Margherita Rinaldi

Margherita Rinaldi
Rinaldi in Radiocorriere magazine (1971)
Born	12 January 1935 (1935-01-12) Turin, Italy
Died	7 September 2023 (2023-09-08) (aged 88) Impruneta, Florence, Italy
Occupation	Lyric soprano

Margherita Rinaldi (12 January 1935 – 7 September 2023) was an Italian lyric soprano, primarily active in the 1960s and 1970s, after she made her debut as Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor in 1958. She performed a wide repertoire of roles including Baroque and French opera. She recorded the roles of Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto and Ilia in Mozart's Idomeneo. From 1981, she worked as a voice teacher.

Life and career

Margherita Rinaldi was born in Turin on 12 January 1935, and completed her music studies in Rovigo. She won the Belli voice competition in Spoleto, appearing there in 1958 in the title role of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor. Her debut at La Scala in Milan came the following year as Sinaide in Rossini's Mosè in Egitto. She first performed at the Arena di Verona in 1962, as Oscar in Verdi's Un ballo in maschera, alongside Leyla Gencer, Carlo Bergonzi, and conducted by Gavazzeni. She performed at the Teatro Filarmonico of Verona as Amelia in Verdi's Simon Boccanegra in 1979, alongside Renato Bruson in the title role, directed by Crivelli's and conducted by Roberto Abbado. Rinaldi sang at most of the major opera houses in Italy, in roles such as Amina in Bellini's La sonnambula, Donizetti's Adina in L'elisir d'amore and Norina in Don Pasquale, and especially Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto. She also excelled in operas by Mozart and by Cimarosa.

Rinaldi won acclaim as Giulietta in Claudio Abbado's version of Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi, opposite Giacomo Aragall and Luciano Pavarotti, at La Scala in 1966, and also as Linda in a revival of Linda di Chamounix there in 1972, opposite Alfredo Kraus. She sang a wide variety of roles for RAI between 1963 and 1975, such as Bertha in Meyerbeer's Le Prophète, Cleopatra in Handel's Giulio Cesare, Ginevra in Ariodante, and Noraime in Les Abencérages. She recorded Verdi's La traviata with Pavarotti in Dublin in 1964.

In 1977 she had a triumph singing Amenaide in Rossini's Tancredi alongside Marilyn Horne at Teatro dell'Opera di Roma. Reviewers noted limpid quality and agility of her voice, and her stylistic security. Angelo Sguerzi wrote for Stirpi canore about her "homogeneity of timbre, equality of registers, smooth and clear extension up to E-flat on the top, gentle, demure phrasing, without melodramaticism of dubious taste".

In 1978, Rinaldi appeared as Adalgisa in a production of Bellini's Norma at the Teatro Comunale in Florence. Conducted by Riccardo Muti and starring Renata Scotto in the title role, these performances offered the Florentine public a rare chance to hear a lyric soprano as the younger, more vulnerable character of Adalgisa, according to the composer's intention. In November of the same year Rinaldi sang Ines in Meyerbeer's L'Africaine at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden, opposite Plácido Domingo and Grace Bumbry.

Rinaldi also enjoyed a successful international career, making her American debut at the Dallas Opera as Gilda in 1966. Her debut at the San Francisco Opera was as Lucia in 1968. She also sang at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. Rinaldi also performed at the Glyndebourne, Wexford and Bregenz festivals.

Rinaldi made only two commercial opera recordings, as Gilda in Rigoletto opposite Rolando Panerai and Franco Bonisolli, which was also the soundtrack of a German television production, and as Ilia in Mozart's Idomeneo with Sir Colin Davis conducting. Luckily, unofficial "pirate" recordings have preserved several of her live performances: the Spoleto Lucia di Lammermoor, the Scala I Capuleti e i Montecchi and Linda di Chamounix, the RAI Le Prophète, a 1967 Rigoletto from Turin, and the 1978 Norma from Florence.

Rinaldi was also an excellent performer of sacred music; she often sang with the RAI National Symphony Orchestra. She sang the part of Maria Maddalena in Lorenzo Perosi's oratorio La Resurrezione di Cristo in 1969, and was the soprano soloist in both Handel's Messiah in 1970, conducted by Bertola, and in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony in 1981. She performed at La Scala in Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle, and for RAI TV in Mozart's Vesperae solennes de confessore. She took part in the first recording of Rossini's Messa di gloria (1974). She recorded two Bach cantatas, Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen, BWV 51, and Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut, BWV 199, with Antonio Janigro and the Angelicum Orchestra of Milan for Ricordi.

Rinaldi retired from the stage in 1981. She lived outside Florence where she privately coached young singers.

Rinaldi died in Impruneta on 7 September 2023, at age 88.

Further reading

• Roland Mancini and Jean-Jacques Rouveroux, (orig. H. Rosenthal and J. Warrack, French edition), Guide de l’opéra, Les indispensables de la musique (Fayard, 1995). ISBN 2-213-59567-4

External links

• Margherita Rinaldi (Soprano) Bach Cantatas Website
• Margherita Rinaldi discography at Discogs
• Margherita Rinaldi at IMDb