But what was so unique about the work of this outstanding tenor? How did his destiny develop, and how long was his path to the heights of musical art? Today we will try to reveal some of the secrets associated with the life and work of the great maestro. In our biographical review you will find all the most interesting facts from the life of the inimitable Italian classic.
Early years, childhood and family of Enrico Caruso
Enrico Caruso was born on February 25, 1873 in the family of an ordinary auto mechanic. The parents of the future singer - Anna Maria and Marcello Caruso - lived quite poorly, but our today's hero always called them very kind, generous and open people.They always wanted the best for their beloved son, and therefore they fully supported him at the moment when he said that he would like to study music.
From an early age, Enrico Caruso sang in the church choir. This hobby became a real obsession for the boy at a time when his mother began to get sick often and soon died. As the great tenor himself later recalled, for a long time he sincerely believed that only in church would his deceased mother be able to hear him sing.
However, some time later, due to the plight of his family, the singer began to perform church compositions right on the central streets of Naples. Thus, he made money for a long time.
During one of these "street concerts" our today's hero was noticed by one of the teachers of the vocal school Guglielmo Vergine. The young singer was invited to audition, and very soon Enrico Caruso began to study music with the famous conductor and teacher Vincenzo Lombardi. It was he who organized the first concerts of the young performer in the bars and restaurants of the resort areas of Naples.
Some time later, Enrico felt popular for the first time. A lot of people always came to his concerts. Soon after the performances, well-known representatives of the Italian music industry began to often approach him, who offered the talented performer certain contracts. Thus, our today's hero first appeared in Palermo.
Enrico Caruso - O Sole Mio
According to many researchers, it was after the legendary performance of the part of Enzo from the opera La Gioconda that the twenty-four-year-old Caruso was talked about as an established star of the Italian scene.
Star Trek Enrico Caruso
After this triumphant success, Enrico went on the first foreign tour in his life. Oddly enough, the musician's route lay in distant and cold Russia. This was followed by performances in other countries and cities. And already in 1900, as a full-fledged celebrity, Caruso first appeared on the stage of the legendary Milanese Teatro alla Scala.After that, our today's hero went on tour again. During this period, the great Italian performed at London's Covent Garden, and also gave concerts in Hamburg, Berlin and some other cities. The singer's performances were held with constant success, but the concerts of the Italian performer on the New York stage of the Metropolitan Opera became truly magical and inimitable. Having performed here for the first time in 1903, later our today's hero became the leading soloist of this theater for almost twenty years.
dedicated to Enrico Caruso
Caruso's repertoire included both lyrical and dramatic parts. However, our today's hero has always coped with any operatic works with the same virtuosity. In addition, it is worth noting the fact that throughout his career, Caruso has always included traditional Neapolitan songs in his repertoire. Perhaps that is why today Enrico remains one of the most famous natives of Naples and all of Italy.
It is also quite remarkable that it was Enrico Caruso who became one of the first opera performers on the world stage, who decided to fix their repertoire on gramophone records. To a large extent, it was this circumstance that predetermined the worldwide popularity of the tenor, and made his work accessible to the broad masses.
Already during his lifetime, Enrico Caruso was called the legend of vocal art. This outstanding tenor is also a role model for many contemporary performers.
Death of Caruso, cause of death
Enrico Caruso performed and toured a lot. Therefore, the news of his death was largely unexpected for his fans in different countries of the world. 
At the age of 48, the great tenor died in his native Naples as a result of purulent pleurisy. After his death, a special wax candle of enormous size was made in memory of the outstanding opera performer. It was promised that every year this candle will be lit in front of the face of the holy Madonna. According to some estimates, only after 500 years the gigantic candle should burn out.
Personal life of Enrico Caruso
It is known for certain that in his youth Enrico was in love for a long time with the opera singer Ada Giachetti, who for a long time was actually his common-law wife. Despite a passionate romance one day, the girl simply ran away from the singer with a young chauffeur.After that, our today's hero was married to a girl named Dorothy, who until the end of her days bore his last name and always remained by Caruso's side. After the death of the legendary tenor, the performer's wife wrote several publications about his life.
Enrico Caruso is still considered one of the most talented and popular opera singers the music world has ever known. Born in the slums of Naples into a family where, in addition to him, there were 20 children, Enrico himself managed to get out of poverty only because, as a child, he realized that he had a truly golden voice. He sang at this time in the church choir, and wealthy parishioners often paid him to sing serenades to their beloved. Raised by great Italian singers, Caruso achieved immense success both in Europe and America. He enjoyed wealth and spent a fortune to surround himself and everyone he loved with magnificent luxury. Caruso never denied himself anything. For example, he was a heavy smoker and smoked 2 packs of Egyptian cigarettes a day, at the risk of losing his unique voice. At the end of his life, he suffered greatly from all kinds of physical ailments. Caruso died on August 2, 1921 of pleurisy.
Watermelon is an excellent food: eat, drink, and wash at once.
Caruso Enrico
Short, stocky, with a wide chest and a funny mustache, Caruso made an irresistible impression on women with the bewitching magic of his voice. Early in his career, Caruso was engaged to the daughter of the director of the opera house, where he sang. At the last moment, he managed to disrupt the engagement and escape with the ballerina of the same theater.
