Miscellaneous Lanza-related News/Comments

[Derek McGovern]

This will be our new thread for any miscellaneous Lanza-related news or comments. This will include news about other singers, actors, etc who worked with Lanza. 

[Steff]

The Spanish News have just announced that Sarita Montiel, one of Mario's leading ladies, has passed away today, April 8, at the age of 85 years in Madrid

 

Steff

[Derek McGovern]

Oh, I'm very sorry to hear that, Steff. Sarita Montiel has always been my favourite Lanza leading lady, and somehow I'd expected her to go on for many years yet. She was perfectly cast in Serenade, and certainly the most vibrant of all the actresses with whom Lanza worked. 

 

RIP, Sarita.  

[Derek McGovern]

This photo of Lanza and Montiel together was new to me:

[Steff]

For those who want to read more about Sarita Montiel, please visit the following website:

 

http://infomontiel.tripod.com/index.htm

 

"Serenade" is featured with great pictures in the : "The Hollywood Years 1954-1957" - section:

 

http://infomontiel.tripod.com/id36.htm 

 

Steff

[Vincent Di Placido]

That Photograph of Mario & Sara is fantastic! Best "Serenade" publicity shot I've seen, so vibrant & full of life. Montiel was an incredibly beautiful woman & her performance in Serenade is full of warmth & personality, I loved watching her.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jin0s5HJAQg

[Steff]

 

[Armando]

Sarita was both a stunning looking woman (although she aged badly) and a good actress. There was great chemistry between her and Lanza in Serenade.

R.I.P.

 

[leeann]

Such as lovely photo of  a lovely woman!

In her recent autobiography, Rita Moreno (Toast of New Orleans) speaks of ethnic typecasting in Hollywood. It's interesting to read that Sarita Montiel  turned down a Hollywood contract in the 1950s, fearful, too, of exactly that. 

The attached is a pleasant interview with Hedda Hopper in 1956 in which she says of Lanza, "I worked five months with him; he was good and kind and he is for me a wonderful person." And there is an allusion to a secret American romance, which of course, we now know to be director Anthony Mann.  Lee Ann

 

[Steff]

I know, this is very trivial, but I just find it amazing on which places Mario's name pops up:

 

The personalized Mario Lanza 7-pieces pitcher set

 

"It is reputed that the fabled crooner swilled a gallon of water during each performance to soothe his vocal cords and, in his honor, we name our most popular pitcher set."

 

This offer comes from an online crystal shop from Indian Trail, North Carolina.

 

Steff

 

 

[leeann]

If you have a Google Alert set for Mario Lanza, you may have noticed an announcement a few days ago about a theater production at George Mason University. The play, Passagio, is set in 1959, in  fictional town in Italy, and features Mario Lanza--not as a character in the production, but as a metaphor  to explore some universal  themes and ideas.

George Mason is my institutional affiliation as a historian and where I am (very, very, very slowly) completing my doctoral dissertation. Even so, I'm embarrassed to say I missed the performances because I didn't know about them, and I really wish I hadn't. On the other hand, I appreciate that  the playwright, Michael Patrick Smith,  is on George Mason's faculty and kindly answered some questions about his work via email--and also took the time to visit our main site.

Smith's interests and academic work include taking a look at how theater lets us explore ways in which culture and ethnicity influence how we respond to conflict. In Passagio, Enrico Caruso and Mario Lanza are a backdrop for this exploration--vehicles for his characters. Michael Smith talked a little in the email about how he landed on Caruso and Lanza--and he had some nice things to say about the website:

I enjoyed browsing through the Mario Lanza
website.  I particularly liked listening to the private recordings, a
number of which I'd never heard before.

I chose Caruso and Lanza for my play because I'm a fan of both and
thought it would be fun to weave together a story that involved the two
of them.  An opera-loving mayor who sang for Caruso as a boy, has always
dreamed of following in his hero's footsteps, but never had the nerve to
see if he had the talent to succeed.  One day in the piazza, a man from
a local town pastes up a movie poster for "The Great Caruso."  The mayor
sees the poster and is surprised.

FRANCO:  Nobody could play Caruso!

PASQUALE:  They say this Lanza is the American Caruso.

FRANCO:  An American?  Impossible!

Apparently, someone else has dared to live out the mayor's dream. When
it's revealed that a rival town is getting a movie star for their
festival to steal away the tourists, the mayor brags that he will get
Mario Lanza to sing.  If he can't become the next Caruso himself, maybe
he can get the American Caruso to save the town.  But things don't work
out the way he planned them.

Neither Caruso nor Lanza is an actual character in the play, but the two
of them stand for the unfulfilled dreams of the mayor and, it turns out,
of most of the town people.  That's the idea, anyway.

Thank you again for the link to the website.

Best,
Michael

Smith's work seems to me a multi-layered illustration of Lanza's legacy speaking to his impact on individuals--how it is that his voice and his incredible interpretive gifts put us in touch with something very personal within ourselves, and and something bigger, beyond ourselves. 

It's interesting. too,  that a play without music seems to represent a meaning of Lanza--likely far better than a conventionally conceived biopic and definitely better  than the way-too-many sensationalist biographies have done. Lee Ann

[Steff]

 

Joseph Calleja's complete tribute concert to Mario Lanza, which took place in Prague (Smetana Hall, Prague Municipal House) on 24 January 2013, can now be  watched on you-tube.

 

Prague was one of the venues of Calleja's European "Be My Love" concert tour.

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0UfbkYwWHI

 

 

Steff

[Vincent Di Placido]

New Lanza cd from Sony, 2 discs. Derek Mannering choices...

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Toast-Hollywood-Mario-Lanza/dp/B00DW473YW/ref=sr_1_8?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1374779642&sr=1-8&keywords=mario+lanza 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Vince

I wasn't going to comment on this new Mannering compilation until after its release, but since you've brought it up, here's my take on it.

What a wasted opportunity! Mannering had the enviable task of selecting material for two CDs, and yet what does he do? On Disc 1, ten of the fifteen tracks are repeated from his Ultimate Collection (repackaged as disc 1 of The Essential Mario Lanza only a few years back, and still readily available), plus he repeats the English version of "Arrivederci Roma" from his previous compilation (??!).  Meanwhile on Disc 2, which is entirely made up of Coke selections, he repeats a good third of the material from his earlier releases, throws in the hideously arranged "Make Believe," the poorly sung "Among My Souvenirs," lesser versions of "For You Alone," '"A Vucchella" and "I Love Thee," and adds a couple of spoken introductions as if to justify the whole enterprise. In fact, barely a third of the tracks on Disc 2 could be described as excellent. And apart from the uneven and overwrought "What Is This Thing Called Love?", which I know has its admirers (yourself included!), the only real carrot that Mannering dangles here is the beautiful "My Romance."

Even assuming that Mannering was asked to follow a specific brief here---i.e. one disc of material related to Lanza's Hollywood films and another of love songs---this set could have been so much better. Disc 1, for example, could have included outstanding material that Mannering has never selected for any of his discs: the RCA "Mamma Mia, Che Vo' Sape?" (featured in two of Lanza's films), the 1955 "Torna a Surriento" (ditto), the sublime 1955 version of "Amor Ti Vieta" (only available on an obscure BMG UK disc) from the Serenade soundtrack, and so on. The absence of something like "Amor Ti Vieta" is all the more keenly felt when a recording as poor as the RCA "Libiamo" has been included here. (Bizarrely, in his promo for what he describes as a new "Lana" set, Mannering seems to justify its selection on the basis that its co-performer, Elaine Malbin, has been nice about Lanza over the years. But so what? It doesn't make up for the fact that this is one of Mario's poorest operatic renditions for RCA, with his singing graceless and his voice lacking its usual brilliance.)

And why on earth has Mannering included the Bach-Gounod "Ave Maria" for the fourth time?! (Five times, in fact, if we include Original Album Classics.) That's bordering on obsession, and it's not even one of Lanza's great recordings. 

As for Disc 2, well, the mouth waters when one considers what love song gems could have also been included here. For starters, the inexplicably rare 1951 "Some Day"---which Mannering has never included on any of his CDs (despite his fondness for rehashing many of the same recordings on multiple compilations; 22% of all the material he's released, in fact) was surely a no-brainer. After all, it's one of the top five Coke radio recordings, and given that an astonishing 96 of the 137 unique recordings that Mannering has issued on his eight compilations have been from those same shows, one would think that its origin alone would have ensured its inclusion.

Mannering could also have included the magnificent "Passione," which would not have been out of place despite his tired argument that Lanza's later recordings should never sit alongside earlier ones, the 1956 "Yours Is My Heart Alone" (another inexplicably rare recording on CD), "You Do Something to Me," "If" (only released once in 1993 on a now mercifully deleted compilation), and many other beautiful recordings of love songs. In fact, given that this set was a co-release with TCM, which holds the screening rights to Lanza's films, Mannering should have moved heaven and earth to persuade Sony to include the MGM version of "All the Things You Are," which surely ranks as one of the greatest Lanza recordings---and yet remains one of the least well known.

I'll say it again: what a wasted opportunity. While I have little doubt that the set will be a decent seller---how could it not be, when it's going to be promoted on TV in an "aggressive" marketing campaign?---I can't imagine it appealing to many music lovers under the age of 60. Who on earth would be excited by such snoozefests as "The Best Things in Life Are Free" or the classic "Make Believe," butchered in a hideous arrangement and performed in a throwaway fashion, etc? In any event, as many of us know from personal experience, what younger people actually want to hear of Lanza's legacy---and what truly impresses them---is the best of his operatic and Italian/Neapolitan recordings. Many of the English songs, and not just because of the frequently bad arrangements (especially on the Coke Shows) or intrusive Jeff Alexander Choir (on the non-Coke material), sound terribly dated to younger listeners. But as long as Mannering is controlling the content of Lanza CD compilations, that potential audience will continue to be ignored.

Lanza was not Frank Sinatra, despite the fact that he could sing a brilliant "Begin the Beguine" when he wanted to; he was an operatic singer. To continually be marketing him in the Sinatra mold simply because he recorded (with varying success) some of the standards of the American Songbook during a mere 11-month period of his life is to do him an injustice.       

I have much more to say on Mannering's handling of Lanza's recorded legacy, but I'll save that for an upcoming essay.

Cheers

Derek

[Vincent Di Placido]

Sorry Derek, I didn't realise we were back up & running, otherwise I would have said more about the new CDs...
I agree with you almost completely, you only have to read Derek Mannering's comments on his choices & see words like, paint-stripper & lung power. He seems to choose material that is sometimes rough as old boots just because he gets thrills & high notes.
Before i get to my real problem choices why do we have the 3 Million sellers yet again, I understand it's a TCM movie tie-in & maybe I'm being stupid here but this space could have been taken up with much more important material, We have had these songs released to a ridiculous point now & Mario is so much more than these million sellers & I never understood the fascination with Loveliest night, it's awful, Mario could have released anything at that point of his career & got a hit, such a shame it was this piece of nonsense.
Now... The Brindisi is a joke of a choice, awful performance from Mario, a waste of a track choice, end of story! I don't care how adorable & loyal Elaine Malbin has been, it shows Mario in a bad light & this is Mario's album not a tribute to guests of honour at Lanza get-togethers.
Day in, day out is messy, I was listening to this the other day actually as I was putting together a playlist & wanted to her was it as bad as I remembered & it was, it should never have been chosen for a one off broadcast let alone a cd 60 odd years later.
I'll never love you, bad song, bad choice!
For you alone is just a dated, ordinary song that Mario never seemed comfortable with & we know it was only recorded because of the Caruso connection.
Derek, I agree with your alternates, you have great taste & yes beautiful performances like Someday & Amor ti Vieta for example would have rounded out this collection & gave it a bit of class & polish but it seems unless Mario is stripping paint we can't have these included.
Now I am happy with They didn't believe me, Serenade, Che Gelida Manina, E Lucevan le stele etc these are perfect & are going to make some of the other choices sound even rougher & odd than they are, we have yet to have a rounded, classy collection of Mario, granted he was rough at times but I don't want to be reminded of that over jut 2 CDs worth of choices, there is enough good stuff to choose from.
I like What is this thing called love, no apologies, Mario sings it well & I like the song & arrangement. & disc 2 has some other good performances that I don't have a problem with but there are others on disc 2 that could have been replaced with more impressive songs & performance, we are stuck with Derek Mannering's fascination with the pre 1953 Lanza voice, which is an awful shame when he recorded some of his greatest recordings after this. It seems to me that the Derek Mannering CDs never show Mario to be the truly Great artist he was right up until 1959 & yes the exclusion of the great tracks from 1958's "Mario!" album over the years drives me insane!!!

