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One of the 20th century's great conductors, Carlo Maria Giulini was known for his probing, self-effacing approach to orchestral and operatic scores. In addition to Italy, he was active for long periods of time in Britain and the U.S.

Giulini was born on May 9, 1914, in Barletta in southeastern Italy, but when he was small, the family moved to Bolzano. In the far north of what is now Italy, the city was part of the Austrian Empire at the time. It reverted to Italy at the end of World War I, but the area remained German-speaking for decades, and Giulini grew up hearing German and Austrian music. He began violin lessons at five, and at 16, he was admitted to the Conservatorio Santa Cecilia in Rome as a violist and conducting student. Giulini auditioned and won a place in the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, then known as the Orchestra dell'Augusteo. Two years later, he won a conducting competition, but all aspects of his musical career were temporarily sidelined when he was drafted into the Italian army. A pacifist and an opponent of Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, Giulini was sent to the front in Croatia but avoided firing his gun at enemy soldiers. Later in the war, he went into hiding in a tunnel under his wife's uncle's house; Rome was festooned with wanted posters showing his pictures. After nine months in the tunnel, he emerged after Allied troops liberated Rome in June of 1944. In short order, he conducted the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Brahms' Symphony No. 4 in E minor, Op. 98. Giulini conducted several orchestras, including the RAI Orchestra in Rome (the Italian Radio Orchestra) and the Milan Radio Orchestra, the latter from 1946 until 1954. He led several productions at an opera house in Bergamo, and there, he programmed not only Italian opera standards but works from the Baroque and Classical periods that, at the time, were little known. This caught the attention of famed conductor Arturo Toscanini, who recommended Giulini to the La Scala Opera House. Giulini became assistant conductor there in 1952 and ascended to principal conductor the following year. Over five years at La Scala, he introduced works like Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle and Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea to the tradition-bound La Scala stage, and he worked with innovative young stage directors Franco Zeffirelli and Luchino Visconti. Giulini departed La Scala in outrage when a crowd booed the controversial soprano Maria Callas, and in subsequent positions at English opera houses, he came into conflict with management, although his conducting of Visconti's production of Verdi's Don Carlos in 1955 earned acclaim. Over the 1950s and '60s, Giulini's operatic appearances became rarer. His recording debut came in 1959 with the Philharmonia Orchestra in London, leading a concert version of Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro.

Fortunately, he had his growing career as an orchestra conductor to fall back on. In 1955, he made his U.S. debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and that turned out to be the beginning of a longstanding relationship. He became the orchestra's principal guest conductor in 1969, and beginning in the late '70s, he also recorded with the orchestra for the Deutsche Grammophon label. In 1978, he succeeded Zubin Mehta as director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and he recorded often with that group as well. He stepped down from that post in 1984 but continued to work and record with that orchestra and many others as a guest. As an orchestral conductor, Giulini had a repertory that was narrow but deep; he added new works only after studying them intensively. He was a superb conductor of the German Romantics from Beethoven to Bruckner. Giulini was extremely prolific as a recording artist in his later years; in 2005, the year of his death, 15 recordings appeared under his name. Giulini died in Brescia, Italy, on June 14, 2005. Numerous reissues continued to appear after his death, and by the early 2020s, his recording catalog comprised well over 300 items. ~ James Manheim

The daughter of a teacher, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf began to study voice in 1934 at the Berliner Musikhochschule with Lula Mysz-Gmeiner and with Maria Ivogun. She also studied lieder interpretation with Michael Raucheisen, Ivogun's husband. In 1938, Schwarzkopf debuted in Berlin as a Flower Maid in Parsifal. She remained in Berlin until 1944 when she joined the Vienna State Opera making her debut as Zerbinetta in Ariadne auf Naxos. Her first international appearances were in 1947 at London with the Vienna State Opera on tour as Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and Marzelline in Fidelio. She became a regular guest at Covent Garden. That same year she made her debut at the Salzburg Festival and she appeared there nearly every year until 1964. At Salzburg she was best known for her Mozart roles of Donna Elvira, Countess in Le nozze di Figaro and Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte, but also had great success as Alice Ford in Falstaff and the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier. Her recitals with Gerald Moore as accompanist at Salzburg were always highly regarded, but in 1953 the great conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler accompanied her in an all Wolf recital. Her Teatro alla Scala debut in 1949 as the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro was a great success and she sang there until 1964 in a variety of roles including Melisande, Carmina burana, Catulli Carmina, and Il Trionfo of Orff, Elisabeth in Tannhäuser, Elsa in Lohengrin, Anne in The Rake's Progress, Iole in Handel's Hercules, as well as her Mozart and Strauss roles. She made her San Francisco Opera debut in 1955, but did not sing at the Metropolitan Opera until 1964. Her belated debut there is attributed to her ties to the National Socialist regime in Germany and Austria.

