“On Cetra we can hear the tenor Achille Braschi (the man who sang the ‘Di quella pira’ thrice in one evening!) as Turiddu: Instead of excessive complexes a voice like elemental forces, with a temper and healthiness, which unfortunately belong to the past.” (Jean Cabourg in L’avant scène opéra on the complete recording of Mascagni’s Cavalleria with Braschi).
Today Braschi belongs – just as Antonio Annaloro, Leonida Bellon, Vasco Campagnano, Giovanni Consiglio, Mario Filippeschi, Giuseppe Gismondo, Antonio Salvarezza, Primo Zambruno and many others – to the long list of first-class tenors, which were eclipsed by the outstanding careers of del Monaco and di Stefano who had become a kind of idols for generations of opera enthusiasts and singers all over the world. Not only the audience but also the record-companies, which had to accommodate the public’s demands, began to forget those singers who were condemned into a shadowy existence but who actually were the singers who kept the great old tradition of the Italian opera alive by singing in medium-big and even minor theaters all over Europe. Who remembers that Filippeschi kept singing in Ferrara, Massa, Pietrasanta and many other small places in Italy while he was on the peak of his career? Who remembers the great Primo Zambruno, an excellent tenor who sang in the Arena di Verona as well as in Cagliari, Sassari and Trento? Why does the Mascagni-tenor Giuseppe Gismondo have only one really important commercial recording (Il Piccolo Marat with Zeani and Rossi Lemeni)? Antonio Salvarezza, a lirico spinto in the style of Lauri Volpi with breathtaking top notes was like Giovanni Consiglio completely ignored by the record industry. And also Achille Braschi, a voice like elemental forces, has been obstinately disregarded. A complete recording of Cavalleria Rusticana from 1952 and a recital on the small Orbis-label is his only commercially recorded legacy.
But the interest in the tenors besides Del Monaco and Di Stefano grows continuously and many recordings, which ran the risk of going to seed inside the archives have been reissued on CD – due to the request of enthusiasts who had seen some of these great singers live on stage. Due to the interest of ex-students who wanted to revitalize the reminder of their old maestros, due to the request of all those who assumed that the glory of the 1950s and 1960s was based on more then a couple of stars. Tima Club has compiled an interesting CD with live-recordings of Zambruno. Cetra has recently reissued the complete recordings of La Fanciulla del West and Manon Lescaut with Campagnano, Leoncavallo’s Bohème with Annaloro, a couple of arias with Salvarezza and Bellon under the romanticising title The Cetra tenors and – finally – the Cavalleria Rusticana with Braschi as Turiddu.
Braschi’s Turiddu is not only in the opinion of the French connoisseur Jean Cabourg one of the best interpretations of this tremendously difficult and dangerous role. But any kind of tribute to Braschi’s work is still missing. Biographical notes are difficult to find. Not even the large standard works like the Opera Grove or the Italian Enciclopedia dello Spettacolo mention him – to say nothing of the net, where the situation is barely better.
Only few biographical facts are known about Achille Braschi. He was born in 1909 in Rome (the exact date is unknown). He debuted in 1934 after having studied with the Escalais-pupil Morini in Rome but did not attract much attention until the beginning 1950s, when he was Cetra’s choice for the role of Turiddu for Cetra’s first complete recording of Cavalleria Rusticana. The first recording of one of the “most Italian” operas by the leading Italian record Company was a prestigious project and the choice of Braschi a great honor for the 43-year-old. His precursors as Turiddu on commercial 78rpms had been stars like Breviario (1929 under Sabajno) and Gigli (1940 under the direction of Mascagni, both for HMV) and respetively Nash and Melandri (1927 and 1930 for Columbia). Cavalleria Rusticana was a very popular opera during the first half of the 1950s (the movie with Anthony Quinn bears witness), and by 1952 the LP was a well-established medium: a good recording was indispensable for competing in the Italian market. Recording an entire opera was now easier and profitable and all record companies were about to build comprehensive catalogues of standard operas. A look at the discography of Cavalleria Rusticana clarifies how fierce the competition for the best casts was: Braschi’s Cavalleria was the first commercial post war Cavalleria, followed by Remington’s recording with the couple Ruhl/Petrova as Turiddu/Santuzza. In 1953 RCA countered with Björling and Milanov, Decca with Del Monaco and Nicolai, EMI with Di Stefano and Callas, CBS with Tucker and Harshaw, and still in the same year, once again Remington with Spruzzola Zola and Apolai.
