Italian operatic mezzo-sopranos
Lucia_Valentini_Terrani
Lucia Valentini Terrani (29 August 1946 in Padua – 11 June 1998 in Seattle) was an Italian coloratura mezzo-soprano, particularly associated with Rossini roles.
Giulietta_Simionato
Giulietta Simionato (born Giulia Simionato; Forlì, Romagna, 12 May 1910 – Rome, 5 May 2010) was an Italian mezzo-soprano. Her career spanned the period from the 1930s until her retirement in 1966.
Gianna_Pederzini
Gianna Pederzini (10 February 1900 - 12 March 1988) was an Italian mezzo-soprano.
Pederzini was born in Trento. She studied in Naples with Fernando de Lucia, and made her stage debut in Messina, as Preziosilla, in 1923. She sang widely in Italy, notably as Mignon and Carmen, and made her debut at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, as Adalgisa, in 1928, and at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, in 1930.
Abroad, she appeared at the Royal Opera House in London in 1931, the Opéra de Paris in 1935, the Teatro Colón in 1938, and the Berlin State Opera in 1941.
She defended a wide repertoire, she took part in the 1930s in revivals of rare operas by Rossini and Donizetti, while singing the standard mezzo roles; Azucena, Ulrica, Amneris, Laura, but also a few dramatic soprano roles such as Santuzza and Fedora, etc. She also often sang Charlotte in Massenet's Werther with Tito Schipa. A live recording exists of one such performance.
In the 1950s, she began concentrating on "character roles" such as the Countess in The Queen of Spades, Mistress Quickly in Falstaff, Madame Flora in The Medium, and took part in the creation of Dialogues of the Carmelites at La Scala, in 1957. She died, aged 88, in Rome.