Sigmund Romberg was a Hungarian-born American composer. He is best known for his musicals and operettas, particularly The Student Prince (1924), The Desert Song (1926) and The New Moon (1928).
The Desert Song is an operetta with music by Sigmund Romberg and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, Otto Harbach and Frank Mandel. It was inspired by the 1925 uprising of the Riffs, a group of Berber fighters, against French colonial rule in Morocco. It was also inspired by stories of Lawrence of Arabia aiding native guerrillas. Many tales romanticizing Saharan North Africa were in vogue, including Beau Geste and The Son of the Sheik.
The Great Caruso is a 1951 biographical film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and starring Mario Lanza as famous operatic tenor Enrico Caruso. The movie was directed by Richard Thorpe and produced by Joe Pasternak with Jesse L. Lasky as associate producer. The screenplay, by Sonya Levien and William Ludwig, was suggested by the biography Enrico Caruso His Life and Death by Dorothy Caruso, the tenor's widow. The original music was composed and arranged by Johnny Green and the cinematography by Joseph Ruttenberg. Costume design was by Helen Rose and Gile Steele.
Mario Lanza was an American tenor and actor. He was a Hollywood film star popular in the late 1940s and the 1950s. Lanza began studying to be a professional singer at the age of 16. After appearing at the Hollywood Bowl in 1947, Lanza signed a seven-year film contract with Louis B. Mayer, the head of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, who saw his performance and was impressed by his singing. Prior to that, the adult Lanza sang only two performances of an opera. The following year (1948), however, he sang the role of Pinkerton in Puccini's Madama Butterfly in New Orleans.
The New Moon is an operetta with music by Sigmund Romberg and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, Frank Mandel, and Laurence Schwab. The show was the third in a string of Broadway hits for Romberg written in the style of Viennese operetta. Set in 1792, shortly before the French Revolution, the story centers on a young French aristocrat in disguise, who has fled his country and falls in love with the daughter of a prominent New Orleans planter.
The Student Prince is an operetta in a prologue and four acts with music by Sigmund Romberg and book and lyrics by Dorothy Donnelly. It is based on Wilhelm Meyer-Förster's play Old Heidelberg. The piece has a score with some of Romberg's most enduring and beautiful tunes, including "Golden Days", "Drinking Song", "Deep in My Heart, Dear", "Just We Two" and "Serenade". The plot has elements of melodrama but lacks the swashbuckling style common to Romberg's other works.
Jan Peerce was an American operatic tenor. Peerce was an accomplished performer on the operatic and Broadway concert stages, in solo recitals, and as a recording artist. He is the father of film director Larry Peerce.
Annunzio Paolo Mantovani was an Anglo-Italian conductor, composer and light orchestra-styled entertainer with a cascading strings musical signature.
Mario! Lanza At His Best is a CD released by RCA Victor in 1995, and consists of two original albums recorded by tenor Mario Lanza. These are: the Neapolitan songs album Mario!, recorded in December 1958, and The Vagabond King, recorded in July 1959. The Mario! album has been singled out for special praise, with its star conductor Franco Ferrara of Rome's Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia later hailing Lanza's singing on the disc as "vocally extraordinary...a Caruso-type voice." Lanza's first studio album in stereo, the Mario! selections include the Neapolitan songs "Voce 'e Notte," "Canta Pe' Me," "'Na Sera 'e Maggio," and "Passione." The arrangements were created by Carlo Savina and Ennio Morricone.
Mario Lanza Live at the Hollywood Bowl: Historical Recordings is a 2000 CD, released by the Gala label, includes the six selections that tenor Mario Lanza sang at his first Hollywood Bowl concert on August 27, 1947. This is the performance that first brought Lanza to the attention of Hollywood, and shortly afterwards he was signed to a seven-year film contract with MGM. Included from the performance at the Bowl are six arias, three of them in duet with soprano Frances Yeend. Eugene Ormandy conducts the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra for these performances.
Mario Lanza: Opera Arias and Duets is a compact disc from RCA Victor released October 8, 2001, of recordings re-mastered in 1999. At the time of its release, it was the only all-operatic Mario Lanza CD collection that RCA has issued. It includes several previously unreleased versions of a number of operatic arias associated with Lanza, together with the duet "Dio ti giocondi" from Otello with soprano Licia Albanese, the Improvviso from Andrea Chénier, and "M'appari" from Martha. The CD also includes four recordings from The Mario Lanza Radio Show. Writing in Records and Recordings in October 1967, the critic Delcie C. Howard described Lanza's recording of the Improvviso featured here as "a well-nigh model account of this impassioned outpouring".
"I'll Walk with God" is a popular song written for the motion picture The Student Prince with music by Nicholas Brodzsky and lyrics by Paul Francis Webster published in 1954. The film's title character, who was played by actor Edmund Purdom with singing dubbed by tenor Mario Lanza, sings this song at the coffin of his grandfather, the king of Karlsburg. The song was released on The Student Prince soundtrack album issued by RCA Victor
Howard Warren Marsh was a leading Broadway tenor of the 1920s.
The Student Prince is a 1954 American musical film directed by Richard Thorpe and starring Ann Blyth, Edmund Purdom, John Ericson, Louis Calhern, Edmund Gwenn, S. Z. Sakall and Betta St. John. The film is an adaptation of the 1924 operetta of the same name composed by Sigmund Romberg with lyrics by Dorothy Donnelly. The film's screenplay was written by Sonya Levien and William Ludwig.
"Drinking Song" or "Drink, Drink, Drink" is an exuberant song composed by Sigmund Romberg with lyrics by Dorothy Donnelly. It is the most popular piece in the 1924 operetta, The Student Prince. It was a success for tenor Mario Lanza, who recorded it for the 1954 movie and was released on vinyl that same year. Lanza was originally scheduled to play the lead role, but during production Lanza and the studio parted ways. Edmund Purdom was brought in as a replacement however Purdom lip-synced over Lanza's recordings during the musical performances in the film.
Nicholas "Slug" Brodszky was a composer of popular songs for the theatre and for films.
Richard Alexander Crooks was an American tenor and a leading singer at the New York Metropolitan Opera.
Das Dreimäderlhaus, adapted into English-language versions as Blossom Time and Lilac Time, is a Viennese pastiche operetta with music by Franz Schubert, rearranged by Heinrich Berté (1857–1924), and a libretto by Alfred Maria Willner and Heinz Reichert. The work gives a fictionalized account of Schubert's romantic life, and the story was adapted from the 1912 novel Schwammerl by Rudolf Hans Bartsch (1873–1952). Originally the score was mostly Berté, with just one piece of Schubert's, but the producers required Berté to discard his score and create a pasticcio of Schubert music.
The following is a discography of original albums and singles released by American singer Mario Lanza.
"Serenade" is a song with music by Sigmund Romberg and lyrics by Dorothy Donnelly from the first act of their operetta The Student Prince
Cesari, Armando. Mario Lanza: An American Tragedy (Fort Worth: Baskerville 2004).