[Armando]

Mannering is boasting on Rense’s forum that “The folks at Sony and TCM are delighted with the finished product.” If this is so, it’s an alarming state of affairs since it proves, that like Mannering, they know absolutely nothing about singing!

[Derek McGovern]

Many thanks for your comments, Vince. You've got me all fired up again!

As you say, the fact that there are some wonderful recordings on this set---Serenade, Che Gelida Manina, If I Loved You, etc---only makes the substandard stuff stick out all the more painfully. It was the same story on Mannering's Definitive Collection back in 2004: awful (Coke) versions of Loveliest Night of the Year, O Sole Mio, Torna a Surriento, etc, sitting alongside great renditions of things like Without a Song and M'Appari'. The end result is that newcomers to Mario who hear these CDs are confused by the erratic nature of his singing, and come away wondering what sort of artist he was.

Considering how rarely Lanza CDs come along, there is simply no excuse for not making any compilation consistently excellent. But if the very person entrusted with choosing the selections can't tell the difference between great singing and poor singing, then what hope do we have of ever getting such a collection?!  

Mannering constantly states that he makes no apologies for his CDs---in fact, he even recently described his last compilation, the frustratingly uneven Serenade: A Mario Lanza Songbook, as "great"---and has declared that his priority lies in getting as much previously unreleased material onto CD as possible. Yet that hasn't stopped him from recycling 22% of the material he has released, with many of the same titles appearing on successive CDs. For instance, we've had "Because" on five CDs now (six if we include Original Album Classics) and even the mediocre "Valencia" on three of his eight compilations. Whether the new-to-CD material is good or bad appears to be irrelevant; as long as the recording features the "dazzling" young Lanza voice of 1949-52, it qualifies for release. 

Just think: of the 137 recordings that Mannering has chosen for his compilations over a period of nineteen (!) years, only fourteen have been from the 1953-59 period!! And even then, a good half of those post-1952 recordings have not represented the best of Lanza's later years, with the Mario! and Caruso Favorites albums only represented by their least impressive moments---Funiculi' Funicula' and Santa Lucia, respectively---and the great operatic material from For the First Time entirely neglected. And Otello recordings from Serenade aside, Mannering has ignored the best of the operatic material from that soundtrack album as well (along with Torna a Surriento). Even Cavalcade of Show Tunes, an album that Mannering professes to love, has been curiously overlooked, with just the Donkey Serenade and Only a Rose chosen for compilations in 1994 and 2001, respectively. Instead we've had the Italian version of Arrivederci Roma included on two compilations (plus Original Album Classics), irrespective of its inclusion on many other non-Mannering compilations, and the "pop" side of Lanza favoured from the later years (Love in a Home, Come Prima, etc) over the more serious artist. 

In short, no one unfamiliar with Lanza's entire recorded legacy would ever guess from the Mannering compilations that Mario Lanza actually grew as an artist from 1949 to 1959. The erratic singer of the Flower Song on a 1952 Coke Show (a recording chosen by Mannering for his Opera Arias and Duets CD)  is about as far removed from the artist who recorded the Otello Death Scene in 1958 as can be imagined, and the same goes for much of the Italian/Neapolitan song repertoire, especially when comparing Mannering's favoured years of 1951-52 with 1955-59. Even as an interpreter of English songs, there are many examples of Lanza giving better performances in the latter part of his career (think of the superior 1956-59 versions of Donkey Serenade, Yours Is My Heart Alone, I Love Thee, One Alone, etc). Then there's the smoldering sensuality of Love Me Tonight, a quality one seldom hears in "Coke Show" Lanza. (I'm sure most listeners would prefer that recording to something as bland as The Best Things in Life Are Free, a rendition that, with this new CD set, has now appeared on two Mannering compilations.)

By the way, I see that Mannering claims he was "taken to the woolshed" by a few fans---he always likes to convey the impression that his compilations have only "a few" critics---when he chose a lesser version of My Romance for his 1998 compilation, When Day Is Done. He was not. Perigo mildly chided him at the time for passing over the much-superior version, while giving him high marks for most of the remaining tracks, and I wasn't even on the internet in 1998. It was only later, in 2001, when---astonishingly---Mannering not only recycled the mediocre rendition (along with three other tracks from that same album of just three years earlier!!), but even emphasized it by naming the CD after that very track. That's why I criticized him---after all, one CD was surely enough indulgence for a recording so unremarkable!!---and again when he did the same thing by recycling the poorly sung Coke version of One Alone.  

As for the current CD set, I honestly can't imagine what audience will be delighted by it. Lanza aficionados, who already own the great majority of its 30 tracks on numerous CDs, will grudgingly shell out for it on the basis of it featuring the beautiful version of My Romance and possibly one or two other tracks---and, if they're like me, feel ripped off in the process---while musically literate non-aficionados, who simply want to hear consistently great singing, will be irritated by its inconsistency (not to mention the banality of some of the material). They're also likely to become fatigued from hearing an entire album of Coke arrangements, which, let's face it, get very wearying after a few successive tracks!

Cheers

Derek               

              

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Mario Lanza, Tenor" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to mariolanza+...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.

[Derek McGovern]

Vince wrote:

 I never understood the fascination with Loveliest night, it's awful, Mario could have released anything at that point of his career & got a hit, such a shame it was this piece of nonsense.

I feel exactly the same way, and I was aghast just now to read that of all the recordings that could be included on a future Lanza compilation, Mannering has singled out the 1957 version of this song, apparently to please Bill Ronayne and Fred "Day." All I can say to that is: how about pleasing a larger number of people by not making dull recordings of an ever duller song a priority for your next CD?! If this is any indication of the kind of lightweight material Mannering has "earmarked" for his next "dazzling" Lanza compilation, I can only assume his other priorities include the not-yet-released Coke versions of "Tina-Lina" and "Boom Biddy Boom." Jesus wept!     

An outstanding operatic compilation should be Mannering's immediate priority, not yet another compilation of love songs. While I realize that there are Lanza admirers who don't care for opera, surely even the most dedicated fan of the kind of English-language ditties that Mannering favours for his compilations would be sated by now?       

Cheers

Derek

[Derek McGovern]

In the spirit of helpfulness, here are my suggestions for a single CD of operatic recordings:

  1/ Che Gelida Manina (RCA, 1949) 
  2/ Addio alla Madre (RCA, 1950) 
  3/ Improvviso (RCA, 1950) 
  4/ M'Appari' (RCA, 1950) 
  5/ Questa o Quella (RCA, 1950) 

  6/ Parmi Veder le Lagrime (RCA, 1950)

  7/ Recondita Armonia (RCA, 1950) 

  8/ E Lucevan le Stelle (RCA, 1950) 
  9/ O Tu Che in Seno agli Angeli (RCA, 1950) 
 10/ Cielo e Mar (Coke, 1952)* 
11/ Come un Bel Di' di Maggio (Coke, 1952)* 
12/ Di Rigori Armato (Serenade, 1955) 
13/ Amor Ti Vieta (Serenade, 1955) 
14/ Lamento di Federico (Serenade, 1955) 
15/ O Paradiso (Serenade, 1955)
16/ Dio! Mi Potevi Scagliar (Otello Monologue) (Serenade, 1955) 
17/ Niun Mi Tema (Otello Death Scene) (For the First Time, 1958) 
18/ Vesti la Giubba (For the First Time, 1958) 

Possible bonus tracks (if SonyBMG can locate them): 

19/ E Voi Ridete (Trio from Cosi' Fan Tutte) (For the First Time, 
1958)  
20/ Qual Occhio al Mondo (from Tosca) (Serenade, 1955) 
21/ Vesti la Giubba (RCA, 1950---unreleased third take) 

* = Could be deleted if space is an issue and/or to make room for bonus track(s)

This compilation would repeat three recordings from Mannering's 1999 Opera Arias and Duets--M'Appari', the Otello Monologue and the Improvviso---but that shouldn't be an issue (especially considering the amount of recycling that has taken place on other Lanza CDs!). Besides, these three outstanding recordings simply have to be on the same collection---for once!!---as other great Lanza operatic renditions.

Any thoughts?  

[Barnabas Nemeth]

That's a great compilation. Beyond this I would contemplate Leoncavallo: La Boheme' ... Musette... and something  from the 1947 Holliwood Bowl Concert.

Barnabas 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Barnabas: I'd be very happy for "Testa Adorata" from Leoncavallo's La Boheme to be on the CD as well---along with the Coke version of "Come un Bel Di' di Maggio"---but there probably wouldn't be enough space on the CD. The other reason I didn't suggest "Testa" is that it was featured on Opera Arias and Duets, and I was trying to keep duplications from that CD to a minimum. The Coke version of "Come un Bel di' di Maggio," on the other hand, wasn't on that CD, and I actually prefer it to the RCA version (overall).     

Unfortunately, nothing from the Hollywood Bowl concerts can be included on a Sony/BMG CD.

Cheers

Derek  

[Derek McGovern]

One further thought on an operatic compilation: in the unlikely event of Sony agreeing to a two-CD set, I would suggest the following selections: 

  1/ Che Gelida Manina (RCA, 1949)

  2/ Celeste Aida (RCA, 1949)
  3/ Addio alla Madre (RCA, 1950)
  4/ Improvviso (RCA, 1950)
  5/ M'Appari' (RCA, 1950)
  6/ Questa o Quella (RCA, 1950)
  7/ Parmi Veder le Lagrime (RCA, 1950)
  8/ Recondita Armonia (RCA, 1950)
  9/ E Lucevan le Stelle (RCA, 1950)
10/ O Tu Che in Seno agli Angeli (RCA, 1950)
11/ Vesti la Giubba (unreleased third take, RCA 1950)
12/ Cielo e Mar (Coke, 1952)
13/ Un Tal Gioco (Coke, 1952)
14/ Testa Adorata (Coke, 1952)
15/ Come un Bel Di' di Maggio (Coke, 1952)
16/ Di Rigori Armato (Serenade, 1955)
17/ Amor Ti Vieta (Serenade, 1955)
18/ Lamento di Federico (Serenade, 1955)
19/ Dio Ti Giocondi (Serenade, 1955) (with Licia Albanese)
20/ Dio! Mi Potevi Scagliar (Otello Monologue) (Serenade, 1955)
21/ O Paradiso (Serenade, 1955)
22/ Niun Mi Tema (Otello Death Scene) (For the First Time, 1958)
23/ Gloria all'Egitto (Aida Grand March Scene) (For the First Time,
1958)
24/ Vesti la Giubba (For the First Time, 1958)

Possible bonus tracks (if SonyBMG can locate them):

25/ E Voi Ridete (Trio from Cosi' Fan Tutte) (For the First Time,
1958)
26/ Qual Occhio al Mondo (from Tosca) (Serenade, 1955)
27/ Dio Ti Giocondi (with Gloria Boh) (Serenade, 1955) -- a real long
shot!
28/ Nessun Dorma (unreleased alternate take) (Serenade, 1955) -- not
great, but better than the one released

    

[Derek McGovern]

In case anyone's wondering why I haven't included the RCA "La Donna 'e Mobile" on either list, it's because a) I feel the recording has been reissued more than enough times---it's on Mannering's latest disc for a start---and that b) it's an overblown piece of singing. The Coke Italian version, which was featured on Opera Arias and Duets, is actually better, I feel, stylistically speaking---even if Mario's in more impressive voice on the RCA recording. 

