Sergio Franchi – tenor

Budding opera star became popular for singing romantic ballads

Sergio Franchi's voice first gained
recognition in South Africa

The tenor and actor Sergio Franchi was born Sergio Franci Galli on this day in 1926 in Codogno in the province of Lodi in northern Italy.

Franchi earned recognition as a performer in Britain in the 1960s and subsequently went to America where he became such a success he was once invited by John F Kennedy to sing the US national anthem at a rally.

Franchi was born to a Neapolitan father and a Ligurian mother who were living in Codogno in the Lombardy region. As a child he sang with his father who played the piano and guitar.

When he was 16, Franchi formed a band to earn extra money and went on to sing with a male group in jazz clubs.

Franchi’s father was a successful businessman but he lost all his assets during the German occupation of Italy in World War II.

After the war a family friend suggested to Franchi’s father that he should emigrate to South Africa where there were more opportunities for work. The whole family moved to Johannesburg in 1947.

Franchi worked initially for his father but also began singing in informal concerts. His voice soon attracted attention and he was offered roles in musicals.

Franchi's career took a new direction after opera
 failed to provide an income to support his family 

Alessandro Rota, a successful operatic tenor who had moved to Johannesburg, helped form the National Opera Association and began producing operatic concerts. Taught by Rota, Franchi’s voice matured and his vocal range and technique developed.

He was given the leading tenor roles in Puccini’s Madam Butterfly and Verdi’s La traviata.

Franchi returned to Italy to seek more opportunities to become an opera singer. He reached the finals of a competition at La Scala in Milan and secured a role in an opera at a minor theatre. But with a wife and children to support by then, he had to look for other opportunities to earn money.

He began recording for Durium records, having hits with ‘Amore mio’ and ‘I tuoi occhi verde’, and he then made an album of Italian songs.

An English agent encouraged him to travel to London, where he made two appearances on Sunday Night at the London Palladium. This was to bring him to the attention of RCA Victor in America, who soon gave him a recording contract.

After Franchi’s first album was released in America in 1962 he appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show and also made his concert debut at Carnegie Hall, singing without a microphone. He was to become one of Ed Sullivan’s favourite guests.

Sergio Franchi with Ed Sullivan (left), on whose show he
made regular guest appearances

In 1963 Franchi was asked to sing the national anthem by President Kennedy at a rally and he bought a record to help him learn the words. This turned out to be a good move because he was able to reassure the President before the performance when he asked if Franchi knew all the words to the anthem. He later sang for Ladybird Johnson and President Ronald Reagan.

Franchi became a US citizen in 1972 and continued to enjoy a glittering career in America.

The last of Franchi’s 130 television appearances was in July 1989 and his last concert was later that month. While rehearsing for his next concert in August, Franchi collapsed and was taken to hospital. Tests revealed a brain tumour and despite treatment he died in May 1990, less than a month after his 64th birthday.

Franchi had supported the arts and many charities throughout his career and for his support for Italian children’s charities he was posthumously awarded the title of Cavaliere in the Order of Merit (stella al merito del lavoro) by the Italian government in 2001.

The church of Santi Teodoro
e Paradiso in Codogno

Travel tip:

Codogno, where Sergio Franchi was born, is a small city with a population of under 16,000 in Lombardy in the province of Lodi, to the south east of Milan. Codogno hit the headlines worldwide because of the Covid 19 pandemic. It was there that a 38-year-old Italian went to a clinic on 16 February 2020 reporting respiratory problems and it is thought the virus then spread from Codogno throughout Italy and the rest of Europe. The city was quarantined on 22 February 2020.

Il Torrazzo in Cremona is Italy's tallest
bell tower at 112 metres

Travel tip:

Cremona, to the south east of Codogno, was often thought to be Sergio Franchi’s home town, but he made it clear in interviews that he was born in Codogno but spent a lot of time in Cremona while he was growing up. Cremona is famous for having the tallest bell tower in Italy, il Torrazzo, which measures more than 112 metres in height. As well as being well known for producing the world’s best violins, Cremona is also famous for making confectionery. Negozio Sperlari in Via Solferino specialises in producing the city’s renowned torrone (nougat). The concoction of almonds, honey and egg whites was first created in the city to mark the marriage of Bianca Maria Visconti to Francesco Sforza in 1441, when Cremona was given to the bride as part of her dowry.

