Giuseppe Anselmi - Malia (Tosti) video

with Bellezza (piano). Fonotipia master xPh 4076, rec. Milan, October 6 1909. Giuseppe Anselmi is a prime example of what, according to quite a few jokers, should not exist: an intelligent tenor. Although sometimes not free of technical flaws and more often than not showing difficulties with the highest and lowest tessitura, all recordings I know of him are of staggering musicality, able to transform everything he set his eyes on into something interesting. Anselmi at first wanted to become a violinist - he gave his first solo recital in 1890, when he was 13 years old, at the same time studying composition and piano. He developed an interes in singing shortly afterwards, and joined an operetta company three years later. He seems to have sung his first opera roles in Greece in 1896 or 1898 (the earlier date is frequently repeated in biographical sketches, but nobody seems to be able to come up with verification for this). He returned to Italy for further studies and in 1900 finally made his Italian debut in Naples. Soon afterwards he was admired throughout Europe. Although his carreer was not really a long one, in the fifteen years between his arrival on the bigger stages and the outbreak of the Great War he sang in London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Odessa, Monte Carlo, Lisbon, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Warszaw, and numerous others. He was a sensation in Madrid, the city he gave his heart to (literally! His heart is resting in the Madrid Conservatorio...) and also had great ...