Caruso was often attracted to women older than him. He fell in love with Ada Giachetti, an opera singer 10 years his senior. In return for her young lover's passion, Ada abandoned her own career as an opera singer. In turn, Caruso began to refuse love offers of close acquaintance, coming to him from an innumerable number of fans, although his constant flirting often infuriated Ada. Their life together, marked by numerous scandals and mutual accusations of adultery and infidelity, lasted 11 years. They had two sons. Caruso's fits of jealousy were eventually justified when Ada fled with the young chauffeur of their car. Caruso was shocked and suffered a nervous illness that nearly ruined his musical career. Then, trying to take revenge on Ada, whom, by the way, he continued to love, Caruso started a short but stormy romance with Ada's younger sister. When such tactics did not force Ada to return to the family, Caruso surrounded himself with a whole crowd of enthusiastic admirers of his talent, many of whom became his mistresses. Ada, in turn, filed a lawsuit against him, demanding that he return to her the jewelry that he had "stolen." The case, however, did not come to court, since Caruso offered Ada to pay her a certain amount of money every month, and she favorably accepted his offer.
The famous Irish tenor John McCormack, upon meeting with Caruso, exclaimed: "Hail the greatest tenor in the world!" “Hello Johnny,” Caruso replied. - And what, do you sing in baritone now?
Caruso Enrico
At the age of 45, Caruso once again surprised the entire music world by marrying Dorothy Benjamin, a calm and even somewhat prim woman 20 years younger than him. Dorothy was not a music lover. Her father was against this marriage and disinherited her after the wedding did take place. Soon Dorothy had a daughter. Until the end of his days, Caruso was very fond of Dorothy. He was still very jealous and often begged his wife to become "very, very fat, so that no man would ever even look at her."
In 1906, Caruso made a splash when he was arrested in New York after pinching an unfamiliar woman on the lower back while walking around the zoo in the city's Central Park. The press lashed out at Caruso, calling him an "Italian pervert" who came to the United States only to seduce innocent American women. During the hearing of the case in court, a stranger, whose face was hidden by a veil, spoke to the jury. She claimed that Caruso molested her right at the Metropolitan Opera. The spokesman for the police department said that he had a whole case against Caruso, because, according to the victims, he often harasses women. Caruso was found guilty and fined, despite the fact that the police officer who arrested him at the zoo was known as a specialist who knew how to fabricate any accusation against anyone. In addition, the same police officer was a witness at the wedding of the "victim", 30-year-old Hannah Graham from the Bronx. Until the end of his life, Caruso did not admit this accusation and always insisted that the whole case was set up by his competitors and detractors in the music world in order to destroy his popularity in America with the help of this scandal. Caruso's friends also pointed out that he had just returned from Latin America, where this was the order of things and where no one would pay the slightest attention to it. Perhaps, they said, Caruso had simply forgotten where he was.
Caruso Enrico
Caruso was quite worried that this scandal had completely destroyed his reputation. For a long time he did not speak and hid from the press. He eventually returned to the stage for a triumphant performance in New York, greeted with a storm of applause from true music lovers who were enthusiastic about his talent and ignored his off-stage antics.
Enrico Caruso is still considered one of the most talented and popular opera singers the music world has ever known.
Enrico Caruso experienced unheard-of fame during his lifetime, she was exceptional. Considered the world's highest paid opera singer, his royalties have grown from 15 Italian lira at the start of his career, when he sang in provincial Italian theaters, to $ 2,500 for each performance at the Metropolitan Opera.
But neither wealth, nor orders and awards (Caruso was the owner of orders and honorary titles of many European states), nor the admiration of the powerful, nor the sincere love of colleagues and the public changed his nature.
What does a singer need? Wide chest, wide throat, ninety percent memory, ten percent mind, a lot of hard work and something in the heart.
Caruso Enrico
Enrico Caruso creativity:
Questa o quella (Verdi "Rigoletto")
Pour moi jour est tout mystere (Tchaikovsky "Eugene Onegin")
La donna e mobile (Verdi "Rigoletto")
Libiamo, libiamo (Verdi "La Traviata")
Una fortuna lagrima (Donizetti "Love Potion")
Di quella pira (Verdi "La Traviata")
Che gelida manina (Puccini "Bohemia")
Di`tu se fedele (Verdi's "Masquerade Ball")
Recitar! .. Vesti la giubba (Leoncavallo "Pagliacci")
Bella figlia dell`amore (Verdi "Rigoletto")
La fleur que tu m`avais jetee (Bizet "Carmen")
Ah si, ben mio (Verdi's "Troubadour")
O soave fanciulla (Puccini "La Boheme")
Celeste Aida (Verdi "Aida")
Elucevan le stella (Puccini "Tosca")
Spirito gentil, neёsogni miei (Donizetti "Favorite")
Chi mi frena in tal momento? (Donizetti "Lucia di Lammmermoor")
O figli, o figli miei ... (Verdi "Macbeth")
A cette voix quel trouble ...
Chi mi frena in tal momento ... (Donizetti "Lucia da Lammurmur")
Amor ti vieta (Giorgiano "Fedora")
Enrico Caruso - quotes
Watermelon is an excellent food: eat, drink, and wash at once. 
