Interview with Luisa Tetrazzini

My Interview With Luisa Tetrazzini

AW: Today I’ll be interviewing Luisa Tetrazzini. Oh look there she is over there. So hey, how are you doing Ms.Tetrazzini

Luisa Tetrazzinin: I’m fine thank you. How are you?

AW: I’m good, so what got you interested in the arts in your earlier years or What made you say hey I wanna be a opera singer?

Luisa Tetrazzini: You know, that’s a very good question. A very good question indeed. I started singing when I was very young. I was a very small child, three years old. A part of what got me interested is that my older sister sang opera.

 AW: Really?

Luisa Tetrazzini: Yes she was a opera singer. A soprano just like me. She was also my teacher, my voice teacher. But some other people. In my family were very musically inclined like my sister Eva. My other sister and my parents, they were not very talented in fact. But that’s kind of how I got started darling. AW: Okay, wow very interesting. So lets move on to the next question. Who was the person that really influenced you or taught and helped kind of make you or should I say mold you into the artist you are today? And I know you said your sister was your teacher so would she had played a role in that?

Luisa Tetrazzini: Yes she would have indeed because as you know she was my teacher as I explained earlier. My sister was also a successful opera singer, her name was Eva Tetrazzini- Campanini, a public opera singer. You know I also studied with Professor Ceccherini at the Liceo Musicale in Florence.

AW: Wow! That’s pretty cool Ms.Tetrazzini. How was that?

 Luisa Tetrazzini: It was great. Professor Ceccherini was very amazing, a great teacher. Matter of fact shortly after that I began Singing in different operas around Florence.

AW: Okay, what you just said kind of ties in with my next question. So here it is. What was everything like when you first broke into the world of opera?

Luisa Tetrazzini: When I first broke into the world of opera my jump to stardom was very slow. As I said I started singing in Florence . I traveled around Italy and was successful there. I was also heard in some of the Italian seasons at St. Petersburg. But I wanted to be bigger than that. So you know I couldn’t give up. So instead of me staying in those little opera houses in Italy I went to South America because you know I was trying to make it in the world, trying to make it in my era darling.So while I was in south America I debuted as Annetta in the opera Crispinoe la Camare. I received rave reviews for my performance, and that’s when my career started to take off.

Aw: So what major cultural, economic and political situations of the time impact your work?

Luisa Terazzini: Well in the beginning of my career I had some troubles with my orchestra. They tried to demand more money because they were envious of how much money I was making.

AW: So what did you say?

Luisa Tetrazzini: I said no darling they weren’t taking any of my money. So the orchestra went on strike right before my performance. So a man in the gallery asked the conductor and other singers were they willing to perform, and they said yes. And some people from the audience played the violin and the piano. Then later on in my career my third husband Pietro Vernati took my money and I was nearly broke.

 AW: What?! Now you see that’s cold right there, real cold. What methods or method did you use in singing opera?

Luisa Tetrazzini: A method I used in my singing is breath control. When you take a breath it must be even all around because you can take in to much air or not enough. Breath control is also important in ““Filare la voce,” to spin the voice from tiny little thread into a breadth of sound and then diminish again, is one of the most beautiful effects in singing.” When you are able to do this that means that you have mastered the greatest difficulty on learning to sing. (Tetrazzini and Caruso,1909) . Isn’t that wonderful dear. All you have to do is work at it.

AW: What opportunities did you take that led you to turning points in opera?

Luisa Tetrazzini: Well I joined different opera companies dear. I went from the Musical Institute in Florence to a opera house in Mexico. While I was with the opera house in Mexico we traveled to San Francisco. And boy was I a sensation there. I sang in front of thousands. I stayed with them for a little while then I went to Covent Garden to the Manhattan Opera House. Aahh.. I was just jumping from opera house to opera house and yeah it had it’s down times. But it was wonderful.

AW: What choices did you have to make to become successful?

Luisa Tetrazzini: Well I realized that I had a voice because you know you have to have some vocal talent to be an opera singer. In my hometown they were doing a opera of the Prima Donna, but the women who was playing her was sick.

AW: Really, wow.

 Luisa Tetrazzini: Yes very ill, so I volunteered and got the part because well you know I knew the songs and that went well. I Played the part of Inez in Mayerbeers “L’ Africana” and at the end of the show the audience gave me a standing ovation and this also was apart of my success. It was so wonderful darling I still remember that day, the applause.

AW: Amazing. What were the road blocks you had to overcome to be an opera singer?

Luisa Tetrazzini: Well it was this one time when I had to get my parents to agree with me applying for the admission at the Lycee (A French high school). I proved that I was capable… that I was capable of playing the role of Inez. I also had to escape from my first husband Giuseppe Santino Alberto, so I could sing with Emilio Usiglio. He gave me an offer to sing with his company. His has one of the largest theatres in Rome and Argentina. So like I was saying earlier. I had to escape from my first husband go because he was trying to stop me from achieving my success, and a great success it was.

AW: What limitations did you run into as an opera singer and a person?

Luisa Tetrazzini: A man by the name of Doc Leahy found me in Mexico when I was doing the opera “Lucia di Lammermor.” He was so impressed with my performance that he came to my dressing room and offered me twice as much of what I was being paid. So I sang for him at the Tivoli in San Francisco. It was amazing I thought, that he would come to Mexico because fame and success was only confined in Europe and Latin America. I did achieve good success but in the United States I was not the most famous among the ladies of the last “golden age”.

AW: What story did you create that mostly illustrates how you became successful and may help others on doing so as well?

Luisa Tetrazzini: I would say my book How To Sing.

AW: Could you tell me a little about this book?

Luisa Tetrazzini: In this book I’m trying to stir people in the right direction on how to be a successful singer. What drove me to write this book is that people were writing me letters on how to use there vocal talents to the best of there ability. So in my book I’m giving the people who have my book advice on breathing techniques and things like that. But the chapter I think is really important is the first chapter. I’m telling people not to wait to be found, because sometimes you have bring yourself to success, you have to go out looking for it. Like take me for example no one brought me to success but me.

AW: So there you have it folks. The great Luisa Tetrazzini. See you next time.

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