Also on this day:

1483: The birth of Renaissance genius Raphael

1901: The birth of social activist Pier Giorgio Frassati

1918: The birth of war hero Alberto Marvelli

1957: The birth of race-walking twins Maurizio and Giorgio Damilano

(Picture credit: church in Codogno by Ago56)


Home

Frances Xavier Cabrini – the first American saint

Missionary who was directed to the US by the Pope

Saint Frances was encouraged by the Pope to go
to the United States to help Italian immigrants

Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini, who founded a religious institute to provide support for impoverished Italian immigrants in the United States, was born on this day in 1850 in Sant’Angelo Lodigiano, in Lombardy.

Frances did such good in her life that she become the first naturalised citizen of the United States to be canonised in 1946.

She had been born into a family of cherry tree farmers, the youngest of 13 children. She was two months premature and remained in delicate health all her life.

After her parents died she applied for admission to the Daughters of the Sacred Heart but was told she was too frail for the life.

She became the headmistress of an orphanage in Codogno, about 30km (19 miles) from her home town, where she drew in other women to live a religious life with her.

She took religious vows in 1877, adding Xavier to her name to honour Francis Xavier, the patron saint of missionary service.

Along with some of the other women who had taken religious vows, she founded the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Frances went to seek Pope Leo X’s approval to establish missions in China but he suggested she went to the United States instead, to help the many Italian immigrants who were living in poverty.

The Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus began
to organise themselves soon after Frances arrived in New York

She arrived in New York in 1889 along with six other sisters and despite encountering difficulties she founded an orphanage there, which is now known as Saint Cabrini Home.

She also founded Columbus Hospital and Italian Hospital, which were merged into the Cabrini Medical Center in the 1980s.

In Chicago, she opened Columbus Extension Hospital in the heart of the city’s Italian community. Her name lives on today in Chicago’s Cabrini Street.

In total she founded 67 institutions in the United States, South America and Europe and became a naturalised US citizen in 1909.

Frances died at the age of 67 at Columbus Hospital in Chicago in 1917 and was interred at Saint Cabrini Home in New York.

But her body was exhumed in 1931 as part of the canonisation process. Her head is now preserved in the chapel of the congregation’s international motherhouse in Rome.

An arm is at a shrine in Chicago and most of her body is at a shrine in New York.

Frances was beatified in 1938 by Pope Pius XI and canonised in 1946 by Pope Pius XII.

Her beatification miracle involved restoring the sight and healing the disfigurements of a one-day-old baby. The same baby attended her canonisation ceremony years later and went on to become a priest.

Her canonisation miracle involved the healing of a terminally ill member of her congregation.

Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini is now the patron saint of immigrants and there are shrines, churches and educational establishments dedicated to Saint Frances all over the United States.

The Piazza della Vittoria in Lodi

Travel tip:

Sant’Angelo Lodigiano, where Saint Frances was born, is a town in Lombardy in the province of Lodi. It is about 30 kilometres south east of Milan and about 12 kilometres south west of Lodi. Piazza della Vittoria, the main square in Lodi, features porticoes on all four sides and has been listed by the Italian Touring Club among the most beautiful squares in Italy.

Milan's Stazione Centrale was given the name Stazione
Francesca Cabrini in 2010

Travel tip:

Milan’s Central Station was renamed Stazione Francesca Cabrini in 2010 in memory of the patron saint of immigrants. The Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, explained at the time that ‘stations where people pass through who are far from home, often alone and therefore extremely fragile and exposed to dangers, are difficult places, and above all, are points of arrival and departure for migratory groups.’ Milano Centrale is one of the main railway stations in Europe. Its cornerstone was laid by King Victor Emmanuel III in Piazza Duca d’Aosta in 1906. The architect, Ulisse Stacchini, won the contest to design the station in 1912.

Home