Soprano Amelita Galli-Curci ~ My Old Kentucky Home (1928)

Italian Soprano Amelita Galli-Curci (1882-1963) / My Old Kentucky Home (Stephen Foster) / Recorded: December 12, 1928 --

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Music

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• Italian
• Soprano
• Amelita
• Galli-Curci
• Stephen
• Foster
• 78
• rpm
• CurzonRoad

[meltzerboy]

My previous comment remains the same: the greatest natural singer of all time. Thanks for re-posting this one, Doug.

[CurzonRoad]

Hi Nate: Again, apologies for the mix-up. ITEM: Not sure I've ever understood the stories concerning Galli-Curci singing off key, even her explanation to Gatti-Casazza... so while there's plenty of documentation, to my ears it doesn't come across in her recordings. Cheers, etc. Doug --

[meltzerboy]

Good point; I agree.

[AulicExclusiva]

She pronounced her name in a posh English manner in her spoken dedication to her child-husband, the Norwegian baron Cederstrøm. That spoken autograph is in English. I must assume she pronounced her name à la Française when speaking French and certainly in the Italian manner when speaking Italian.

Many multinational types, such as yours truly, do that.

[meltzerboy]

I happen to like Patti's recording of "Batti, batti" and even more her "Voi che sapete." Sometimes I don't understand what these so-called critics and singers are talking about.

I meant that Herman Klein was not Italian. I know Patti was, even though she was cosmopolitan, as you point out, and pronounced her name in the English--not traditional Italian--manner.

[AulicExclusiva]

One can tell much from her Zerlina records. I particularly like her contrasted tempi, as opposed to today's boring, monotonous style.

Thouh a great cosmopolitan (born in Spain, brought up in the Bronx) Patti's parents were both Italians. She certainly thought of herself as Italian.

[meltzerboy]

I agree partially, except that perhaps there is more warmth to G-C's tone than the average madrigalist's, and also less rhythmic rigidity (more rubato, for example) and more interpolations and charm.

[meltzerboy]

Though not Italian, Klein states that when Patti sang Zerlina, she became the star of the performance, for she WAS Zerlina. Hard to tell from her primitive and aged recording, which has been criticized as being "funny," interpretively speaking. Klein was obsessed with Patti, much as yours truly is with Galli-Curci.

[AulicExclusiva]

I adore Patti too.

But no Italian would consider Zerlina a true starring part. There can only be ONE prima donna in any one opera!

[AulicExclusiva]

I agree with Eames! GC was a kind of Lisa Della Casa.

But I don't think one should sneeze at that kind of disembodied medieval miniature beauty. Each singer is unique, and so was GC. At her madrigalist best, as a kind of Milanese salon singer, she attained her own kind of greatness. I do not mean this as a put-down at all. She was a great vocal aristocrat. She even looked like an Italian princess—unlike Tetrazzini!

[meltzerboy]

Herman Klein commented that he did not understand why Patti had not sung more Mozart, Zerlina being her only role, rather than focusing on Carmen, Aida, and Marguerite. According to him, she would have been the ideal Mozart singer, as well as the perfect Rossini-Donizetti-Bellini-Meye­rbeer-early Verdi singer. Of course, Klein (and many other critics, composers, and singers, except Chorley) adored the great Patti.

[meltzerboy]

Maybe Galli-Curci failed to arouse enthusiasm because her placid and calming style put her listeners to sleep! (Did I just write that?) As I've mentioned before, when Eames heard G-C, Eames remarked to De Schaunsee that while her voice was very beautiful, all she got out of her was an aura of great peace. That said, IMO Galli-Curci's "Ah, non credea" is one of her best recordings as well as my favorite version of the aria. (The recordings by Patti, Tetrazzini (both), and Sayao are also superb.)