 

[Michele]

Hello Derek,
Have just read your C.D. compilation, If only some one would do it for you. By the way you probably  know this but the Cosi Trio has never been
on a C.D. I think because of the fact the Mario was singing with Rome Opera House Principles, one has to watch the movie to hear it.

Michele 

On Sunday, 31 March 2013 18:21:40 UTC+8, Derek McGovern wrote:

This will be our new thread for any miscellaneous Lanza-related news or comments. This will include news about other singers, actors, etc who worked with Lanza. 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Michele: Yes, I'm aware that the Cosi' Fan Tutte Trio has never been released by RCA or BMG. It's odd (and frustrating) that it hasn't, especially since the Aida scene from the same film was released. One would assume that if RCA were able to release that recording, which featured at least one prominent singer from the Rome Opera (the baritone Guelfi), then they'd also hold the rights to the Cosi' Trio. Even more frustrating is the fact that, despite the best efforts of several Lanza admirers, we still don't know the names of the baritone and bass in the Trio---or even if they're the same people whom we see with Mario in the actual film. (I presume they are.) All we can say with reasonable certainty is that they're both singers associated with the Rome Opera.

By the way, I love the Cosi' scene in the film---and it's pretty obvious that all three men were enjoying themselves here! (Click on the image below to enlarge it.)

Cheers

Derek       

[Derek McGovern]

This pic's even better:

[Derek McGovern]

And here's a widescreen capture of the whole stage:

[Lover of Grand Voices]

I enjoyed Leann's post about the George Mason play. I'm also involved in education. I explain to my students that Lanza represents "passion." I show them a series of clips and explain the background of each. I also give them copies of my book, "A Kid from Philadelphia, Mario Lanza, the Voice of the Poets." The result is amazing. They fall in love with the voice, the performer and most of all can perceive, feel and understand what "passion" is all about. They can sense that Lanza loved what he did and dedicated himself completely to his art. This is a rare quality. It has costs for those who give but means so much for those of us who receive.

[Daniella]

Hi,

I discovered Mario Lanza only a few months ago, but I immediately was in awe of his voice.  Since then, I've learned so much on your website and discussions this forum about which of his albums/compilations to buy (or avoid), and that's been tremendously helpful, many thanks!

Having listened to most of the highlights of Lanza's career, I have to say undoubtedly he had the greatest voice ever.  No other tenor has or had the combination of roundness, timbre, and range that he did, or his passionate interpretations and phrasing.  I wonder though, is it possible that Lanza could have benefited from continued vocal training?  From the 1949 RCA recordings, Midnight Kiss recordings, down to his Hollywood Bowl recordings, I feel his singing was effortless.  But after 1950, it seemed to me that he started to put more pressure on his high notes (almost as if he were singing more from the chest voice), resulting in louder notes that usually were still excellent but occasionally resulted strain or fast/uneven vibrato.  I don't know if this was because Hollywood demanded him to sing loud, flamboyant high notes, or if he became more distant from his vocal training after he entered the Hollywood black hole, or none of the above?  It was his occasional inconsistency on high notes which he often sings perfectly but other times sound strained, that makes me think he could have benefited from continued vocal training to improve his consistency.  As opposed to someone like Pavarotti who was more consistent throughout his very long career, and from whom I rarely if ever heard strained high notes.  (However, I personally still prefer Lanza's voice to Pavarotti's, which sounds thin in comparison.)  I'm a firm believer in the need for even the best to have continued feedback and supervision on their skills, which is why, for example, even world champion figure skaters still retain coaches to make sure they don't start developing bad habits and so forth.  Lanza at his best was the best, but I feel that perhaps continued vocal training, or even just periodic supervision/feedback from a great voice teacher, would have helped improve his consistency.  Is this possible? 

Thanks a bunch

[Armando]

Hi Daniella,

I’ m sure our esteemed host won’t mind if I step in and try to answer what I think are some interesting and intelligent questions.

Particularly pertinent is your questioning of whether Lanza became more distant from his vocal training after he entered the “Hollywood black hole.”

The answer to that is that he did not become more distant from his vocal training, and by that I mean the technique he had acquired primarily from his studies with the great teacher Enrico Rosati, but stylistically between 1950 and 1952 he certainly regressed simply because he was not working in a proper environment with top coaches and musicians.  

The career of an operatic singer is a complex one-it has to be nurtured and guided on a daily basis and the operatic repertoire in particular requires special study.

Every detail of the music has to be carefully gone over with the singer, initially by the coach/ repetiteur, and subsequently with the conductor/accompanist, regardless of whether the singer knows the music or not. Matters such as phrasing, tempi, whether to sing forte, pianissimo etc. have to be carefully studied, discussed and worked out, and in the case of a non- native singer performing in a specific language, be it Italian, French, German or whatever, a language coach is also present.

These are the working conditions of just about every opera singer performing in an opera house. They were not the conditions Lanza was working under in Hollywood- in fact, far from them!

The work he did with top musicians between 1950/52 was limited to the preparation for The Great Caruso on which he worked with the conductor Peter Herman Adler. Operatically speaking, given the limited time, most of the singing, though not all, is pretty good. On matters of pronunciation, however, it’s another story. For whatever reason, since Lanza was required to utter only a couple of phrases in Italian, a language coach was engaged for the Italian dialogue, but not for the far more important operatic scores.

Consequently, there are quite a few mispronounced words which, except in the case of musical experts would not be picked up in non -Italian speaking countries, but which stand out if you happen to speak Italian. What’s more, they could easily have been corrected if someone simply pointed out the various mispronunciations to Lanza. Along with Bjorling and a few others, this is partly what Lanza is criticised for in Italy.

So, mispronunciations aside, when you examine Lanza’s career you have to divide it into three distinct periods: 1947/49 consisting of mostly outstanding singing- stylistically sound. 1950/53 extremely erratic with some impressive performances and some truly ghastly lapses of taste.  From 1954 to 1959 we have some outstanding singing in Serenade, 1955, abominable recording of the Lanza on Broadway album in 1956 followed by a back to form Lanza with the subsequent Cavalcade of Show Tunes LP. In 1957 there’s mostly good singing from Lanza with the exception of most of the material in the woeful Seven Hills of Rome.

1958 varies from average (Albert Hall recital) to some outstanding singing in For the First Time and the Neapolitan Songs album, Mario.

1959 also produced mixed results.  Even though the voice was very heavy due to Lanza’s life style, he still managed some standout singing on the Caruso Favourites LP. 

Summing up, what Lanza achieved given his working conditions is nothing short of a miracle and is permanent proof of his tremendous talent.  However, even the greatest artists need to work with the best and, in the operatic material in particular, except for sporadic work with the above mentioned Adler and the brilliant coach Giacomo Spadoni, this was not the case for Lanza.

As such, he is most vulnerable and open to criticism precisely in some of the operatic repertoire. But even allowing for this there is sufficient outstanding singing, if carefully selected, to thrill at least this particular listener (and on this we are in complete agreement, Daniella) with the greatest tenor voice I have ever heard. 

Armando

[Derek McGovern]

Welcome to this forum, Daniella, and thanks for a most interesting first post.

I couldn't agree more with Armando that it was Hollywood, and not a lack of vocal training, that led to Lanza's singing becoming more inconsistent after 1949. Artistically speaking, Lanza was in the worst possible environment in Hollywood for a young tenor who had always needed discipline and focus in his life. Who in Hollywood really cared about or understood his needs as a potentially great operatic prospect? Instead of people like his former teacher Enrico Rosati and coach Leila Edwards to challenge and inspire him, and the likes of superior artists such as Frances Yeend and George London to perform with (and learn from) on a regular basis, Lanza was surrounded by people, who, with few exceptions (Spadoni being one of them), were either hangers-on or studio executives blithely unconcerned with his development as an operatic singer. 

We can hear sloppiness and a tendency for sheer volume over subtlety creeping into quite a few of Lanza's 1950 operatic recordings for RCA, particularly on the two duets with Elaine Malbin, which are both as rough as old boots. Other RCA operatic recordings that could have been better (much better, in some cases!) include "Una Furtiva Lagrima," "La Donna 'e Mobile," and even his famous "Vesti la Giubba," which is histrionic rather than heartbreaking. (The 1958 version is another story, though!) Mario was still capable of singing brilliantly when he was focused and properly prepared (think of the magnificent "M'Appari'" and Improvviso from Andrea Chenier), but far too often retakes weren't made when they obviously should have been. Producers and conductors simply refused to do their jobs properly and tell him! And the situation only worsened during the radio shows of 1951-52, a period in which a rushed Lanza---through sheer shortage of time---was often singing without sufficient rehearsal, let alone the right frame of mind.

You mentioned that from 1950 onwards, Lanza would periodically show strain on some of his high notes. I agree about his inconsistency, but we have to remember that he often went through long periods of inactivity as a performer---and regular performing is crucial in the life and development of any operatic singer. But he certainly didn't damage his voice; he didn't sing enough for that! His vocal technique was rock solid, in any event---the proof being that he could sing for hours without tiring, as was often noted, and without displaying any loss of vocal quality at any point throughout the three registers. 

There are a few high notes that are noticeably strained in Serenade, which of course is a perfect example of Lanza singing after a long vocal layoff. These include the pinched high Cs at the end of "Serenade" (end of film version), "O Soave Fanciulla," and "Di Quella Pira." The high B at the end of "Nessun Dorma" could also have been better (although the three high As in the first half of the aria are brilliantly executed). But these are difficult notes for most singers, particularly for the larger-voiced spinto and dramatic tenors (Pavarotti, of course, was a purely lyric tenor), and I don't think we should be too hard on Lanza about them. There would be plenty of tenors glad to have a "disappointing" high C such as the one we hear at the end of "O Soave Fanciulla"! Besides, I'm convinced that had Lanza gone to the trouble of recording retakes of all of these pieces, the results would have been considerably better. (In fact, there's an alternate first take of "Nessun Dorma" with a superior high B ending.) 

In The Great Caruso, the outtakes of some of the arias (Che Gelida Manina, Cielo e Mar, etc) reveal less-than-brilliant high notes, but the difference was that either Lanza or (more likely) conductor Peter Herman Adler insisted on retakes. The result was some thrilling vocal moments. It was a different story with Serenade, I sense---and indeed conductor Ray Heindorf acknowledged that shortage of time was often behind the comparative lack of retakes. (Heindorf also sought to justify the situation by claiming that few cinemagoers would have been able to tell the difference between a great high note and a somewhat lesser one!) 

Still, the majority of the material in Serenade was magnificently sung---a miracle, really, as Armando was pointing out above, and surely proof of Lanza's innate artistry.

Cheers

Derek    

     

[Daniella]

Hi Armando and Derek,

Thank you both so much for your detailed and greatly informative replies!  I definitely see how poor working conditions (for an operatic singer), lack of regular performing, etc. caused the occasional imperfections.  It is so fortunate that we have such an excellent body of his work to enjoy despite the unforgiving conditions he had to deal with as an artist.  The first time I heard him sing, I was just stunned that a human could produce such a sound.  My only regret is not having discovered him sooner, but better late than never, I guess.  I really hope more people continue to discover this great tenor.  His singing is thrilling and magnificent indeed! 
 
