RESEARCH

Ph.D in Musicology

University of London, Goldsmiths College - Department of Music

Supervisor: Dr. Berta Joncus
Proposed Title: Enrico Caruso's Recordings: Performance Traditions Past and Present.

Abstract

Enrico Caruso was both a great opera star and an eccentric personality whose international career left a legacy of historical recordings. Although his life and career are extensively documented, the performance traditions captured by his recordings have scarcely been investigated. In this study I focus on the arias that Caruso sang to analyse the different traditions that those recordings reveal, comparing Caruso’s practices to those of modern tenors. In addition, I shed light on singing practices and traditions followed by the tenors of the 21^st century. This is the first in-depth research on Caruso’s recordings whose findings illuminate practices specific to him and those typical of his generation. These recordings attest also to the influence of Caruso’s singing on subsequent generations of singers. The results reveal that Caruso was undeniably an archetype, a ‘style-defining’ singer, whose singing traditions created norms not only for the tenors of his age but also for modern singers.