Mario Sammarco

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Giuseppe Mario Sammarco (December 13, 1868 - January 24, 1930) was an Italian operatic baritone.

He was born in Palermo, Sicily, where he made his operatic début as Valentine in Faust in 1888. He subsequently sang in Milan, Buenos Aires, London and then America. In New York he was hired by Oscar Hammerstein I for his Manhattan Opera Company as a replacement for Maurice Renaud. He soon became the principal baritone for that company. He had a relatively smooth time in the States until he met up with a disapproving Mary Garden in a Chicago Tosca in 1913. She requested that he be replaced, but after he named some of his former distinguished and uncomplaining Tosca partners, notably Emmy Destinn, the performances went on to critical success.

Apart from Scarpia, he was a famous Rigoletto and Hamlet. He created the role of Gerard in Giordano's Andrea Chénier (1896) and Cascart in Leoncavallo's Zazà (1900).

He died in Milan.

[edit] Sources

• Celletti, Rodolfo (1964). Le Grandi Voci. Istituto per la Collaborazione Culturale (Rome)
• Kutsch, K. J. and Riemens, Leo (1969). A Biographical Dictionary of Singers. Chilton Book Company (New York)
• Warrack, John and West, Ewan (1992), The Oxford Dictionary of Opera, 782 pages, ISBN 0-19-869164-5