the feature films Vanilla Sky and Blow. In Vanilla Sky, Cameron Crowe's interpretation of Open Your Eyes, she played Sofia Serrano, the love interest of Tom Cruise's character. The film received mixed reviews but made $200 million worldwide. Her performance was well received by critics, with BBC film critic Brandon Graydon saying that Cruz "is an enchanting screen presence," and Ethan Alter of the Film Journal International noting that Cruz and her co-star Cruise were "able to generate some actual chemistry".

Her next film was Blow, adapted from Bruce Porter's 1993 book Blow: How a Small Town Boy Made $100 Million with the Medellin Cocaine Cartel and Lost It All. She had a supporting role as Mirtha Jung, the wife of Johnny Depp's character. The film received mixed reviews, but made $80 million worldwide. Nina Willdorf of the Boston Phoenix described Cruz as "multi-talented" and Mark Salvo of the Austin Chronicle wrote "I may be one of the last male holdouts to join the Cruz-Rules camp, but her tour de force performance here sucks you right in." In 2001, Cruz also appeared in Don't Tempt Me, playing Carmen Ramos. The film received negative reviews,. Jeff Vice of the Deseret News commented that "unfortunately, casting Cruz as a tough girl is a hilariously bad one..." and Michael Miller of the Village Voice writing that "as Satan's helper Carmen, Penélope Cruz doesn't hold a candle to her cocaine-huffing enabler in Blow".

Cruz's last film in 2001 was Captain Corelli's Mandolin, film adaption of the novel of the same name. She played Pelagia, who falls in love with another man while her fiancé is in battle during World War II. Captain Corelli's Mandolin was not well received by critics, but made $62 million worldwide.

In 2002, she had a minor role in Waking Up in Reno. It had negative reviews and was a box office failure, making $267,000 worldwide. The following year, Cruz had a minor role in the horror film Gothika, as Chloe Sava, a patient at a mental hospital. David Rooney of Variety wrote that Cruz "adds a serviceably malevolent edge to Chole's apparent madness." Cruz's performance in Fanfan la Tulipe, also in 2003, was not well received, Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian commenting that Cruz "deserves a special Cannes Razzie for a performance of purest teak."

In 2004, Cruz appeared in the Christmas film Noel as Nina, the girlfriend of Paul Walker's character and as Mia in the romantic drama, Head in the Clouds, set in the 1930s. For Head in the Clouds, Bruce Birkland of Jam! Canoe said, "The story feels forced and the performances dreary, with the notable exception of Cruz, who seems to be in a different film from the rest of the cast." Desson Thompson of the Washington Post was more critical; his comment about the character's "pronounced limp" was that "Cruz (hardly the world's greatest actress) can't even perform without looking fake."

In 2005, Cruz appeared as Dr Eva Rojas in the action adventure Sahara. She earned $1.6 million for her supporting role. The film grossed $110 million worldwide but did not recoup its $160 million budget. Moviefone dubbed the film "one of the most famous flops in history" and in 2007 listed it at 24 on its list of "Biggest Box-Office Turkeys of All Time" . Lori Hoffman of the Atlantic City Weekly felt Cruz put her "considerable [acting] skills on cruise control as Dr Eva Rojas" and James Berardnelli of ReelViews described Cruz's performance as a "black hole", that she "lacks screen presence." Also in 2005, Cruz appeared in Chromophobia, screened at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival and released the following year. Mathew Turner of View London said Cruz's character Gloria, a cancer-riddled prostitute, is "actually more interesting than the main storyline" while Time Evan's of Sky Movies wrote, "The Cruz/Ifans storyline – featuring the only two remotely sympathetic characters – never really fuses with the main plot". Her final 2005 film was Don't Move playing Italia. Eric Harrison of the Houston Chronicle noted that Cruz "goes all out" with her appearance and Patrick Peters of Empire magazine commented that the film's director, who also appears in the film, was able to draw a "sensitive performance" from Cruz.

Worldwide recognition, 2006–present

Cruz appeared in the 2006 Western comedy film Bandidas as María Álvarez, a poor farm girl who robs banks with a wealthy friend to combat an enforcer terrorising their town. Randy Cordova of the Arizona Republic said the film "sports" Cruz and her co-star Salma Hayek as the "lusty dream team" and that they were the "marketing fantasy" for the film. A writer for 20minutos.es called Cruz and Hayek the "demand curves" of the film. Also in 2006, Cruz received favourable reviews for her performance as Raimunda in Pedro Almodóvar's Volver. The film was well received by critics and on multiple top ten film lists for 2006. Carina Chocano of The Los Angeles Times wrote, "Cruz, who has remarked that in Hollywood she's rarely allowed to be anything more than pretty, instills her with an awesome resoluteness and strength of character." Jan Stuart of Newsday described Cruz as having "never been more radiant and funny". IGN film critic Todd Gilchrist praised Cruz, saying her "performance is nothing short of revelatory" and that "Here, she finds the best role of her career, and leaps in with complete commitment". She shared a Best Actress award at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival with five of her co-stars, as well as receiving a Goya Award and European Film Award, and was nominated for the Golden Globe, the Screen Actors Guild Award, the BAFTA Award, and the Academy Award for Best Actress in a leading role. She was the first Spaniard to ever be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress. and did not perform well at the box office. TV Guide film critic Maitland McDonagh noted that in the film Cruz "expertly mines the contrast between chic, compliant, white-clad Anna and funky, street-smart Melody, who treats [Martin Freeman's character] Gary like the world-class drag he is." David Edelstein of New York Magazine said "Cruz shows up in the flesh, and she's wonderfully tart and funny". In 2008, Cruz appeared in Isabel Coixet's film Elegy, which was based on the Philip Roth story The Dying Animal, as the lead female role, Consuela Castillo. The film generated mixed to positive reviews, and appeared on multiple film critics' top ten film lists for 2008. Ray Bennett of the Hollywood Reporter described Cruz's performance as being "outstanding in an otherwise lame male fantasy [film]" and MSNBC film critic Alonso Duralde praised Cruz and her co-star, Ben Kingsley, writing that they give "extraordinary performances" in the film. . She won her first Academy Award later that night for her performance as María Elena.]]

Later that year, she starred in Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona as María Elena, a mentally unstable woman. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian praised Cruz's performance in the film, commenting, "Cruz looks as if she has wandered in from a more hefty film entirely; everything she does and says seems to mean more, count for more. This isn't to say that she gets bigger laughs, or perhaps any laughs, but she certainly walks off with the film." Kirk Honeycutt of the Hollywood Reporter remarked that the film "belongs" to Cruz and her co-star Bardem. Todd McCarthy of Variety magazine felt that Cruz's performance was "dynamite" in both of the languages she spoke. A writer for 20minutos.es described Cruz as having planted "relentless growth" in the film. Cruz received a Goya Award and her first Academy Award and BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress. She also received a Golden Globe and SAG nomination. Cruz was the first Spanish actress to ever be awarded an Academy Award and the sixth Hispanic person to ever receive the award.

