The Best Performances “Nessun dorma” by Giacomo Puccini

by Hermione Lai 

Poster of Puccini’s Turandot, 1926

Talk about a strange story. Calaf is one of three suitors for the hand of the prickly Princess Turandot. Her suitors must solve three riddles, with any single wrong answer resulting in execution. Calaf manages to solve all three riddles but Turandot still refuses to marry him. So Calaf comes up with a bizarre challenge. If the Princess is able to guess his name before dawn the next day, she may execute him. However, if she can’t guess his name correctly, she must marry him. That puts the Princess in bit of a bind, and she declares “Nessun dorma” (None shall sleep) in the entire kingdom until Calaf’s name is discovered. If her minions are not able to come up with the correct name by morning, everybody will be executed. Calaf is rather hopeful that he will win this strange little wager, and begins to sing one of the best-known tenor arias in all of opera.  

Franco Corelli

Luciano Pavarotti called Franco Corelli “the greatest dramatic tenor that ever lived.” So it is only fitting that we start this selection of best performances with him. Franco Corelli (1921-2003) was closely connected with the dramatic tenor roles of the Italian repertory. In his heyday he was called the “prince of tenors,” celebrated for his “powerful voice, electrifying top notes, clear timbre, and passionate singing style.” Audiences just loved him for his charismatic stage presence and his handsome features. Whenever audiences are enthralled, critics are not far behind. They found him “self-indulgent in terms of phrasing and expression,” acknowledging however, that “his performance possessed its own kind of logic.” And that’s certainly true of his drawn-out rendition of “Nessun dorma,” which I personally consider one of the best performances ever.   

Luciano Pavarotti

Speaking of Luciano Pavarotti. Regardless whether or not you enjoy his rendition of “Nessun dorma,” he is single-handedly responsible for making the tune as popular as it is today. There is no arguing about the fact that his voice has a remarkable quality, and it’s a sound that is instantly recognizable. In his best performances, he produces a remarkable security throughout his entire range, and Pavarotti is beautifully capable of producing the most delicious cantabile lines. Of course, his diction is flawless and his “vincero” at the end of “Nessun dorma” is simply spectacular. Some critics have suggested that in concerts of operatic arias and lighter materials that have become his principal activity in his later years, Pavarotti “makes much the same sound in whatever role he sings.” That may well be the case, but let’s not forget that by that time Pavarotti had become a brand. And he certainly turned “Nessun dorma” into cultural shorthand for opera.   

Mario Lanza, 1950

Pavarotti clearly wasn’t the first pop star tenor. That distinction probably belongs to the American tenor Mario Lanza (1921-1959). He studied to be a professional singer but did not appear on operatic stages with any kind of frequency. However, he had the looks, the voice and great acting talent and signed a multi-year film contract with a Hollywood studio. As such, Lanza was the first tenor to break through into popular consciousness. He was dubbed the “new Caruso,” and José Carreras paid tribute to Lanza during a worldwide concert tour, saying, “If I’m an opera singer, it’s thanks to Mario Lanza.” His rendition of “Nessun Dorma,” as part of the film “Serenade,” gives us a taste of his magnetism and vocal ability. At the time of his death in 1959 Lanza was still considered “the most famous tenor in the world.”   

Beniamino Gigli, 1914

Beniamino Gigli (1890-1957) is widely regarded as one of the greatest operatic tenors of all time. He came to international prominence after the death of Enrico Caruso in 1921. Audiences called him “Caruso Secondo,” but he said that he much preferred to be known as “Gigli Primo.” While Caruso had a most powerful and heroic voice, Gigli’s voice, particularly during his early career, was known for “its beautifully soft and honey-like lyrical quality.” As he grew older, his voice developed some dramatic qualities, which enabled him to tackle heavier roles. Gigli was said to be overemotional during his performances, “often resolving to sobbing and, in some cases, exaggerations.” In the featured studio recording of “Nessun dorma” there is none of this exaggeration or theatricality. The focus is purely on the music, as a matter of fact, and I absolutely love the immense beauty and technical facility of his unique voice.

“Nessun dorma” (Placido Domingo)    

Placido Domingo

Placido Domingo (b. 1941) really doesn’t need any kind of special introduction. He has been around operatic and other stages for decades, and recorded over a hundred complete operas in Italian, French, German, Spanish, English and Russian. Astonishingly, his repertoire includes a massive 151 different roles. He sang his first Calaf in 1969 at Verona with Birgit Nilsson, and following his voice’s natural progression he has now turned towards the baritone repertoire. In fact, Domingo did start out as a baritone as he had always had a rich lower register. Throughout his career, Domingo’s “voice has been extremely attractive and quite individual in timbre, having considerable liquidity… The bottom sometimes has a trace of huskiness, which he often turns to coloristic effect.” There can be no doubt that Domingo possesses a combination of lyrical flexibility and dramatic power that allowed him versatility across the entire tenor repertory. And such is certainly the case in the featured performance of “Nessun dorma.”   