As great as her reputation as an opera singer was, her work on the recital and concert stage had even higher acclaim. Her fame as a recitalist was matched only by that of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. Her appearances were eagerly awaited around the world. In particular, her interpretations of the songs of Schubert, Strauss, and Wolf were admired. She is one of the few singers who was able to fulfill all of the requirements of an evening devoted to the songs of Wolf. On the concert stage she was often heard in cantatas and Passions of Bach, as well as the Verdi Requiem and symphonies of Mahler.

The voice of Elisabeth Schwarzkopf in her very early career was a light high soprano with excellent control of fioritura and breath control. As she matured, the middle and lower registers became much stronger and she began to sing more dramatic scores while giving up the lighter roles. By the late 1950s, she concentrated her operatic appearances on five or six roles to which she devoted great energy developing her interpretations to their highest level. This attention to detail and constant probing for added interpretive depth is the reason some writers find her performances too mannered and studied. In the recording studio, where she would work for hours perfecting one phrase, she was aided by her husband, record producer Walter Legge, in finding the perfect vocal color and phrasing to illuminate each piece. Even her most vocal critics stand in awe of the hard work that she brought to bear on even the simplest of songs. It is as a Mozart, Strauss and Wolf interpreter that Elisabeth Schwarzkopf will always be remembered.

Piero Cappuccilli was one of the premier baritones of his generation, most closely associated with the music of Verdi. His wide range, of more than two-and-a-half octaves, and his near-legendary breath control were perfectly suited to even the most demanding roles. While his physical acting was generally limited, he was a fine vocal interpreter who eschewed extra-musical effects in favor of lyrical nuance.

Cappuccilli had no interest in music while he was growing up, and it took the combined persuasion of several family members--opera lovers who had been impressed by the quality of his untrained voice--to convince him to consider music as a career. He auditioned at a local opera house in 1949, where Luciano Donnaggio (a retired singer beginning a second career as a teacher) heard him and urged him to study. Cappuccilli was still reluctant, believing he had a better potential career as an architect, and even briefly discontinued his lessons, until Donnaggio's urging and the offer of free lessons persuaded him to resume studies in 1950. Cappuccilli's wide range was largely innate, and he had developed excellent breath control due to his enthusiastic sports participation, particularly diving and swimming. Donnaggio and he worked on applying that breath control to singing, sustaining a phrase and developing the technique of messa di voce.

In 1955, Cappuccilli auditioned for La Scala in Milan, where the auditioners, deeply impressed, encourage him to enter the Viotti competition. After his first place award, the Teatro Nuovo engaged him to sing Tonio in Pagliacci, and in 1957 he made his debut. In 1958, he sang Monforte (I Vespri Siciliani) in his Palermo debut under Tulio Serafin, who invited him to sing Enrico in his upcoming recording of Lucia di Lammermoor with Maria Callas. He was soon engaged to sing at other houses in Italy and abroad, making his Met debut as Germont in 1960, and his La Scala debut in 1964. He made his Covent Garden debut in 1967 as Germont in La Traviata, and his United States debut in 1969 at the Lyric Opera of Chicago in a relative rarity--Verdi's I due Foscari.

Through the 1970s, he developed his repertoire carefully, balancing the Verdi with bel canto roles, such as Rossini's Figaro, and waiting to add the heavier roles, such as Simon Boccanegra.