Cruz's next film was the kid-friendly animated film, G-Force, which was released to theaters in July 2009. In the film, she voiced a guinea pig spy named Juarez. Also in 2009, she appeared in the film Broken Embraces as Lena, the lead character's mistress and assistant who is an aspiring actress. Moira Macdonald of the Seattle Times wrote "Cruz, so lovely she hardly seems real, makes Lena both vulnerable and steely. Lena's life, it seems, is turning into a movie that she can't escape, as men and cameras seem to blur together and her dazzling smile becomes little defense." Claudia Puig of USA Today described Cruz's performance as Lena as being "superb". Stephanie Zacharek of Salon.com noted in her review for the film that Cruz "doesn't coast on her beauty in Broken Embraces, and she has the kind of role that can be difficult to flesh out." Cruz received nominations from the Satellite Awards and European Film Awards for her performance in Broken Embraces.

Cruz's final 2009 film was the film version of the musical Nine, playing the character Carla Albanese, the lead character's mistress. Variety reported that Cruz had originally auditioned for the role of the film within a film's star, Claudia, which eventually went to Nicole Kidman. Cruz said that she trained for three months for the dance routine in the film. and was a financial failure. Claudia Puig of USA Today commented that while Cruz "does a steamy song and dance," her "acting is strangely caricatured." Chris Tookey of the Daily Mail made a similar comment, saying: "I know Penelope Cruz has been nominated for a Golden Globe for her camp vamp act, but to me she is unnervingly over the top [in this film], like Strictly Come Dancing's Bruno Tonioli in drag." F. Bernal of Que.es commented, "In terms of its ability to integrate with luck in the cast of a musical, it is clear that Penelope does a good note [in the film]". Cruz's performance as Carla garnered her nominations for Best Supporting Actress from the Academy Awards, Golden Globes and SAG Awards. In 2010, Cruz appeared in the film Sex and the City 2, the sequel to the 2008 film, in a cameo role. Cruz is set to appear in the as Angelica Teach, Blackbeard's daughter and the former love interest of Captain Jack Sparrow. This film has Cruz and director Rob Marshall returning once more for a film. The film will have a total of four Spanish actors including Astrid Berges-Frisbey, Óscar Jaenada, and Juan Carlos Vellido. Though, Penelope's pregnancy has caused some problems on the set; as Penelope's baby bump grew producers on the film decided to enlist the help of her younger sibling, Monica Cruz who is the spitting image of her. According to reports, Penelope will be in all of the close-up shots, Monica will star in the long-distance scenes since the wardrobe department has struggled to hide her pregnancy. In April 2010, Cruz was contracted to star in the film Venuto al mondo, playing Gemma, a mother who accompanies her teenage son to Sarajevo, where his father died during the war. In an interview with the Italian publication La Repubblica Cruz commented on playing Gemma, saying, "I feel as an actress Gemma will be playing one of the most important opportunities of my life".

Public image

In 2006, she became spokesmodel for the French beauty company, L'Oréal, to promote products such as the L'Oréal Paris hair dye Natural Match and L'Oreal mascara products. Cruz appears in television and print ads for the company. She receives $2 million a year for her work for the company. and had a contract with Ralph Lauren in 2001.

Cruz ranked as No. 58 in Maxim's Hot 100 of 2007 list, and was chosen by Empire magazine as being one of the 100 Sexiest Movie Stars in the world. Penelope was also ranked on Askmen.com's Most Desirable Women of 2008 at No.26, in 2009 at No. 25, and in 2010 at No.7

In April 2010, Penélope Cruz replaced Kate Winslet as the new face and ambassador of Lancôme's Trésor fragrance. Lancôme has signed Cruz as the brand’s third superstar spokesmodel, along with Julia Roberts and Kate Winslet. The campaign was shot by Mario Testino at Paris's Hotel de Crillon and will debut fall 2010.

Is on the cover of Spanish Vogue's December 2010 issue. It was reported that she agreed to be photographed by fashion photographer Peter Lindbergh only if her pregnancy not be shown. In the early 2000s she spent time in Nepal photographing Tibetan children for an exhibition attended by the Dalai Lama. She also photographed residents at the Pacific Lodge Boys' Home, most of whom are former gang members and recovering substance abusers.

Personal life

Cruz, known to her friends as Pe, She learned Italian for Don't Move. She picked up a stray dog when filming Bandidas in Mexico and took it home to Los Angeles . Cruz owns a clothing store in Madrid and designed jewelry and handbags with her younger sister for a company in Japan. , 2007]]

Cruz had a three-year relationship with Tom Cruise after they appeared together in Vanilla Sky. It ended in January 2004. In April 2003, she filed a lawsuit against the Australian magazine New Idea for defamation over an article about her relationship with Cruise.

After filming Sahara in February 2005, she began dating actor Matthew McConaughey. In June 2006, they told People that they "have decided to take time off as a couple" and that "due to busy work schedules and so much time apart" they decided that "separating was the best thing to do." In April 2007, Cruz, who was single, said she would like to adopt children. "Of course I want to have kids," she told the Spanish edition of Marie Claire in April 2007. "I want to have my own kids, but also adopt. For a while I've had the feeling that my life won't be complete if I don't adopt."

Cruz is friends with Pedro Almodovar, whom she has known for almost two decades and with whom she has worked on films.

Cruz began dating co-star Javier Bardem in 2007. They married in early July 2010 in a private ceremony at a friend's home in the Bahamas. After photos emerged of Cruz with a baby bump on the set of , representatives said the couple expect a child in March 2011.

Filmography

References

External links

Category:1974 births Category:Living people Category:Spanish people Category:People from Alcobendas Category:European Film Awards winners (people) Category:Independent Spirit Award winners Category:BAFTA winners (people) Category:Spanish film actors Category:Spanish television actors Category:Spanish television presenters Category:Spanish vegetarians Category:Spanish Roman Catholics Category:Best Supporting Actress Academy Award winners Category:Best Actress Goya Award winners Category:Best Supporting Actress Goya Award winners

Name	Marco Mengoni
Background	solo_singer
Born	December 25, 1988 Ronciglione, Viterbo, Italy
Occupation	Singer
Years active	2009–present
Label	Sony Music

Marco Mengoni (Ronciglione, December 25, 1988) is an Italian singer. In 2009 he won the third edition of the Italian talent show X Factor and then received third place in the sixtieth edition of the Sanremo Music Festival with the song '"Credimi ancora" (Believe Me Again).

X Factor

During his stay at X Factor, he sang songs from many different genres, including AC/DC's "Back in Black", Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror" and "Billie Jean", Mia Martini's "Almeno tu nell'universo", The Beatles' "Helter Skelter", David Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes" and Nina Simone's "My Baby Just Cares for Me". As a result, he received the congratulations and the admiration of many famed singers such as Mina, Renato Zero, Ron, Giorgia Todrani, Elisa, Adriano Celentano and Mario Biondi.

After X Factor

After winning X Factor, his first EP Dove si vola was released in late 2009. It contains seven tracks: two new songs "Dove si vola" (single) and "Lontanissimo da te", and five covers "Man in the Mirror", "Psycho Killer", "Insieme a te sto bene", "L'amore si odia", "Almeno tu nell'universo".

His second album, released after Sanremo Music Festival in february 2010, is called Re matto. It includes the singles "Credimi Ancora", "Stanco (Deeper Inside)" and "In un giorno qualunque", as well as four other songs.

In 2010 he also won the TRL award for the MTV Man of the Year and the "Best European Act" for the MTV Europe Music Awards, after being elected as "Best Italian Act".

Still this year he was on his Re Matto Tour, which had more than 60 concerts all over Italy for the entire summer; the two hours show gave him the possibility to work with the famous choreographer Luca Tommassini, who also worked with celebrities such as Madonna and Michael Jackson. On tour Marco had the chance to show his vocal abilities by singing a varoius range of song like "Live and Let Die", "Satisfaction", "Mad World", "Proud Mary" and "Tears in Heaven", among the others. In autumn 2010 a live album was released, called Re Matto Live.