Braschi’s Turiddu was met with great enthusiasm and was the launch for a late but successful career. In 1952 Braschi sang at the Teatro Comunale di Adria, together with famous singers like the tenors Isidoro Antonioli and Antonio Salvarezza, the baritone Walter Monachesi and opposite the young Piero Cappuccilli. The performances in Adria were followed by calls to the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, the Arena di Verona and the Terme di Caracalla in Rome, where Braschi was heard not only as Turiddu but within heavier and dramatic roles: Manrico, Radames, Otello, Arnoldo, Canio, Eleazar and Raoul soon became the abutment of his repertoire. He also made a name as Mascagni specialist, adding Osaka (Iris) and the extremely demanding title role of Il piccolo Marat to his repertoire.
In 1957 Braschi decided to continue his career in France, where the lack of dramatic tenors was evident. The Italian scene was dominated by the idols del Monaco, di Stefano and the upcoming Corelli. Vocally Braschi could bear comparison with them, but not when it came to his presence on the stage. Del Monaco, di Stefano and Corelli were exceptionally good looking performers while Braschi was only 1, 65 tall, bulky, bald and gimlet-eyed. The young Guy Chauvet and Alain Vanzo, two tenors who originally were domiciled within lighter and lyric repertoire, sang the spinto and dramatic repertoire in France during the 1950s. Vocally they could not compete with Braschi.
Between 1957 and 1963 Braschi was a regular guest-performer in Marseille, Lyon and Bordeaux – treading into Giuseppe Lugo’s footsteps who in the 1930 had jeopardized an international career singing mainly in Belgium and France. Braschi’s most requested role was, like in 1959 at the Théâtre du Casino in Enghien-les-Bains, opposite Gabriella Tucci and Piero Cappuccilli under the direction of Franco Patané, Manrico in Verdi’s Trovatore. Soon, Braschi made his mark as “l’homme qui trissait le ‘Di quella pira'”, the man who sang “Di quella pira” thrice in one performance and of course in the original key. A private recording of a performance in Lille proves that the henceforth legendary acuti were more than just a legend. The sound of his high C was, just as Jean Cabourg wrote, like an elemental force, brawny, ringing, animal and absolutely staggering. The Italian baritone Alberto Roccatani, who studied with Braschi from 1962 to 1966, remembers:
“Braschi was a hard-working man, he accompanied himself at the piano while he ‘fired off’ dozens and dozens of high Cs from the chest, all day long and without showing the slightest sign of fatigue – at an age of over sixty. (…) The story about the Pira is right: I have seen him doing it.”
In 1960 Braschi returned to Italy, giving guest performances at the Teatro San Carlo di Napoli (1960-61) and and recitals at the Teatro di Adria (1963). In Naples he appeared as Canio opposite Sofia Mezzetti (Nedda) and Walter Alberti (Tonio) under the direction of Franco Patanè – and again as Manrico, being now, after the retirement of Filippeschi and Lauri Volpi, one of the first interpreters of this role also in Italy. The cast of the Trovatore at the Teatro San Carlo included Luciana Serafini (Leonora), Lucia Danieli (Azucena), Walter Alberti (Conte di Luna) and the conductor Pasquale De Angelis.
Shortly after Braschi retired after twenty years on stage. The reasons for the retirement were, as Alberto Roccatani points out, not vocal problems but an inferiority complex caused by his unfavorable appearance.