The famous Irish tenor John McCormack, upon meeting with Caruso, exclaimed: "Hail the greatest tenor in the world!" “Hello Johnny,” Caruso replied. - And what, do you sing in baritone now?
The tenor must suffer. Then they love him more.
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Enrico Caruso is a world famous Italian opera singer, tenor. He was born the third child in a poor family, where six more children were raised with him. Only thanks to his talent and hard work, he was able to get out of poverty, surrounding himself and his loved ones with the luxury of a rich life.
Enrico was born in a poor industrial area (Napoli) on February 25, 1873 to a working class family in a two-story house. After finishing elementary school, the boy did not want to study further, he went to the church choir of a small local church. He enjoyed singing so much that he did not become an engineer as his parents, Marcello Caruso and Anne-Marie Caruso, had desired. Enrico wanted to study music.
When the young man was 15 years old, his mother died suddenly and the young man was forced to share financial concerns for the family with his father. He got a job as a worker in the workshop where Marcello worked, but did not stop singing. Church members admired his beautiful voice and sometimes asked him to perform serenades for loved ones. Wealthy clients paid generously for such services.
Success spurred the young man to look for new earning opportunities and he began to sing church songs right on the street. For a long time this was a good help for a large family.
He entered night school and studied with the pianist Skirardi and the maestro de Lyutno. The velvet baritone Missiano also taught Enrico how to play several parts.
Way to success
Enrico Caruso's songs were accidentally heard by the vocal school teacher Guglielmo Vergine. This happened in the production of Briganti by Michele Fasanaro, where Caruso performed the part chosen for him by the teacher Bronzrtti. The opera was staged in a small church theater, where the young man continued to go.
Vergine, seeing the young talent, persuaded the boy's father to send his son to the Neapolitan school of singing (it was called the Bel canto Temple, "bel canto" - "beautiful singing"). My father did so, but did not particularly hope for success. Now he did not need to feed an extra mouth, and his son happily began to study music science.
After some time, Vergine showed the young man to the famous and influential operatic tenor Masini. The singer appreciated the range and strength of the young talent, but warned that a lot of work needed to be done on the natural gift. Caruso wanted fame, recognition, wealth and he worked hard and hard all his life, thanks to which he became one of the greatest tenors of his time.
The main stages of the biography
- 1894 - the first performance in the Naples "Nuovo" (Teatro "Nuovo");
- from 1900 throughout the year he appeared on the stage of the Milanese "La Scala" (Teatro "La Scala");
- 1902 - debut in London at the "Covent Garden" (Theater "Covent Garden");
- from 1903 for 17 years he performed solo roles at the Metropolitan Opera in New York;
- since 1898 he made many tours around the world.
Best games
Any game was easy for the legendary tenor. The work of Enrico Caruso reveals him both as a lyricist and so a tragedian. He was the first to play Federico in L'arlesiana by Francesco Cilea in 1897, Loris in Fedora by Umberto Giordano in 1898, Johnson in La fanciulla del West by Giacomo Puccini; in 1910
The best games are rightfully considered:
- Duke of Rigoletto Giuseppe Verdi;
- Manrico from "II trovatore" by Verdi;
- Radames from Aida by Verdi;
- Nemorino from "L'elisir d'amore" by Gaetano Donizetti;
- Faust from "Mefistofele" by Arrigo Boito;
- Canio from "Pagliacci" by Ruggero Leoncavallo;
- Turiddu from Cavalleria rusticana by Pietro Mascagni;
- Rudolf from La Bohème by GiacomoPuccini;
- Cavaradossi from "Tosca" by Puccini;
- Des Grieux of Puccini's Manon Lescaut;
- José from "Carmen" by Georges Bizet;
- Eleazar from "La Juive" by Fromental Halévy.
At the concerts, Neapolitan songs were especially touching and gentle in his performance.
Personal life
The magical voice of a short, strong man with a gorgeous mustache made an indelible impression on women. At the dawn of his career, Enrico almost married the daughter of the director of the theater in which he worked. But the wedding did not take place, the groom escaped from the wedding with a ballerina of the same theater.
The first common-law wife for Caruso was the opera singer Ada Giachetti, she was 10 years older than her husband. Ada gave her wife four sons, but only two survived: Rodolfo and Enrico, they were named after the main characters of the opera Rigoletto. Giachetti put her career on the altar of family happiness, but restless Enrico did not want to be an exemplary husband.
He did not make close acquaintances with other ladies, but continued to flirt right and left. After 11 years, Ada ran away from her husband with their family's driver. Enrico became terribly angry and began to date the younger sister of his unfaithful wife. But instead of returning, Giachetti filed a lawsuit against Caruso, demanding the return of the "stolen" jewelry. The case ended in peace, the former spouse took on the obligation to pay the family a good monthly allowance.
The first official price of 45-year-old Caruso was the daughter of an American millionaire, 25-year-old Dorothy Park Benjamin (Dorothy Park Benjamin).
The girl's father did not recognize his son-in-law and after the wedding he deprived his daughter of an inheritance. But Enrico loved Dorothy, who soon gave birth to his daughter Gloria. From the words of family friends, Caruso quite seriously asked his wife to put on weight so that no man would look at her again.
