GIUSEPPE DE LUCA
CEASELESS EFFORT NECESSARY FOR ARTISTIC PERFECTION
"A Roman of Rome" is what Mr. Giuseppe De Luca has been named. The very words themselves call up all kinds of enchanting pictures. Sunny Italy is the natural home of beautiful voices: they are her birthright. Her blue sky, flowers and olive trees—her old palaces, hoary with age and romantic story, her fountains and marbles, her wonderful treasures of art, set her in a world apart, in the popular mind. Everything coming from Italy has the right to be romantic and artistic. If it happens to be a voice, it should of necessity be beautiful in quality, rich, smooth, and well trained.
Guiseppe De Luca
While all singers who come from the sunny land cannot boast all these qualifications, Mr. De Luca, baritone of the Metropolitan Opera House, New York, can do so. Gifted with a naturally fine organ, he has cultivated it arduously and to excellent purpose. He began to study in early youth, became a student of Saint Cecilia in Rome when fifteen years of age, and made his début at about twenty. He has sung in opera ever since.
In 1915,—November 25th to be exact—De Luca came to the Metropolitan, and won instant recognition from critics and public alike. It is said of him that he earned "this success by earnest and intelligent work. Painstaking to a degree, there is no detail of his art that he neglects or slights—so that one hesitates to decide whether he is greater as a singer or as an actor." Perhaps, however, his most important quality is his mastery of "bel canto"—pure singing—that art which seems to become constantly rarer on the operatic and concert stage.
"De Luca does such beautiful, finished work; every detail is carefully thought out until it is as perfect as can be." So remarked a member of the Metropolitan, and a fellow artist.
Those who have listened to the Roman baritone in the various rôles he has assumed, have enjoyed his fine voice, his true bel canto style, and his versatile dramatic skill. He has never disappointed his public, and more than this, is ever ready to step into the breach should necessity arise.
A man who has at least a hundred and twenty operas at his tongue's end, who has been singing in the greatest opera houses of the world for more than twenty years, will surely have much to tell which can help those who are farther down the line. If he is willing to do so, can speak the vernacular, and can spare a brief hour from the rush of constant study and engagement, a conference will be possible. It was possible, for time was made for it.
THE MUSICAL GIFT
Mr. De Luca, who speaks the English language remarkably well, greeted the writer with easy courtesy. His genial manner makes one feel at home immediately. Although he had just come from the Opera House, where he had sung an important rôle, he seemed as fresh and rested as though nothing had happened.
"I think the ability to act, and also, in a measure, to sing, is a gift," began the artist. "I remember, even as a little child, I was always acting out in pantomime or mimicry what I had seen and felt. If I was taken to the theater, I would come home, place a chair for audience, and act out the whole story I had just seen before it. From my youngest years I always wanted to sing and act.
A REMARKABLE TEACHER
"As early as I could, at about the age of fifteen, I began to study singing, with a most excellent teacher; who was none other than Signor Wenceslao Persischini, who is now no longer living. He trained no fewer than seventy-four artists, of which I was the last. Battestini, that wonderful singer, whose voice to-day, at the age of sixty-five, is as remarkable as ever, is one of his pupils. We know that if a vocal teacher sings himself, and has faults, his pupils are bound to copy those faults instinctively and unconsciously. With Persischini this could not be the case; for, owing to some throat trouble, he was not able to sing at all. He could only whisper the tones he wanted, accompanying them with signs and facial grimaces." And Mr. De Luca illustrated these points in most amusing fashion. Then he continued:
"But he had unerring judgment, together with the finest ear. He knew perfectly how the tone should be sung and the student was obliged to do it exactly right and must keep at it till it was right. He would let nothing faulty pass without correction. I also had lessons in acting from Madame Marini, a very good teacher of the art.
THE ARTIST LIFE
"After five years of hard study I made my début at Piacenza, as Valentine, in Faust, November 6th, 1897. Then, you may remember, I came to the Metropolitan in the season of 1915-1916, where I have been singing continually ever since.
"The artist should have good health, that he may be always able to sing. He owes this to his public, to be always ready, never to disappoint. I think I have never disappointed an audience and have always been in good voice. It seems to me when one is no longer able to do one's best it is time to stop singing."
"It is because you study constantly and systematically that you are always in good voice."