Daniella

[hertz...@gmail.com]

My grandmother, Mildred Seymour, shared an apartment with Tomiko Kanazawa in Los Angeles. Mimi was an accompanists for the chamber orchestra who performed a weekly radio broadcast, The Music Room. To this day I have the 1919 Steinway grand piano given to my grandmother by Allan Handcock who played the viola in the orchestra. At the museum at the LaBrea tar pits there is a small photo of the musicians as they performed for the broadcast at USC. Alan Hancock donated the land on Wilshire Boulevard to the city of Los Angeles. In 1950 my grandmother became the accompanist for the Wiere Brothers, an international opening act for Johnny Matthews, Judy Garland, Tom Jones and many others. They performed four command performances for the queen of England over the course of her 20 year career with the Wiere Brothers.
I remember meeting Tomiko in the mid 50's. She joined us for a memorable dinner in China Town, and she told me about learning to eat with "great dignity" by having to balance an egg in the crux of each elbow throughout her meals. She did not demonstrate this, of course. I did not have the privilege of hearing her perform, but her smile is in indelibly etched in my heart. I was so thrilled to learn she lived at least until she was 95. Three summers ago I was in Venice and had I known she was there I would have cherished the opportunity to visit with her.
I am about to search for a recording of Tomiko's Butterfly. Do you know if such exists?
V Hertz

[Derek McGovern]

Thanks for your post, and welcome to this forum.

I'd be very interested to know if Tomiko Kanazawa ever discussed Mario Lanza with you and/or your grandmother---and, if so, what she had to say about him. 

By the way, she was living in Vienna---not Venice---when Armando Cesari interviewed her in January 2011. She may well still be alive too, as she was listed in the Vienna phone book as recently as last year. (Perhaps one of our German-speaking members can check if she's currently in the book.) If she is still with us, then she would have turned 98 last month.  

Regards

Derek

P.S. I do love the photo below of Kanazawa and Lanza (out on the town?) with their conductor, Walter Herbert.

[George Laszlo]

For what it is worth, I sent a letter and some photos to Tomiko about a year ago and never heard back. So, either she is too old to answer or she may no longer be with us. Not sure which. Some of you may recall that my good family friend, Gabor Carelli, often sang as Pinkerton opposite Tomiko as Butterfly. So, the photos I sent were of the two of them together. By coincidence, my cousin Vincent Schaffer, was a violinist in LA and played with the Hollywood Bowl orchestra probably in the same time-frame as Allen Handcock. I'm guessing that Vincent would have been born around 1915-17. We live in a small world.

[George Laszlo]

Well, Mario seems to have succeeded in sneaking into a performance in Vienna. Our public broadcasting station here in the USA organized a live program called "Salute to Vienna" with heavy emphasis on the Merry Widow with others like Strauss sprinkled in here and there. Whoever was producing the program must love Mario and signed up a British singer to ask us to hear his serenade. Let's just say, he tried hard but...

You can catch a bit of it at roughly 45 seconds into this promo video:

http://video.pbs.org/video/2365053555/

[George Laszlo]

I should have mentioned that the program overall was pretty well done.

[Steff]

Hi Derek,

 

I have been in contact with a neighbour of Tomika Kanazawa in Vienna/Austria, and I can confirm that she's still with us.Yet, given that she's almost 100 years old, contacting her, understandably enough, is not possible. I might be able though to pass on a message to her, that's what her neighbour has kindly offered to me.

 

Steff

[George Laszlo]

Steff, I'm sure that Derek would love to hear comments about Mario from Tomiko. But, if you can squeeze it in, try to find out if Tomiko received my letter and photographs about Gabor Carelli. I guess it's possible that I did not have the right address. If you know what that is, let me know. Thanks, George

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Steff

Many thanks for going to all that trouble. It's lovely to know that Ms. Kanazawa is still with us. 

No, I don't have any particular message for her---and I certainly don't want to bother a 98-year-old with further questions about Mario. I'm just very grateful that she granted Armando an interview two and a half years ago. At that time, she'd only recently been discharged from hospital, so I thought it most gracious of her to agree to speak with him.

Cheers

Derek

[Steff]

 

Some news about the beer mats phantom:

 

http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/lifestyle/food-and-drink/birminghams-phantom-doodler-spotted-5733412

 

The article mentions that, when Philips invented the compact disc, Mario's recordings were chosen as the first ones to be transferred to a CD. Never had heard that before. Anyone?

 

Steff

. 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Steff: The claim that Lanza's recordings were the first ones ever transferred to a CD appeared on his Wikipedia page a few years ago. There was no substantiation provided by the anonymous contributor, so the statement was later deleted. The Birmingham Mail must have been using an old version of that Wikipedia page as its unreliable source! 

If Mario's recordings really were the first ever transferred to that medium, then why did we have to wait until 1987---a good five years after compact discs first appeared in stores---for a Lanza CD to appear?! I don't believe the claim for a second.

Cheers

Derek 

[Steff]

Always good to hear comments like this:

 

One classical singer Mahogany admires is the great tenor Mario Lanza.                                                                         “The object of what I do, especially when you do a ballad, you want everyone in the audience to feel you’re singing just for them,” he said. “That’s what I get from Mario Lanza. “It always felt as if he were singing just for you. This beautiful sound and style that seem to cross boundaries. Again, even though it’s classical, it didn’t sound as if it had to stay there. He could have done anything, I think.”  Mahogany got used to crossing boundaries in his listening.

From: The Buffalo News, August 20, 2013

"Singer Kevin Mahogany to headline Lewiston Jazz Festival"

http://www.buffalonews.com/gusto/concert-previews/singer-kevin-mahogany-to-headline-lewiston-jazz-festival-20130819

Steff

 

 

[Derek McGovern]

Thanks for that, Steff! While it's not the first time Kevin Mahogany has mentioned Lanza as an influence, it's nice to see the latter being described as a "classical singer." Bizarrely, this NPR article about Mahogany and his life and musical loves describes Mario as "a television singer":

http://www.npr.org/programs/btaylor/archive/mahogany.html

More lazy journalism! Still, at least he wasn't labelled a "crooner," as has happened on quite a few occasions.... 

Cheers

Derek

[Derek McGovern]

I see that Lindsay Perigo's long-promised book on Lanza---The One Tenor---is now available as a Kindle purchase:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ERKHX2M 

Any Kindle owners out there? I'm not one of them, but I'm certainly curious to read what mercurial Linz has to say here. It's a shame the book's not available in other formats. From what I understand---and there's a decent-sized preview available at the link above---this is mostly a compilation of Perigo's various essays for the Lanza Legend, together with assorted CD reviews from his freeradical site. No doubt there's been some revising, but what I'm mainly interested in reading here is Roland Bessette's defense of the often hyper-critical approach taken in his 1999 book---and an elaboration of his bipolar theory---together with Perigo's no-doubt-spirited response. 

If you read this book, please do share your thoughts on it here.

Cheers

Derek

[George Laszlo]

Derek,

You don't have to buy a Kindle reader in order to read a Kindle book. You can just download the reader to your computer or other device like an iPhone or iPad. You can probably do the same on an android device. Just go to the Amazon site and look for the Kindle link.

George

[Derek McGovern]

Thanks for the information, George. I really am a novice in these matters!

I've just downloaded a Kindle reader to my computer and have purchased Lindsay Perigo's book. 

Cheers

Derek

[Lou]

Hi Derek: I've just purchased the book, too. (Thanks to George for his tip.) It says "To Armando" on the title page and contains Lindsay Perigo's foreword to Armando's book. Do I take these gestures to be an olive branch?

Cheers,
Lou

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Lou:

Count me as surprised too on seeing the dedication to Armando! Perhaps it was Perigo's way of reciprocating Armando's dedication to him back in 2004 in his Lanza book. Or maybe it was an olive branch---I really don't know! But it was nice to see.

I'm juggling a ton of stuff right now (the new semester starts next week), so I've only had time to skim the book. But I will say this: the back and forth with Roland Bessette, as Perigo probes him about his bipolar theory, is fascinating, and Perigo's response to Bessette, in a chapter titled "Mario's Magic Madness," is an excellent riposte to the latter's depressing though ultimately unconvincing speculation.

And it really is pure conjecture on Bessette's part! He throws in all but the kitchen sink in his attempt to label this episode or that event as evidence of Lanza having suffered from bipolar disorder. For example, he makes a great deal out of the fact that, in his experience, everyone except "dyed-in the wool Lanza fans" has been "alarmed" by the Christopher Program. According to Bessette, the program never aired [not true, as it turns out---see this 2014 post], and he speculates that the reason for this was Lanza's behavior on the show, which the good attorney diagnoses as "mania at work." 

So what I see as a charismatic Lanza in pure PR mode---telling the priest (Father Keller) exactly what he wants to hear---by genially fibbing about (or, at the very least, creatively expanding on) his altar boy experiences, Bessette and his remarkably like-minded friends all see as disturbing evidence of a manic episode. Good Lord! Perigo's witty response to all this is bang on in my opinion---"It's [actually] the psychiatrist who needs help! Mario is endearing and adorable throughout, funny and fluent, loving and lovable." As for the supposedly alarmed Father Keller, if he had been that concerned by Lanza's behavior on the program, then why did he write the following words to him in May 1958?

Dear Mario:
At long last we have just received from Hollywood the finished half-hour TV film in which you and Betty "star"---and you really do!
I expected the program to be good --- but not as informally sparkling as it turned out to be. Your singing is tops and you could not be more natural. Betty is a real charmer, too. 

And so the letter goes on.  

Then there's some of the other "evidence" that Bessette throws out there as part of his shock-and-awe approach to convince us that Lanza mentally ill: he was discharged from the army while the war was still raging, Warner Bros. didn't want to make a second film with him, etc. What he fails to mention here, however, is that, in the first instance, Mario was discharged because of defective hearing and associated dizziness, vomiting, etc (we have the medical discharge to prove it), and not some kind of destructive behavior, and, that in the second, whatever Warner Bros. may have thought of Lanza (Bessette darkly alludes to unspecified bad behavior on the set of Serenade), the company would have made a second film with him if the first had been a hit! In fact, Warners waited until it was clear that Serenade wasn't going to light up the box office before shelving the planned second film. (And, incidentally, why would Anthony Mann have been so keen to direct another Lanza film---even going so far as to form a company with him---if Mario had been so impossibly difficult to work with?)

Bessette does have a few interesting things to say when he's not conjuring up dark episodes or labelling people who disagree with his view of Lanza as "cultists" and "non-scholarly." I wish he'd drop the pompous and often condescending mode of expressing himself, though. Sentences such as "[He] was of an age where Lanza's career was contemporaneous with his time as a moviegoer" also reminded me of how much I disliked Bessette's heavy-handed prose throughout Tenor in Exile.  

As for the gaggle of psychiatrists whom Bessette says he consulted and gained qualified agreement from regarding his Lanza Bipolar Theory---five in all, I think---I certainly hope they don't include the elderly fellow who (almost distractedly in Bessette's recounting) mutters something along the lines of "It fits" when told in passing about the theory. Hardly convincing. Besides, as I've questioned before, what psychiatrist worth a damn would even consider diagnosing mental illness in someone whom s/he had never met?!

Cheers

Derek      

 

[Derek McGovern]

Re-reading the Bessette chapter in Perigo's book this morning, I was struck by how much of what Bessette says would fall apart under cross-examination. I'm also now convinced that through the use of selective testimony and referencing of isolated incidents, it's possible to argue a case for mental illness in just about anybody. That's not to say I don't believe that Lanza had some serious problems, including a dependence on booze that, curiously enough, Bessette downplays here. But I strongly believe that Bessette misdiagnoses the root cause of those problems in his enthusiasm for his theory, while relying on some highly dubious testimony and an awful lot of hearsay. 

