Opera Singer. A respected bass over a long career, he is possibly best remembered as Mephistopheles in Charles Gounod's "Faust" and as the first Pistol of Giuseppe Verdi's "Falstaff". Raised in the northwestern Italian city of Saluzzo, he studied music while training for a career in business; after making his 1883 operatic bow at Varese in Carlos Gomes' "Il Guarany" he spent the next decade refining his art in provincial theatres. Arimondi made his 1893 La Scala Milano debut in as the hired killer Sparafucile of Verdi's "Rigoletto" then on February 9th of that year was Pistol for the La Scala world premiere of "Falstaff". First heard at Covent Garden, London, in 1894 as Don Basilio of Rossini's "The Barber of Seville" with Adalina Patti as Rosina, he bowed at New York's Metropolitan Opera on December 7, 1896, as Ferrando in Verdi's "Il Trovatore". Over the years his roles included Jacopo Fiesco of Verdi's "Simon Boccanegra", King Philip II in the same composer's "Don Carlos", Il Commendatore who takes the title lead of Mozart's "Don Giovanni" to hell, and the intransigent Cardinal of Brogni from Jacques Halevy's "La Juive". Mostly confining his career to the United States from 1905 on, Arimondi spent some years with Oscar Hammerstein's short-lived Manhattan Opera Company and did return to Europe for appearances in Russia and Poland. He was to join the Chicago Opera in 1910, for a time taught at the Chicago Music College, and left a number of recordings which have been preserved on CD.
Opera Singer. A respected bass over a long career, he is possibly best remembered as Mephistopheles in Charles Gounod's "Faust" and as the first Pistol of Giuseppe Verdi's "Falstaff". Raised in the northwestern Italian city of Saluzzo, he studied music while training for a career in business; after making his 1883 operatic bow at Varese in Carlos Gomes' "Il Guarany" he spent the next decade refining his art in provincial theatres. Arimondi made his 1893 La Scala Milano debut in as the hired killer Sparafucile of Verdi's "Rigoletto" then on February 9th of that year was Pistol for the La Scala world premiere of "Falstaff". First heard at Covent Garden, London, in 1894 as Don Basilio of Rossini's "The Barber of Seville" with Adalina Patti as Rosina, he bowed at New York's Metropolitan Opera on December 7, 1896, as Ferrando in Verdi's "Il Trovatore". Over the years his roles included Jacopo Fiesco of Verdi's "Simon Boccanegra", King Philip II in the same composer's "Don Carlos", Il Commendatore who takes the title lead of Mozart's "Don Giovanni" to hell, and the intransigent Cardinal of Brogni from Jacques Halevy's "La Juive". Mostly confining his career to the United States from 1905 on, Arimondi spent some years with Oscar Hammerstein's short-lived Manhattan Opera Company and did return to Europe for appearances in Russia and Poland. He was to join the Chicago Opera in 1910, for a time taught at the Chicago Music College, and left a number of recordings which have been preserved on CD.
Bio by: Bob Hufford
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See more Arimondi memorials in:
Records on Ancestry
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