The American tenor Barry Morell spent the first 10 years of his career in the United States singing lyrical roles, but then, as his voice grew larger and darker in colour, he took his new, heavier repertory abroad, appearing in London, Santiago, Vienna, Graz, Naples, Rome, Berlin and Barcelona. The beauty of his voice and the musicality of his singing did not change, though his limitations as an actor were perhaps more noticeable. He studied singing in New York, at first as a baritone, then with Giuseppe Danise, as a tenor. Having made his operatic début at the New York City Center Opera in 1955 as Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly, he transferred to the Metropolitan Opera in 1958, making his first appearance there in the same role. Morell continued to sing at the Met every year until 1968, his roles including Cavaradossi in Tosca (with Renate Tebaldi), Matteo in Arabella (with Lisa della Casa), Alfredo, the Duke of Mantua in Rigoletto and Rodolfo. He played more than 20 roles with the Met during 257 performances. After moving to Rome in 1968 with his family he went on to perform in Barcelona, Berlin, Vienna and many other key opera houses across the world. He returned to the Metropolitan for a final time in 1979, singing, as he had on his début there 21 years previously, Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly, and retired in the mid-1980s. The competition of other tenors such as Carlo Bergonzi and Franco Corelli was too great. Today he would have been world famous, judged by his studio and radio recordings.

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CD Length and Format:

CD 1 77.58 minutes
CD 2 77.07 minutes

The CDs are in MP3 Format (320 kbps), with Cue Sheets.