Death
A year later, in 1920, the happy father fell seriously ill after suffering an accident, he had to return to Italy. On August 2, 1921, he could not resist the illness and died of pleurisy... He was buried in (San-Francesco di Paola). The doors of the church basilica were opened for the deceased by the king himself. The funeral procession of the legendary singer consisted of more than 80 thousand people. The maestro was placed in a crystal coffin and for 15 years fans could contemplate the great singer after his death. Then the body was buried. With the money of admirers of the singer's talent, a huge wax candle was cast, which they promised to light annually in memory of the deceased before the Pompeian Madonna. According to calculations, the candle should last for 500 years.
- Enrico's parents, besides him, had 18 more children, 12 of them died in infancy.
- At birth, the mother and father gave the boy the name Errico, so it was consonant with the Neapolitan dialect. The teacher Verzhine advised the young man to rename himself Enrico.
- After the death of his mother, Caruso sang daily in the church choir, sincerely believing that only from there she could hear him.
- After playing the old man's father in L'Amico Francesco, directed by Giuseppe Morelli, performed by Caruso (the son's part was represented by a tenor who is already 60 years old), the promising young man was invited to tour Cairo. There he made his first big money.
- Sometimes he had to sing his parts without rehearsal, he fastened a sheet of paper with the words on the back of the partner in front of him and sang.
- The first earnings were spent in an entertainment establishment for girls and wine. The young rake returned to the hotel in the morning, riding on a donkey, hung with mud. He fell into the Nile, it is not clear how he avoided meeting with the crocodile.
- On tour in Enrico, he appeared before the audience drunk. He misread the words "destiny" and sang "gulba" instead (they look like Italian), which almost crossed out his career.
- Singer Enrico Caruso smoked a lot. A couple of packs of Egyptian cigarettes a day was his norm throughout his life. The maestro was not even embarrassed by the fact that due to an addiction he risked losing his wonderful voice.
- Enrico Caruso's voice became the first opera's voice recorded on gramophone records. The main part of the repertoire, thanks to recordings on 500 discs, has survived to this day.
- Once on tour in Buenos Aires, Caruso caused the orchestra's musicians to be false. They could not hold back the tears caused by the tenor's soulful performance.
- The singer has performed 607 opera performances and over 100 opera parts in different languages (French, Spanish, English, German).
- In addition to ear for music and voice, nature has endowed Caruso with the talent of an artist. His cartoons of loved ones were published in New York, in the weekly Follia since 1906.
- After the death of her husband, his widow Dorothy wrote two books about the life of her talented husband. They were published in 1928 and 1945 and contained many affectionate letters from Caruso to his beloved wife.
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Enrico Caruso(February 25, 1873 - August 2, 1921) was an Italian operatic tenor. He sang to great acclaim at major opera houses in Europe and the Americas, appearing in a wide variety of roles from Italian and French repertoires that ranged from lyric to dramatic. From 1902 to 1920, Caruso also made approximately 290 commercially released recordings. All of these recordings, which cover most of his acting career, are available today on CD and as digital downloads.
Historical and musical significance
Caruso's 25-year career, stretching from 1895 to 1920, included 863 appearances at the New York Metropolitan Opera before he died at the age of 48. Thanks in part to his immensely popular phonograph records, Caruso was one of the most famous personalities of his day, and his fame came to the present. He was one of the earliest examples of global media celebrity. Beyond the records, Caruso's name has become known to millions through newspapers, books, magazines and the new media technology of the 20th century: cinema, telephone and telegraph. Caruso has toured widely with both the Metropolitan Opera tour company and on his own, giving hundreds of performances throughout Europe, and North America and South America. He was a client of noted patron Edward Bernays, during the latter's tenure as press secretary in the United States. Beverly Sills noted in the interview: “I was able to do it with television and radio and media and all kinds of helps. The popularity that Caruso enjoyed without any of this technological assistance is amazing. "
Biographers Caruso Pierre Kei, Bruno Zirato and Stanley Jackson attribute Caruso's fame not only to his voice and musicality, but also to the keen business sense and enthusiastic embrace of commercial recording, then in its infancy. Many opera singers of Caruso's time rejected the phonograph (or gramophone) due to the poor quality of the early discs. Others, including Adelina Patti, Francesco Tamagno, and Nelly Melba, exploited the new technology as soon as they learned the financial profit that Caruso was reaping from his initial recording sessions. Caruso made more than 260 existing recordings in America for the Victor Talking Machine Company (later RCA Victor) from 1904 to 1920, and he earned millions of dollars in royalties from retailing the resulting 78 rpm discs. (Previously, in Italy in 1902–1903, he cut five batches of records for the Gramophone & Typewriter Company, the Zonophone label and Pathé Records.) He was also heard live from the Met transferred to the United States.
Caruso has also appeared in two movies. In 1918, he played a double role in the American silent film My Cousin for Paramount Pictures. This film included a sequence depicting him on stage performing Vesti la giubba aria from Leoncavallo's opera Pagliacci. The following year, Caruso played a character named Cosimo in another film, Magnificent Romance. Producer Jesse Laskey paid Caruso $ 100,000 each to appear in the two endeavors, but My Cousin flopped at the box office and The Magnificent Novel was apparently never released. Brief, heartfelt glimpses of Caruso backstage have been preserved in modern newsreel footage.
