e come un albero fiorito. Giordano: An- me ora fatale. Forza del Destino: Invano oneer days of the phonograph and by drea Chénier: Come un bel dì di maggio. Alvaro! (with Martinelli). Gounod: Faust: songs recorded at the very end of his career, Fedora: Amor ti vieta. Dio possente. Wolf- Ferrari: Gioielli della when he was a septuagenarian phenomenon Madonna: powers. Here we have Gianni Poggi, tenor; Orchestra of L'Accad- Serenata. Fatuo: Siviglia. of greatly curtailed great moments from Verdi operas as De ernia di Santa Cecilia (Rome), Alberto G' seppe De Luca, baritone; Metropolitan Luca sang them during his notable career Erede, cond. pera House Orchestra and Chorus, Giulio at the Metropolitan, which stretched from LONDON LL 1381. 12 -in. S3.98. Setti, cond. V 1915 to 1941. RCA CAMDEN CAL 320. 12 -in. $1.98. Back -to -back opera miscellanies are not De Luca was a baritone in the tradition common -more than rare in pairings of Giuseppe De Luca, the classic, bel canto of Battistini; he was a master of suave tenors who, as in the Andrea Chénier baritone par excellence, has been until now legato, of exemplary phrasing, of a diction aria on this disc, compete in repertoire. incomprehensibly ignored on microgroove. that the Italians best describe as fior di But both singers are on the Metropolitan When RCA Victor favored many of its labbra ( flower of the lips) , and of a roster this season. So you can compare other operatic celebrities of former days, quality of voice altogether entrancing. Be- them. it only noticed De Luca in a few scattered cause of these refinements, the legend has The Gianni Poggi material was issued ensembles and duets. Two collections spread that De Luca was a rare vocalist on LD 9106 a couple of years back; it labeled Critic's Choice bypassed the famous with a small, carefully nurtured voice. sounds the same as it did before he passed singer; but the most unpardonable omis- Nothing could be further from the truth. his single trial -by- audience test in New sion of all occurred when RCA presented De Luca sustained all the major baritone York last season: A strong, bright voice, with much éclat its Fifty Years of Great roles at the Metropolitan, holding his own with more point than richness or weight, Operatic Singing, for which Irving Kolodin with such big- voiced stars as Caruso, Pon - rather on the light side for much of the chose sixty-eight selections with never a selle, Matzenauer, Mardones, and Lauri - music sung here; readings just but not slight nod in De Lucas direction. Volpi; he never caused impresarios to pick consistently brought alive; basically good Before this recent release on the Cam- easy spots for him because of vocal fra- style, marred by a tendency to scoop and den label, De Luca was represented only gility. Indeed, at his peak, De Luca could flicker. by reissues of recordings made in the pi- be memorably impressive in moments of Although he is now a third -season New Yorker, this is Giuseppe Camporá s first even semiprivate LP (unless the start of Act III of the London Tosca counts). On it his qualities seem very much as they Dig That Lurchin' Urchin do in the opera house, or as they might if the repertoire bore more relation to NO ONE speculating on the huge fame American reality. His is a medium -sized of this unlikely anthropoglot can avoid lyric tenor voice of attractive quality but .1 plunge into the dirty waters of sociology. no particular memorability of timbre (save The crooners, whiners, and whimperers of in a few Gigli- imitative moments); even the last thirty years have been enriched by and easy- moving most of the time, when a junior -high, poolroom, and soda -foun- used within normal lyric dynamic margins, tain claque probably as numerous and cer- yet with an odd way of popping rapidly tainly as rapturous as the young myrmidons out of focus and back in again when of the urchin troubadour, but the latter has under no particular pressure. It is, all told, added a new rung at the bottom of the a good voice, used in an attractively spon- ladder in music's underground, a feat that taneous way that makes its points without was unthinkable until he did it. excess -a great blessing in the Cilea The record only gives the audial half of "Lamento," which has been sobbed to a him, whereas the sociological inferences are mush by some usually moderate tenors. best drawn from the visual half. Audially His "E lucevan le stelle," done out of we have in this record a pugnacity of the context, skirts the borders of good taste artist's belief in his energy, which there is on occasion but averages out virtuous; and no mistaking. The voice is a complete his Lodoletta aria is quite as good as the harangue in puffy diction and pure fer- music, which is not the very greatest vency. Under its propulsion the manu- Mascagni. factured Folk comes to swarming life like The Boito two are sung with style and the energetic little creatures cavorting in with reputable cantilena, though with a hunk of rotting ham illuminated by a Elvis Presley, baritone. some shaded intonation. But the Campora microscope. Whether in chanted mutter, voice is not by several units of mass suit- rising howl in portamento, or the full clusive masculine licenses? From the testi- able for Andrea Chénier. The result is dignity of the shouted grunt, the voice is mony of Phryne to the disclosure of Miss a performance that (like the Poggi) comes vehement and ominous, and sets all us Gipsy Rose Lee and the precarious bodices off only in a hard -driven, miked -up way. sociologists analyzing. It also sets some of this evening, men have been never seri- Nor is it a leggero voice, so the Falstaff millions of twirlers a- dreaming, and forces ously denied the spectacle of what they aria is wanting the grace and fine -spun a look at the visual half. wish so much to see, and women have tone it needs for more than a merely The Presley strophes are accompanied by always had an unsporting indignation at factual account. corporeal motion, for which clergymen a practice from which they were excluded. Accompaniments are routine, and the have denounced him while others prayed The lurching urchin in the hand -painted engineering pulls the voices forward with- for his salvation. The elaborate ritual of Lincoln Cuh -pree could conceivably serve out particularly flattering either of them, this motion has been publicly discussed as the stimulus for a condign compensation. but the sound is bright and clean. Yet as a counterpart of the lucid involutions Among Mr. Presley's more emphatic of- for all reservations, this is a representation of the strippeuses along the burlesque ferings here (but his adorers insist that of two of the better tenors about, and circuit, and indeed it is hard not to dis- all are the nuts) are Rip It Up, Old Shep, worth hearing. J. H., JR. cern in his writhing gymnastic contortions, Ready Teddy, Paralyzed, etc. The accom- performed with spirit, some promise of paniments are from instruments that one loving intention. Reflecting that this is hits, and the engineering is slick, to say GIUSEPPE DE LUCA: Opera arias not Galahad, one is driven right back to the very least. A real gone record. Verdi: Rigoletto: Povero Rigoletto!; Cor- sociology. C. G. BURKE tigiani, vil razza dannata! Don Carlos: O For is not the artist here in bold ad- "ELVIS" Vocalizations (12) Carlo, ascolta. Traviata: Di Provenza il vocacy of complete equality of the sexes mar. Ernani: O de' nerd' anni miei; O in duties and privileges? Does he not chal- Elvis Presley, baritone; instrumental ac- sommo Carlo! (with Grace Anthony and lenge, in his breathcatching gyrations, one companiment. Alfio Tedesco). Trovatore: 11 balen; Per of the last, and one of the oldest, of ex- RCA VICTOR LPM 1382. 12 -in. $3.98.

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