30 August

Joe Petrosino - New York crime fighter

Campanian immigrant a key figure in war against Mafia

Joe Petrosino, a New York police officer who dedicated his life to fighting organised crime, was born Giuseppe Petrosino in Padula, a southern Italian town on the border of Campania and Basilicata, on this day in 1860.  The son of a tailor, Prospero Petrosino, he emigrated to the United States at the age of 12.  The family lived in subsidised accommodation in Mulberry Street, part of the area now known as Little Italy on the Lower East Side towards Brooklyn Bridge, where around half a million Italian immigrants lived in the second half of the 19th century.  Giuseppe took any job he could to help the family, at first as a newspaper boy and then shining shoes outside the police headquarters on Mulberry Street, where he would dream of becoming a police officer himself.  In 1878, by then fluent in English and known to everyone as Joe, Petrosino became an American citizen. Read more…

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Andrea Gabrieli - composer

Father of the Venetian School

The Venetian composer and organist Andrea Gabrieli, sometimes known as Andrea di Cannaregio, notable for his madrigals and large-scale choral works written for public ceremonies, died on this day in 1585.  His nephew, Giovanni Gabrieli, is more widely remembered yet Andrea, who was organist of the Basilica di San Marco – St Mark’s – for the last 19 years of his life, was a significant figure in his lifetime, the first member of the Venetian School of composers to achieve international renown. He was influential in spreading the Venetian style of music in Germany as well as in Italy.  Little is known about Andrea’s early life aside from the probability that he was born in the parish of San Geremia in Cannaregio and that he may have been a pupil of the Franco-Flemish composer Adrian Willaert, who was maestro di cappella at St Mark’s from 1527 until 1562.  Read more…

Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo – painter and printmaker

Famous artist’s son developed his own style

Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo, who became famous for his paintings of Venetian life and of the clown, Pulcinella, was born on this day in 1727 in Venice.  Also known as Giandomenico Tiepolo, he was one of the nine children born to the artist Giovanni Battista Tiepolo and his wife, Maria Guardi, the sister of painters Francesco and Giovanni Guardi. Perhaps not surprisingly, Giandomenico inherited the talent to go into the same profession as his father and uncles and, by the age of 13, he had become the elder Tiepolo’s chief assistant. His younger brother, Lorenzo, also became a painter and worked as an assistant to his father.  By the age of 20, Giandomenico was already producing his own work for commissions. However, he continued to accompany his father when he received his major commissions in Italy, Germany and Spain.  Read more…

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Emanuele Filiberto – Duke of Savoy

Ruler who made Turin the capital of Savoy

Emanuele Filiberto of Savoy, who was nicknamed testa di ferro (iron head) because of his military prowess, died on this day in 1580 in Turin.  After becoming Duke of Savoy he recovered most of the lands his father Charles III had lost to France and Spain and he restored economic stability to Savoy.  Emanuele Filiberto was born in 1528 in Chambery, now part of France. He grew up to become a skilled soldier and served in the army of the emperor Charles V, who was the brother-in-law of his mother, Beatrice of Portugal, during his war against Francis I of France. He distinguished himself by capturing Hesdin in northern France in July 1553.  When he succeeded his father a month later he began the reacquisition of his lands.  His brilliant victory over the French at Saint Quentin in northern France in 1557 on the side of the Spanish helped to consolidate his power in Savoy. Read more…

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Book of the Day: The Italian Squad: How the NYPD Took Down the Black Hand Extortion Racket, by Andrew Paul Mele

At the turn of the 20th century, thousands of Italian immigrants left their home country for the United States - New York City, in particular. A small minority of the immigrants were members of a criminal syndicate that largely victimized fellow immigrants. The most common crime was a type of extortion known as "Black Hand." The methods of extortion were particularly violent, and included kidnapping, arson, and murder. The New York Police Department, unable to speak the language and unaware of the traditions of the immigrants, was virtually helpless in dealing with them. In 1904, Italian-American Lt. Detective Joseph Petrosino formed a group of Italian detectives to deal exclusively with the extortion crimes and the criminal underworld of Italian society in New York which had become known in the American press as "The Black Hand Society." This book tells the story of The Italian Squad from its inception, through to Petrosino's death and the squad's expansion into Queens and Brooklyn.

Andrew Paul Mele was an American author who took up writing after he had retired from the Brooklyn Public Library. He wrote six books and several short stories, as well as articles for the Staten Island Advance and the Italian Tribune.

