page_title: Giuseppe Danise
section_title: Education and early career
hierarchical_section_title: Giuseppe Danise / Education and early career
caption_attribution_description: English: Advertisement in the May 9, 1910 edition of Kavkaz — The Artistic Society Theater presents a Gonsalez (Italian) Opera Company performance of La favorita, four-act opera with music by Donizetti. Singers listed include baritone Giuseppe Danise.
context_page_description: Giuseppe Danise was an Italian operatic baritone. He sang to great acclaim throughout Italy and the Americas, appearing in lyric and dramatic roles from the Italian, French, Wagnerian, and Russian repertoire.
context_section_description: Danise was born in Salerno, near Naples, to Pasqualina Capaldo, an amateur musician, and Enrico Danise, an official in the Italian government. Though he began studies in law, he was urged to take up a career in singing, as he had a natural singing voice. He attended the Conservatorio di San Pietro a Majella in Naples, where he was trained first by Luigi Colonnese, a baritone of the previous generation whose own pedagogical lineage included Alessandro Busti and the castrato Girolamo Crescentini. According to Danise, for the first year he was only allowed to sing tones—no scales and no songs. Studies with Abramo Petillo followed.  Danise's first daughter, Floria, was born in 1905. A son, Enrico, was to follow in 1907.
  In 1906, he made his debut at the Teatro Bellini in Naples as Alfio in Cavalleria rusticana. Shortly thereafter he was hired as a leading baritone of the Gonsalez Opera Company, a touring company that traveled through the Balkans and throughout Russia and Siberia, as was described by the soprano Germana Di Giulio in Lanfranco Rasponi's The Last Prima Donnas. For at least part of the tour, the company included, among others, tenor Alessandro Procacci, soprano Giulietta Battaglioli, lyric soprano Ernestina Gonsalez, and bass Ignazio Cesari. In the course of his two and a half years with this company, Danise sang 630 performances.
  He returned to Italy in May 1912. Two weeks later he sang a concert in Trieste and was engaged there for the fall season. After that, he was engaged to sing at the Teatro Regio di Torino. During that engagement he was asked to go to La Scala for the centennial of Verdi's birth. Danise refused this request over differences about the repertoire.
  He continued building his Italian career to great success, singing in Bologna, Genoa, Rome, and Naples, among other places. He sang the role of Amonasro in Verdi's Aida at the opening of the Arena di Verona. In 1915 he performed at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome in the world premiere of the opera Una tragedia fiorentina by Mario Mariotti.
  From May 1914 through September 1915, Danise sang primarily in South America, in theatres in Uruguay, Brasil, and Argentina, such as the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires.
  Back in Italy, the Italian arm of the HMV record company, La Voce del Padrone, made its first complete recording of Verdi's Rigoletto in May 1916, with Danise in the title role. Due to an unfortunate incident, however, some of the matrices were damaged before they made it to the fabrication process. The sections that were lost were re-recorded the following year with a different set of singers, Rigoletto being sung by Ernesto Badini. The complete but cobbled-together recording was issued in 1918 with the mixed cast.
  Danise made his La Scala debut as the title role in the Scala premiere of Borodin's Prince Igor. He enjoyed great success in that house, opening a season with Spontini's Fernando Cortez and taking part in the Scala premiere of Zandonai's Francesca da Rimini and in the world premiere of Macigno by Vittorio De Sabata. In 1918, at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome, he sang in the world premiere of Vincenzo Michetti's Maria di Magdala.
  Danise had to retire from the stage temporarily when he was conscripted to service in World War I. He was transferred from Milan to Rome, where he worked as a censor. During his stay in Rome, he sang at Teatro Costanzi (now known as the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma). It was at this time (1917–1918) that Danise first had occasion to sing with Beniamino Gigli, both performing in Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur.
caption: Advertisement in the May 9, 1910 edition of the Tbilisi-based Kavkaz: The Artistic Society Theater to a Gonsalez (Italian) Opera Company performance of La favorita, four-act opera with music by Donizetti. Singers listed include baritone Giuseppe Danise.
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