Piero Cappuccilli

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Italian baritone Piero Cappuccilli (9 November 1929 - 12 July 2005) was a famous opera singer, best know for his Verdi roles, particularly Macbeth and Simon Boccanegra. He was renowned for his extraordinary breath control and smooth legato. Opera fans considered Cappuccilli one of the finest Italian baritones of the second half of the 20th century.

Born in Trieste, Cappuccilli originally intended to become an architect, but after encouragement from relatives decided to pursue a career in opera. He made his operatic debut in 1957 at the Teatro Nuovo in Milan, singing Tonio in I Pagliacci. In 1960, he made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera, singing Germont in Verdi's La Traviata.

Cappuccilli spent most of his career singing in Europe, with only infrequent travels to North America. He never achieved the level of fame in the US that baritones like Robert Merrill or Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau had, but he worked with the greatest European conductors of his time (von Karajan, Gavazzeni, Abbado, Kleiber) and became one of the greatest interpreters of the Italian repertoire.

Cappuccilli was highly respected as an actor on the operatic stage, and for his fine vocal technique and singing elegance -- not to mention his beautiful singing voice, which he used to his best advantage.

Among his recordings, the 1960 performance of Enrico in Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, with Maria Callas in the title role is considered one of his finest. But it was his 1970s recording of Verdi's Simon Boccanegra and Macbeth under the baton of the renowned Italian conductor Claudio Abbado which made operatic history, since they helped to reinstate those operas in the regular canon of staged Verdi operas.

Cappuccilli died in 2005 at age 75 in Trieste. His health had been fragile since an automobile accident in 1992.