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29 August

NEW - Lucia Valentini Terrani - opera singer

Colaratura mezzo-soprano noted for velvety softness of agile voice

The opera singer Lucia Valentini Terrani, who became one of Italy’s most captivating mezzo-sopranos, blessed with an agile, velvety voice and magnetic stage presence, was born on this day in 1946 in Padua, in the Veneto region.  Equally at home in contralto roles, she was among the most notable interpreters of the 18th and 19th century bel canto repertoire and was a major influence on the way the Gaetano Rossini repertoire evolved over the last three decades of the 20th century.  After her debut in 1969 and breakthrough in 1973, Valentini Terrani sang at most of the world’s major opera houses, in South America and Russia as well as Europe and the United States.  Little is known about her early life in Padua before she attended the city’s Cesare Pollini Music Conservatory. From there she moved on to the Benedetto Marcello Conservatory in Venice. Read more…

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Ugo Nespolo - artist and designer

Painter and sculptor worked in theatre, advertising and literature

The contemporary artist Ugo Nespolo, whose broad range of work includes paintings and sculpture, theatre sets and costumes, advertising posters, book layouts, commercial designs and experimental films, was born on this day in 1941 in the village of Mosso Santa Maria in the Biellese Prealps, about 70km (43 miles) northeast of Turin. As well as an enormous output of artworks influenced by Pop Art, conceptual art and Arte Povera among others and numerous sculptures in glass and ceramic, Nespolo created unique set and costume designs for major opera and theatre productions and was associated with several prestigious advertising campaigns, including for the drinks manufacturer Campari and the chocolatier Caffarel.  Nespolo is described as having an insatiable artistic and intellectual appetite. Read more…

Tiziana ‘Tosca’ Donati - singer

Versatile performer whose range spans musicals to sacred songs

The singer Tiziana Donati, who performs under the stage name Tosca, was born on this day in 1967 in Rome.  Winner of the Sanremo Festival in 1996, Tosca has recorded 10 studio albums, released a similar number of singles and has recorded duets with many other artists.  She has enjoyed a successful stage career, appearing in numerous theatrical productions, and has been invited to perform songs for several movies, including the title track for Franco Zeffirelli’s version of Jane Eyre in 1996. She also sang and spoke the part of Anastasia in the Italian dubbed version of the Disney cartoon of the same name.  At Christmas in 1999, she participated in concerts in churches in Italy where she performed Latin songs set to music. Following this she began a collaboration with the Vatican, taking part in several televised events to commemorate the Jubilee of 2000. Read more…

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Libero Grassi - anti-Mafia hero

Businessman brutally murdered after refusing to pay

Libero Grassi, a Palermo clothing manufacturer, died on this day in 1991, shot three times in the head as he walked from his home to his car in Via Vittorio Alfieri, a street of apartment buildings not far from the historic centre, at 7.30am.  It was a classic Mafia hit to which there were no witnesses, at least none prepared to come forward. Such killings were not uncommon in the Sicilian capital as rival clans fought for control of different neighbourhoods.  Yet this one was different in that 67-year-old Grassi had no connection with the criminal underworld apart from his brave decision to stand up to their demands for protection money and refuse to pay.  Grassi owned a factory making underwear, which he sold in his own shop.  He employed 100 workers and his business had a healthy turnover. In a struggling economy, he was doing very well.  Read more…

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Leonardo De Lorenzo – flautist

Flair for the flute led to international career

Leonardo De Lorenzo, a brilliant flute player who passed on his knowledge of the instrument to others through his books, was born on this day in 1875 in Viggiano in the province of Potenza.  De Lorenzo started playing the flute at the age of eight and then moved to Naples to attend the music conservatory of San Pietro a Majella.  He became an itinerant flautist until he was 16, when he moved to America, where he worked in a hotel. He returned to Italy in 1896 to do his military service in Alessandria and became a member of a military band directed by Giovanni Moranzoni, whose son was to become a famous conductor of the orchestra at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.  De Lorenzo then began a career as a flautist and toured Italy, Germany, England and South Africa, joining an orchestra in Cape Town for a while. Read more…

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Book of the Day: Rossini: A Life, by Gaia Servadio

