Nino Piccaluga

Born Filippo Piccaluga, he briefly studied voice in Milano, and made his debut in La Spezia as Turiddu at age 18. Novara, Molfetta, Parma and Salerno were his next stages, then in 1919, he made his first tour abroad, to Cairo. Back to Italy, he sang in Ravenna, Carrara, Faenza, and (a world premiere, the futurist opera Aviatore Dro by Francesco Balilla Pratella) in Lugo di Romagna. That latter production's primadonna, soprano Augusta Concato, soon became his wife.

From 1921 to 1923, Piccaluga was in Trieste and Venice (La Fenice), but mainly in Milano, first at the Teatro dal Verme (Francesca da Rimini), then at La Scala (Il tabarro, Boris Godunov under Toscanini, La Wally, Manon Lescaut, and La leggenda di Sakuntala, whose world premiere in Bologna he and Concato had sung on 10 December 1921). He was to return to La Scala in the 1931/32 and 1932/33 seasons for L'amore dei tre re, Khovanshchina and another world premiere, Una partita by Zandonai. (Zandonai must have had a bad taste as far as tenors, since he admired not only Franco Lo Giudice, but even Piccaluga, who produced an exemplarily ugly sound.)

In 1923, he toured Egypt, Barcelona and South America (Santiago del Chile), and in 1924 Australia (Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide). 1925 saw him in Carrara, Reggio nell'Emilia, and again in Santiago; 1926 in Sassari, Modena, Monte Carlo and at the Liceu in Barcelona, 1927 in Pesaro. In 1928, he was in Genova, and in South America again (Rio de Janeiro, Colón in Buenos Aires), in 1929 at La Fenice and in Budapest. In December 1929 and January 1930, he sang in the United States (Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco. For 1930 and 1931, he remained in Italy (La Scala, Sanremo, Trieste, Genova, Bolzano, Merano, and on the radio). The first half of 1932 was spent in the Netherlands, the second half again in Italy (Merano, Vigevano, La Fenice, Asti). In 1933, he sang in Milano (La Scala as well as open air opera), Modena, Venice and Rome (Teatro Argentina), in 1934 again in Venice, Reggio nell'Emilia and Budapest, and gave concerts in Belgium and the Netherlands.

In 1935, he appeared in the Netherlands once more, then in Merano, at the San Carlo in Naples, and in Busto Arsizio. In 1936, he was a guest in Bremen, then he retired for health reasons. He sang one last time at the Teatro Puccini in Milano in 1939 (Don José).

He spent his last few years at the Casa di riposo Verdi in Milano.

Reference 1: Enciclopedia Treccani, reference 2: Kutsch & Riemens

I wish to thank Thomas Silverbörg for the recordings (Africaine, Manon Lescaut).