While Caruso sang at venues such as La Scala in Milan, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in London, the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg and the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, he was also the leading tenor of the Metropolitan Opera in New York for 18 consecutive seasons. It was at Met, in 1910, that he created the role of Dick Johnson in La fanciulla del West by Giacomo Puccini.
Caruso's voice extended to a high C at his start and grew in power and weight as he got older. He has sung a wide range of roles, ranging from lyric, to spinto, to dramatic parts, in Italian and French repertoires. In the German repertoire, Caruso sang only two roles, Assad (in Karl Goldmark's Queen of Saba) and Richard Wagner's Lohengrin, both of which he performed in Italian in Buenos Aires in 1899 and 1901, respectively.
Youth
Enrico Caruso came from a poor but not devoid of background. Born in Naples at Via San Giovannello agli Ottokalli 7 on February 25, 1873, he was baptized the next day in the adjacent church of San Giovanni e Paolo. Called Errico according to the Neapolitan dialect, he would later adopt the formal Italian version of his name, Enrico (equivalent to “Henry” in English). These changes came in the suggestion of the singing teacher, Guglielmo Vergine, with whom he began his lessons at the age of 16.
Caruso was the third of seven children and one of only three to survive infancy. There is a story of Caruso's parents having 21 children, 18 of whom died in infancy. However, based on genealogical research (among others conducted by a friend of the Caruso family, Guido D'Onoforio), biographers Pierre Quay, Francis Robinson, and Enrico Caruso Jr. & Andrew Farkas, has proven it to be an urban legend. Caruso himself and his brother Giovanni may have been the source of the exaggerated number. Caruso's widow Dorothy also included the story in the biography that she wrote about her husband. She quotes the tenor speaking of his mother, Anna Caruso (née Baldini): “She had twenty-one children. Twenty boys and one girl are too many. I'm boy number nineteen. ”
Caruso's father, Marcellino, was a foundry worker and mechanic. Initially, Marcellino thought his son should adopt the same trade, and at the age of 11, the boy was apprenticed to a mechanical engineer named Palmieri, who built public water fountains. (Visiting Naples in future years, Caruso liked to point out the fountain he helped install.) Caruso later worked alongside his father in the Meuricoffre factory in Naples. At the urging of his mother, he also attended school for a time, receiving basic education under the tutelage of a local priest. He learned to write in a solid original and studied the technical drafting of documents. During this period he sang in his church choir and his voice showed enough promise for him to consider a possible career in music.
Caruso was encouraged in his early musical aspirations by his mother, who died in 1888. To raise money for his family, he found work as a street singer in Naples and performed in cafes and parties. At the age of 18, he used the fees he earned singing at an Italian resort to buy his first pair of new shoes. His success as a paid artist was cut short, however, by 45 days of military service. He completed this in 1894, resuming his voice lessons with Vergine after being ejected from the army.
Recordings
Caruso possessed a pleasant-voiced voice that was “courageous and strong, yet sweet and lyrical,” to quote singer / author John Potter (see bibliography, below). Not surprisingly, he became one of the first major classical vocalists to make numerous recordings. He and the disc phonograph, known in the United Kingdom as the gramophone, did much to promote each other in the first two decades of the 20th century. Many of Caruso's recordings have remained continuously available since their initial placement about a century ago, and each of his surviving discs (including unreleased takes) have been updated and re-released in recent years.
Caruso's first recordings were arranged, recording pioneer Fred Gaysberg and cutting on disc in three separate sessions in Milan during April, November and December 1902. They were made with piano accompaniment for HMV / EMI's predecessor, the Gramophone & Typewriter Company. In April 1903 he made seven further recordings, also in Milan, for the Anglo-Italian Commerce Company (AICC). They were released on discs bearing the Zonophone seal. Three more Milan recordings for the AICC followed in October. This time they were released by Pathé Records on cylinders as well as discs. On February 1, 1904, Caruso began recording exclusively for the Victor Talking Machine Company in the United States. While most of Caruso's American recordings would have been done in studios in New York and Camden, New Jersey, Victor also occasionally recorded it at Camden Trinity Church, which they acquired in 1917 for its acoustic properties and which could house a large group. musicians. Caruso's first recordings for Victor in 1904 were made in Room 826 at Carnegie Hall in New York. Caruso's final recording of the session took place in Camden on September 16, 1920, with the tenor singing "Domine Deus" and "Crucifixus" from Rossini's Petite messe solennelle. Caruso's earliest American records of operatic arias and songs, like their 30 or so Milanese production predecessors, were accompanied by a piano. From February 1906, however, orchestral accompaniment became the norm, employing an ensemble of between eleven and twenty musicians. Regular conductors of these recording meetings with the orchestra were Walter B. Rogers and, since 1916, Joseph Pasternack. Beginning in 1932, RCA Victor in the US and EMI (HMV) in the UK, reissued several of the older discs with existing accompaniment re-recording the sound by a larger electrically recorded orchestra. (Earlier experiments using this dubbing method, performed by Victor in 1927, were considered unsatisfactory.) In 1950 RCA Victor reissued a much more complete sounding of Caruso's 78 rpm discs, made from smoother vinyl instead of conventional phonograph record. As long-playing discs (LP) became popular, many of his recordings were electronically enlarged for release in an expanded format. Some of his recordings were also released by Victor RCA in 45 rpm format in the early 1950s.
