Nicola Rescigno

Nicola Rescigno was born in New York in May 1916, the son of Italian immigrants — his father, Joseph Rescigno, conducted at the Metropolitan Opera and the San Carlo Opera Company. He studied piano and conducting in Italy at the Liceo Musicale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, then returned to the United States and made his conducting début with the Brooklyn Opera Company in 1943. He held a series of regional American posts before his appointment as artistic director of the Lyric Theatre of Chicago in 1954 — the company he co-founded with Carol Fox and Lawrence Kelly.

He left Chicago after a year and co-founded the Dallas Civic Opera (later the Dallas Opera) in 1957, where he served as principal conductor for twenty-five years until 1990. His career was particularly defined by his collaborations with the major Italian sopranos of the post-war era — Maria Callas (the famous 1958 *La traviata* and the 1959 Covent Garden *Medea*), Joan Sutherland, Montserrat Caballé and Renata Tebaldi — and by his commitment to the lesser-known bel canto repertoire. He worked regularly at Covent Garden, the Metropolitan Opera, La Scala and the Vienna State Opera as a guest.

Rescigno died in Viterbo, Italy, in August 2008. Music Preserved’s archive includes a range of his work with the major sopranos of the 1950s and 1960s in operatic recordings and concert performance.