(Isi)Doro Antonioli was born in the town of Edolo (Brescia) on 30th April 1929. He began his career at a very young age winning a competition from 120 contestants to study voice at La Scala, Milan with Maestri Grandini, Montesanto and Pessina. He took first prize at an international singing competition in Brussels in 1955 and this launched him on a singing career that would last 45 years.
That Brussels success led him initially to Chicago in that same year to sing in “Aida” with Renata Tebaldi, Astrid Varnay & Tito Gobbi with Tullio Serafin conducting – and subsequently invitations to all the major opera houses around Europe and Italy; Bologna, Milan, Naples, Parma, Palermo, Turin, Venice, Belgium,Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Norway, Spain, Turkey and the UK. He boasted a huge repertoire of over 80 tenor roles and sang with such famous names as Renato Bruson, Piero Cappuccilli, Boris Christoff, Mirella Freni, Magda Olivero, Renata Scotto, Joan Sutherland, Renata Tebaldi and under illustrious maestri such as Claudio Abbado, Gianandrea Gavazzeni, Riccardo Muti, Antonino Votto and Tullio Serafin.
He first came to Ireland and the UK in 1952 as part of an Italian quartet of young singers from the La Scala vocal school and again the following year as part of another quartet (Jeannie Reddin was their accompanist). Some thirty years later, in February, 1983, he would be invited back to Ireland, initially visiting Cork to sing Manrico in Verdi’s “Il Trovatore” for the inaugural season of the newly-formed Cork City Opera company, which was recorded for television and two months later, in April, to Dublin for the DGOS Spring season singing Pinkerton in Madame Butterfly, his debut as Des Grieux in “Manon Lescaut” and – at short notice – another debut in the title role in “Andrea Chenier” with Maestro Annovazzi conducting.
Antonioli made several commercial recordings – all on LP and long out-of-print: “La Boheme” (Puccini) in 1958 on the Eterna label, another “La Boheme” ten years later along with “Aida” and “Un Ballo in Maschera” as part of the benchmark recording series “Le Grande Opere Liriche” originally issued on the Fratelli Fabbri label during the later years of the LP disc – published periodically within Italy. Some of this celebrated series of recordings also featured other musicians who were to play significant roles in the history of opera in Ireland but whose contributions are not widely recorded elsewhere; notably Aureliana Beltrami, Efttimios Michalopoulos, Maria Angela Rosati (Carusi) and her husband Alberto Carusi, Ileana Sinnone. Gianni Maffeo, Franco Taino and Bruno Rigacci.
He was still to be heard singing Manrico in “Il Trovatore” when Ellen Kent brought the Compagnia d’Opera Italiana di Milano touring during 1996 – there are fragments of a performance from Skien in Norway on YouTube (“Mal Reggendo“, “Perché piangete?”, “Ah si ben mio – Di quella pira” “Miserere” and “Che! Non m’inganna“) although it’s currently unclear whether this “Trovatore” toured to the UK or Ireland.
Doro Antonioli died in his home town of Edolo (Brescia) on the 8th of June 1999; a local park was subsequently named in his memory.
AIDA (Verdi) Fabbri 1968
Aida : Mila Kaluskova
Radames : Doro Antonioli
Amneris : Gloria Foglizzo
Amonasro : Gianni Maffeo
Ramfis : Eftimios Michalopoulos
Il Re : Gino Calo
Un Messangero : Pier Francesco Poli
Una Sacerdtessa : Mirella Marcossi
Orchestra and Chorus dell’Opera Stabile del Viotti
Ino Savini : Conductor
Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi) Fabbri 1970
Riccardo : Doro Antonioli
Amelia : Maria Angela Rosati Carusi
Renato : Piero Francia
Oscar : Maria Rosa Nazario
Ulrica : Rashida Agosti
Silvano : Alberto Carusi
Samuele : Carlo del Bosco
Tom : Salvatore Catania
Un Servo : Mario Cescato
Coro Filarmonico di Milano,
Orchestra Filarmonica di Milano,
Conductor : Gabriele Bellini.
La Boheme (Puccini) Fabbri 1969
Mimi : Ileana Sinnone
Rodolfo : Doro Antonioli
Marcello : Gianni Maffeo
Musetta : Gabriella Ravazzi
Schaunard : Orazio Mori
Colline : Eftimios Michalopoulos
Benoit : Mario Ciofi
Alcindoro : Guido Malfatti
Parpignol : Franco Taino
Coro Accademia Corale Napoletana,
Orchestra Filarmonica di Napoli,
Ugo Rapalo – Conductor.
La Boheme (Puccini) Eterna 1958 (Hlts)
Mimi : Aureliana Beltrami
Rodolfo : (Isi)doro Antonioli
Marcello : Aurelio Oppicelli
Musetta : Jeda Valtriani
Schaunard : Lorenzo Testi
Colline : Giuliano Ferrin
Benoit & Alcindoro : Edo Peduzzi
Chorus of the State Theatre Bologna,
Berlin Rundfunk Symphony Orchestra,
Bruno Rigacci – Conductor.
Opera in Ireland 