Julián Biel

On Biel's life and career, a lot of research is missing; so far, there is an unusual lot of question marks. Not even his dates of birth and death are undisputed; for his birth, also 1870 can be found, and for his death, 1945 and 1917 (but the 1948 date given above is definite). He was from poor conditions and worked as a confectioner and a wallpaperer before becoming a singer, his voice was discovered when he sang at work, and at some point, he moved from Zaragoza to Madrid. As for the details, it's all question marks: it may be that his boss at the pastry shop in Zaragoza was the first one who told him to make use of his beautiful voice, that he entered a choir first and then went to Madrid to take voice lessons, while working as a wallpaperer to earn a living – but that's not proven and tested.

The next confirmed steps are his career start as a chorister at the Teatro Real in 1898, his promotion to soloist in 1899, and his departure for Italy in 1900; and also that the Marquise of Villamejor sent him to Rome for vocal studies with Antonio Cotogni. But: question marks as far as the sequence of events! One account has him make his chorister and soloist debuts in 1898 and 1899, respectively, has the Marquise hear him on stage and send him to Cotogni in 1900. The other account (which makes for the better story, but isn't necessarily more accurate just for that reason) tells how he wallpapered some rooms at the residence of the Marquise, and how his singing during his work attracted her attention; then she would have dispatched him to Rome well before 1898, he would have returned after his studies with Cotogni, sung in Madrid first as a chorister and then as a soloist, and returned to Italy in 1900 to sing and not to study there. (If the attribution of the anonymous AICC cylinder – see discography below – to Biel is correct, and if it has indeed been recorded in Milano in 1898, that would prove the wallpapering-at-the-Marquesa's version, but having heard that cylinder, I'm not convinced that it's really Biel.)

In any case, a brilliant and short career ensued. In 1901, he sang in his native Zaragoza for the first time, in 1902 in Buenos Aires (in Aida) and Montevideo, in 1903 at the Liceu in Barcelona (Africaine), and from 1903 to 1907, he was a regular at the Teatro Real, while making very successful guest appearances: at the Liceu, (1906/07), in Bologna, at La Scala (where Toscanini thought him to be the best Manrico of his time), at Covent Garden in 1905/06 (where he was considered Caruso's equal), in France, Belgium, Germany, Russia and Lisbon (Africaine, 1901 and 1910). From 1907, he sang a lot in South America: Santiago de Chile, Valparaíso, and again in Buenos Aires and Montevideo.

He retired early after developing a stage fright so severe that it was considered neurasthenia (or total nervous exhaustion). Question marks, once again, as to any details: his retirement took place in 1910 as per Kutsch & Riemens, or in 1917 as per Spanish sources. Well, 1910 cannot be true since he sang his first Otello in Buenos Aires in 1911; but as no further Biel performances after that 1911 Otello have been listed by anybody, 1917 doesn't seem probable, either.

He was a voice teacher in Barcelona for the rest of his life.

Reference 1, reference 2, reference 3, reference 4: Kutsch & Riemens