Discography

EP/Albums

{|class="wikitable" |- ! style="text-align:center;" rowspan="2"|Year ! style="text-align:center;" rowspan="2"|Title ! style="text-align:center;"|Peak chart positions ! style="text-align:center;" rowspan="2"|Sales ! style="text-align:center;" rowspan="2"|Certifications |- | style="text-align:center;"|ITA |- |2009 |Dove si vola | style="text-align:center;"|9 |70,000+ |Platinum |- |2010 |Re matto | style="text-align:center;"|1 |60,000+ |Platinum |}

Live album

{|class="wikitable" |- ! style="text-align:center;" rowspan="2"|Year ! style="text-align:center;" rowspan="2"|Title ! style="text-align:center;"|Peak chart positions |- | style="text-align:center;"|ITA |- |2010 |Re matto live | style="text-align:center;"|1 |}

Singles

Compilations

2009: X Factor 3 (The Compilation)

2009: X Factor - The Christmas Album

2010: Super Sanremo 2010

2010: TRL On the Road Compilation

Tours

2010: Re Matto Tour

External links

Official website

X Factor Officail artist page

First and Official Forum- The Empire of his madness

X FactorWinner|before=Matteo Becucci|after=Nathalie Giannitrapani|years=2009}} maNga}}

Category:1988 births Category:2000s singers Category:2010s singers Category:Italian male singers Category:Italian pop singers Category:Living people Category:X Factor series winners

Name	Jon Culshaw
Birth date	June 02, 1968
Birth place	Ormskirk, Lancashire, England
Nationality	English
Active	1980s-present
Genre	Impressions, sketch comedy
Notable work	Dead Ringers (2000–2007)2DTV (2001–2004)The Impressionable Jon Culshaw (2004) Headcases (2008–present) The Impressions Show with Culshaw and Stephenson (2009)

Jonathan Peter Culshaw (born 2 June 1968 in Ormskirk, Lancashire) is an English impressionist and comedian. He was educated at St Bede's RC High School, Ormskirk, and St John Rigby College, in Orrell, Wigan.

He is famous for his work on BBC Radio 4 and BBC2's Dead Ringers , ITV's 2DTV and his contributions to BBC Radio 1, particularly on The Chris Moyles Show. He also appeared in ITV's Heartbeat on 26 November 2006.

Broadcasting career

His radio career began in hospital radio in Ormskirk. His first job was at Red Rose Radio (now Rock FM) in Preston in 1987, where even then he used to occasionally read the weather in the voice of Frank Bruno. He did voice-over work then was catapulted to prominence with Spitting Image, where he voiced around forty characters, including John Major, the then Prime Minister.

For around four years in the late 1980s, he was a DJ on the commercial radio station Viking FM, based in Hull, and also had a breakfast show on Pennine Radio (now The Pulse of West Yorkshire) and Radio Wave in Blackpool. It was a receptionist at Viking FM who persuaded Culshaw he should go onstage with his impressions and make it his living. He later appeared on BBC Radio 2's It's Been a Bad Week, appeared as a guest on the BBC2 Star Trek Night Quiz in August 1996, and was also a regular guest on the Chris Moyles afternoon show on BBC Radio 1 from 1998–2002, where he would phone up commercial organisations such as a Kwik-Fit garage in the voice of Patrick Moore or Obi-Wan Kenobi, politely requesting whether they could service his X-wing fighter, and how much time it would take.

Radio 4 years

He rose to fame in January 1998 by impersonating William Hague while working for Capital Radio, and succeeding in contacting Number 10 Downing Street. He was put through to Tony Blair who, despite instantly discovering the ruse, had a lengthy conversation with him until a member of Blair's staff ended the call.

Between 2001 and 2002 he had a programme on ITV called Alter Ego where he interviewed male celebrities in their own style of speaking, a form of simultaneous translation. On ITV he also appeared on 2DTV, a cartoon version of what Dead Ringers would do when transposed to TV. Using the same production team, in early 2004, he had his own programme, The Impressionable Jon Culshaw which was commissioned for ITV1. His most famous impressions are ex-British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Obi-Wan Kenobi (in the Alec Guinness persona), Russell Crowe, President George W. Bush, Ozzy Osbourne, Dale Winton, the newsreader Brian Perkins, Sir Patrick Moore and Tom Baker (who played the fourth incarnation of The Doctor in Doctor Who).

He also appeared in the Doctor Who webcast "Death Comes to Time" and audio drama The Kingmaker. In the latter, he got to perform his Tom Baker impression "for real" (voicing tape recordings of the fourth Doctor), although his nominal part was that of Earl Rivers.

In 2005, Culshaw was a celebrity contestant on Comic Relief does Fame Academy.

In January 2006, he began presenting the BBC show Jon Culshaw's Commercial Breakdown shown on Friday Nights. In 2006, he received an honorary fellowship from the University of Central Lancashire in Preston.

Culshaw was one of the final judges in Let's Dance for Comic Relief.

In August 2007, he appeared on a celebrity edition of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire with John Thomson.

In January 2008, he appeared on , as part of a pub-quiz team, with Chris Moyles. In May 2008 he appeared in the BBC documentary series Comedy Map of Britain.

He is also voicing Piston Pete in the upcoming film Agent Crush.

On 29 December 2008, Culshaw appeared on Celebrity Mastermind. His specialist subject was British Pop of the 80s. He came third with 23 points.

In November 2007, and again in December 2008, Culshaw appeared on The Sky at Night and is a keen amateur astronomer.

On 31 October 2009, Culshaw started a new comedy sketch show with Debra Stephenson, The Impression Show with Culshaw and Stephenson.

In 2010, Culshaw appeared in the television series, Missing, as Des Martin.

Filmography

References

External links

Alter Ego.

Article in The Stage

BBC Dead Ringers.

Honorary fellowship

Viking FM photo

Audio clips

Prank call.

The Time Lord contacts terrestrial organisations by telephone.

Voice over work.

Viking FM jingle

Talking about his work on Dead Ringers.

Interviewed on Radio Lancashire in July 2006

Helping out with Budget 2005 on Radio Five Live

Would You featuring celebrity vocals

Talking on Danny Baker's programme.

This is the Radio Four News with Brian Perkins.

Are you sitting comfortably? It's time for Dead Ringers to begin.

Video clips

Receiving his honorary degree in Preston (YouTube)

Category:1968 births Category:Living people Category:English comedians Category:English Roman Catholics Category:People from Ormskirk Category:British impressionists (entertainers) Category:Fame Academy participants

Enrico Caruso (February 25, 1873 – August 2, 1921) was an Italian tenor. He sang to great acclaim at the major opera houses of Europe and North and South America, appearing in a wide variety of roles from the Italian and French repertoires that ranged from the lyric to the dramatic. Caruso also made approximately 290 commercially released recordings from 1902 to 1920. All of these recordings, which span most of his stage career, are available today on CDs and as digital downloads.

Historical and musical significance

Caruso's 25-year career, stretching from 1895 to 1920, included 863 appearances at the New York Metropolitan Opera before he died from an infection at the age of 48. His fame has lasted to the present day despite the limited marketing and promotional vehicles available during Caruso's era. (He was, nonetheless, a client of Edward Bernays, during the latter's tenure as a press agent in the United States.) Publicity in Caruso's time relied on newspapers, particularly wire services, along with magazines, photography and relatively instantaneous communication via the telephone and the telegraph, to spread a message and raise a performer's profile.