Rossini was without a doubt the most highly sought after composer of his time, in an age when opera was not only more popular than we can imagine, it was also a powerful political tool. For his many fans the tragic mystery of his life is why, after having written 39 operas, did he stop composing at just 32 years of age?  After the Napoleonic occupation the romantic movement swept Europe, and it is clear that Rossini is linked to both the neoclassical era and romanticism, caught between monarchies and revolutions, autocracy and liberalism. Following triumphant years in Italy, he encountered the greatness of romanticism in the Paris salons, where he met Victor Hugo, Honoré de Balzac and Eugéne Delacroix, among others. But by nature he was a depressive and had come to hate both the public and himself. With significant new material and previously unpublished letters, the author sheds a remarkable light on the mystery of Rossini's life. Rossini: A Life puts in context the composer's difficult childhood and impoverished family life, his women, the divas, his nervous illnesses and not least his wonderful creative intelligence.

Gaia Servadio was an Italian writer who was twice married to British castle owners. With the art historian William Mostyn-Owen, she resided at Aberuchill Castle, Perthshire, and then wed Hugh Robert Myddelton, owner of Chirk Castle in Wales. She was a prolific writer of novels and non-fiction.

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Lucia Valentini Terrani - opera singer

Colaratura mezzo-soprano noted for velvety softness of agile voice

Lucia Valentini Terrani in 1982: The singer had a
powerful stage presence as well as a brilliant voice 

The opera singer Lucia Valentini Terrani, who became one of Italy’s most captivating mezzo-sopranos, blessed with an agile, velvety voice and magnetic stage presence, was born on this day in 1946 in Padua, in the Veneto region.

Equally at home in contralto roles, she was among the most notable interpreters of the 18th and 19th century bel canto repertoire and was a major influence on the way the Gaetano Rossini repertoire evolved over the last three decades of the 20th century.

After her debut in 1969 and breakthrough in 1973, Valentini Terrani sang at most of the world’s major opera houses, in South America and Russia as well as Europe and the United States.

Little is known about her early life in Padua before she attended the city’s Cesare Pollini Music Conservatory. From there she moved to the Benedetto Marcello Conservatory in Venice, where she was a student under the former soprano Iris Adami Corradetti.

There, she laid the foundations for her career. At that point, she performed as Lucia Valentini, making her debut in 1969 in Brescia as Angelina in Rossini’s La Cenerentola, a role that would become her signature. 

With its demanding coloratura and nuanced comedy elements, La Cenerentola showcased Valentini’s vocal brilliance but also her theatrical finesse. 

Following her triumph in the International Competition for New Rossini Voices organised by the broadcaster Rai in 1972, her big breakthrough came in 1973, again in La Cenerentola, this time at Teatro alla Scala in Milan. Stepping in for Teresa Berganza, one of the most popular and admired mezzo-sopranos of the modern era, Valentini reprised the Angelina role to great acclaim. The performance effectively launched her international career.

Alberto Terrani said he was "spellbound
by the beauty of her face" when they met

It was around this time that she met Alberto Terrani, an actor, at a party in Padua. He described being “spellbound by the beauty of her face” and “enraptured by her voice when she started to sing.”

They fell in love and were married in 1973, at which point he gave up his own career to become her manager and she added his name to hers

Valentini Terrani’s artistry was deeply entwined with Rossini’s music. She mastered both his comic heroines and his more florid, serious roles, such as Arsace in Semiramide, Tancredi, and Malcolm in La donna del lago. 

The last three were so-called “trouser roles”, in which a male character is sung by a female singer. Valentini Terrani’s versatile, expressive and richly coloured voice allowed her to perform such roles with convincing masculinity and emotional depth. 

Yet her repertoire was not limited to Rossini and his genre. She also ventured into baroque opera, portraying Medea in Cavalli’s Giasone, Dido in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, and Bradamante in Handel’s Alcina, as well as dramatic and lyrical roles such as Eboli in Don Carlos, Carmen, Charlotte in Werther, and Quickly in Falstaff. 

Her international engagements took her to the Metropolitan Opera (debuting in 1975 as Isabella in L’italiana in Algeri), Covent Garden, Paris, Moscow, Buenos Aires, and beyond. 

Valentini Terrani's career was cut short
after she was diagnosed with leukemia

On her visits to Moscow, she embraced Russian opera, performing with distinction in Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex and Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov. 