In the 1970s, Thomas G. Stockham of the University of Utah used an early digital reworking technique called “Soundstream” to update Victor Caruso's recordings for RCA. These early digitized efforts were released in part on LP, starting in 1976, and then they were released in full RCA on CD (in 1990 and again in 2004). Other complete sets of Caruso's recordings in newer digital reconstructions were released on CD on the Pearl label and in 2000–2004 by Naxos. The 12-disc Naxos set has been updated by noted American audio restoration engineer Ward Marston. Pearl also released in 1993 a CD set dedicated to RCA's electrically re-recorded sound version of Caruso's original acoustic discs. RCA has also released three sets of CDs of Caruso's material with contemporary, digitally recorded orchestral added accompaniment. Caruso's reports are now available online as digital downloads. His best-selling iTunes downloads were the familiar Italian songs “Santa Lucia” and “O The Only Mio”. Caruso died before the introduction of the higher fidelity, electrical recording technique in 1925. All of his recordings were made using an acoustic process, which required the recording performer to sing into a metal horn or trumpet, which transmitted the sound directly to the main disc via a stylus. This process captured only a limited range of connotations and nuances that exist in the singing voice. Caruso's 12-inch acoustic recordings were limited to a maximum length of approximately 4:30 minutes. Consequently, the choices he recorded were limited to those that could be edited to fit this time limit.
Honors
During his lifetime, Caruso received many orders, decorations, certifications and other kinds of honors from monarchs, governments and various cultural organizations of the various countries in which he sang. He was also the recipient of Italian knighthood. In 1917, he was elected an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, a national fraternity for men involved in music, head of the Alpha fraternity at the New England Conservatory in Boston. One unusual award bestowed upon him was the "Honorary Captain of the New York Police Force" award. In 1987, Caruso was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. On February 27 of that same year, the United States Postal Service issued a 22-cent postage stamp in his honor. He was selected into the Gramophone Magazine Hall of Fame in 2012.
Later career and personal life
From 1916 onward, Caruso began adding heroic pieces such as Samson, John Leiden, and Eléazar to his repertoire.
Caruso toured the South American countries of Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil in 1917, and two years later performed in Mexico City. In 1920 he was then paid a whopping $ 10,000 a night to sing in Havana, Cuba.
The United States entered World War I in 1917 by sending troops to Europe. Caruso did extensive charitable work during the conflict, raising money for war-related patriotic reasons, giving concerts and participating enthusiastically in the Freedom Bond drives. The tenor has shown himself to be an astute businessman since arriving in America. He has put a significant proportion of his income from record royalties and singing fees into the investment range. Biographer Michael Scott writes that by the end of the war in 1918, Caruso's annual income tax bill was $ 154,000.
Prior to World War I, Caruso was romantically involved with the Italian soprano, Ada Giachetti, who was several years older than he was. Although already married, Giachetti gave birth to Caruso four sons during their relationship, which lasted from 1897 to 1908. Two survivors of infancy: Rodolfo Caruso (born 1898) and singer / actor Enrico Caruso Jr. (1904–1987). Ada left her husband, the manufacturer Gino Botti, and her present son, to cohabit with the tenor. The information provided in the biography of Scott Caruso suggests that she was his eloquent trainer as well as his lover. Enrico Caruso Jr.'s statements in his book tend to prove this. Her relationship with Caruso broke down after 11 years and they separated. Subsequent attempts by Giachetti to sue him for damages were dismissed by the courts. Towards the end of the war, Caruso met and wooed a 25-year-old socialite, Dorothy Park Benjamin (1893-1955). She was the daughter of a wealthy New York City lawyer. Despite the disapproval of Dorothy's father, the couple married on 20 August 1918. They had a daughter, Gloria Caruso (1919–1999). Dorothy lived until 1955 and wrote two books about Caruso, published in 1928 and 1945. The books include many of Caruso's letters to his wife.
A meticulous dresser, Caruso took two baths a day and loved good Italian food and friendly company. He forged a particularly close bond with his Met and Covent Garden colleague Antonio Scotti, a gracious and stylish baritone from Naples. Caruso was superstitious and usually carried a good luck charm with him when he sang. He played cards for relaxation and sketched friends, other singers and musicians. Dorothy Caruso said that by the time she knew him, her husband's favorite hobby was collecting scrapbooks. He also amassed a valuable collection of rare postage stamps, coins, watches and antique snuff boxes. Caruso was a heavy smoker of strong Egyptian cigarettes, too. This bad habit, combined with a lack of exercise and a punishing schedule of actions that Caruso willingly embarked on season after season at Met, may have contributed to the persistent ill health that has afflicted the last 12 months of his life.