Caruso biographers Pierre Key, Bruno Zirato and Stanley Jackson attribute Caruso's fame not only to his voice and musicianship but also to a keen business sense and an enthusiastic embrace of commercial sound recording, then in its infancy. Many opera singers of Caruso's time rejected the phonograph (or gramophone) due to the low fidelity of early discs. Others, including Adelina Patti, Francesco Tamagno and Nellie Melba, exploited the new technology once they became aware of the financial returns that Caruso was reaping from his initial recording sessions.

Caruso made more than 260 extant recordings in America for the Victor Talking Machine Company (later RCA Victor) from 1904 to 1920, and he earned millions of dollars in royalties from the retail sales of the resulting 78-rpm discs. (Previously, in Italy in 1902–1903, he had cut five batches of records for the Gramophone & Typewriter Company, the Zonophone label and Pathé Records.) He was also heard live from the stage of the Metropolitan Opera House in 1910, when he participated in the first public radio broadcast to be transmitted in the United States.

Caruso appeared in newsreels, too, as well as a short experimental film made by Thomas Edison and two commercial motion pictures. For Edison, in 1911, Caruso portrayed the role of Edgardo in a filmed scene from Donizetti's opera Lucia di Lammermoor. In 1918, he appeared in a dual role in the American silent film My Cousin for Paramount Pictures. This movie included a sequence of him on stage performing the aria "Vesti la giubba" from Leoncavallo's opera Pagliacci. The following year Caruso played a character called Cosimo in another movie, The Splendid Romance. Producer Jesse Lasky paid Caruso $100,000 to appear in these two efforts but they both flopped at the box office.

While Caruso sang at such venues as La Scala in Milan, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in London, the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg, and the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, he was also the leading tenor of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City for 18 consecutive seasons. It was at the Met, in 1910, that he created the role of Dick Johnson in Giacomo Puccini's La fanciulla del West.

Caruso's voice extended up to high C in its prime and grew in power and weight as he grew older. He sang a broad spectrum of roles, ranging from lyric, to spinto, to dramatic parts, in the Italian and French repertoires. In the German repertoire, Caruso sang only two roles, Assad (in Karl Goldmark's The Queen of Sheba) and Richard Wagner's Lohengrin, both of which he performed in Italian in Buenos Aires in 1899 and 1901 respectively.

Life and career

Early life

Enrico Caruso came from a poor but not destitute background. Born in Naples in the Via San Giovannello agli Ottocalli 7 on February 25, 1873, he was baptised the next day in the adjacent Roman Catholic Church of San Giovanni e Paolo. Called Errico in accordance with the Neapolitan dialect, Caruso was nicknamed "Erri" by his family and friends; but he would later adopt the formal Italian version of his given name, Enrico (the equivalent of "Henry" in English). This change came at the suggestion of a singing teacher, Guglielmo Vergine, with whom he began lessons at the age of 16.

Caruso was the third of seven children born to the same parents, and one of only three to survive infancy. There is an often repeated story of Caruso having had 17 or 18 siblings who died in infancy. Two of his biographers, Francis Robinson and Pierre Key, mentioned the tale in their books but genealogical research conducted by Caruso family friend Guido D'Onofrio has suggested it is false. According to Caruso's son Enrico, Jr., Caruso himself and his brother Giovanni may have been the source of the exaggerated number. Caruso's widow Dorothy also included the story in a memoir that she wrote about her late husband. She quotes the tenor as follows in relation to his mother, Anna Caruso (née Baldini): "She had twenty-one children. Twenty boys and one girl – too many. I am number nineteen boy."

Caruso's father, Marcellino, was a mechanic and foundry worker with a steady job. Initially, Marcellino thought that his son should adopt the same trade and at the age of 11, the boy was apprenticed to a mechanical engineer named Palmieri who constructed public water fountains. (Whenever visiting Naples in future years, Caruso liked to point out a fountain that he had helped to install.) Caruso later worked alongside his father at the Meuricoffre factory in Naples. At his mother's 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 handsome 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 possible adult career in music.

Caruso was encouraged in his early musical ambitions by his mother, who died in 1888. In order to raise much needed cash for his family, he found supplementary work as a street singer in Naples and performed at cafes and soirees. Aged 18, he used the fees that he had earned by singing at an Italian resort to buy his first pair of new shoes. 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 with Vergine upon discharge from the army.

Early career

At the age of 22, Caruso made his professional stage debut in serious music. The date was March 15, 1895 at the Teatro Nuovo in Naples. The work in which he appeared was a now-forgotten opera, L'Amico Francesco, by the amateur composer Domenico Morelli. A string of further engagements in provincial opera houses followed, and he received instruction from the conductor and voice teacher Vincenzo Lombardi that improved his high notes and polished his style. Three other prominent Neapolitan singers taught by Lombardi were the baritones Antonio Scotti and Pasquale Amato, both of whom would go on to partner Caruso at the Met, and the tenor Fernando De Lucia, who would also appear at the Met and later sing at Caruso's funeral.

Money continued to be in short supply for the young Caruso. One of his first publicity photographs, taken on a visit to Sicily in 1896, depicts him wearing a bedspread draped like a toga since his sole dress shirt was away being laundered. At a notorious early performance in Naples, he was booed by a section of the audience because he failed to pay a claque to cheer for him. This incident hurt Caruso's pride. He never appeared again on stage in his native city, stating later that he would return "only to eat spaghetti".

During the final few years of the 19th century, Caruso performed at a succession of theaters throughout Italy until, in 1900, he was rewarded with a contract to sing at La Scala in Milan, the country's premier opera house. His La Scala debut occurred on December 26 of that year in the part of Rodolfo in Giacomo Puccini's La bohème with Arturo Toscanini conducting. Audiences in Monte Carlo, Warsaw and Buenos Aires also heard Caruso sing during this pivotal phase of his career and, in 1899–1900, he appeared before the Tsar and the Russian aristocracy at the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg and the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow as part of a touring company of first-class Italian singers.

The first major operatic role that Caruso was given the responsibility of creating was Loris in Umberto Giordano's Fedora, at the Teatro Lirico, Milan, on November 17, 1898. At that same theater, on November 6, 1902, he would create the role of Maurizio in Francesco Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur. (Puccini considered casting the young Caruso in the role of Cavaradossi in Tosca at its premiere in 1900, but ultimately chose the older, more established Emilio De Marchi instead.)

Caruso took part in a "grand concert" at La Scala in February 1901 that Toscanini organised to mark the recent death of Giuseppe Verdi. Among those appearing with him at the concert were two other leading Italian tenors of the day, Francesco Tamagno (the creator of the protagonist's role in Verdi's Otello) and Giuseppe Borgatti (the creator of the protagonist's role in Giordano's Andrea Chénier). He embarked on his last series of La Scala performances in March 1902, creating along the way the principal tenor part in Germania by Alberto Franchetti.

