Miriam Pirazzini (21 August 1918 – 26 December 2016) was an Italian mezzo-soprano and occasionally soprano. She made her formal debut in Rome, in 1944, as Laura Adorno in ''La Gioconda''. For the next twenty years, she was one of Italy's foremost mezzo-sopranos. Pirazzini was born in

Castelfranco Veneto Castelfranco Veneto () is a town and (municipality) of Veneto, northern Italy, in the province of Treviso. It is the third largest municipality in the province by population after the capital Treviso and Conegliano. It is centrally located betwe ...

Treviso Treviso ( ; ; ) is a city and (municipality) in the Veneto region of northern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Treviso and the municipality has 87.322 inhabitants (as of December 2024). Some 3,000 live within the Venetian wall ...

Veneto Veneto, officially the Region of Veneto, is one of the 20 regions of Italy, located in the Northeast Italy, north-east of the country. It is the fourth most populous region in Italy, with a population of 4,851,851 as of 2025. Venice is t ...

in 1918. Opposite

Maria Callas Maria Callas (born Maria Anna Cecilia Sophia Kalogeropoulos; December 2, 1923 – September 16, 1977) was an American-born Greek soprano and one of the most renowned and influential opera singers of the 20th century. Many critics praised ...

, Pirazzini appeared as Amneris in ''Aïda'', at Rovigo (1948), Reggio Calabria (1951) and the Verona Arena (directed by G.W. Pabst, 1953); in the oratorio ''San Giovanni Battista'' at Perugia (1949); as Azucena in ''Il trovatore'' at the Teatro dell'Opera, Rome (1953); and Neris in ''Medea'' (the Italian version of Luigi Cherubini's ''Médée'') in Venice (1953), as well as on the first studio recording of Cherubini's masterpiece. She was also the Adalgisa (replacing the indisposed Fedora Barbieri) in the infamous ''Norma'' at Rome in 1958, when the performance was cancelled after Callas sang Act I and felt unable to continue; she kept the role partnering

Anita Cerquetti Anita Cerquetti (13 April 193111 October 2014) was an Italian dramatic soprano who had a short but meteoric career in the 1950s. Her voice was very powerful and pleasing to audiences. Career Cerquetti was born in Montecosaro, near Macerata, Ital ...

, who replaced Callas for the remaining performances. She appeared at the

Teatro alla Scala La Scala (, , ; officially , ) is a historic opera house in Milan, Italy. The theatre was inaugurated on 3 August 1778 and was originally known as (, which previously was a church). The premiere performance was Antonio Salieri's ''Europa r ...

in 1951, as Maffio Orsini in ''Lucrezia Borgia'', opposite

Caterina Mancini Caterina Mancini (10 November 1924 – 21 January 2011) was an Italian dramatic coloratura soprano, primarily active in Italy in the 1950s. Mancini was born at Genzano di Roma. She made her debut in 1948, as Giselda in ''I Lombardi'', in Flore ...

, Mirto Picchi, and Nicola Rossi Lemeni. Another of Pirazzini's roles was of the Princesse de Bouillon in ''Adriana Lecouvreur'', which she often sang with

Magda Olivero Magda Olivero (née Maria Maddalena Olivero) (25 March 1910 – 8 September 2014), was an Italian operatic soprano. Her career started in 1932 when she was 22, and spanned five decades, establishing her "as an important link between the era of the ...

in the title role, in Brescia (1956), Lisbon (1956), Palermo (1959) and Caracas (1961). In 1962, her recording of Suzuki in ''Madama Butterfly'' won a

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious ...

. She died in Rome on 26 December, 2016, at the age of 98.

Studio Discography

* Cherubini: ''Medea'' (Callas, Scotto, Picchi, Modesti; Serafin, 1957)

Ricordi Ricordi may refer to: People * Giovanni Ricordi (1785–1853), Italian violinist and publishing company founder *Giulio Ricordi (1840–1912), Italian publisher and musician Music *Casa Ricordi, an Italian music publishing company established i ...

/EMI * Ponchielli: ''La Gioconda'' (Corridori, Campora, Colzani; Parodi, 1952)

Urania Urania ( ; ; modern Greek shortened name ''Ránia''; meaning "heavenly" or "of heaven") was, in Greek mythology, the muse of astronomy and astrology. Urania is the goddess of astronomy and stars, her attributes being the globe and compass. T ...

* Puccini: ''Madama Butterfly'' (de los Ángeles, Björling, Sereni; Santini, 1959)

EMI EMI Group Limited (formerly EMI Group plc until 2007; originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At t ...

* Verdi: ''Aïda'' (Curtis-Verna, Corelli, Guelfi, Neri; Questa, 1956)

Cetra Cetra, a Latin word borrowed from Greek, is an Italian descendant of ''κιθάρα'' (cithara). It is a synonym for the cittern but has been used for the citole and cithara (the lyre-form) and cythara (the lyre-form developing into a necked i ...

* Verdi: ''La forza del destino'' (Guerrini, Campora, Colzani, Corena; Parodi, p. 1952) Urania * Verdi: ''I lombardi'' (Vitale, Bertocci; Wolf-Ferrari, 1951) Cetra * Verdi: ''Otello'' (Rysanek, Vickers, Gobbi; Serafin, 1960)

RCA RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded in 1919 as the Radio Corporation of America. It was initially a patent pool, patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Westinghou ...

* Verdi: ''Rigoletto'' (d'Angelo, Tucker, Capecchi; Molinari-Pradelli, 1959)

Philips Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), simply branded Philips, is a Dutch multinational health technology company that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, its world headquarters have been situated in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarter ...

* Verdi: ''Il trovatore'' (Mancini, Lauri-Volpi, Tagliabue; Previtali, 1951) Cetra

References

* Liner notes, Act I of ''Norma'', Voce, undated.

External links

Miriam Pirazzini in an excerpt from ''Aïda'' (1956).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pirazzini, Miriam 1918 births 2016 deaths Italian opera singers Italian operatic mezzo-sopranos Musicians from Vicenza Grammy Award winners