I also think it's grossly unfair to imply that those who do not accept his depiction of Lanza are "cultists." No Lanza aficionado I know is blind to the man's darker side. Many, however, are more sympathetic to Lanza---and more willing to consider context----than Bessette is obviously prepared to be.         

When I have a bit more time, I plan to write a response to Bessette's allegations. In the meantime, I'd be most interested to know others' thoughts on all this.

Cheers

Derek        

[leeann]

Hmmm, thoughts on the Bessette chapter.  It is good, I think, to hear Bessette's own voice, to follow his own thought process on his highly controversial thesis of bipolar disorder. Does he make his case though? I really don't think so.

I think the constrictions and reconstructions he places on the questions Lindsay Perigo poses to him reflect the limitations and boundaries of his argument. And like his book, Tenor in Exile, there's a dearth of evidence, lack of footnotes, factual inaccuracies that you already began to point out, Derek. And there's an awfully narrow selection of opinions. If you only quote people who agree with you--well, you can make a case for whatever you want. But will it be accurate? Probably not.

And, how could reputable psychiatrists form a valid posthumous diagnosis with such limited evidence as the unidentified people  whom Bessette quotes? --Take the Christopher program for example--you can say a lot of things about the staging of BOTH Father Keller and Mario Lanza during that show, but give me a break--bipolar disorder doesn't make the list.

And as for the timeline of mood swings, which seems to have served as the framework of Bessette's investigation--well, timelines can tell us a lot. But in the case of human behavior, context counts. The points on timelines are usually results of huge tangled networks of events and emotions and people. Iit seems to me Bessette just cherry-picked stripped-down stories, happenings, and the recollections of others that matched his dots on the timeline.

So, as much as any shortcoming, the analysis seems invalid because it is so narrow, so without context.  There's a lot twisting and shoving and shaving of information to cram the thesis into the bipolar-disorder definition.

Whether you agree with Lindsay Perigo's rebuttal emphasizing the physical abuse of dieting as a cause for Lanza's sometimes difficult behavior, with his discussion of "good madness" and "bad madness"--certainly his discussion brings the highs and lows of the emotional time line into a more balanced context.

In any event, it's useful to have this group of familiar essays bound together--several of which I'd run across by chance when the impact of Lanza's voice first struck, and I was searching for materials by our Derek beyond his reviews on Amazon! Certainly, they're thoughtful, subjective, fast-paced and heartwarming reads and they give us brilliance and calamity, sometimes on the same page. And the quiet dedication, "To Armando," and identifying him as the best Lanza biographer in the text--well, bravo for that.

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Lee Ann: I'm sure Perigo is right that excessive dieting contributed to Mario's erratic behavior, particularly in the 1951-52 period. Bessette would no doubt pour scorn on that---in fact, I think he did on one occasion---but I know even from my own limited experience with dieting (and I don't mean the radical variety practiced by Lanza!) that it does indeed cause mood swings. One can't lose eighty pounds, as Lanza did during the making of Because You're Mine, without going through some sort of private hell. Add to that being World Famous Mario Lanza, with the press breathing down his neck and making fun of his weight, or having to deal with the other pitfalls of fame---not to mention unsympathetic MGM executives. (Or wrestling at the same time with insecurities about wasting his talent on lowbrow Hollywood films.) 

As Keenan Wynn publicly observed when he was discussing the detrimental effect that severe dieting had on Lanza's psyche, MGM didn't care about what was actually happening to the man. "A bundle of nerves" was how he described Lanza's state of mind after radical dieting. But in Wynn's opinion, cashing in on Lanza's popularity while he was still a hot commodity was MGM's only concern.

Not surprisingly, you won't find Wynn's observation in Bessette's book. It doesn't tie in with his theory.    

Cheers

Derek

[Derek McGovern]

I was amused to read Derek Mannering's claim on the Rense forum today that tenor Joseph Calleja is "clearly" an admirer of his [Mannering's] quote "great" compilation CD Serenade: A Mario Lanza Songbook. How does Mr. Mannering know this? Because on his new album, Amore, Calleja employs the same arrangements as Lanza used on his recordings of "Besame Mucho" and "O Sole Mio," two of the five very well-known songs featured on both CDs.     

Hmm. That's a bit of a leap! After all, there's a fair amount of substandard material on Mannering's 2009 compilation, as the discerning Mr. Calleja no doubt recognizes. Besides, using the Mannering Book of Assumptions, one could equally argue that Calleja is "clearly" a great fan of Mario Lanza Sings Caruso Favorites as well, since he also sings a number of songs from that album on his new disc. (In fact, I'd put money on Calleja being a Caruso Favorites admirer. Apart from anything else, he's made it clear that he loves Lanza's late voice, singling out the colour and shading on the latter's recording of the Otello Death Scene.) But, of course, Caruso Favorites doesn't bear the Mannering imprimatur, so the thought may not have occurred to our trusty compiler...

:)  

Sarcasm aside, it does get rather wearying to read Mr. Mannering's continual boasts about the CDs he's compiled---every one of which he assures us is "fabulous." I'd be much less inclined to prick his balloon if even occasionally he lavished the same enthusiasm on worthy Lanza CDs that weren't compiled by him. Or if, heaven forbid, he were to forget the Coke Shows for once and push for an all-operatic CD that included outstanding material recorded after 1952.      

[Vincent Di Placido]

My copy of the new Lanza cd arrived yesterday & the mastering is very good to my ears, "Granada" especially, it seems less muddy than usual & "Che Gelida Manina" seemed very clear & I could hear detail I couldn't before, now I must add I was using Beats headphones & they are exceptional so that could have something to do with it...
I marveled yet again at how stunning a voice & vocalist Mario was, that Boheme aria is just a wonder, it's perfect!!!
Then you have recordings like "Romance", he was just so gifted the way he caresses those phrases... I have to say the Coke "For you alone" is more enjoyable than the RCA recording. A mixed bag? Definitely, but I'm happy to have these discs because of the mastering, which I have used as replacements in my archive of ripped WAV files, they seem better to me anyway over previous CDs...

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Vince: Thanks for the feedback on the Toast of Hollywood CD. You've convinced me to order it! I was hesitating, as the only reason I could see for buying it was to have My Romance in pristine sound at last. I certainly wasn't expecting the sound to be improved on the likes of the 1949 Granada and Che Gelida Manina. That's good news. 

At the same time, though, it frustrates me no end to think that Mario's 1949 recordings aside, the material that is really crying out to be properly remastered---and that probably never will be remastered now---is the best of the 1959 albums and, to a slightly lesser extent, the Serenade and For the First Time soundtracks. The 1950-52 love song recordings that Derek Mannering overwhelmingly favours for his compilations were mostly well recorded in the first place. While I'm sure it's nice for those who like their Lanza lite to have "Make Believe," "The Best Things In Life Are Free," etc, in the best possible sound, what lover of great singing and great voices wouldn't prefer to hear, say, the 1955 "Amor Ti Vieta"---a relatively obscure recording as far as the general public is concerned (and one that's never been released on CD in the US)? And that recording could so easily have fitted in with the Hollywood theme here, since it was featured in Serenade. As Lindsay Perigo points out in his book, it's ridiculous that so few arias have been included on a set that's supposedly representative of Lanza's Hollywood years when one considers the sheer amount of opera that he sang in his first five films.    

Oh well. I'll order The Toast of Hollywood anyway, and I'll share my thoughts here on its sound quality once it arrives.

Cheers

Derek                      

[Vincent Di Placido]

I agree Derek, but I am just taking this release for what it is & I was hopping back & forth between Granada masterings & I was amazed how muddy my previously favoured rip was compared to this new cd as I say maybe I should have used basic headphones because these beats have so much depth, I have been listening to the Mario! album with them & the orchestral detail I'm picking up stuns me...
As regards remastering later Mario recordings, I have been longing for that since I was a wee boy, before I even knew what remastering was, I just knew those albums were badly recorded, well more specifically Mario was badly miked, as we have discussed previously the orchestral microphones seem fine & this is a separate issue to Mario's voice darkening & being in poor health, but there was definitely something strange going in the choice of microphone, the last time Mario was miked properly in Italy was December 1958...
I am amazed at how well his voice was captured for those mono radio transcriptions in 1951-52, possibly the best capturing of Lanza's voice over the 19 years he recorded... Material & stylistic lapses aside the engineering & placement of microphone was near perfect for these radio performances, I actually can't think of a moment of distortion or dullness in all those recordings & he is placed perfectly in the mixes & not a bit of RCA echo. Of course Mario's instinctual microphone technique is never better demonstrated than on these recordings, moving in close for those soft, sensual phrases that make us shiver & stepping back & letting his voice have breathing space on those strong notes which gives them a great acoustic & added dimension, he was a master of this....
But back to 1955-59, I think a great project & really the best we can hope for at this stage would be a compilation of the best of his 1959 performances remastered to the best point they can be... "Mature Mario!", never fails to make me sad that we refer to this glorious tenor voice as mature at 38, practically a baby in tenor years...

[Steff]

Joseph Calleja’s album “Be My Love – A Tribute to Mario Lanza,” is nominated for the „Classic Brit Awards 2013,” in the category “Classic FM Album of the Year.”

You can give your vote for this category on:

http://www.classicbrits.co.uk/vote/

The award ceremony will take place at the Royal Albert Hall on October 2nd.  

     

Calleja is also nominated in the category “Breakthrough Artist of the Year.”

Let's hope that Calleja will be among this year’s winners; This would not only mean an acknowledgment for his own success in the world of music, but certainly also a wonderful promotion for Mario Lanza.

http://www.classicbrits.co.uk/nominees/

Steff

 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Vince: Yes, I'd agree that the Coke Shows were brilliantly recorded. There are a few exceptions---With a Song in My Heart, the ghastly Mattinata and Ah! Sweet Mystery of Life come to mind, and the very first show wasn't particularly well recorded---but overall the sound quality was superior to RCA's efforts, with the exception of the Cavalcade album. Imagine how differently even the detractors of Mario's 1959 recordings would view those efforts if they had been as well captured as the Coke Shows!

Of course, if the shows had begun only two or three years earlier---before taping of radio programmes became standard practice---it would have been a very different story. The advances in recording quality in that short period were quite remarkable. 

As for a lovingly remastered compilation highlighting the best of "mature Mario," something tells me that's not going to happen under Derek Mannering's watch. But I'd love to be proven wrong!   

Cheers

Derek

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Steff

I certainly hope Calleja wins---especially since most of the competition is pretty ghastly! I can't speak for the quality of Lang Lang's Chopin album, but it'd be a travesty if Calleja were to lose to Bocelli, Rieu or Clayderman. 

Cheers

Derek

[Armando]

Hi Steff and Derek,

Since it’s the “people” who are voting I’d be very surprised if Calleja wins.

I’ve had people tell me that Bocelli is as good if not better than Pavarotti!

That says it all!

[Armando]

Carl Reiner's rendition of Vesti La Giubba. Priceless!

http://operachic.typepad.com/

[Derek McGovern]

Ha! Very funny! And what a great character Reiner is. Amazingly vitality for a man of 91.

Cheers

Derek

[Steff]

Hi Derek and Armando,

 

Since Rieu and Bocelli certainly are more widely known than Calleja (at least I would say this for Germany; he might rather have an advantage of popularity in U.K. - due to his successful Proms appearances ), it might indeed be difficult for Calleja to win the "Best Album" category. Yet, the thought of Calleja receiving the award at the Royal Albert Hall and him mentioning Mario Lanza in his speech of thanks is VERY tempting. Kind of return of Mario to the place where he was so successful.

 

When I watched parts of the "Last Night of the Proms" on TV the other day, I thought to myself what an uplifting feeling it must have been for Mario to perform there. An impressive venue and what an atmosphere!