A month later, he was engaged by the Gramophone & Typewriter Company to make his first group of acoustic recordings, in a Milan hotel room, for a fee of 100 pounds sterling. These 10 discs swiftly became best-sellers. Among other things, they helped to spread 29-year-old Caruso's fame throughout the English-speaking world. The management of London's Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, signed him for a season of appearances in eight different operas ranging from Verdi's Aida to Don Giovanni by Mozart. His successful debut at Covent Garden occurred on May 14, 1902, as the Duke of Mantua in Verdi's Rigoletto. Covent Garden's highest-paid diva, the Australian soprano Nellie Melba, partnered him as Gilda. They would sing together often during the early 1900s. In her memoirs, Melba praised Caruso's voice but considered him to be a less sophisticated musician and interpretive artist than Jean de Reszke—the Met's biggest tenor drawcard prior to Caruso.

The Metropolitan Opera

The following year, 1903, Caruso traveled to New York City to take up a contract with the Metropolitan Opera. (The gap between his London and New York engagements was filled by a series of performances in Italy, Portugal and South America.) Caruso's Met contract had been negotiated by his agent, the banker and impresario Pasquale Simonelli. Caruso debuted at the Met in a new production of Rigoletto on November 23, 1903. This time, Marcella Sembrich sang opposite him as Gilda. A few months later, he began a lifelong association with the Victor Talking-Machine Company. He made his first American discs on February 1, 1904, having signed a lucrative financial deal with Victor. Thereafter, his recording career ran in tandem with his Met career, the one bolstering the other, until he died in 1921.

Caruso purchased the Villa Bellosguardo, a palatial country house near Florence, in 1904. The villa became his retreat away from the pressures of the operatic stage and the grind of travel. Caruso's preferred address in New York City was a suite at Manhattan's Knickerbocker Hotel. (The Knickerbocker was erected in 1906 on the corner of Broadway and 42nd Street.) Caruso commissioned the New York jewelers Tiffany & Co. to strike a 24-carat-gold medal adorned with the tenor's profile. He presented the medal in gratitude to Simonelli as a souvenir of his many well remunerated performances at the Met (see illustration, above).

In addition to his regular New York engagements, Caruso gave recitals and operatic performances in a large number of cities across the United States and sang in Canada. He also continued to sing widely in Europe, appearing again at Covent Garden in 1904–07 and 1913–14. Audiences in France, Belgium, Monaco, Austria, Hungary and Germany heard him, too, prior to the outbreak of World War I. In 1909, Melba asked him to participate in her forthcoming tour of Australia; but he declined the invitation because of the significant amount of travel time such a trip would entail.

Members of the Met's roster of artists, including Caruso, had visited San Francisco in April 1906 for a series of performances. Following an appearance as Don Jose in Carmen at the city's Grand Opera House, a strong jolt awakened Caruso at 5:13 on the morning of the 18th in his suite at the Palace Hotel. He found himself in the middle of the San Francisco Earthquake, which led to a series of fires that destroyed most of the city. The Met lost all the sets and costumes that it had brought on tour but none of the artists was harmed. Holding an autographed photo of President Theodore Roosevelt, Caruso made an ultimately successful effort to flee the city, first by boat and then by train. He vowed never to return to San Francisco and kept his word.

In November 1906, Caruso was charged with an indecent act allegedly committed in the monkey house of New York's Central Park Zoo. The police accused him of pinching the bottom of a married woman. Caruso claimed a monkey did the bottom-pinching. He was found guilty as charged, however, and fined 10 dollars, although suspicions linger that he may have been entrapped by the victim and the arresting officer. The leaders of New York's opera-going high society were outraged initially by the incident, which received widespread newspaper coverage, but they soon forgot about it and continued to attend Caruso's Met performances. Caruso's fan base at the Met was not restricted, however, to the wealthy. Members of America's middle-classes also paid to hear him sing—or buy copies of his recordings—and he enjoyed a substantial following among New York's 500,000 Italian immigrants.

Caruso created the role of Dick Johnson in the world premiere of Puccini's La fanciulla del West on December 10, 1910. The composer conceived the music for the tenor hero with Caruso's voice specifically in mind. With Caruso appeared two more of the Met's star singers, the Czech soprano Emmy Destinn and baritone Pasquale Amato. Toscanini, then the Met's principal conductor, presided in the orchestra pit.

Later career and personal life

From 1916 onwards, Caruso began adding heroic parts such as Samson, John of Leyden and Eléazar to his repertoire, while he planned to tackle Otello (the most demanding role written by Verdi for the tenor voice) at the Met during 1921.

Caruso toured the South American nations of Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil in 1917 and two years later performed in Mexico City. In 1920, he was paid the then enormous sum of 10,000 American dollars a night to sing in Havana, Cuba.

The United States had entered World War I in 1917, sending troops to Europe. Caruso did extensive charity work during the conflict, raising money for war-related patriotic causes by giving concerts and participating enthusiastically in Liberty Bond drives. The tenor had shown himself to be a shrewd businessman since arriving in America. He put a sizable proportion of his earnings from record royalties and singing fees into a range of remunerative investments. Biographer Michael Scott writes that by the end of the war in 1918, Caruso's annual income tax bill amounted to $154,000.

Prior to World War One, Caruso had been romantically tied to an Italian soprano, Ada Giachetti, who was a few years older than he. Though already married, Giachetti bore Caruso four sons during their liaison, which lasted from 1897 to 1908. Two survived infancy: Rodolfo Caruso (born 1898) and singer/actor Enrico Caruso, Jr. (1904). Ada had left her husband, manufacturer Gino Botti, and an existing son to cohabit with the tenor. Information provided in Scott's biography of Caruso suggests that she was his vocal coach as well as his lover. Statements by Enrico Caruso, Jr. in his book tend to substantiate this. Her relationship with Caruso broke down after 11 years and they separated. Giachetti's subsequent attempts to sue him for damages were dismissed by the courts.

Towards the end of the war, Caruso met and wooed a 25-year-old socialite, Dorothy Park Benjamin. She was the daughter of a wealthy New York patent lawyer. In spite of the disapproval of Dorothy's father, the couple wed on August 20, 1918. They had a daughter, Gloria Caruso (1919–1999). Dorothy lived until 1955 and wrote two books about Caruso, whom she had called "Rico" in private life. Published in 1928 and 1945, her books include many of Caruso's letters to his "Doro".

A fastidious dresser, Caruso took two baths a day and liked good Italian food and convivial company. He forged a particularly close bond with his Met and Covent Garden colleague Antonio Scotti—an amiable and stylish baritone from Naples. Caruso was superstitious and habitually carried good-luck charms with him when he sang. He played cards for relaxation and sketched friends, other singers and musicians. Dorothy Caruso said that by the time she knew him, her husband's favorite hobby was compiling scrapbooks. He also amassed a valuable collection of rare postage stamps, coins, watches and antique snuffboxes. Caruso was a heavy smoker of strong Egyptian cigarettes, too. This deleterious habit, combined with a lack of exercise and the punishing schedule of performances that Caruso willingly undertook season after season at the Met, may have contributed to the persistent ill-health which afflicted the last 12 months of his life.

Illness and death

On September 16, 1920, Caruso attended Victor's prime recording venue, Trinity Church, at Camden, New Jersey, for the final time. He recorded several discs over three days, including the "Domine Deus" and "Crucifixus" from the Petite Messe Solennelle by Rossini. These discs were to be his last. Dorothy Caruso noted that her husband's health began a distinct downward spiral in late 1920 while they were on a lengthy North American tour. He displayed symptoms of what appeared to be a severe episode of bronchitis but his condition worsened just before Christmas, and he began experiencing persistent pain in his left side in addition to his breathing difficulties. Caruso's physician, Philip Horowitz, who usually treated him for migraine headaches with a kind of primitive TENS unit, diagnosed "intercostal neuralgia" and pronounced him fit to appear on stage, although the pain continued to hinder his voice production and movements.

