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4 unusual facts about Arturo Toscanini


Angel Records

In 1967, as RCA Victrola reissued numerous recordings of Arturo Toscanini and the NBC Symphony Orchestra, Seraphim reissued some of Toscanini's British recordings with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, made in London's Queen's Hall from 1937 to 1939.

Joseph Horowitz

In Understanding Toscanini: How He Became an American Culture-God and Helped Create a New Audience for Old Music, he treats the “Toscanini cult” of the mid-twentieth century as a metaphor for the decline of classical music in the United States, arguing that the conductor Arturo Toscanini became the first non-composer to be widely regarded the “world’s greatest musician,“ and that no prior conductor of comparable eminence and influence had been so divorced from the music of his own time.

Sony Masterworks

The label owns rights to famous recordings dating from the 20th century and late 19th century, by artists such as Enrico Caruso, Arturo Toscanini, Mario Lanza, Fritz Reiner, Artur Rubinstein, Jascha Heifetz, Vladimir Horowitz, Eugene Ormandy and Van Cliburn as well as from more recent performers such as Yo-Yo Ma, and Joshua Bell.

Toscanini: The Maestro

Toscanini: The Maestro is a documentary produced and directed by Peter Rosen, about Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini, who is considered by many to be the greatest maestro of the twentieth century.


Gabriel Astruc

From 1905 through 1912 Astruc brought a long list of musical giants to Paris under the banner "Great Season of Paris", including an Italian season with Enrico Caruso and Australian soprano Nellie Melba in 1905, the creation of Salome under the baton of Richard Strauss in 1907, the Ballets Russes of Diaghilev in 1909, the Metropolitan Opera conducted by Arturo Toscanini in 1910, and the Le martyre de Saint Sébastien of Debussy by Gabriele D'Annunzio in 1911.

Kirk Browning

The clerical position led to his directing live televised performances by the NBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Arturo Toscanini.

Lauri Kennedy

He made his mark in the US in the 1920s, where he became principal cellist with the New York Philharmonic at the personal invitation of Arturo Toscanini.

Lucy Kelston

Noticed and helped by Arturo Toscanini, she entered the Vocal Contest of America, which led to her debut at La Scala in Milan, as Leonora in La forza del destino, opposite Mario Filippeschi, in 1949.

Mercedes Llopart

In 1924, at the invitation of maestro Arturo Toscanini, she made her debut at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, as Sieglinde in Walkure, and went on singing there as Alice Ford in Falstaff, the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier, the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro, and created the role of Dolly at the world premiere of Wolf-Ferrari's opera Sly in 1927, with the great Italian tenor Aureliano Pertile.

Mount Royal Station

Luminaries using the B&O's station over the years include U.S. Presidents Woodrow Wilson, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Dwight D. Eisenhower, along with Western showman "Buffalo Bill" Cody, singer Enrico Caruso, and celebrated conductor Arturo Toscanini, whose private Pullman car was parked on a siding during his appearances at the nearby Lyric Theatre.

Orin O'Brien

She was born in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California to actors George O'Brien and Marguerite Churchill, and began her studies with Milton Kestenbaum, former principal bass of the Pittsburgh Symphony under Fritz Reiner and member of the NBC Symphony under Arturo Toscanini, and with Herman Reinshagen, assistant-principal bass of the New York Philharmonic under Gustav Mahler and Arturo Toscanini at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Quattro pezzi sacri

The first performance in Italy, again without the Ave Maria, was conducted in Turin on 26 May 1898 by Arturo Toscanini who had talked to Verdi.

René Maison

The best-known of these live performances are his marvelously funny, light-hearted Loge in Das Rheingold (conducted by Artur Bodanzky, 1937), his passionately dramatic Florestan in Bruno Walter's 1941 Metropolitan Opera broadcast of Fidelio, and as the tenor soloist in Arturo Toscanini's 1941 Buenos Aires performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

Seraphim Records

In 1967, Seraphim issued some of the 1937–39 recordings by Arturo Toscanini and the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

Tristan chord

In 1993, the opening theme was used in the film Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould in the scene on Lake Simcoe as performed by the NBC Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Arturo Toscanini (recorded 1952).

Verdi Square

The festival brings music back to a square frequented by Caruso, Chaliapin, Toscanini, the Gershwin brothers and other famous musicians.


see also

Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra

A major coup was achieved when the industrious and ever-versatile Cameron Baird (the Chairman of the UB Music Department) received a recommendation from Arturo Toscanini of the NBC Symphony that its Associate Conductor, William Steinberg, would be perfect for the job.

Giuseppe Verdi's Rigoletto Story

Filmed in Siena in 2002 (Arturo Toscanini Foundation), it was directed by Gianfranco Fozzi and produced by David Guido Pietroni and Maurizio De Santis.

Hymn of the Nations

Hymn of the Nations, originally titled Arturo Toscanini: Hymn of the Nations (1944), is a film directed by Alexander Hammid, which features the Inno delle nazioni, a patriotic work for tenor soloist, chorus, and orchestra, composed by Italian opera composer Giuseppe Verdi in the early-1860s.