Opera Singer. A tenor known as "Il Principe dei Comprimari", he reigned supreme among the genre of singers called upon to go onstage virtually every night, portraying widely differing characters in a variety of languages. Though little is recorded of his early years, he started his professional career as a chorister, began singing on RAI in 1948, and made his 1952 operatic debut at Naples' Teatro San Carlo. Perhaps indicative of his status as the Prince of Comprimarios, Mr. De Palma was not attached to any one house but instead made his name in several of the world's leading venues; soon after his Naples bow he was heard in Rome and Florence, in 1958 made his debut at La Scala Milano as Pong from Puccini's "Turandot", and over his career was to be a regular in Genoa, Palermo, Turino, Barcelona, and elsewhere, as well as with the Dallas Opera and at London's Covent Garden. While his signature pieces were probably Pong and Dr. Caius of Verdi's comedic masterpiece "Falstaff", he sang roughly 200 roles, his Verdi parts including Cassio in "Otello", Gastone from "La Traviata", the Messenger" in "Aida", Malcolm of "Macbeth", Ruiz from "Il Trovatore, Bardolph of "Falstaff", and Borsa in "Rigoletto". In addition, he was frequently seen as Pang and the Emperor Altoum from "Turandot", Basilio in Mozart's "The Marriage of Figaro", Baron Scarpia's evil henchman Spoletta of Puccini's "Tosca", Spalanzani from Jacques Offenbach's "The Tales of Hoffmann", Goro of Puccini's "Madame Butterfly", both Normano and Arturo in Donizetti's "Lucia di Lammermoor", Beppe of Leoncavallo's "I Pagliacci", Sir Bruno from Vincenzo Bellini's "I Puritani", Remendado and Dancaire of Georges Bizet's "Carmen", Triquet in Tchaikovsky's "Eugene Onegin", and Flavio from Bellini's "Norma". He bowed at the Vienna State Opera in 1963 as Cassio but interestingly, perhaps because the Metropolitan Opera had "princes" of its own in Paul Franke and Charlie Anthony, New York audiences did not get to hear him until his September 25, 1992 Met debut as Dr. Caius. Mr. De Palma made Philadelphia Opera and Lyric Opera of Chicago bows around the time of his seven Metropolitan appearances, kept his voice well into advanced years, lived out his days in Milan, and died following a protracted illness. At his death he could be heard on numerous studio recordings including five versions of "Tosca" and three of "Madame Butterfly", one of the latter being Sir John Barbirolli's 1986 reading that is considered definitive by many critics, as well as on literally countless archived live performances. There is confusion as to his year of birth, with some sources listing dates as early as 1916.