During a performance of L'elisir d'amore by Donizetti at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on December 11, 1920, he suffered a throat haemorrhage and the performance was canceled at the end of Act 1. Following this incident, a clearly unwell Caruso gave only three more performances at the Met, the final one being as Eléazar in Halévy's La Juive, on Christmas Eve 1920. (Also appearing that night was the Australian coloratura soprano, Evelyn Scotney, who had sung with Caruso a number of times.)

Caruso's health deteriorated further during the new year due to what was now diagnosed as purulent pleurisy and empyema. He experienced episodes of intense pain because of the infection and underwent seven surgical procedures to drain fluid from his chest and lungs. He returned to Naples to recuperate from the most serious of the operations, during which part of a rib had been removed. According to Dorothy Caruso, he seemed to be recovering, but allowed himself to be examined by an unhygienic local doctor and his condition worsened dramatically after that. The Bastianelli brothers, eminent medical practitioners with a clinic in Rome, recommended that his left kidney be removed. He was on his way to Rome to see them but, while staying overnight in the Vesuvio Hotel in Naples, he took an alarming turn for the worse and was given morphine to help him sleep.

Caruso died at the hotel a few minutes after 9:00 a.m. local time, on August 2, 1921. He was 48. The Bastianellis attributed the likely cause of death to peritonitis arising from a burst subrenal abscess. The King of Italy, Victor Emmanuel III, opened the Royal Basilica of the Church of San Francesco di Paola for Caruso's funeral, which was attended by thousands of people. His embalmed body was preserved in a glass sarcophagus at Del Pianto Cemetery in Naples for mourners to view. In 1929, Dorothy Caruso had his remains sealed permanently in an ornate stone tomb.

Honours

During his lifetime, Caruso received many orders, decorations, testimonials and other kinds of honours from monarchs, governments and miscellaneous cultural bodies of the various nations in which he sang. He was also the recipient of Italian knighthoods. In 1917, he was elected an honorary member of the Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, the national fraternity for men involved in music, by the fraternity's Alpha chapter of the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. One unusual award bestowed on him was that of "Honorary Captain of the New York Police Force". Caruso was posthumously awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1987. On February 27 of that same year, the United States Postal Service issued a 22-cent postage stamp in his honor.

Repertoire

Caruso's operatic repertoire consisted primarily of Italian works along with a few roles in French. He also performed two German operas, Wagner's Lohengrin and Goldmark's Die Königin von Saba, singing in Italian, early in his career. Below are the first performances by Caruso, in chronological order, of each of the operas that he undertook on the stage. World premieres are indicated with **.

L'amico Francesco (Morelli) – Teatro Nuovo, Napoli, 15 March 1895 (debut)**

Faust – Caserta, 28 March 1895

Cavalleria rusticana – Caserta, April 1895

Camoens (Musoni) – Caserta, May 1895

Rigoletto – Napoli, 21 July 1895

La traviata – Napoli, 25 August 1895

Lucia di Lammermoor – Cairo, 30 October 1895

La Gioconda – Cairo, 9 November 1895

Manon Lescaut – Cairo, 15 November 1895

I Capuleti e i Montecchi – Napoli, 7 December 1895

Malia (Frontini) – Trapani, 21 March 1896

La sonnambula – Trapani, 24 March 1896

Marriedda (Bucceri) – Napoli, 23 June 1896

I puritani – Salerno, 10 September 1896

La Favorita – Salerno, 22 November 1896

A San Francisco (Sebastiani) – Salerno, 23 November 1896

Carmen – Salerno, 6 December 1896

Un Dramma in vendemmia (Fornari) – Napoli, 1 February 1897

Celeste (Marengo) – Napoli, 6 March 1897**

Il Profeta Velato (Napolitano) – Salerno, 8 April 1897

La bohème – Livorno, 14 August 1897

La Navarrese – Milano, 3 November 1897

Il Voto (Giordano) – Milano, 10 November 1897**

L'arlesiana – Milano, 27 November 1897**

Pagliacci – Milano, 31 December 1897

La bohème (Leoncavallo) – Genova, 20 January 1898

The Pearl Fishers – Genova, 3 February 1898

Hedda (Leborne) – Milano, 2 April 1898**

Mefistofele – Fiume, 4 March 1898

Sapho (Massenet) – Trento, 3? June 1898

Fedora – Milano, 17 November 1898**

Iris – Buenos Aires, 22 June 1899

La regina di Saba (Goldmark) – Buenos Aires, 4 July 1899

Yupanki (Berutti)– Buenos Aires, 25 July 1899**

Aida – St. Petersburg, 3 January 1900

Un ballo in maschera – St. Petersburg, 11 January 1900

Maria di Rohan – St. Petersburg, 2 March 1900

Manon – Buenos Aires, 28 July 1900

Tosca – Treviso, 23 October 1900

Le maschere (Mascagni) – Milano, 17 January 1901**

L'elisir d'amore – Milano, 17 February 1901

, 1904]]

Lohengrin – Buenos Aires, 7 July 1901

Germania – Milano, 11 March 1902**

Don Giovanni – London, 19 July 1902

Adriana Lecouvreur – Milano, 6 November 1902**

Lucrezia Borgia – Lisboa, 10 March 1903

Les Huguenots – New York, 3 February 1905

Martha – New York, 9 February 1906

Madama Butterfly – London, 26 May 1906

L'Africana – New York, 11 January 1907

Andrea Chénier – London, 20 July 1907

Il trovatore – New York, 26 February 1908

Armide – New York, 14 November 1910

La fanciulla del West – New York, 10 December 1910**

Julien – New York, 26 December 1914

Samson et Dalila – New York, 24 November 1916

Lodoletta – Buenos Aires, 29 July 1917

Le prophète – New York, 7 February 1918

L'amore dei tre re – New York, 14 March 1918

La forza del destino – New York, 15 November 1918

La Juive – New York, 22 November 1919.

Note: At the time of his death, Caruso was preparing to perform the title role in Verdi's Otello in an intended Met production.

Caruso also had a repertory of more than 520 songs. They ranged from classical compositions to traditional Italian melodies and popular tunes of the day, including a few English-language titles such as George M. Cohan's "Over There" and Henry Geehl's "For You Alone".

Recordings

Caruso possessed a phonogenic voice which was "manly and powerful, yet sweet and lyrical", to quote the singer/author John Potter (see bibliography, below). Not surprisingly, he became one of the first major classical vocalists to make numerous recordings. He and the disc phonograph, known in the United Kingdom as the , did much to promote each other in the first two decades of the 20th century. His 1907 acoustic recording of "Vesti la giubba" was the first phonograph/gramophone record to sell a million copies. (Caruso's searing rendition of this aria from Pagliacci would inspire popular singer Freddie Mercury to quote its melody in the first section of Queen's hit "It's a Hard Life".) Some of Caruso's recordings have remained continuously available since their original issue around a century ago, and every one of his surviving discs (including unissued takes) has been re-engineered and re-released on CD in recent years. Regrettably, for legal reasons arising from a clash of contracts, he never recorded any of the music written for the character of Dick Johnson in Puccini's La fanciulla del West, which he created in 1910.