"Is this real?" as Mario would say.

 

Steff

[Steff]

The other day I spotted a photo of Mario, on the French e-bay, and I wonder if anybody here has an idea when and where it was taken. Mario’s suit looks like the one he was wearing in some scenes of “Seven Hills of Rome,” yet, Mario’s hairdo looks quite different. I tend to believe that this photo was only taken a year later, which means sometime in 1958, as his looks in the e-bay photo reminded me of the ones with the Solomons (Mario’s promoter in Ireland) in Belfast or at the Caledonian Hotel in Edinburgh (both March 1958).

I understand the photo was printed in a French magazine (“revue de l’année”) in November 1959. Is it possible that the photo was taken during Mario’s short stay in Paris (April 1958)?

Steff

[Armando]

HI Steff: That photo is definitely from 1958. There are other photos of Lanza wearing the same suit during the European tour in March of that year. It’s also more than likely that the photo was taken in Paris as you suggested.

Cheers

Armando

[Derek McGovern]

That's a nice photo of Lanza. While he does look quite tired---and his very curly hair is badly in need of a cut (did he ever visit a hairdresser on that final tour?!)---I can see here why Irish reporter Marie Studdard, who met him later that month in Belfast, described him as,

"[not] good-looking exactly, but striking. Quite a dramatic cast of features, including his whole body. He certainly wasn't anybody you'd pass over!"

Of course, the Lanza whom Ms. Studdard met was probably in the vicinity of 240 pounds at the time. Had she met him just four months earlier when he made his first trip to London, she may well have found the (then) much slimmer tenor somewhat better looking :)

Cheers

Derek     

[Derek McGovern]

Speaking of photos, here's an interesting pic of Lanza with Licia Albanese that was sent to me recently by new member Pierro: 

[Steff]

Yes Derek,

A great photo (it has been offered on e-bay for quite a while!) of a smoking Mario with Licia.

I just wanted to add another photo, which Nelly Vaccari-Brüggeman from Italy asked me today to post here.

It shows Mario wearing the same (or at least a very similar) suit as on the e-bay photo. It was taken on St. Peter's Square in 1957 and was printed in an Italian magazine or newspaper shortly after Mario had passed away.

But I agree, the e-bay photo is from 1958, no 1957 shot.

 

Steff

[Derek McGovern]

Thanks for sharing that photo, Steff. Very nice! 

By the way, I was surprised to see that even here in Korea, Mario Lanza: The Toast of Hollywood debuted at an impressive #27 on the official foreign artists' album chart last week. I should have the CD from Amazon by next Monday (in fact, I would have bought it locally if I'd known it was going to be available here!), and will post my thoughts on it as soon as I've listened to it.

Cheers

Derek   

[Derek McGovern]

Here's a review of The Toast of Hollywood by someone who clearly hadn't listened to the actual set! The reviewer gives himself away when he complains about the "big note" at the end of "My Romance" (there isn't one; this is Mario's tender version of the song from the Coke album A Kiss and Other Love Songs). He also implies that the "Che Gelida Manina" featured here is the version from the soundtrack of The Great Caruso, which he describes as "not quite as transcendent as [Lanza's] 1949 recording." In fact, it is the 1949 version on this set!!

The reviewer does get one thing right, however: he describes Seven Hills of Rome as "nearly unwatchable": 

 

http://www.culturekiosque.com/opera/reviews/mario_lanza_tcm826.html

[Derek McGovern]

TCM's Lanza movie marathon in the US this week has certainly caused an impressive spike in the number of visitors to our main site, http://mariolanzatenor.com. Between September 17 and 19 alone, we had nearly 7000 page views on our site, the vast majority of them from first-time visitors based in the US. The most-visited page during the last 36 hours has been Mario Lanza: Myths About the Man, followed by an essay about Armando Cesari's definitive Lanza biography, an article on For the First Time (which was one of the films screened this week), and then this forum.

 

Given that TCM host Robert Osborne mentioned the Mafia rumour in connection with Lanza's death, I'm delighted that so many people are visiting the Myths page, which completely debunks that piece of nonsense. People may also find a more pleasant Lanza described there than the gluttonous and temperamental one Osborne apparently emphasized! I'm equally delighted that many more people are now aware of Armando's biography.

It's also good to see The Toast of Hollywood 2-CD set doing so well on Amazon as a result of the TCM promotion---it's currently at #405 overall in music sales and #5 in Classical Vocal. Of course, it's a bittersweet success for those of us frustrated by the mixed bag nature of this set. After all, it stands to reason that any CD promoted on TV will experience a rise in sales, so to its much-lauded compiler I say yet again: why didn't you make the most of this splendid opportunity and put together something far more substantial and vocally consistent? 

Still, I'm hopeful that there'll be plenty of first-time Lanza CD buyers happy to overlook such vocal misfires as the awful "Libiamo" and "Among My Souvenirs" on this present set as they focus instead on the vastly superior singing of Romberg's Serenade, If I Loved You, Che Gelida Manina, etc. And with any luck, they'll be inspired enough to seek out further examples of Mario Lanza at his best.  

 

Cheers

Derek   

   

[Derek McGovern]

A P.S. to the above: another gratifying consequence of the TCM Lanza Movie Marathon, and the subsequent visits to our site, is that Armando's book has been propelled to #1 in Amazon.com sales of Classical Musician Biographies:

http://www.amazon.com/Mario-Lanza-American-Tragedy-Voices/dp/1880909669/ref=zg_bs_2332_1

An impressive feat, especially when one considers how much more expensive Armando's book is (due to its inclusion of a CD) than the other books on the best-seller list here---or, for that matter, the other Lanza biographies.

[Derek McGovern]

Goodness! Two days later, and Armando's book is still riding high on Amazon at #2 in Classical Musician Biographies---and it's now charting impressively in Amazon's top operatic and actor biographies as well. On top of that, every time I click on Google Analytics' real-time visitor stats for our site, there seems to be someone in some part of the world checking out the essay on Armando's book at that very moment. Amazing.

[Armando]

I received the much heralded The Toast of Hollywood set. From various reports it seems that as a result of a number of media promotions the set is selling rather well. I’m sure that BMG/TCM will be extremely pleased if the sales are indeed as reported; however this means absolutely nothing to me.

Lanza on Broadway also sold well! One can sell snow to the Eskimos if marketed well enough!

The sad reality is that out of a total of 30 tracks, 9 (including 5 of the previously unreleased ones) represent sub-standard Lanza singing. With the exception of For You Alone there are better alternatives to the other unreleased songs and, frankly, I don’t see the need at all for the inclusion of a perfectly pedestrian song such as I’ll Never Love You, when there’s such a wealth of superior material available.

I also don’t buy the often repeated mantra from our esteemed compiler that BMG didn’t want this or that in the compilation or that he was forced to include specific numbers. That’s utter nonsense. Judging from past releases I’m convinced that BMG doesn’t have a clue as to what should or should not form a compilation and probably doesn’t care as long as it sells. How else can one explain the inclusion of Make Believe, Among My Souvenirs, Lolita, Day In Day Out, A Vucchella, I Love Thee and What Is This Thing Called Love? All are badly sung.

The one good thing about the set is the sound- what a pity it wasn’t put to better use!

Summing up, I find The Toast of Hollywood is more than a bit burnt round the edges!  

 

 

[Derek McGovern]

Well, I received my Toast of Hollywood set today, and I'm afraid my opinion of it is even lower than Armando's!

The one thing I was looking forward to was improved sound on various tracks on Disc 1 (which is by far the best of the two discs), but I honestly can't hear any appreciable improvement---even on "Granada" (sorry, Vince, but this recording sounds better on the 1997 Encore! set!). "Che Gelida Manina" is better reproduced elsewhere too---on the You Do Something to Me CD, for example. "Because" is brighter than I recall hearing it, but I've never cared much for the RCA version featured here, anyway. (It's not a patch on the Great Caruso rendition.) I was pleased to hear the original mono, though, on the two Student Prince selections and "E Lucevan le Stelle."    

As for the inexplicably all-Coke Disc 2, yes, the sound ranges from very good to excellent---though none of the previously released tracks (If I Loved You, Romance, etc) sounds any better than I've heard before. In fact, when I later went to Disc 1 and played "Be My Love," I immediately found myself preferring the richer, more dynamic, RCA sound on this recording to most of the Coke reproductions of Disc 2. 

In any event, the good sound quality on the Coke disc only makes the faults on many of these renditions even more obvious! The uncomfortably high key on the throwaway version of "Make Believe," the very sloppy singing on "'A Vucchella" (how could Mannering have selected this version over the wonderful RCA recording?!), the rushed, off-key and almost-manic "I Love Thee," etc....I found myself with a headache after listening to all this Coke "goodness"!  Even apart from the problems with the singing---and I should include the previously unreleased Coke "Lolita" from Disc 1 in that category---the arrangements on these songs make for tiring listening after half a dozen tracks in succession. There should definitely have been RCA recordings included here---for variety's sake in terms of the arrangers, if nothing else. A few tracks from Cavalcade, for example, would have made all the difference, and would still have been in keeping with the "tenor in love" theme here.

Completely forgettable songs such as I'll Never Love You---and the rendition included here is not even Lanza's best version!!---also have no place on a disc featuring only fifteen tracks.  

Apart from the paltry number of operatic selections (of which only two are outstanding, and one---the Libiamo---is awful), I simply cannot understand why Mannering restricted Neapolitan and Italian songs to one selection of each genre ('A Vucchella & Lolita, respectively). The fact that neither is well sung makes me even more frustrated. And if "Lolita" is included on Disc 1 ostensibly because it was featured in Seven Hills of Rome, then why weren't the glorious 1949 Mamma Mia, Che Vo' Sape? and 1955 Torna a Surriento included as well? (Mannering has never selected either of these A+ recordings for any of his compilations.) Both those songs featured in two of Mario's Hollywood films---the supposed theme of Disc 1. Then again, perhaps we got off lightly, since Mannering might well have chosen the ghastly Coke versions of both songs if he had included these titles. But does anyone seriously believe that Sony would have objected if either of these classic and seldom-reproduced recordings had replaced, say, the dull "Best Things In Life Are Free" and the painful "Among My Souvenirs"?

The bottom line? The set will no doubt please the sort of listeners who have lavished praise on Mannering's previous compilations, but for those of us hungering for more substantial Lanza, it's a major disappointment.    

Cheers

Derek  

[George Laszlo]

Derek,

While reading your comments and those from Armando, an idea popped in my head. Since Calleja is doing very well with his CD, why not bring up these concerns with him. Perhaps he could approach the record company with these concerns and convince them to do another release is say 2 years with input from you and Armando. If money is the real motivation, which it most likely is. Why would they not listen? I'm guessing that choosing the right messenger may be the key to getting what we'd all like to have.

George

[Derek McGovern]

Hi George: While I'm frustrated beyond belief at the way Lanza's legacy continues to be mishandled on CD, I'm not sure that emailing Joseph Calleja would achieve anything. For one thing, he doesn't record with RCA, so I really can't see him being in a position to approach or influence them. Being a great admirer of Armando's book, however, he's probably already aware that Lanza's legacy hasn't been well served on CD. (Armando goes into some detail about this.)     

But the biggest problem in trying to persuade RCA/Sony that far better compilations of Lanza's recordings could be achieved than these endless patchy Coke albums and other mixed offerings is, as you guessed, money. This latest CD, aided in no small measure by a TV campaign, is apparently selling well---as have several of its predecessors. And that's all that matters, as far as these companies are concerned. Why, then, would RCA/TCM/Sony want to change (compiler) horses?

