Gianna D'Angelo (18 November 1929 - 27 December 2013) was an Americancoloraturasoprano, primarily active in the 1950s and 1960s.
BornJane Angelovich inHartford,Connecticut, she studied first atThe Juilliard School inNew York City withGiuseppe De Luca. In the early 1950s, she moved toVenice, Italy, where she became a pupil ofToti Dal Monte, who also advised her to italianize her name.
She made her debut in 1954 at theBaths of Caracalla in Rome asGilda inRigoletto, a role she would remain closely associated with throughout her career. She was rapidly invited at all the major opera houses of Italy, Naples, Florence, Bologna, Trieste, Parma, Milan, etc. She also made appearances at theParis Opéra and theGlyndebourne Festival as Rosina inIl barbiere di Siviglia and at theEdinburgh Festival as Norina inDon Pasquale.
She made her American debut at the Cosmopolitan Opera inSan Francisco, in March 1959, in the title role ofLucia di Lammermoor (oppositeGiuseppe Campora andNorman Treigle), and at theMetropolitan Opera in New York, on April 5, 1961 asGilda (withRobert Merrill as Rigoletto), and remained there for eight seasons, appearing in roles such as:Lucia,Amina,Rosina,Norina,Zerbinetta,the Queen of the Night. She also appeared in Philadelphia, Houston, New Orleans, etc.
D'Angelo made few commercial recordings. The most notable was Musetta inLa bohème withRenata Tebaldi,Carlo Bergonzi andEttore Bastianini underTullio Serafin, recorded in 1959 in Rome. Other recordings includeIl barbiere di Siviglia andRigoletto both with baritoneRenato Capecchi, as well as the doll Olympia inLes contes d'Hoffmann, oppositeNicolai Gedda. A live performance ofI puritani from Trieste in 1966, has also been recently released on DVD.
After retiring from singing, she became a voice teacher at theJacobs School of Music, where she remained from 1970 until 1997.
She died on December 27, 2013, at the age of 84, at Lawyers Glen Assisted Living inMint Hill,North Carolina.[1]
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
| Artists | |
| People | |
| Other | |