Jussi Björling

Puccini could definitely write a great melody full of growing passion and reaching for the stars; in a word, perfect tearjerkers. And for me personally, Jussi Björling (1911-1960) delivers the best performance of “Nessun dorma.” His vocal timbre had remarkable clarity and warmth, and his sound “excelled in its rare plasticity, suavity, and flexibility, and was at the same time saturated with succulent ardor.” His upper register was shining and resonant, the middle captivated with great flexibility. It’s no wonder that Björling was considered “the living embodiment of the bel canto tradition,” but without the usual emotional exaggeration. In his “Nessun dorma” he never interrupts the beauty of the phrase with declamation, exaggerated accents or a sense of melodrama. There is simply a concentrated narrative tone tinged with the emotions of a sleeping volcano. Everybody it seems has had a go at “Nessun dorma;” which performances do you like best?

On This Day 29 November: Giacomo Puccini Died

by Georg Predota, Interlude

Giacomo Puccini lived life to its fullest. He loved fine cigars, expensive spirits, and fell in love at the drop of a hat. He was an addicted gambler and hunter and loved nothing more than fast cars and speedboats. Puccini bought the latest and fastest automobiles, and his yachts were named after the works whose proceeds financed them. A serious automobile accident in 1903 almost took his life, and he was barely saved by the quick intervention of a nearby doctor. Puccini was a heavy smoker of cigarettes and cigars, and he could not escape the long-term effect of this addiction. He persistently complained about a pain in his throat, and while attempting to put the finishing touches on his opera Turandot, his son Tonio urges him to consult a specialist.

Giacomo Puccini in Torre del Lago, where he lived for thirty years

Like his colleagues before, the physician discovered nothing suspicious beyond a slight inflammation deep down the throat. He advised Puccini to take a complete rest, abstain from smoking and come back in fourteen days. While his family was clearly relieved, Puccini knew that things weren’t right.

Giacomo Puccini: Turandot, “Tu che di gel sei cinta” 

Unbeknownst to his family, Puccini consulted yet another specialist in Florence who diagnosed a “walnut-sized advanced extrinsic cancer of the supraglottis.” Tonio refused to accept the diagnosis but was told in no uncertain terms that his father was suffering from cancer of the throat in so advanced a stage that an operation would be futile. After consulting a number of eminent specialists, it was suggested that treatment by X-ray “was the only method likely to arrest the rapid progress of the disease.”

Puccini in 1924

As this kind of treatment was in its infancy, there were only two clinics in all of Europe where the method had been tried out with some success. Puccini decided to consult Dr. Ledoux in Brussels, and he wrote to his librettist Adami on 22 October 1924, “I am leaving soon… Will they operate on me? Shall I be cured? Or condemned to death? I cannot go on like this any longer. And then there is Turandot… Puccini departed for Brussels on 4 November 1924, taking with him sketches for the love duet and the finale of the last act, thirty-six pages in all.

Giacomo Puccini: Turandot, “Nessun dorma” 

The first part of the experimental treatment saw Dr. Ledoux place a collar containing radium around Puccini’s neck. Puccini reports, “I am crucified like Christ! External X-ray treatment at present—then crystal needles into my neck and a hole in order to breathe… What a calamity! God help me. It will be a long treatment, six weeks, and terrible.”

Poster of Turandot‘s performance

During his initial treatment stage, Puccini was not confined to bed but was allowed to leave the clinic. He went to see a performance of Butterfly at the Theatre de la Monnaie, and his clinical condition improved. Puccini visited the local markets and went out for luncheons, and he started smoking again. The second part of the treatment commenced on 24 November, when seven needles were inserted into the tumor in an operation that lasted three hours and forty minutes. Although Puccini suffered agonizing pain, Dr. Ledoux was apparently satisfied that Puccini would pull through.

Memorial plate of Puccini

Unexpectedly, however, Puccini collapsed in the evening of 28 November and he died of heart failure at 4 am on 29 November 1924. A biographer writes, “Dr. Ledoux was so shattered by this sudden turn of events that, driving home in his car afterward, he is said to have fatally injured a woman pedestrian.”

Giacomo Puccini: Turandot, “Del primo pianto si, straniero” 

When news of Puccini’s death reached Rome, a performance of La Boheme was stopped, and the orchestra spontaneously played Chopin’s “Funeral March.” The funeral ceremony took place on 1 December in Brussels, and mourners silently lined the street from the clinic to the Church of Ste Marie. When Mme Laure Berge sang Gounod’s “Ave Maria,” a wave of emotion “rippled through the crowd outside the church as the public wanted to share their sorrow for the loss of a famous and very loved Maestro.”

Statue of Giacomo Puccini in Lucca, Italy

Puccini’s body was taken to Milan two days later. Toscanini and the Scala orchestra played the Requiem music from Edgar. Amid torrential rain Puccini’s mortal remains were then conveyed in a solemn procession to the Cimitero Monumentale for provisional burial in Toscanini’s family tomb. On the day of the second anniversary of his death, the coffin was brought to Torre and placed in “the mausoleum, which Tonio had erected in the villa by the lake. Pietro Mascagni spoke the funeral oration, and the conductor Bavagnoli and an orchestra performed music from Puccini’s operas. As for Turandot, Franco Alfano was commissioned to complete the score, a task that took him roughly six months.

Luciano Pavarotti sings "Nessun dorma" from Turandot

62,877,586 views Jun 7, 2019

The Three Tenors (José Carreras, Plácido Domingo, and Luciano Pavarotti) are joined by conductor Zubin Mehta, the L.A. Philharmonic, and the L.A. Music Center Opera Chorus.