Francesco Meli (born 15 May 1980) is an Italian operatic

tenor A tenor is a type of male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. Composers typically write music for this voice in the range from the second B below m ...

particularly associated with the romantic repertoire.

Life and career

Born in

Genoa Genoa ( ; ; ) is a city in and the capital of the Italian region of Liguria, and the sixth-largest city in Italy. As of 2025, 563,947 people live within the city's administrative limits. While its metropolitan city has 818,651 inhabitan ...

, Meli began his vocal studies at age 17 with Norma Palacios at the Conservatorio di Musica "Niccolò Paganini" in Genoa. He later became a pupil of

mezzo-soprano A mezzo-soprano (, ), or mezzo ( ), is a type of classical music, classical female singing human voice, voice whose vocal range lies between the soprano and the contralto voice types. The mezzo-soprano's vocal range usually extends from the A bel ...

Franca Mattiucci Franca Mattiucci (Rome, 1938) is an Italian operatic mezzo-soprano who had an active international career from 1963 to 1987. In her native country she made appearances at the Arena di Verona Festival, the Baths of Caracalla, La Fenice, La Scala, t ...

. In 2002 he debuted in Verdi's ''

Macbeth ''The Tragedy of Macbeth'', often shortened to ''Macbeth'' (), is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, estimated to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the physically violent and damaging psychological effects of political ambiti ...

'' and as the tenor soloist in Rossini's ''

Petite messe solennelle Gioachino Rossini's ''Petite messe solennelle'' (Little Solemn Mass) was written in 1863, possibly at the request of Count Alexis Pillet-Will for his wife Louise, to whom it is dedicated. The composer, who had retired from composing operas m ...

'' and Puccini's '' Messa di Gloria'', broadcast by

RAI (), commercially styled as since 2000 and known until 1954 as (RAI), is the national public broadcasting company of Italy, owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. RAI operates many terrestrial and subscription television channels a ...

(the Italian state broadcasting company) from the

Festival dei Due Mondi The ''Festival dei Due Mondi'' (Festival of the Two Worlds) is an annual summer music and opera festival held each June to early July in Spoleto, Italy, since its founding by composer Gian Carlo Menotti in 1958. It features a vast array of conc ...

Spoleto Spoleto (, also , , ; ) is an ancient city in the Italian province of Perugia in east-central Umbria on a foothill of the Apennines. It is south of Trevi, north of Terni, southeast of Perugia; southeast of Florence; and north of Rome. H ...

. He has gone on to sing leading roles in

La Scala La Scala (, , ; officially , ) is a historic opera house in Milan, Milan, Italy. The theatre was inaugurated on 3 August 1778 and was originally known as (, which previously was Santa Maria della Scala, Milan, a church). The premiere performa ...

The Metropolitan Opera The Metropolitan Opera is an American opera company based in New York City, currently resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Referred to colloquially as the Met, the company i ...

Teatro Regio di Torino The Teatro Regio (Royal Theatre) is a prominent opera house and opera company in Turin, Piedmont, Italy. Its season runs from October to June with the presentation of eight or nine operas given from five to twelve performances of each. Several b ...

, London's

Royal Opera House The Royal Opera House (ROH) is a theatre in Covent Garden, central London. The building is often referred to as simply Covent Garden, after a previous use of the site. The ROH is the main home of The Royal Opera, The Royal Ballet, and the Orch ...

Opéra National de Lyon The Opéra National de Lyon (), marketed as Opéra de Lyon during the last decade, is an opera company in Lyon, based and performing mostly at the Opéra Nouvel, an 1831 theater that was modernized and architecturally transformed in 1993. Histo ...

Opernhaus Zürich The Zurich Opera House () is an opera house in the Swiss city of Zurich. Located at the Sechseläutenplatz, it has been the home of the Zurich Opera since 1891, and also houses the Bernhard-Theater Zürich. It is also home to Ballett Zürich. I ...

, and the

Rossini Opera Festival The Rossini Opera Festival (ROF) is an international music festival held in August of each year in Pesaro, Italy, the birthplace of the opera composer Gioachino Rossini. Its aim, in addition to studying the musical heritage of the composer, is to re ...

in Pesaro. In 2017, he made his debut as Verdi's

Don Carlo ''Don Carlos'' is an 1867 five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French-language libretto by Joseph Méry and Camille du Locle, based on the 1787 play '' Don Karlos, Infant von Spanien'' (''Don Carlos, Infante of Spain'') by Fried ...

at La Scala and as Radames in Salzburg next to

Anna Netrebko Anna Yuryevna Netrebko (; born 18 September 1971) is a Russian and Austrian operatic soprano who has performed at the Salzburg Festival, Metropolitan Opera, Vienna State Opera, the Royal Opera and La Scala. Netrebko is one of the few Russian p ...

Aida ''Aida'' (or ''Aïda'', ) is a tragic opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni. Set in the Old Kingdom of Egypt, it was commissioned by Cairo's Khedivial Opera House and had its première there on 24 De ...

Recordings

* Donizetti: '' Pia de' Tolomei'' - Cast:

Patrizia Ciofi Patrizia Ciofi (born 7 June 1967) is an Italian operatic coloratura soprano. Career Born in Casole d'Elsa, Ciofi studied at the Istituto Musicale Pietro Mascagni in Livorno. She subsequently took part in master classes at the Accademia Musicale ...

, Laura Polverelli, Dario Schmunck, Andrew Schroeder, Francesco Meli, Daniel Borowski. Conductor: Paolo Arrivabeni. CD recorded live from

Teatro La Fenice Teatro La Fenice (; "The Phoenix (mythology), Phoenix Theatre") is a historic opera house in Venice, Italy. It is one of "the most famous and renowned landmarks in the history of Italian theatre" and in the history of opera as a whole. Especial ...

