I played and loved everything in the collection, but I could not yet fully appreciate the perfect poise of Gluck, the flawless legato and settled richness of Homer, the purity and agility of Galli-Curci. I was drawn to Crookss are-you-sure-you-want-to-try-that assault on the serenade from The Student Prince (and truly, it is both scary and terrific, like some of early di Stefano), the overt dramatizations of Tibbett and Chaliapin, and Carusos conquest of the Rossinian heights. I understood from the start that, captivating though the others were, Caruso was the greatest of the tenors. This was in part because I was told so, and in part because of books. Except for Angel Mo and her Son, the life story of the fine African–American tenor Roland Hayes, the only books about a singer in my parents small but fairly classy library were Pierre Keys Enrico Caruso (the first full-length biography) and Dorothy Carusos Enrico Caruso, His Life and Death. The presence of these volumes, and these alone, was clear evidence of sovereign standing, and I absorbed the story of striving and victory and tragedy as if it had been my own. But beyond the tutelage and the books, I could hear that Caruso was separated from the others by a sort of quantitative measure — fearless like Crooks and dulcet like Gigli, but mightier. No doubt this awareness meshed with preadolescent power fantasies. Caruso was a sports hero, like Bobby Feller. It was also the beginning of a temperamental affinity for voices with some fight in them.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Mar 2014 09:40:10 +0000
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