It's not through want of trying on our part, though, George. Many of us have gone to great lengths to try to persuade RCA simply to consider our proposals. But the problem is that, unlike Mannering, most of us are not in the US, nor do we enjoy the friendship of Lanza's surviving daughter (as he does). So Mannering has the proximity to Sony's Head Office, the Lanza family connection and a track record for compiling CDs that sell---and that's a tough combo to be up against. 

I'll say it again: the idea that one man---and a person apparently without musical credentials---should be entrusted with choosing the principal content on Mario Lanza's CDs over a period of almost 20 years (and counting) seems preposterous to me. Clearly, it doesn't seem that way to others, though---especially on the Rense Lanza forum, where each one of these recycled and uneven compilations is received like an offering from the gods.    

Cheers

Derek

[jora...@gmail.com]

I also received and listened to the new release “ML, The Toast Of Hollywood”. Very disappointing, as I expected it would be. I think it boils down to this: For newbies or for people not familiar with the Lanza  voice, sales will be good!

But those of us who KNOW and appreciate the potential of his gift will be disappointed. Nevertheless, we will buy it anyway (how could we not?, there might be a few new or brighter notes and we can’t afford to miss out).

Some of the choices are real head scratchers, e.g. A Vucchella and For You Alone. How could a compiler choose these versions over the existing and much better ones? When there are choices, shouldn’t the guiding question for the compiler be “ Which one would Mario have picked?

On Wednesday, September 25, 2013 12:44:21 PM UTC-4, Derek McGovern wrote:

Hi George: While I'm frustrated beyond belief at the way Lanza's legacy continues to be mishandled on CD, I'm not sure that emailing Joseph Calleja would achieve anything. For one thing, he doesn't record with RCA, so I really can't see him being in a position to approach or influence them. Being a great admirer of Armando's book, however, he's probably already aware that Lanza's legacy hasn't been well served on CD. (Armando goes into some detail about this.)     

But the biggest problem in trying to persuade RCA/Sony that far better compilations of Lanza's recordings could be achieved than these endless patchy Coke albums and other mixed offerings is, as you guessed, money. This latest CD, aided in no small measure by a TV campaign, is apparently selling well---as have several of its predecessors. And that's all that matters, as far as these companies are concerned. Why, then, would RCA/TCM/Sony want to change (compiler) horses?

It's not through want of trying on our part, though, George. Many of us have gone to great lengths to try to persuade RCA simply to consider our proposals. But the problem is that, unlike Mannering, most of us are not in the US, nor do we enjoy the friendship of Lanza's surviving daughter (as he does). So Mannering has the Lanza family connection and a track record for compiling CDs that sell---and that's a tough combo to be up against. 

[Derek McGovern]

I hear you, Joe.

As I've said a thousand times, this compiler's fixation on one brief period in Lanza's life---and on material that was generally more lightweight than what he sang in his films, recorded for RCA, or performed on the concert stage---is problematic enough in that it misrepresents (in my view) the man's legacy. Mario Lanza was an operatic singer. He was not Ella Fitzgerald or Nat King Cole---two singers whom Mannering mentions, rather tellingly, in his liner notes---no matter how much the compiler might wish he had been. The fact that over an 11-month period between 1951 and 1952 Lanza happened to record---with decidedly mixed results---a number of songs from the Great American Songbook for one-off broadcasts that he (presumably) believed---and, for all we know, hoped---would never be heard again doesn't make him another Sinatra or Crosby. And his CDs should not reflect that belief in compilation after compilation.         

But on top of that, for his compiler to choose examples of his singing that are actually below par---and sometimes downright terrible---well, it's enough to make a music lover weep. Apart from those who can't tell the difference between good singing and bad singing---those who simply love the sound of Lanza's voice---who on earth would be satisfied with this compilation? Lanza aficionados already own all of this material in one form or another, and, if they're like me, only begrudgingly bought the set to have one or two tracks in (somewhat) better sound, while the casual fans or newcomers to the man couldn't care less about the six previously unreleased tracks. But is it great Lanza singing? would be the latter group's only concern. 

When news of this CD first came out, I wrote that this set, with its emphasis on often dated English ditties, would appeal mainly to older listeners---and that, let's face it, younger admirers are crucial to the future promotion of Lanza's legacy. I still feel that way. While the right collection of English-language songs might conceivably appeal to younger listeners, in my experience it's the best of the Neapolitan and Italian songs and operatic recordings that almost invariably make the biggest impact on bright young music lovers. This is also borne out in YouTube comments. (As an aside, the viewing stats for our website consistently show that hits on the "serious" recordings and operatic/Italian/Neapolitan discographies greatly outweigh those on the lighter material.)

In my opinion, it's time for Mr. Mannering to hang up his compiler straps. Good Lord: the man's had numerous opportunities to compile Lanza CDs to his heart's desire; surely he and his many admirers on the Rense forum and in the BMLS must be satisfied by now? How many compilations should one person be allowed to determine---or did I miss something, and he was appointed Lanza CD Compiler for Life?! And if people think I'm being too hard on this pleasant and well-meaning man, all I can say to that is: anyone prepared to take on the role of determining the content of Lanza's CDs ought to have a thick skin!     

I know I've used a similar analogy before, but I think it bears repeating: 

Imagine walking into a Van Gogh exhibition with the expectation that one is going to view the masterpieces of that artist's career. Instead, what does one find? An exhibition that's restricted to Van Gogh's Sunflower period, and not only that: a full third of the paintings are not the versions he was celebrated for, but flawed, "pale imitations" (as Kendall Hale would say) of the real thing. What art lover wouldn't be baffled and disappointed?

That's how I feel about this set---and most of its predecessors.

Cheers 

Derek 

 

[Des Hanson]

Hi Derek,

I have been reading your comments on Mannering’s latest nonsense ( we have all heard the same thing before, in particular The Operatic Arias and

Duets).  I couldn’t agree with you more.  From what you have said about him mentioning Ella Fitzgerald and Nat King Cole, both of whom I like very

much but Lanza is in a completely different singer altogether. While he did sing ‘pop songs’ they were not on the whole his forte in my humble

opinion.  I also agree with you in reference to the powers that be not being concerned about what they release on C.D. of Mario.  I have always

thought that all they want is to sell his disc and make as much money as they can.  Lanza died when I was only 17 yrs. old and I have thought this       

ever since.  Having read your comments I do not think I will buy it as I probably have most of the content, having bought all his recordings even

from 2nd hand shops that sell  them.  I like the different covers they have to the ones released here in Australia.  I’d like to see the

“Serenade” record from another country as I think the Aust. cover they released was quite frankly  AAAwwwffull.  Anyway I’ve prattled on for

long enough to bore everyone to death so will finish and thank you for your comments they have saved me money.

 

Michele

 

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Michele: I've always felt that Lanza admirers have generally fallen into two discrete groups: those who would rather hear him singing popular songs in English, Broadway numbers and operetta---and whose interest in opera or the Italian/Neapolitan song repertoire (if it exists at all) is limited to the more accessible pop 'hits' such as La Donna 'e Mobile, Santa Lucia & O Sole Mio---and genuine opera lovers who simply want to hear the man singing material that is worthy of his voice and his artistry. For the latter group, "worthy" material naturally includes a fair number of the English-language songs (who, after all, cannot be thrilled by the MGM Student Prince recordings or the likes of Some Day, If I Loved You, Long Ago and Far Away, Without a Song, etc?), but not the often-forgettable or poorly sung material found on many of the Coke Shows, in particular, and which has equally dominated Lanza's CD compilations. The latter group is also far more likely to appreciate the best of Lanza's later (1955-59) singing, not because they necessarily prefer the generally darker sound of his voice during that period, but because the material---and, just as importantly, his approach to it---is often superior to the 1951-52 "Coke" period. 

And while it might be a slight over-simplification, it's hard not to escape the impression that the biggest regret of the first group is that the Coke Shows ever ended, while the chief lament of the second group is that Mario Lanza never fully realized his operatic potential.

I assume Derek Mannering belongs to the first group; in fact, some might even say that he was its patron saint. Certainly, his many compilations have overwhelmingly emphasized the lighter repertoire from Lanza's legacy. Just think: only 51 Coke numbers were commercially released during Lanza's lifetime, and with the exception of the mostly awful Touch of Your Hand album, they were generally well chosen. Yet of the 137 titles that Mannering has selected for his CDs, a staggering 96 have come from the Coke Shows---and these have included some of the worst performances, such as The Desert Song, Strange Music, Amor Ti Vieta, O Sole Mio and Torna a Surriento, or misfires such as One Alone, My Romance (previously unreleased version) and Valencia, all of which he has seen fit to feature twice (or three times in the case of Valencia). Even his 2009 5-CD set Original Album Classics was fully three-fifths Coke. Incredibly, only 14 of the 137 titles chosen by Mannering were recorded after 1952, and while many of the 1949-52 recordings have been recycled on his subsequent compilations---30 in all!---tellingly, the only post-1952 recordings he has ever repeated have been the English and Italian versions of one popular song: Arrivederci, Roma.  

While I'm all for emphasizing the best of Mario's achievements in popular song and the lighter repertory, surely we've reached the point of saturation now? Besides, this latter-day attempt to present him as an American Songbook specialist when (as you pointed out, Michele) the material was not always his forte---or the Coke arrangements worked against him---often invites unflattering comparisons with iconic popular singers who were more suited to these songs, many of which were never intended for an operatic voice. I don't feel, for example, that Mario was a natural fit for Cole Porter, despite the fact that he pulled off a superb and beguiling Begin the Beguine. I suspect that Porter would have cringed at Lanza's handling of What Is This Thing Called Love, and he probably wouldn't have approved of the full-voiced endings to You Do Something to Me (much as I like the recording) or Night and Day either. In the English repertoire, I feel, Mario generally fares much better with the likes of Rodgers and Hammerstein and, of course, the Romberg operettas.    

If I had my way---and I know it's one heck of a long shot---we'd start over with a clean slate as far as compilations of Lanza's recordings are concerned. I'd be satisfied with a mere three compilations, all of them (hopefully) as well promoted as some of Mannering's releases have been. Armando Cesari, a man eminently qualified to distinguish great singing from bad, would be put in charge of selecting a two- (or ideally) three-CD compendium of Lanza's best English recordings (and not just those from the Coke period; the third disc could comprise the best of the 1956-59 period), together with a double CD of operatic recordings and a double CD of Italian/Neapolitan recordings. No additional compilation of religious and Christmas music would be needed, thanks to the perfectly fine Christmas with Mario Lanza that still exists in the catalogue. 

Just think: Lanza compilations featuring no dud recordings. What a concept!

Cheers

Derek  

P.S. Contrary to the public claims of one of Mr. Mannering's admirers, I'm not so naive as to believe that one great Lanza operatic compilation would make all the difference---"finally" convincing the world that the man was indeed a great opera singer. But a consistently superb operatic collection---something that has never happened before---certainly wouldn't hurt his critical rehabilitation either. As Clyde T. McCants observes in his 2004 American Opera Singers and Their Recordings: Critical Commentaries and Discographies, "One wonders [...] how much of the negative critical response to Lanza is based on the failure of the RCA company over the years to promote him as a serious artist and their hard commercial push for his recordings in the 'popular' mart." 

Amen to that.

      

[Barnabas Nemeth]

Likely, you're right with categorization. I definitely belong to the group of No. II, if exist at all. The Toast of Hollywood, as far as the compilation is concerned, typical but is not my favourite one. I'm looking forward a complete compilation of operatic arias, separately neapolitan songs, and another one of English songs. I'm keen on having at last the Caruso Favourites on SACD as well.