Caruso's first recordings, cut on disc in three separate sessions in Milan during April, November and December 1902, were made with piano accompaniments for HMV/EMI's forerunner, the Gramophone & Typewriter Company. In April 1903, he made seven further recordings, also in Milan, for the Anglo-Italian Commerce Company (AICC). These were released on discs bearing the Zonophone seal. Three more Milan recordings for AICC followed in October. This time around, they were released by Pathé Records on cylinders as well as on discs. Then on February 1, 1904, Caruso began recording exclusively for the Victor Talking Machine Company in the United States. While most of Caruso's American recordings would be made in boxy studios in New York and nearby Camden, New Jersey, Victor also recorded him occasionally in Camden's Trinity Church, which could accommodate a larger band of musicians. (In 1904, however, Victor had elected to use Room 826 at Carnegie Hall, New York, as a makeshift recording venue for its initial bundle of Caruso discs.) Caruso's final recording session took place at Camden on September 16, 1920. The last classical items that the doomed tenor recorded consisted, fittingly enough, of the sacred pieces "Domine Deus" and "Crucifixus" from Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle.

Caruso's earliest American records of operatic arias and songs, like their 30 or so Milan-made predecessors, were accompanied by piano. From February 1906, however, so-called 'orchestral' accompaniments became the norm. The regular conductors of these instrumental-backed recording sessions were Walter B. Rogers and Joseph Pasternack. After RCA acquired Victor in 1929, it re-issued some of the old discs with the existing accompaniment over-dubbed by a larger, more authentic sounding, electronically recorded orchestra. (Earlier experiments using this re-dubbing technique, carried out in 1927, had been considered unsatisfactory.) In 1950, RCA re-published a number of the fuller-sounding Caruso recordings on 78-rpm discs made of smooth vinyl instead of brittle and gritty shellac, which was the traditional material used for "78s". Then, as vinyl long-playing discs (LPs) became popular, many of his recordings were electronically enhanced for release on the extended format. Some of these particular recordings, remastered by RCA Victor on the alternative 45-rpm format, were re-released in the early 1950s as companions to the same selections sung in the "Red Seal" series by movie tenor Mario Lanza. In 1951, Lanza had starred in a popular and profitable Hollywood biopic, The Great Caruso, which took numerous liberties with the facts of Caruso's life.

In the 1970s, Thomas G. Stockham of the University of Utah utilised an early digital reprocessing technique called "Soundstream" to remaster Caruso's Victor recordings for RCA, but the results were not entirely successful. Nonetheless, these early digitised efforts were issued in part on LP, beginning in 1976. Twice they were issued complete by RCA on Compact Disc (in 1990 and then in 2004). Other complete sets of Caruso's restored recordings have been issued on CD by the Pearl label and, more recently, in 2000–2004 by Naxos. The 12-disc Naxos set was remastered by the renowned American audio-restoration engineer Ward Marston. Pearl also released in 1993 a CD set devoted to RCA's electrically over-dubbed versions of Caruso's original acoustic discs. RCA has similarly issued three CD sets of Caruso material with modern, digitally recorded orchestral accompaniments added. Caruso's records are now available, too, as digital downloads. His best-selling downloads at iTunes have been the familiar Italian songs "Santa Lucia" and "O Sole Mio".

Note: Caruso died before the introduction of higher fidelity, electrical recording technology (in 1925). All of his recordings were made using the acoustic process, which required the recording artist to sing into a metal horn or funnel which relayed sound directly to a master disc via a stylus. This process captured only a limited range of the overtones and nuances present in the singing voice. Caruso's 12-inch acoustic recordings were limited to a maximum duration of about 4:30 minutes. Therefore, some of the arias, duets and ensemble pieces that he recorded had to be edited in order to fit this time constraint.

Media

::Over There ::Caruso singing the popular World War I song by George M. Cohan.

See also

Enrico Caruso discography (CD)

Caruso Sauce

Bibliography

Key, P.V.R. and Zirato, B, Enrico Caruso, a Biography (Little, Brown and Co, Boston, 1922).

Scott, Michael, The Great Caruso (Hamish Hamilton, London, 1988).

Caruso, Dorothy, Enrico Caruso – His Life and Death, with a discography by Jack Caidin (Simon and Schuster, New York, 1945).

Jean-Pierre Mouchon, "Particularités physiques et phonétiques de la voix enregistrée de Caruso", foreword by Prof.André Appaix (in Le Sud Médical et Chirurgical, 99e année, n°2509,Marseille, France, 31 octobre 1964, pp. 11812–11829).

Jean-Pierre Mouchon, "Enrico Caruso. 1873-1921. Sa vie et sa voix. Étude psycho-physiologique, physique, phonétique et esthétique", foreword by Dr.Édouard-Jean Garde (Académie régionale de chant lyrique, Marseille, France, 1966, 106 p., ill.).

Jackson, Stanley, Caruso (Stein and Day, New York, 1972).

Jean-Pierre Mouchon, "Enrico Caruso. His Life and Voice" (Éditions Ophrys, Gap, France, 1974, 77 p., ill.).

Jean-Pierre Mouchon, "Enrico Caruso. L'homme et l'artiste, 4 vol.: Première partie. L'homme (Étude psycho-physiologique et historique), p. 1-653 bis, ill.;deuxième partie. L'artiste (étude physique, phonétique, linguistique et esthétique), pp. 654–975 bis, bibliographie critique, index des représentations données par Enrico Caruso entre 1895 et 1920, index de ses concertsq et récitals,p. 976-p. 1605 (Paris-Sorbonne 1978, published by Atelier national de reproduction des thèses, Université de Lille III, 9, rue Auguste Angellier, 59046 Lille, France in three volumes, and by Didier-Érudition, Paris, in microfiches).

Pleasants, Henry, The Great Singers (Macmillan Publishing, London, 1983).

Caruso, Enrico Jr., and Farkas, Andrew, Enrico Caruso, My Father and My Family, with a discography by William Moran and a chronology by Tom Kaufman (Amadeus Press, Portland, 1990).

Gargano, Pietro and Cesarini, Gianni, Caruso, Vita e arte di un grande cantante (Longanesi, 1990).

Douglas, Nigel, Legendary Voices (Andre Deutsch, London, 1992).

Jean-Pierre Mouchon, "Chronologie de la carrière artistique du ténor Enrico Caruso" (Académie Régionale de Chant Lyrique, Marseilles, France, 1992, 423 p., ill.).

Vaccaro, Riccardo, Caruso, foreword by Dr. Ruffo Titta (Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane, Naples, Italy, 1995).

Gargano, Pietro, Una vita una leggenda (Editoriale Giorgio Mondadori, 1997).

Griffith, Hugh, CD liner notes for The Complete Recordings of Enrico Caruso, volumes 1 & 2, produced by Ward Marston (Naxos Historical, 8.110703, 8.110704, (c) 2000 HNH International Ltd).

Potter, John, Tenor: History of a Voice (Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2009).

Steane, John, The Grand Tradition: 70 Years of Singing on Disc (Duckworth, London, 1974).

Jean-Pierre Mouchon, "Caruso in Concert" (in "Étude" n°46, "Hommage à Marguerite-Marie Dubois", January–February-March–April 2010, pp. 12–37, Journal of Association internationale de chant lyrique "Titta Ruffo", Marseilles, France, edited by Professor Jean-Pierre Mouchon, M.A., Ph.D., Mus.D., D.Li).

Il Progresso italo americano, Il banchiere che portò Caruso negli USA, sezione B – supplemento illustrato della domenica, New York, 27 luglio 1986.

