ARNOLD VII: ANTONIO PAOLI

Antonio Paoli (1871-1946) – “The Pride of Puerto Rico”, “King of Tenors and Tenor of Kings”

Born in Puerto Rico, he studied first in Spain and later in Italy (Milan). His big operatic debut took place in Paris in 1899, aptly as Arnoldo in Rossini´s „Guillaume Tell“, which was an immediate success.  Still in his twenties, apart from being immensly popular, also owed to a great stage presence, he sang before princes, kings, emperors and the Csar – and  also behaved like onhimself. His career skyrocketed in both Americas, the Caribbean, Africa and Asia – yet, Caruso made sure he was being kept away from the Met. During World War I forced Paoli made his living as a professional boxer…. and lost his voice, which he regained only after scrupulous exercises and returned in all his glory at his debut in January 1917 in Samson and Delilah at the Constanzi in Rome:

“People were there to see him fail. Instead, Paoli’s voice sounded like one of those trumpets that you expect to hear in the day of the final judgment.  He had to repeat twice every single aria that he performed that night, because the public furiously demanded it. I was there for all seven consecutive nights and every night he sang better than the night before.”, Elvira de Hidalgo remembered.

In 1928 he sang his last operatic performance, Otello, and died of cancer at age 75.

One instantly hears, that this is a truly dramatic voice. – Rich, powerful, dark and firm with a trumpetlike and ringing top, at times produced with just a little too much pressure. Yet it is considerably flexible for a voice of such size, because Paoli handles it well. He does not broaden and darken the higher middle range, he keeps it well collected and covered, instead, and thus has easy access to the top. He handles admirably the crucial tessitura of „Ah, Matilde“ sounding maybe just a hint squeezed at times. But listen to „Troncar suoi dì“. The clean phrasing of the first phrases, then  „il padre, ahimè, mi malediva” and “o ciel, o ciel”. Rock solid, no wobble – this is an ideal voice for a dramatic and full voiced Otello, Manrico or in our case – Arnoldo.