Cheers,

Barnabas

[George Laszlo]

You may want to listen to this. Opinions welcome.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/mario-lanza/id76030839?i=167167741&mt=2

[George Laszlo]

And here is the link to the Fishko web site. Steff, I see that you made a comment there. Sorry if you already posted about this podcast here but I did not see it. George

http://www.wnyc.org/story/317717-mario-lanza/#commentlist

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Barnabas: Sadly, it looks unlikely that we'll be seeing any more Lanza SACD releases. As far as I know, Sony/BMG in the US stopped producing SACD versions of its albums quite a while ago (though I think its subsidiary Sony Masterworks still produces the occasional SACD). There are simply not enough people interested in the superior quality of SACD to make the whole thing commercially viable. In fact, sound quality is becoming less important to many younger buyers, as the popularity of the lower-quality MP3 format suggests. SACD albums are still being released, but it seems that only the smaller labels are interested in this format. 

It's also sad that the superb Mario! album is only available on SACD now for ridiculous prices---US$69 from Amazon's online sellers when I last looked. Sony stopped producing that CD some time ago. I'm guessing it sold well, though, as supplies of other SACD albums released by Sony around the same time (2006) of Leontyne Price, Anna Moffo et al are still not exhausted.

Our best hope in getting a Lanza operatic compilation on CD may lie with the subsidiary label Sony Music Classical International, which is based in Berlin. In 2010, when I was on one of my periodic quests to persuade Sony/BMG to release an operatic CD of Lanza, I was referred by Sony's head office in New York to a person at Sony Music in Edisonhöfe, Berlin. Initially, things looked very promising:

Dear Mr. McGovern,

 

thank you very much indeed for your e-mail on Mario Lanza.

In short: I completely agree to your statement and I am very thankful for your contructive input.

We intend to release a singers recitals series in autumn 2010 to spring 2011.

in which we considered reissues of Mario Lanzas operatic recordings.

Your tracklisting proposal for the Aria-CD is excellent work. 

I keep you informed as soon as we have confirmed plans with Mario Lanza

which wil be in early summer.

 

With very best wishes

*******

A few months later, however, the person above stopped replying to my emails, and all subsequent attempts to get in touch with him failed. I can only speculate as to why this happened....

Anyway, all I can suggest (naively, perhaps) is that the more noise we make about demanding better-compiled Lanza CDs---and a new operatic collection, in particular---the greater our chances will be of seeing Sony grant our wish. I also hope that Rense forum regulars who are reading this message will start exerting a little gentle pressure on Derek Mannering to dissuade him from making yet another love song collection his next priority. After all, there are a number of opera lovers on the Rense/Mannering forum, and surely some of them would love to see another Lanza operatic compilation. It's been 14 years since the first and only one.

And to nudge that process along, here---once again---are my suggestions for the content of such a CD:

https://groups.google.com/d/msg/mariolanza/oUTS9we8TeA/5E5dSeGnP2MJ

 

Cheers

Derek     

[Derek McGovern]

Thanks for the link, George. I've just listened to the clip and posted a comment underneath.

Cheers

Derek

[Vincent Di Placido]

It took me many years, since I was a child in fact, to understand & realise exactly what kind of vocal animal, Mario was. Some people still don't understand.  

Mario Lanza's strength, & it also turned out to be a weakness, was that he was an exceptionally gifted operatic tenor who could when he wanted move into popular song territory convincingly, not to the extent of a popular song stylist like Sinatra, but enough that when he was on form,understood the material & how he was going to approach it intelligently he could sound perfectly at home in the Great American Songbook. This does not mean as you rightly say, Derek, that he should be repeatedly portrayed almost in the opposite way, which is how the majority of the BMG/Sony cds would have the buyers believe. You woulkd almost take from these cds that Mario was a popular singer who happened to push himself occasionally & dabble in recording the odd aria, this is not how I, as a genuine Lanza fan, would like Mario portrayed.

Derek, your suggested Operatic cd tracklisting is actually a Playlist on my iPod, along with a few Hollywood Bowl recordings, it is a perfect well thought out collection of Mario Lanza quality, I really hope it happens someday...

You say, Derek, "Just think: Lanza compilations featuring no dud recordings. What a concept!" Oh! How I second that.

When I was a naive young Mario fan I would have jumped at hearing those unreleased Coke recordings but I cringe now that they are being smuggled in on mainstream high profile collections that are supoposed to be representative of Mario Lanza as an artist. This is ridiculous! Those few months of Coke recordings of one-off performances of sometimes-badly chosen material should not be the main focus on these now precious & rare releases. Let's Have Mario shown in the best light!

[jora...@gmail.com]

Why are there two distinct groups of Lanza CD’s? I look at it this way: Most of us first heard Mario’s voice when we were quite young and we immediately fell in love with its sound. In his earlier days his lyric voice was very fresh and beautiful….a better fit for many of the “lighter” Coke recordings.

However, as Mario matured his voice darkened and became richer. Also his choices of recording became more sophisticated, taking  advantage of his NOW almost Baritonal qualities. Some of his audience ( especially those of a certain compiler) didn’t grow along as Lanza’s abilities expanded. It’s perfectly okay to love the younger Lanza voice, but to completely ignore the the later recordings is to badly under-represent one of the greatest natural instruments the world has known.

On Wednesday, September 25, 2013 12:44:21 PM UTC-4, Derek McGovern wrote:

Hi George: While I'm frustrated beyond belief at the way Lanza's legacy continues to be mishandled on CD, I'm not sure that emailing Joseph Calleja would achieve anything. For one thing, he doesn't record with RCA, so I really can't see him being in a position to approach or influence them. Being a great admirer of Armando's book, however, he's probably already aware that Lanza's legacy hasn't been well served on CD. (Armando goes into some detail about this.)     

But the biggest problem in trying to persuade RCA/Sony that far better compilations of Lanza's recordings could be achieved than these endless patchy Coke albums and other mixed offerings is, as you guessed, money. This latest CD, aided in no small measure by a TV campaign, is apparently selling well---as have several of its predecessors. And that's all that matters, as far as these companies are concerned. Why, then, would RCA/TCM/Sony want to change (compiler) horses?

It's not through want of trying on our part, though, George. Many of us have gone to great lengths to try to persuade RCA simply to consider our proposals. But the problem is that, unlike Mannering, most of us are not in the US, nor do we enjoy the friendship of Lanza's surviving daughter (as he does). So Mannering has the proximity to Sony's Head Office, the Lanza family connection and a track record for compiling CDs that sell---and that's a tough combo to be up against. 

[Des Hanson]

Hello Vince,

 

I couldn’t  agree with you more.  As I said to Derek I was just 17 when Lanza died  and just after he passed away they released “Seven Hills of Rome”

in Sydney and I loved his voice so much I actually went and watched this film 5 times in a row, simply because I could get to the theatre after work

to the 5 o’clock session, but I was so disappointed with the songs he sang (no Operatic arias except Questa ‘O Quella). As you say he was not a popular

song stylist like Sinatra, but he was probably the best of his type to sing the Great American Songbook and in my opinion he certainly still is the best.

If only Derek could be asked to put together the list of Operatic recordings on  CD, one can only dream.  

Michele

M ichrom: Vincent Di Placido

Sent: Monday, September 30, 2013 5:39 PM

To: mario...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: Miscellaneous Lanza-related News/Comments

 

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the Google Groups "Mario Lanza, Tenor" group.
To unsubscribe from this topic, visit https://groups.google.com/d/topic/mariolanza/oUTS9we8TeA/unsubscribe.
To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to mariolanza+...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.

[George Laszlo]

Here is another link to a review (September 30, 2013 - The Epoch Times, New York) of the new "The Toast of Hollywood" CD. Read both this and the Jonas Kaufmann review since references are made to Mario in the second review. Comments about the veracity of the claimed facts and the opinions of the writer are welcome.

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/blog/three-tenors-on-cds/

Here is a short bio of the writer, Barry Bassis. He writes for The  Epoch Times, a newspaper here in New York city that focuses on events in China but covers the Arts fairly nicely.

Barry has been a music, theater and travel writer for over a decade for various publications, including Epoch Times. He is a voting member of the Drama Desk and the Outer Critics Circle, two organizations of theater critics that give awards at the end of each season. He has also been a member of NATJA (North American Travel Journalists Association)

[Lou]

Hi Derek: A bit late in the day, but I finally managed to do more than skim Lindsay Perigo's often informative, always entertaining book, The One Tenor. In your August 27, 2013 post, you noted Roland Bessette's labelling of people who disagree with his view of Lanza as "cultists" and "non-scholarly." Relatedly, I am intrigued by Bessette's statement that some of Lanza's fans and biographers accept only those views that they find convenient to their "not-at-all platonic concept" of Mario Lanza. Is he saying that these fans and biographers reject his Lanza Bipolar 

Theory because they have a romantic interest in the singer?

Best,

Lou 

  

[leeann]

Lou, it's awfully nice that you're posting. Well, where you were intrigued, I choked on my coffee. :-) I certainly took it to mean that disagreeing with Bessette's conclusions meant one was incapable of thinking with one's head--a kind of playground name calling. I wouldn't mind being wrong.

[Derek McGovern]

Hi Lou and Lee Ann:

I certainly took Bessette's comment to mean that those who disagreed with his portrayal of Lanza were "cultists"---that is, people so smitten with the tenor that they were unable to view him objectively. An extraordinary statement---and ironic, too, in Armando's and my case, given how often the two of us have been attacked by others for supposedly "diminishing" Lanza both as a person and as an artist. (Lindsay Perigo even wrote an article for the Lanza Legend in which he described Armando and me as "Mario-diminishers.") 

The "cultist" putdown is nothing new, though. Years ago, after I had reviewed Bessette's book unfavourably on Amazon, he wrote to me declaring that, "You are the sort of cultist that wreaks havoc on Lanza's legacy." A few years later, in one of his two (!) angry reviews of Armando's book on Amazon, Bessette was at it again, referring to "cultist supporters" of the biography, including "Derek McGovern, whose extreme attacks against those who don't abide by his obsessions about the tenor are well known." Ha! 

But while I don't care what insults Bessette throws at me personally, it does bother me that he's perpetuated so many unfortunate myths about Lanza. The most recent one, of course, is the suggestion that the host and producers of The Christophers were so alarmed by Lanza's demeanour on the show that they refrained from broadcasting the programme. We've proved what utter nonsense that claim was (though it's a shame that Perigo, who faithfully repeated it in his 2013 book, didn't bother to check its veracity before publication). But the list of disproved Bessette claims---all of which had cast Lanza in a negative light---is a long one indeed. (Take the Hugo Wolf business for starters.)

Actually, I'm still waiting for Bessette to apologize for claiming in his Amazon review that Armando had invented his reference to Lanza as Elvis Presley's formative influence. "Presley didn't say those things," Bessette thunders, "and no responsible biographer would present them as factual." Yet all Bessette had to do was consult Presley biographies by such respected writers as Jerry Hopkins and Peter Guralnick, and he would have found that Lanza was not only Presley's favourite singer, but that Elvis himself is on record as stating that Lanza had inspired him more than anyone else. Bessette should have done his homework!

Cheers,

Derek

[Vincent Di Placido]

I'm not sure if we ever brought up this subject before but I remember when I was about 12 being in the large music library in Edinburgh & searching the old index card system for a Lanza entry & I found an entry for "Gesualdo Lanza" & a book he had written on singing technique, it required a special booking to view it under supervision from their archive, which I now regret never organising, but isn't it a great coincidence with our Mario...

http://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Lanza,_Gesualdo_(DNB00)

[leeann]

Oh, Vince, is it possible that this is the book, brought to us by the wonders of google digitisation (and no copyright)? If so, many years later, here is "one of the best works on the art of singing which has appeared in this country...[London]"  At least, abridged: Lanza's elements of singing: The elements of singing abridged and familiarly exemplified in a series of lessons by way of question and answer...[and so on]

And PDF downloadable. What a remarkable item for a 12-year old to notice and remember!