Braschi continued to work with young singers, being a serious and provident teacher.
“He always tried hard to solve the individual problems of each of his students. He was very interested in problems of breathing technique, sound production, everything what had to do with the human organism, especially the training of the abdominal musculature.”
One of the most famous pupils of Braschi is Hassan Kamy, the director of the Cairo Opera House.
Braschi passed away on February 23 1983.
* * *
Achille Braschi possessed a bright, virile tenor voice of electrifying power, full of squillo and a runny, fast vibrato. In some way he can remind of Gino Bechi and the young Tito Gobbi. If one would try to compare him to another tenor, one should maybe name Lauri Volpi, Malipiero and Martinelli, although his voice has a darker nuance. Tender lyrical moments and subtleties were in contrast to the lirico spintos Malipiero and Lauri Volpi (who recorded a heavenly mellow A te o cara in 1928), not Braschi’s strong point. Braschi was a genuine tenore robusto, “a splendid fellow with swelling thorax, bristling mustachioes, arms akimbo, or a gleaming sword aloft in his right hand, and all five-foot-eight of him aflame with devotion to mistress or mother, native land or the week’s good cause. (…) Home-ground for the robusto is Manrico in Il Trovatore” (John Steane). Braschi’s strong point was the heroic and dramatic attack. Spinto and robusto can overlap in repertoire, but instead of returning to lighter spinto repertoire (like Lauri Vopli did, singing Tosca and Bohème or Malipiero who did Mefistofele and L’elisir d’amore), Braschi went straight to Otello and heavy Mascagni roles like Il piccolo Marat. Turiddu and Osaka were the most lyrical parts in Braschi’s repertoire.
Braschi’s singing is a first rate example for healthy sound production. The voice flows from a widely opened throat, and the sound, which has its core in a thrilling appoggio is carried perfectly by the air column. The direct appoggio-attack and Glottisschlag are inherent parts of Braschi’s technique and style. They don’t do harm since the voice is well supported and permit dramatic accents of unique power. The passaggio technique is flawless and consequent. Listening to the opening aria of Cavalleria Rusticana, the observant listener might notice the exception of the rule: Braschi takes the A-flat-cue on “e vaju mparadisu” almost completely open, with an attack that almost is a pure Glottisschlag. The cue on “e s’iddu muoro” is executed softly and with unobjectionable passaggio-technique. The following well supported, open attack gives the aria a special “thrill”, a genuine Sicilian element with regard to the traditional Sicilian style of appoggio-singing. The fact that Braschi “survived” twenty years as active robusto without any vocal decline proves that his technique must have been healthy and solid.
Braschi belongs furthermore undoubtedly to the sparsely populated elite of absolute C-tenors. His art recalls the nostalgia for the golden age of singing, and listening to his recording of “Di quella pira” just leaves two words to say: Bravo Leone!
DISCOGRAPHY
Commercial recordings:
– Mascagni: Cavalleria Rusticana (complete) w/ Simionato, Tagliabue, Orchestra e coro della Società dell’Opera, A. Basile, dir., rec. 1952 (CD: Cetra, Opera d’oro)
– Verdi: Aida (excerpts) w/ Parada, Carossi, E. Ghiglia, dir. (LP: Saga, Joker)
– Recital: Pagliacci, Tosca, Cavalleria Rusticana w/ Orchestre de l’opéra de Paris, A. Narducci, dir. (LP: Vega, Pacific, Orbis)
Private recordings
– Rossini: Guglielmo Tell (complete) w/ Colzani, Moscucci, Choeurs et orchestre de l’opéra de Marseille, J. Tick, dir. rec. 14. 2. 1959 (live, pivate in-house recording, not issued)
– Verdi: Il Trovatore: Ah sì, ben mio… Di quella pira, Lille 1957 (live, private in-house recording, not issued)