Notes

References

External links

Pierre V.R. Key: Enrico Caruso; a biography (1922)

Dorothy Caruso: Enrico Caruso His Life And Death (1945)

International Jose Guillermo Carrillo Foundation

Historical Tenors: Caruso

The Enrico Caruso Page

Grandi-Tenori: Caruso

Recordings of Caruso Part 1 (Internet Archive)

Recordings of Caruso Part 2 (Internet Archive)

Caruso and Tetrazzini on the Art of Singing, 1909, by Enrico Caruso and Luisa Tetrazzini, from Project Gutenberg

History of the Tenor – Sound Clips and Narration

Caruso in the San Francisco earthquake San Francisco Museum

Discography of Enrico Caruso on Victor Records from the Encyclopedic Discography of Victor Recordings (EDVR)

Enrico Caruso Playlist and Video 1908 Teatro Colon Buenos Aires Opening

The Enrico Caruso Museum of America

Category:1873 births Category:1921 deaths Category:People from Naples Category:1906 San Francisco earthquake Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners Category:Italian opera singers Category:Italian tenors Category:Operatic tenors Category:1906 San Francisco Earthquake survivors Category:Deaths from peritonitis Category:RCA Records artists Category:RCA Victor artists

Caption	MacDowell at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival
Birth name	Rosalie Anderson MacDowell
Birth date	April 21, 1958
Birth place	Gaffney, South Carolina, U.S.
Years active	1984–present
Occupation	Actress, model
Spouse

Rosalie Anderson "Andie" MacDowell (born April 21, 1958) is an American model and actress. She has received the Golden Camera and an Honorary César.

Early life

Andie MacDowell was born in Gaffney, South Carolina, the daughter of Pauline "Paula" Johnston (née Oswald), a music teacher, and Marion St. Pierre MacDowell, a lumber executive. She is of Scottish descent. Her family owned an Antebellum period summer house in Arden, North Carolina, which has since been made into a bed-and-breakfast named the Blake House Inn. Graffiti from her childhood visits is preserved in an upstairs bedroom closet. She attended Winthrop College for two years before moving briefly to Columbia, South Carolina. There she worked two jobs; one in a clothing boutique and the other in a restaurant/bar called "Stage Door". "Rosie," as she was known locally, lived with her sister, Beverly, and saved all her money so she could move to New York City and start her career. She was initially spotted by a rep from Wilhelmina Models while on a trip to Los Angeles before she would later sign with Elite Model Management in New York City.

Career

, 2001]] In the early 1980s, MacDowell modeled for Vogue magazine and appeared in ad campaigns for Yves Saint Laurent, Vassarette, Armani perfume, Sabeth-Row, Mink International, Anne Klein and Bill Blass. She worked with such esteemed photographers as Bruce Weber, Richard Avedon, Helmut Newton, Irving Penn and Herb Ritts among others. A series of billboards in Time Square and national television commercials for Calvin Klein drew attention to her and led to her 1984 film debut in , a role in which her lines were recorded by Glenn Close because her southern accent was too pronounced for her to play the role of an Englishwoman. In 1985, she had a small part in St. Elmo's Fire.

MacDowell studied method acting with teachers from the Actors Studio, in addition to working privately with the renowned coach Harold Guskin. Four years later, director Steven Soderbergh cast her in the independent film Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989). Her performance earned her an Independent Spirit Award, a Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress, several other award nominations and led to a series of starring roles in films such as Green Card, The Object of Beauty, and Short Cuts.

In the 1990s, MacDowell achieved stardom due to the box office success of the 1993 comedy by Harold Ramis, Groundhog Day, and Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), opposite Hugh Grant. Groundhog Day and FWAAF remain MacDowell's biggest box office hits.

MacDowell appears in print and television advertisements for the cosmetic and haircare company L'Oréal.

In September 2010, MacDowell joined the cast of Fox's drama series Lone Star, which was canceled after two aired episodes due to low ratings.

Personal life

MacDowell was married from 1986 to 1999 to fellow former model and rancher Paul Qualley, whom she met while both were posing for Gap ads. The couple have a son, Justin, and two daughters, Rainey and Sarah Margaret. She was married to businessman Rhett Hartzog from 2001 to 2004.

MacDowell currently resides in the town of Biltmore Forest near Asheville, North Carolina. She is an avid hiker and general outdoorswoman.

Filmography

{| class="wikitable sortable" |+ Films |- ! Year ! Title ! Role ! class="unsortable" | Notes |- | 1984 | | Miss Jane Porter | |- | 1985 | St. Elmo's Fire | Dale Biberman | |- | 1988 | | Anthea | |- | 1989 | Sex, Lies, and Videotape | Ann Bishop Mullany | Independent Spirit Award for Best Female LeadLos Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best ActressNominated—Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best ActressNominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama |- | 1990 | Green Card | Brontë | Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy |- | 1991 | Hudson Hawk | Anna Baragli | |- | 1991 | | Tina | |- | 1991 | Women & Men 2: In Love There Are No Rules | Emily | TV movie |- | 1992 | | Herself | Cameo appearance |- | 1993 | Short Cuts | Ann Finnigan | Golden Globe Special Ensemble Cast AwardVolpi Cup for Best Emsemble CastNominated—Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress |- | 1993 | Groundhog Day | Rita | Saturn Award for Best Actress |- | 1993 | Ruby Cairo | Elizabeth 'Bessie' Faro aka Ruby Cairo | |- | 1994 | Four Weddings and a Funeral | Carrie | Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy |- | 1994 | Bad Girls | Eileen Spenser | |- | 1995 | Unstrung Heroes | Selma Lidz | |- | 1996 | Michael | Dorothy Winters | |- | 1996 | Multiplicity | Laura Kinney | |- | 1997 | | Page | |- | 1998 | Shadrach | Trixie | |- | 1999 | Just the Ticket | Linda Palinski | also producer |- | 1999 | Muppets from Space | Shelley Snipes | |- | 1999 | | Laura Phillips | |- | 2000 | Harrison's Flowers | Sarah Lloyd | |- | 2001 | Town & Country | Eugenie Claybourne | also uncredited producer |- | 2001 | On the Edge | Lisa | segment "Reaching Normal" |- | 2001 | Crush | Kate Scales | |- | 2001 | Dinner with Friends | Karen | TV movie |- | 2002 | Jo | Jo | TV movie |- | 2002 | Ginostra | Jessie | |- | 2005 | | Kathy Macfarlane | |- | 2005 | Beauty Shop | Terri | |- | 2005 | Riding the Bus with My Sister | Rachel Simon | TV movie |- | 2005 | Tara Road | Marilyn | |- | 2006 | Barnyard | Etta the Hen | voice |- | 2007 | Intervention | Kelly | |- | 2008 | Inconceivable | Lottie Louise Du Bose | |- | 2009 | | Kate | |- | 2009 | | Maryanne Abbate | |- | 2009 | As Good as Dead | Helen Kalahan | |- | 2010 | Lone Star | Alex | TV series, recurring guest star |- | 2010 | Daydream Nation | Enid Goldberg | |- | 2011 | Monte Carlo | Grace's mother | Filming |- | 2011 | Footloose | Vi Moore | Filming |}

References

External links

E!Online 1999 article and interview

Blake House Inn, Arden

Category:1958 births Category:Living people Category:People from Gaffney, South Carolina Category:American female models Category:American film actors Category:People from Asheville, North Carolina Category:Actors from South Carolina Category:American actors of Scottish descent Category:American people of Scottish descent