Signed Photograph Postcard with Facsimile AMQS

Postcard portrait of the great Italian tenor with a facsimile AMQS from his role as Chopin in the opera by Giacomo Orefice, and with an autograph signature in bold ink to the right of the image. Orefice's fancified version of the composer's life premiered at the Teatro Lirico, Milan, in 1901, and Bassi recorded excerpts from the opera ca. 1903-1905. The postcard is addressed on the verso to the Argentinian collector Ramona Imaz Otaño and postmarked April 14, 1904. In fine condition. 3.5 x 5.5 inches (9 x 14 cm).

"[Bassi] trained in Florence, making his début at Castelfiorentino in Filippo Marchetti’s Ruy Blas in 1897. After travelling widely in Italy he sang with great success in South America, where he performed regularly until 1912. He joined the Manhattan Opera Company in 1906 and made his Covent Garden début the following year; he returned in 1911 for the British première of La fanciulla del West, in which he also sang at the first performances in Rome and Chicago... In the 1920s at La Scala he began a second career, as an admired Wagnerian tenor. He taught in Florence where Ferruccio Tagliavini was among his pupils. Early recordings show a powerful voice produced in the typical verismo style." (J. B. Steane, New Grove Dictionary of Opera) (13514)

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Signed Photograph

AMQS

Opera

$200.00

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