Valentini Terrani’s career was cut short when she was diagnosed with leukemia in 1996. Encouraged by her friend and fellow opera singer José Carreras, who had recovered from the disease, she travelled to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, where he had been treated successfully. Sadly, though, she died there in 1998 aged just 51, following complications from a bone marrow transplant.

Her legacy endures not only in recordings and memories but also in Padua, where a square near the Teatro Verdi bears her name.  There is also a small hotel in Padua, supported by charity, to accommodate hospital visitors and patients in need of repeated treatment, named the Casa di Accoglienza Lucia Valentini Terrani.

It was inspired by an act of generosity by the singer shortly before she died in Seattle, when she was so dismayed to find that the relatives of fellow patients were sleeping in their cars because accommodation was so expensive that she asked her husband to pay for their hotel rooms.

The Basilica di Sant'Antonio,
with its Byzantine domes

Travel tip:

Lucia Valentini Terrani’s home city of Padua, in Veneto, has a population of around 217,000. It is rich in history, art and architectural treasures. The biggest attractions for visitors include the Scrovegni Chapel, a medieval gem that houses a fresco cycle by Giotto often cited as the dawn of Renaissance painting; the Basilica of Saint’Antonio, notable for its Byzantine-style domes, that houses the relics of St. Anthony and features masterpieces by Donatello; the Palazzo della Ragione, once the seat of Padua’s medieval government and today a civic building with a bustling food market on the ground floor, the elegant Piazza dei Signori, with its beautiful Renaissance clock tower; and Prato della Valle, a vast oval space, built on the site of a former Roman amphitheatre and one of Europe’s largest public squares, which features statues of historic figures around a central island. 

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Brescia's Roman heritage is visible in the ruins
of the Tempio Capitolino in Piazza del Foro

Travel tip:

Brescia, where Valentini Terrani made her public debut, is a city in Lombardy midway between Bergamo and Verona often described as an underrated cultural gem, a mix of Roman and medieval heritage. The Santa Giulia Museum, housed in a former monastery and a UNESCO World Heritage, showcases Roman villas, medieval frescoes, and treasures such as the Desiderius Cross, while Brescia’s ancient heart includes the Capitolium Temple and Forum and other Roman remains that date back to 73AD. Perched on the Colle Cidneo, with panoramic views over the city, is the well-preserved Castello di Brescia.  In the centre of the city, the Piazza della Loggia is a Renaissance square with an astronomical clock and elegant arcades, while the Piazza Paolo VI is home to two cathedrals - the Duomo Vecchio and the Duomo Nuovo, bringing together Romanesque and Baroque styles side by side.  

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Also on this day:

1875: The birth of flautist Leonardo De Lorenzo

1941: The birth of artist and designer Ugo Nespolo

1967: The birth of Tiziana ‘Tosca’ Donati

1991: The Mafia murder of Palermo businessman Libero Grassi

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28 August

Lamberto Maggiorani - unlikely movie star

Factory worker who shot to fame in Bicycle Thieves

Lamberto Maggiorani, who found overnight fame after starring in the neorealist classic Bicycle Thieves (1948), was born on this day in 1909 in Rome.  Maggiorani was cast in the role of Antonio Ricci, a father desperate for work to support his family in post-War Rome, who is offered a job pasting posters to advertising hoardings but can take it only on condition that he has a bicycle – essential for moving around the city carrying his ladder and bucket.  He has one, but it has been pawned.  To retrieve it, his wife, Marie, strips the bed of her dowry sheets, which the pawn shop takes in exchange for the bicycle. They are happy, because Antonio has a job which will support her, their son Bruno and their new baby.  However, on his first day in the job the bicycle is stolen, snatched by a thief who waits for Antonio to climb to the top of his ladder before seizing his moment.  Read more…

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Elisabetta Sirani – artist

Sudden death of talented young woman shocked Bologna

The brilliant Baroque painter and printmaker Elisabetta Sirani died in unexplained circumstances at the age of 27 on this day in 1665 in Bologna. The body of the artist was carried to the Chapel of the Rosary in the Basilica of San Domenico in Bologna to be mourned, not just by her family, but by an entire community as she was loved and respected as an important female painter.  Elisabetta has been described as beautiful, focused and selfless and she became a symbol of the progressive city of Bologna, where the creativity of women was encouraged and they were able to express themselves through art and music.  Elisabetta’s father, Giovanni Andrea Sirani, was himself an artist and she was trained in his studio, although contemporary writers have recorded that he was reluctant to teach her to paint in the Bolognese style. Read more…

