Ettore Bastianini was born on the 24th of September
1922 in Siena
in the district ("contrada") called Pantera (the Panther), and
he died in Sirmione on Lake Garda on the 25th of January 1967. He was son
of an unknown father and his mother was all he had of any importance
in this world. He voice was naturally very beautiful and he started right
after world war two a short carrer as a bass. He wasn't going anywhere really,
but one day he was convinced by his teacher Maestro
Luciano Bettarini to try to study for six months
as a baritone. It was 1951 and he was 29. He was very poor though, and he
couldn't afford to pay for the lessons, but his teacher said to him that
he would have paid him later when he would have been rich and famous, and
that's exactly what happened!
He was so poor that he had to shave himself with
the same razor for a whole week, because he couldn't even afford to buy
new razors! It didn't take long to get to his debut
as a baritone in his Siena on January 1952
and then, that same year, on December at the Teatro Comunale in Florence
in "The queen of spades" by Tciaikovskij. In 1953 he sang in Turin
in "Andrea Chenier" and then, on December of that same year, he
was already at the Metropolitan Theatre of New York in "Traviata"
where he received an ovation after his aria!!! His voice was so beautiful
that was compared to bronze and velvet because it was powerful but soft at the same time.
He was on his way then to a great carrer, going
from triumph to triumph,
and in 1955 he was at La Scala in Milan in the legendary Visconti production
of "Traviata" with Maria Callas and Giulini as conductor. He would
sing then, in his short but very intense carrer (just over 10 years), for
the Teatro alla Scala
in 20 different operas as the principal baritone. He became then the principal
baritone of the most important theatres of the world: La Scala, Vienna Staatsoper
and New York apart from frequent performances in all the others including
London, Salzburg, Chicago...
Then, just when in 1962, he thought he had found
finally the woman of his life, a young girl called Manuela, the terrible condamn to death
in Chicago: cancer in the throath! He never said anything to anyone and he kept for himself
the horrible secret. His dear mother had died in that same period and he
was alone. He said to his girlfriend that he couldn't
go on with her anymore without telling her why. He kept going with his carrer
but he had to undergo the terrible radiations because he had refused to
have an operation that, if it might have made him live until old age, he
would have taken away, on the other hand, his main reason to live: the artistic
expression of singing.
Of course his voice wasn't the same anymore but
nobody knew why, and eventually the inevitable happened: he
got booed at La Scala in "Rigoletto"
as his voice wasn't responding anymore to the orders of his will. A sad
decline followed and the only happy moment was the victory of his district
"The Panther" in the horse race of Siena "Il Palio"
while he was President and Captain. In the pictures in this page you can
see Ettore in triumph after the victory and with the winning horse. He bought
the horse afterwards and he called him "Ettore", of course.Then
sorrow and pain came back and the great theatres one after another finished
the contracts with him. Destiny wanted that the
last scene he sang in 1965 in the three greatest
theatres of Vienna, Milan and New York was the
death scene of Marquis of Posa in "Don Carlo" by Verdi, the noble role he had sung so well in the past...
Public, critics, his colleagues and everybody in
the opera world wondered about this misterious decline of a singer just
over 40 years old who had been so good before, and it
was with surprise and sorrow that the news of his illness was received,
when he was already about to die. He died in
Sirmione on the 25th of January 1967 at only 44
and it was for pure coincidence that the girl he had loved, Manuela, the
one he had wanted to leave 5 years before, the one he had never seen anymore
since, the one who even had married in the meantime, was the only one there
with him when he gave his last breath. Two days later all the town of Siena
was there for his funeral. He received the honours of Captain of the "Contrada
della Pantera" and it was the procedure of a
funeral of State. When the funeral passed close
to one of the openings on Piazza del Campo, the coffin was turned toward
the Tower of Mangia for a last goodbye as the bell of the Palazzo Comunale
stroked death tolls.
The memory of his Art has never died though. It
goes on alive all over the world among the REAL music lovers, the people
who study it , who sing it, who listen to it, who goes to the theatre hoping
desperately to find something decent among the too many CARDBOARD
VOICES around, especially male singers. It is really SAD that the
wonderful art of opera singing is drowning into oblivion and one of the
reasons is definetely the fact that there are too many singers with NO BALLS,
if you get my drift...and if anybody among you is offended by my opinion,
that's simply the proof that I am right! Ettore Bastianini will always live
in our memory.
had of any importance
in this world. He voice was naturally very beautiful and he started right
after world war two a short carrer as a bass. He wasn't going anywhere really,
but one day he was convinced by his teacher Maestro
Luciano Bettarini to try to study for six months
as a baritone. It was 1951 and he was 29. He was very poor though, and he
couldn't afford to pay for the lessons, but his teacher said to him that
he would have paid him later when he would have been rich and famous, and
that's exactly what happened!
to his girlfriend that he couldn't
go on with her anymore without telling her why. He kept going with his carrer
but he had to undergo the terrible radiations because he had refused to
have an operation that, if it might have made him live until old age, he
would have taken away, on the other hand, his main reason to live: the artistic
expression of singing.
before, and it
was with surprise and sorrow that the news of his illness was received,
when he was already about to die. He died in
Sirmione on the 25th of January 1967 at only 44
and it was for pure coincidence that the girl he had loved, Manuela, the
one he had wanted to leave 5 years before, the one he had never seen anymore
since, the one who even had married in the meantime, was the only one there
with him when he gave his last breath. Two days later all the town of Siena
was there for his funeral. He received the honours of Captain of the "Contrada
della Pantera" and it was the procedure of a
funeral of State. When the funeral passed close
to one of the openings on Piazza del Campo, the coffin was turned toward
the Tower of Mangia for a last goodbye as the bell of the Palazzo Comunale
stroked death tolls.