Giuseppe Sabbatini

Giuseppe Sabbatini was born in Rome, on May 11, 1957. His original music training at the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome was as a double bass player. However, towards the end of his training in 1986, encouraged by his family and friends, he began studying voice with Silvana Ferraro, and won the international competition in Spoleto in 1987 with his performance as Edgardo in Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor. His operatic repertoire ncludes the leading tenor roles in Idomeneo, Mitridate, re di Ponto, Don Giovanni, Linda di Chamounix, La favorita, L'elisir d'amore, Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda, Roberto Devereux, Lucrezia Borgia, I puritani, Rigoletto, La traviata, Falstaff, La Bohème, Eugene Onegin, Auber's Fra diavolo. He also performs with distinction in the French repertoire - Massenet (Werther, Manon and Thaïs), Berlioz (La damnation de Faust and Benvenuto Cellini), Offenbach (Les contes d'Hoffmann and Orphées aux enfers), Bizet ( Les pêcheurs de perles), Gounod (Faust). In February 2001, he made his debut at the New York Metropolitan Opera in Massenet's Manon after singing for over twelve years in the world's leading opera houses, including the Vienna Staatsoper, La Scala and the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. His performance proved somewhat of a revelation to the New York critics. As Howard Bushnell wrote in Classical Singer Magazine… "The timbre is leaner and perhaps dryer than one would expect, beautiful in every respect, and capable of a most remarkable dynamic range. His pianissimi were glorious; no singer now before the public can diminish the sound without diminishing the tone as he can. His singing and acting throughout this role, which could have been written for him, were exemplary. His was an important and much-overdue debut." Although he has won many national and international voice competitions - the Jussi Björling Prize in 1987, the Caruso and the Lauri Volpi Prizes of 1990, the 1991 Abbiati Prize for Vocal Interpretation, and the 1996 Tito Schipa Prize - Sabbatini is not a 'star system tenor', nor has his career been particularly promoted by recording companies. However, he has been long admired in Europe for a voice which combines vocal refinement with an Italianate masculinity and a definite dramatic edge. In a review of La Traviata at the Royal Opera House in 2001, Tom Sutcliffe of the London Evening Standard characterized Sabbatini's style as "noble and elegant, his phrasing and agility moulded with precision - aquiline, like his looks. Words feel meant." A musicianly singer by both training and temperament, Sabbatini has performed with distinction in oratorio as well as opera - Rossini's Stabat Mater and Messa Solenne, Donizetti's Requiem, Bach's Mass in B minor, Mozart's Mass in C minor and Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. In 2002 he will be performing in the Verdi Requiem in both New York and Salzburg. Sabbatini's forthcoming opera engagements include Roberto Devereaux (Covent Garden), Jérusalem, La favorita, Don Giovanni, Roberto Devereux, La traviata, Les contes d'Hoffmann, Simon Boccanegra (Vienna Staatsoper), Don Giovanni (New York Metropolitan Opera), Idomeneo (Opéra National de Paris), Lucia di Lammermoor (Teatro Massimo Bellini di Catania) and Les pêcheurs de perles (New York).