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Ugo Mulas - photographer

Images of street life in Milan and of New York art scene won acclaim

The photographer Ugo Mulas, much admired for the way he captured the street atmosphere of postwar Milan and for his portrayals of Andy Warhol and others in the Bohemian New York art scene of the 1960s, was born on this day in 1928 in Pozzolengo, a small town near the southern tip of Lake Garda.  At one time part of Milan’s fashion community, another of Mulas’s claims to fame is having been the photographer who discovered Veruschka, a German aristocrat who became part of the supermodel generation of Twiggy and Jean Shrimpton in the 60s.  Known for his meticulous approach to composition and lighting, and for the candid, spontaneous style of his work, illness denied Mulas a long life but he is widely seen as a pioneering figure in photography who had a profound impact on the art form.  Read more…

Giovanni Maria Benzoni - sculptor

Roman collectors called him the ‘new Canova’

The sculptor Giovanni Maria Benzoni, who earned such fame in Rome in the mid-19th century that collectors and arts patrons in the city dubbed him the “new Canova” after the great Neoclassical sculptor Antonio Canova, was born on this day in 1809 in Songavazzo, a small mountain village in northern Lombardy.  Benzoni sculpted many allegorical and mythological scenes, but also busts and funerary monuments.  Songavazzo being just outside Clusone in the province of Bergamo, Benzoni was regarded as a bergamasco - a native of the ancient city - even though he spent much of his life in Rome.  As such he was held in similar regard to bergamaschi celebrities such as the composer Gaetano Donizetti, the philologist Cardinal Angelo Mai and the painter Francesco Coghetti, all of whom lived in Rome during Benzoni’s time there.  Read more…

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Maurizio Costanzo - talk show host

Journalist whose show was the longest running on Italian TV

Talk show host and writer Maurizio Costanzo was born on this day in 1938 in Rome. Costanzo spent more than 40 years in television.  His eponymous programme, the Maurizio Costanzo Show, broke all records for longevity in Italian television.  Launched on September 18, 1982, the current affairs programme continued for 27 years, alternating between Rete 4 and Canale 5, two of Italy's commercial television networks, part of the Mediaset group owned by former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.  Its run came to an end in 2009 but was relaunched on the satellite channel Mediaset Extra in 2014 and returned to terrestrial television in 2015, again on Rete 4.  Costanzo began his media career in print journalism with the Rome newspaper Paese Sera at just 18 years old and by the time he was 22 he was in charge of the Rome office of the mass circulation magazine Grazia. Read more… 

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Book of the Day: Vittorio De Sica. The Art of Stage and Screen, by Flavio De Bernardinis

Vittorio De Sica was a unique film artist. While Rossellini and Visconti came into being with neorealism, De Sica matured through neorealism. As an already established artist, he put himself wholly on the line and played a gambit that revolutionised Italian and world cinema. From 1923, the year he made his debut in a minor role with Tatiana Pavlova’s theatre company, and over the following 20 years of his career in Italian theatre and cinema, he sowed the seeds of the neorealism that would lead to his 1943 I bambini ci guardano (The Children are Watching Us). Vittorio De Sica: The Art of Stage and Screen tells his whole story, before, during and after neorealism. From the early days in theatre to his role behind the camera, De Sica’s career straddles an era that included the decline of the theatre of the great stars of the 19th century, the “talkies”, songs and gramophone records, up to the formidable season of Sciuscià (Ragazzi) (Shoeshine, 1946) and Ladri di biciclette (Bicycle Thieves, 1948). This is what makes De Sica unique. He was an actor, singer, and director. He was at home with serious repertory as well as light and comic repertoires, ultimately scaling the heights of the art of cinema. To tell De Sica’s story is also to narrate how the young Italy, a kingdom that had been united for only 50 years, aimed to represent itself in the theatre and on screen.  De Sica was a unique figure in this representation of the ethos of Italy, its customs and traditions, its strengths and weaknesses, its glories and its miseries. 

Flavio De Bernardinis (Rome, 1957) is a scholar of the history and aesthetics of cinema and entertainment. He is the author of L’arte secondo Kubrick (2003) and Arte cinematografica: il ciclo storico del cinema da Argan a Scorsese (2017). He teaches Film History and the Analysis of Film Language at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia, in Rome. 

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