Sickness and death
On September 16, 1920, Caruso completed three days of Victor's recording sessions at Trinity Church in Camden, New Jersey. He has recorded several discs including Domine Deus and Crucifixus from Rossini's Petite messe solennelle. These notes were to be his last.
Dorothy Caruso noted that her husband's health began an excellent downward spiral in the late 1920s after returning from a long North American tour. In his biography, Enrico Caruso Jr. points to the theatrical damage that Caruso received as a possible trigger for his terminal illness. A falling pole at Samson and Delisle struck him on the back on December 3, in the left kidney (and not on the chest, as is commonly reported). A few days before Pagliacci's work at the Met (Pierre's Key says it was December 4, the day after Samson and Delilah's injury), he suffered a cold and fell ill with a cough and “dull pain in his side”. This appeared to be a serious episode of bronchitis. Caruso's physician, Philip Horowitz, who used to treat him for migraines with a sort of primitive TENS unit, diagnosed with “intercostal neuralgia” and declared him fit to appear on stage, although pain continued to hamper his voice production and movements. During a performance of Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore at the Brooklyn Conservatory on December 11, 1920, he suffered a throat hemorrhage and the performance was canceled at the end of Act 1. After this incident, the clearly unhealthy Caruso gave only three more acts on Met, the final being as Eléazar at La Juive Alevi, December 24, 1920. By Christmas, the pain in his side was so excruciating that he cried out. Dorothy called the hotel doctor, who gave Caruso some morphine and codeine and called in another doctor, Evan M. Evans. Evans brought in three other doctors, and Caruso finally got the correct diagnosis: purulent pleurisy and empyema.
Caruso's health deteriorated further during the new year. He experienced episodes of severe pain due to infection and underwent seven surgeries to drain fluid from his chest and lungs. He returned to Naples to recover from the most serious of operations in which part of a rib was removed. According to Dorothy Caruso, he appeared to be recovering but allowed himself to be examined by an unsanitary local doctor, and his condition worsened substantially thereafter. The Bastianelli brothers, distinguished doctors with a clinic in Rome, recommended that his left kidney be removed. He was on his way to Rome to see them, but while spending the night at the Vesuvio Hotel in Naples, he took an alarming turn for the worse and was given morphine to help him sleep.
Caruso died at the hotel shortly after 9:00 local time on August 2, 1921. He was 48 years old. Bastianellis attributed the probable cause of death to peritonitis resulting from the explosion of a subrenal abscess. The King of Italy, Victor Emmanuel III, opened the Royal Basilica of the Church of San Francesco di Paola for Caruso's funeral, which was attended by thousands. His embalmed body was kept in a glass sarcophagus in the Del Pianto cemetery in Naples for the mourners to view. In 1929, Dorothy Caruso had his remains sealed permanently in an ornamental stone grave.
First, that there is no doubt about it. It was a brilliant artist. Performing on stage for 26 years, for the last 15 years he proudly bore the title of "king of tenors", and ten years before his death he was recognized as the greatest singer of his era, which, if they talk about opera performance, is still called "Karuzovskaya".
BIOGRAPHY OF THE METER
Enrico Caruso was born on February 25, 1873 into the family of an ordinary auto mechanic. The parents of the future singer - Anna Maria and Marcello Caruso - lived very poorly, but our today's hero always called them very kind and open people. Descriptions of Caruso's childhood are interesting. A lot of interesting things can be learned about the outstanding tenor from the book by Alexei Bulygin "Caruso" from the series "Life of Remarkable People". Just listen:
“Of the seven children in the Caruso family, only three survived - Errico (Enrico in the Neapolitan manner), Giovanni and Assunta. What was the reason for such a high infant mortality rate in Naples? The tenor's son, Enrico Caruso Jr., reflects on this:
It was believed that people were dying of the "Neapolitan fever" (as typhoid and cholera were commonly called). At that time in Naples, dirt reigned everywhere. Treatment facilities did not exist. The poor lived in so-called bassi rooms on the first floors of buildings designed as warehouses - without windows, running water and toilets. Doors that opened directly onto the street served as the only source of ventilation and were closed at night. Many families lived in the same room with chickens and goats, because at night the livestock on the street could simply be stolen.
In the morning, the hostesses took out the animal excrement and emptied the chamber pots, pouring their contents into the gutter. Garbage that was thrown directly into the street was washed away by the unhurried waters of city fountains or collected by street scavengers who dumped it into the bay at the end of the working day.
… The food was cooked on coals right on the sidewalk. The open, dirty cauldrons smelled of rotting scraps.
A spaghetti seller walked along the city streets, pushing a cart in front of him, on which were already cooked pasta, a container of sauce and a burner of charcoal. He reheated a portion in boiling water, served it on a piece of yellow cardboard, simultaneously wondering if the sauce was needed. If so, then he took a full spoonful of sauce and with a full exhalation distributed it throughout the portion of spaghetti ... "
Unsanitary conditions reigned everywhere in Naples. Picturesque sketches depict the life of the poor, who in those years simply could not afford better conditions.
However, Caruso's biography is full of a variety of myths, in sharp contrast to his real life facts.
