Nicola Monti

Nicola Monti was born in Milan in November 1920 and studied with Ettore Campogalliani and Mario Basiola. He made his début in 1948 at Bologna as Pinkerton in *Madama Butterfly* and worked through the late 1940s and early 1950s at the major Italian provincial houses before his appointment to La Scala in 1955.

He was a leading bel canto lyric tenor of the 1950s and 1960s, particularly associated with the Donizetti and Bellini repertoire. His central roles were Almaviva in *Il barbiere di Siviglia*, Don Ramiro in *La Cenerentola*, Ernesto in *Don Pasquale*, Nemorino in *L’elisir d’amore*, Elvino in *La sonnambula*, Arturo in *I puritani*, and the smaller Mozart tenor parts (Ottavio in *Don Giovanni*, Ferrando in *Così fan tutte*). His flexible voice and refined musicianship made him a particularly valued partner for the leading sopranos of the bel canto revival — Joan Sutherland, Renata Scotto, Mirella Freni — and he made important recordings of the Donizetti and Rossini comic operas under Tullio Serafin and other senior conductors of the era.

Monti retired from staged opera in the early 1980s and died in Brescia in March 1993. Music Preserved’s archive includes a range of his bel canto work from the 1950s and 1960s.