Pelizzoni began to study music already at age 14, first near his birthplace, then at the Parma conservatory. He made his debut,
again very early (at age 19 or so) as a baritone in Il segreto di Susanna at the Teatro Sperimentale in Alessandria, and
sang Barbiere in his native Sissa. In 1940, he was drafted, and ended up a prisoner in Germany (I don't know how and why).
In 1945, he returned to Italy, and continued singing baritone roles (Rigoletto, Germont, Sharpless, Silvio) until 1949. Then he
restudied for half a year, and came back as
a tenor, making his second debut as Canio at the Teatro Regio in Parma. He began a good career in Italy: Parma, Bologna, Genova,
Palermo, Rome, Naples, Venice, Bari, Pisa, Bergamo... As a guest, he sang in Egypt (Cairo, Alexandria).
Conductor Gianandrea Gavazzeni hired him for Pizzetti's L'assassinio nella cattedrale at La Scala, where he eventually sang
two tenor roles, substituting also indisposed Mirto Picchi. He remained a Scala fixture
from 1957 to 1969, then he retired, and taught voice at the conservatories of Torino and Parma.
His tenor repertory included Turiddu, Golitsyn, Don José and above all, lots of 20th century opera: Příhody
lišky Bystroušky (The cunning little vixen) by Janáček, La capanna dello zio Tom by Ferrari
Trecate; Il furore di Oreste by Testi; Medea by Tintori; Romulus by Allegra; L'uragano by Rocca;
Margherita da Cortona by Refice; Peter Grimes; Torneo notturno by Malipiero; Maria Egiziaca and
Belfagor by Respighi; Resurrezione by Alfano; La figlia del re by Lualdi; Nuova Euridice by Lupi.
Reference 1, reference 2, reference 3: Kutsch & Riemens