, April 2004. Label: Dynamic * Rossini: ''

Bianca e Falliero ''Bianca e Falliero, ossia Il consiglio dei tre'' ( English: ''Bianca and Falliero, or The Counsel of Three'') is a two-act operatic '' melodramma'' by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto by Felice Romani. The libretto was based on Antoine- ...

'' - Cast: Maria Bayo, Daniela Barcellona, Francesco Meli, Carlo Lepore. Conductor: Renato Palumbo. DVD and CD recorded live from Teatro Rossini Pesaro, August 2005. Label: Dynamic * Rossini: ''

Torvaldo e Dorliska ''Torvaldo e Dorliska'' is an operatic dramma semiserio in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto by Cesare Sterbini, based on the novel/memoir ' (1787–1790) by the revolutionary Jean-Baptiste Louvet de Couvrai, whose work was ...

'' - Cast: Michele Pertusi, Darina Takova, Francesco Meli, Bruno Pratico. Conductor: Victor Pablo Perez. DVD and CD recorded love from Teatro Rossini Pesaro, August 2006. Label: Dynamic * Bellini: ''

La sonnambula ''La sonnambula'' (; ''The Sleepwalker'') is an opera semiseria in two acts, with music in the ''bel canto'' tradition by Vincenzo Bellini set to an Italian libretto by Felice Romani, based on a scenario for a ''ballet-pantomime'' written by Eu ...

'' - Cast:

Natalie Dessay Natalie Dessay (; born 19 April 1965) is a French soprano, best known as an opera singer before her retirement from the opera stage in 2013. She gained wide recognition after her portrayal of Olympia in ''The Tales of Hoffmann'' in 1992, and then ...

, Francesco Meli,

Carlo Colombara Carlo Colombara (born 7 August 1964) is an Italian operatic bass. He has sung leading roles in major opera houses including La Scala in Milan, the Vienna State Opera; the Real Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, the Arena di Verona, the Royal Op ...

Sara Mingardo Sara Mingardo (born 2 March 1961) is an Italian classical contralto who has had an active international career in concerts and operas since the 1980s. Her complete recording of Anna in Hector Berlioz's '' Les Troyens'' won a Gramophone Award and ...

. Conductor: Evelino Pido. CD recorded live from performances with the

in Lyon and Paris, November 2006. Label: Virgin Classics * Donizetti: ''

Maria Stuarda ''Maria Stuarda'' (Mary Stuart) is a tragic opera (''tragedia lirica''), in two acts, by Gaetano Donizetti, to a libretto by Giuseppe Bardari, based on Andrea Maffei's translation of Friedrich Schiller's 1800 play '' Maria Stuart''. The opera ...

'' - Cast:

Anna Caterina Antonacci Anna Caterina Antonacci (born 5 April 1961) is an Italian soprano known for roles in the bel canto and Baroque repertories. She performed as a mezzo-soprano for several years, particularly performing the Rossini canon. Life and career Anna Cater ...

Mariella Devia Mariella Devia (born 12 April 1948) is an Italian operatic soprano. After beginning her career as a lyric coloratura soprano, in the finale part of it she also enjoyed considerable success with some of the most dramatic roles in the bel canto re ...

, Francesco Meli, Paola Gardina. Conductor: Antonino Fogliani. DVD recorded live from Teatro alla Scala, 2008. Label: Arthaus Musik. * Verdi: ''

Giovanna d'Arco ''Giovanna d'Arco'' (''Joan of Arc'') is an operatic ''dramma lirico'' with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Temistocle Solera, who had prepared the libretti for ''Nabucco'' and ''I Lombardi''. It is Verd ...

'' - Cast:

Plácido Domingo José Plácido Domingo Embil (born 21 January 1941) is a Spanish opera singer, conductor, and arts administrator. He has recorded over a hundred complete operas and is well known for his versatility, regularly performing in Italian, French, ...

, Francesco Meli. Conductor: Paolo Carignani. CD recorded live at the

Salzburg Festival The Salzburg Festival () is a prominent festival of music and drama established in 1920. It is held each summer, for five weeks starting in late July, in Salzburg, Austria, the birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Mozart's operas are a focus of ...

in 2013. Label: Deutsche Grammophon.

References

* Fairman, Richard
"''Rigoletto'', Royal Opera House, London"
''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and also published digitally that focuses on business and economic Current affairs (news format), current affairs. Based in London, the paper is owned by a Jap ...

'', 11 February 2009. Accessed 6 March 2009. * Loomis, George
"Opera: Discovering Rossini's small gems"
''

International Herald Tribune The ''International Herald Tribune'' (''IHT'') was a daily English-language newspaper published in Paris, France, for international English-speaking readers. It published under the name ''International Herald Tribune'' starting in 1967, but its ...

'', 23 August 2006. Accessed 6 March 2009. * Mattioli, Alberto, "Intervista: Florez e Meli, al Regio - il derby dei tenorissimi", ''

La Stampa (English: "The Press") is an Italian daily newspaper published in Turin with an average circulation of 87,143 copies in May 2023. Distributed in Italy and other European nations, it is one of the oldest newspapers in Italy. Until the late 1970 ...

'', 15 May 2007. * Rosenblatt Recital Series
Biography: Francesco Meli
(

PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...

), 6 June 2007. Accessed 6 March 2009. Italian operatic tenors Living people 1980 births Singers from Genoa 21st-century Italian male opera singers {{italy-opera-singer-stub