Veriano Luchetti

Italian tenor Veriano Luchetti was born on 12 March 1939 in Viterbo, Italy.

First a pilot in the Italian Air Force, he took to vocal training rather late, and eventually studied under Enrico Piazza and the pedagogues Capuano, Mueller and Picozzi in Milano. His presumed professional debut took place at Wexford in 1965, where he was Alfredo in La Traviata to Egyptian born soprano Jeannette Pilou, as Violetta. His second significant appearance was at the Sperimentale theatre in 1967 with the Spoleto Festival as Loris in Giordano's Fedora, after having won the Sperimentale singing contest. This performance brought him to La Fenice, where he was engaged, giving a forward push to his career and he appeared throughout the most important theatres in Italy, including Rome, Napoli, Fiorentino, Palermo, Parma, Venezia, Verona and Trieste. In Trieste he was Fernando in Donizetti's "Il furioso all'isola di San Domingo" (1967), and a further notable performance took place at the Maggio Musicale di Firenze in 1971 with his Vasco da Gama in Meyerbeer's L'Africaine. 1974 he appeared in a legendary performance of Spontini's Agnese di Hohenstaufen. There was also a memorable Don Carlo conducted by Georges Prêtre at the Fenice in 1973, with Ricciarelli, Ghiaurov, Cappuccilli, Cossotto and Casarini, apart from Luchetti's Don Carlo.

1973 also saw him in his debut at Covent Garden for a performance of Madama Butterfly, Luchetti starring as Pinkerton. He was invited to sing Rodolfo in La Boheme for the 1974/75 season (and the Verdi Requiem 1976), then La Scala followed in May 1975. He debuted with a performance of Verdi's Atilla, where he sang the role of Foresto, followed by a performance in Simon Boccanegra as Gabriele Adorno under Claudio Abbado and Giorgio Strehler at Covent Garden with the La Scala company March 1976. He did a comprimario role in Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier back at La Scala, then parted for the US in September yet again with La Scala and Abbado/Strehler for performances of Macbeth (Macduff) and Simon Boccanegra (Gabriele) in Washington. He returned to Milano and La Scala for the bicentenary inauguration of La Scala in 1978 as Gabriele Adorno in Simon Boccanegra, once more directed by Abbado/Strehler, with subsequent performances of Simon Boccanegra and Macbeth at La Scala during 1979 and a tour with La Scala to Tokyo 1981. There he also performed in the Verdi Messa di Requiem.

He made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera New York during the season of 1977-78, as Rodolfo in La Boheme.

He travelled with La Scala yet again in 1986 for Verdi's I Lombardi in Vancouver, under Gianandrea Gavazzeni, and in 1987 with Riccardo Muti for the Verdi Requiem in Berlin. 1988 he starred in Carmen at the Met under Placido Domingo, with Freni, Horne and Ramey in the cast (one performance night also with his wife, soprano Mietta Sighele).

He also appeared at the theatres of München, Wien, Salzburg, Chicago, San Francisco and Paris during his career, under the baton of grand masters such as Muti, Abbado, Gavazzeni, Votto, Gui, Kleiber, Giulini, Solti, Metha, Ozawa and Sawallisch. He was a splendid Verdian tenor, of which his many performances on stage, radio and television broadcasts did betray, and also performed in works by Meyerbeer, Cherubini, Spontini, Rossini, Donizetti, Bellini, Puccini, Bizet, Gounoud and Berlioz. Unfortunately he remained somewhat anonymous in the wake of Pavarotti, Domingo and Carreras, who all debuted during the same time span in which Luchetti made his debut.

Of his recorded legacy, his two Verdi Requiems late 70's with Muti (EMI) and Solti (RCA/BMG) stand out, which betray a robust and firmly knit voice.

Luchetti has retired as a singer and currently enjoy a notable reputation for his vocal classes and as a juror he has served on the panel of national and international singing competitions, amongst others at the festivals of Spoleto and Garda.