"Yes, I am always at work. I rise at eight in the morning, not later. Vocalizes are never neglected. I often sing them as I take my bath. Some singers do not see the necessity of doing exercises every day; I am not one of those. I always sing my scales, first with full power, then taking each tone softly, swelling to full strength, then dying away—in mezza voce. I use many other exercises also—employing full power. English is also one of the daily studies, with lessons three times a week.
CONSTANTLY ON THE WATCH
"When singing a rôle, I am always listening—watching—to be conscious of just what I am doing. I am always criticizing myself. If a tone or a phrase does not sound quite correct to me as to placement, or production, I try to correct the fault at once. I can tell just how I am singing a tone or phrase by the feeling and sensation. Of course I cannot hear the full effect; no singer ever can actually hear the effect of his work, except on the records. There he can learn, for the first time, just how his voice sounds.
LEARNING A NEW RÔLE
"How do I begin a new part? I first read over the words and try to get a general idea of their meaning, and how I would express the ideas. I try over the arias and get an idea of those. Then comes the real work—the memorizing and working out the conception. I first commit the words, and know them so well I can write them out. Next I join them to the music. So far I have worked by myself. After this much has been done, I call in the accompanist, as I do not play the piano very well; that is to say, my right hand will go but the left lags behind!
ALWAYS BEING SURE OF THE WORDS
"Yes, as you say, it requires constant study to keep the various rôles in review, especially at the Metropolitan, where the operas are changed from day to day. Of course at performance the prompter is always there to give the cue—yet the words must always be in mind. I have never yet forgotten a word or phrase. On one occasion—it was in the Damnation of Faust, a part I had already sung a number of times—I thought of a word that was coming, and seemed utterly unable to remember it. I grew quite cold with fear—I am inclined to be a little nervous anyway—but it was quite impossible to think of the word. Luckily at the moment when I needed the word I was so fearful about, it suddenly came to me.
NATURAL ANXIETY
"Of course there is always anxiety for the artist with every public appearance. There is so much responsibility—one must always be at one's best; and the responsibility increases as one advances, and begins to realize more and more keenly how much is expected and what depends on one's efforts. I can assure you we all feel this, from the least to the greatest. The most famous singers perhaps suffer most keenly.
"I have always sung in Italian opera, in which the language is easy for me. Latterly I have added French operas to my list. Samson and Delilah, which I had always done in Italian, I had to relearn in French; this for me was very difficult. I worked a long time on it, but mastered it at last.
"This is my twenty-second season in opera. I have a repertoire of about one hundred and twenty rôles, in most of which I have sung many times in Italy. Some I wish might be brought out at the Metropolitan. Verdi's Don Carlos, for instance, has a beautiful baritone part; it is really one of the fine operas, though it might be considered a bit old-fashioned to-day. Still I think it would be a success here. I am preparing several new parts for this season; one of them is the Tschaikowsky work—Eugene Onegin. So you see I am constantly at work.
"My favorite operas? I think they are these"; and Mr. De Luca hastily jotted down the following: Don Carlos, Don Giovanni, Hamlet, Rigoletto, Barbier, Damnation of Faust, and last, but not least, Tannhauser.
GROWTH OF MUSICAL APPRECIATION IN AMERICA
Asked if he considered appreciation for music had advanced during his residence in America, his answer was emphatically in the affirmative.
"The other evening I attended a reception of representative American society, among whom were many frequenters of the Metropolitan. Many of them spoke to me of the opera Marouf. I was surprised, for this modern French opera belongs to the new idiom, and is difficult to understand. 'Do you really like the music of Marouf?' I asked. 'Oh, yes indeed,' every one said. It is one of my longest parts, but not one of my special favorites.
"In the summer! Ah, I go back to my beloved Italy almost as soon as the Metropolitan season closes. I could sing in Buenos Aires, as the season there follows the one here. But I prefer to rest the whole time until I return. I feel the singer needs a period of rest each year. To show you how necessary it is for the singer to do daily work on the voice, I almost feel I cannot sing at all during the summer, as I do no practicing, and without vocalizes one cannot keep in trim. If I am asked to sing during vacation, I generally refuse. I tell them I cannot sing, for I do not practice. It takes me a little while after I return, to get the vocal apparatus in shape again.
"Thus it means constant study, eternal vigilance to attain the goal, then to hold what you have attained and advance beyond it if possible."