Famed tenor had Lyric ties

The two greatest Italian tenors of the post-World War II period are now gone.

Giuseppe di Stefano, regarded as one of the most dynamic opera stars of his generation, died March 4 at age 86 at his home in Santa Maria Hoe, a small town north of Milan.

Di Stefano's death follows that of Luciano Pavarotti in September. Pavarotti, whose career flourished from the mid-1960s through the early '90s, was considered the heir to Di Stefano who, in turn, followed Enrico Caruso and Beniamino Gigli in the lineage of great Italian lyric tenors.

Di Stefano died as the long-term result of injuries received when he was attacked in November 2004 at his family's villa in Kenya, according to his wife, Monica Curth. Di Stefano was struck in the head during the attack, undergoing emergency surgery twice in Mombasa. He was returned to Milan, where he awakened from a coma but never fully recovered.

Like the great soprano Maria Callas, Di Stefano's career was spectacular but relatively short when compared to that of Pavarotti. The late Metropolitan Opera general manager Rudolf Bing, who immediately recognized Di Stefano's vocal genius and brought him to New York in 1948, felt the singer's lifestyle shortened his career, a fact Di Stefano did not deny.

"I wanted to enjoy life -- not just the opera," he said in an interview for Opera News in 1999. "Yes, I smoked a lot; and it's true I used to gamble, and I would stay up late and sometimes drive around all night."

Di Stefano recorded 10 complete operas with Callas for the EMI label in the 1950s. They include the legendary 1953 recording of Puccini's "Tosca," with Tito Gobbi as Baron Scarpia, conducted by Victor de Sabata and the orchestra of Milan's La Scala Opera.

Di Stefano was born July 24, 1921, in the Sicilian village of Motta Santa Anastasia. As a child, he moved with his parents to Milan.

Di Stefano's professional opera debut took place in 1946 at the Teatro Municipale, in the city of Reggio Emilia. The role was Des Grieux in Jules Massenet's "Manon," and soon he was in demand throughout Italy.

In 1948, at the invitation of Bing, Di Stefano made his Metropolitan Opera debut as the Duke of Mantua in Verdi's "Rigoletto," one of his favorite Italian roles.

His Lyric Opera of Chicago debut came in 1954, the company's first full season, when he sang Edgardo opposite Callas' title heroine in Gaetano Donizetti's "Lucia di Lammermoor."

In 1955, Di Stefano helped to further solidify the Lyric's reputation as a major player in the international opera world when he returned as Arturo in "I Puritani," with Callas and Ettore Bastinani also featured in the cast; Rodolfo in "La Boheme" in a glamorous cast including Renata Tebaldi and Tito Gobbi; Lt. Pinkerton in "Madama Butterfly," with Callas as Cio-Cio-San; and as Turiddu in "Cavalleria rusticana," co-starring Ebe Stignani.

He returned to the Lyric for the 1957 season in the roles of Enzo ("La Gioconda"), Maurizio ("Adriana Lecouvreur," with that cast also including Tebaldi and Gobbi); along with his second Chicago appearances as Cavaradossi and Edgardo.

In all, Di Stefano sang 42 performances of 13 roles at the Lyric through 1960.