DORIAN'S MILK
There is a version that, despite his origin from a poor family, Caruso was fed with the "countess's milk". "Neapolitan fever" in the year of Enrico's birth, bypassed Caruso's house, but the young mother, Anna Caruso, lost milk, so a familiar countess helped her to feed the baby, whose child died at that time. According to family legend, a noble lady took care of the boy, taught him to read and write, and when Anna was ill, she sent her baskets of fruit.
In 1884, another cholera epidemic broke out in Naples, killing thousands of people. Errico saw how his friends and acquaintances were dying in terrible agony, how corpses were thrown into a huge hole dug near the city, how hordes of huge rats were rushing through the streets, expelled from basements by antiseptic chemicals.
It was impossible to hide from cholera either at home or in the church. On the street where the Caruso family lived, in one day the disease claimed the lives of more than 40 families. Anna Caruso tirelessly prayed that the trouble would pass her home, she believed that her family was not affected by cholera because her beloved Errico sang in the church choir.
Over time, professional singers and musicians began to study with the young man.
Soon after, Caruso's mother died of illness. Some time later, due to the plight of his family, the singer began to perform church compositions right on the central streets of Naples. Thus, he made money for a long time. During one of these "street concerts" Caruso was noticed by one of the teachers of the vocal school, Guglielmo Vergine.
The young singer was invited to audition, and very soon Enrique Caruso became 
to study music with the famous conductor and teacher Vincenzo Lombardi. It was he who organized the first concerts of the young performer in the bars and restaurants of the resort areas of Naples. Some time later, Enrico felt popular for the first time. A lot of people always came to his concerts. Soon after the performances, well-known representatives of the Italian music industry began to often approach him, who offered the talented performer certain contracts. Thus, our today's hero first appeared in Palermo.
STAR HOUR
According to many researchers, it was after the legendary performance of the part of Enzo from the opera La Gioconda that the twenty-four-year-old Caruso was talked about as an established star of the Italian scene. Star Trek Enrico Caruso After this triumphant success, Enrico went on his first foreign tour in his life. Oddly enough, the musician's route lay in distant and cold Russia. This was followed by performances in other countries and cities.
And already in 1900, as a full-fledged celebrity, Caruso first appeared on the stage of the legendary Milanese Teatro alla Scala. After that, our today's hero went on tour again. During this period, the great Italian performed at London's Covent Garden, and also gave concerts in Hamburg, Berlin and some other cities. The singer's performances were held with constant success, but the concerts of the Italian performer on the New York stage of the Metropolitan Opera became truly magical and inimitable. Having performed here for the first time in 1903, later our today's hero became the leading soloist of this theater for almost twenty years.
Caruso's repertoire included both lyrical and dramatic parts. However, our today's hero has always coped with any operatic works with the same virtuosity. In addition, it is worth noting the fact that throughout his career, Caruso has always included traditional Neapolitan songs in his repertoire. Perhaps that is why today Enrico remains one of the most famous natives of Naples and all of Italy. It is also quite remarkable that it was Enrico Caruso who became one of the first opera performers on the world stage, who decided to fix their repertoire on gramophone records. To a large extent, it was this circumstance that predetermined the worldwide popularity of the tenor, and made his work accessible to the broad masses. Already during his lifetime, Enrico Caruso was called the legend of vocal art. This outstanding tenor is also a role model for many contemporary performers.
THE END OF THE CARUSO, THE CAUSE OF DEATH
Enrico Caruso performed and toured a lot. Therefore, the news of his death was largely unexpected for his fans in different countries of the world.
Therefore, the news of his death was largely unexpected for his fans in different countries of the world. Enrico Caruso died of purulent pleurisy At the age of 48, the great tenor died in his native Naples as a result of purulent pleurisy. After his death, a special wax candle of enormous size was made in memory of the outstanding opera performer. It was promised that every year this candle will be lit in front of the face of the holy Madonna. According to some estimates, only after 500 years the gigantic candle should burn out.
In the book by Alexei Bulygin "Caruso" you can find the memoirs of colleagues and admirers of the great tenor:
In an interview, our contemporary, tenor Nicola Martinuccia, when asked which of his singers he loves to listen to, answered:
- Of course Caruso. When I listen to it, I want to bang my head against the wall in despair - how can you sing after that ?!
With the development of recording media in Europe and America, work was carried out to preserve and restore the records of the "king of tenors". With the help of editing, orchestral accompaniment was superimposed on the recordings of Caruso's voice, giving the numbers a less archaic sound. In this updated form, Caruso's records were released (still in huge numbers) throughout the 1950-1980s.
During his lifetime, the name Caruso became a household name, personifying the highest form of giftedness in the vocal sphere. The best compliment to a tenor is to put his name next to Caruso. Thus, the Warsaw cantor Gershon Sirota is called "Jewish Caruso", Jussi Bjerling - Swedish, Leo Slezak - Austrian, Mario Lanza - American.
MEMORY OF CARUSO
In 1951, 30 years after the singer's death, two films were released - in America - "The Great Caruso", in Italy - "Enrico Caruso: The Legend of One Voice."
In the credits of the first of them, it appears that the events of the films are based on a book written by Dorothy Caruso, the artist's widow. 
The success of "The Great Carouso" was officially confirmed by the "Oscar", the following years the film confirmed in the minds of the audience ... an absolutely distorted image of Caruso.
