thumb|200px|Enrico Caruso.

'''Enrico Caruso''' (de son vrai nom Errico Caruso), né à opéra italien, considéré comme l'un des plus grands ténors de tous les temps.

==Les débuts==
Elevé à Naples dans une famille pauvre de sept enfants, il fait d'abord partie de la chorale de sa paroisse. À l'âge de 10 ans, il commence à travailler comme mécanicien, comme son père, puis comme ouvrier dans une fabrique de tissu.  Il passe ses moments libres à interpréter des chansons populaires dans les restaurants de la ville.

En 1891, le jeune baryton Eduardo Missiano l'entend chanter dans une gloriette près du port et décide de le présenter à son professeur de chant, Guglielmo Vergine. Celui-ci accepte de le prendre pour élève. Pour payer ses cours, Caruso doit s'engager par contrat à payer à Vergine 25 % de ses gains pendant « 5 ans de véritable chant »<ref>Cette clause contractuelle fut l'objet d'une controverse entre Caruso et Vergine. Ce dernier entendait par « 5 ans » non pas cinq années civiles, mais la somme des jours où Caruso chantait sur scène, soit une durée considérable, quasiment jusqu'à la fin de ses jours. L'affaire fut portée en justice et le juge trancha en faveur de Caruso qui paya  francs à Vergine pour mettre fin au contrat.</ref>.

Les cours avec Vergine prennent fin au bout de trois ans, et même si Caruso maîtrise mieux la partition, ne sait jouer d'aucun instrument et continue à chanter essentiellement d'oreille<ref> John Kobler, « Where Have All the Great Men Gone ? » paru dans ''American Heritage Magazine'', février-mars 1984</ref>. En Faust'', ''Rigoletto'' et ''La Traviata''.

==Les premiers succès==
thumb|left|Caruso pose aux côtés d'un phonographe
En Fedora'', un opéra d'Puccini qui lui fait passer une audition, et de Toscanini qui l'engage en 1900 pour interpréter ''La Bohème'' à la Scala de Milan.

Sa voix chaude et puissante lui vaut une réputation qui dépasse les frontières. Caruso chante à phonographique, ce qui lui assure la reconnaissance d'un plus large public. Son premier enregistrement est réalisé sur un gramophone le 11 avril 1902 dans une chambre d'hôtel de Milan. D'autres suivront. On compte aujourd'hui 488 de ses disques, pratiquement tous produits par RCA Victor, qui lui ont rapporté plus de 2 millions de dollars.  « Ses enregistrements ont fait de Caruso un modèle universel pour des générations de ténors, et sa réputation a joué un rôle majeur dans le succès social et économique du phonographe », écrit le ''New York Times''<ref>Article de David Hamilton, 6 janvier 1991</ref>.

Caruso enregistre une quantité de chansons, ''Una furtiva lagrima'', ''Addio a Napoli'', ''Cuba'', ''Rachel quand du seigneur'', ''Celeste Aida'', ''Amore o grillo'' avec Antonio Scotti, ''Vesti la giubba'', qui sera l'un de ses principaux tubes, et ''Libiamo ne' lieti calici'' avec Alma Gluck. Il chante en français, en espagnol, en anglais, en italien et en latin. Partout où il passe, c'est un triomphe.

== « Le Grand Caruso » ==
thumb|Caruso en 1910
Les concerts américains marquent l'apogée de la carrière de Caruso. En 1903, il est acclamé par la critique pour son rôle de Rigoletto au Carmen'' à San Francisco, il quitte précipitamment la ville à la suite d'un tremblement de terre. Sa liaison avec Ada s'envenime. Il lui interdit de continuer sa carrière de chanteuse. Elle refuse de l'accompagner dans une nouvelle tournée aux États-Unis. En 1908, Ada part refaire sa vie avec leur chauffeur Cesare Romati<ref>Enrico Caruso Jr et Andrew Farkas, ''Enrico Caruso, My Father and My Family'', Amadeus Press, 1990</ref>.

Caruso poursuit sa carrière mais, gros fumeur, il est de plus en plus souvent victime de problèmes de santé : angines, bronchites, migraines. Il retourne à Milan en 1909 pour subir une intervention chirurgicale suite à l'apparition d'un nodule sur une guerre, il entame une tournée en alliés. Il rencontre alors la jeune américaine Dorothy Park Benjamin qu'il épouse en 1918, et avec qui il aura un fille l'année suivante.

==La maladie et la mort==
thumb|240px|left|Caruso avec son épouse Dorothy Park Benjamin
En 1920, il chante pour dix mille dollars à La Havane, à Cuba, dans ''Aïda''<ref>Pierre Van Rensselaer, ''Enrico Caruso : a biography'', 1922 ([http://ia340941.us.archive.org/1/items/enricocarusobiog00keypuoft/enricocarusobiog00keypuoft_djvu.txt édition en ligne])</ref>. Les billets se vendent jusqu'à 35 dollars, une fortune à l'époque, ce qui suscite la colère du public<ref>Selon le ''New York Times'' du 13 juin 1920.</ref>. Le soir de la première représentation, la salle est la cible d'un attentat à la bombe.

Sa santé s'aggrave à partir de 1920. Le 3 décembre, un pan de décor heurte Caruso sur le côté gauche, juste en bas du rein, durant le dernier acte de ''Samson et Dalila'' au Metropolitan Opera. Victime d'une pleurésie et d'une infection généralisée, il subit six opérations en trois mois. Il retourne alors à Naples où la maladie le rattrappe. Il meurt de septicémie le 2 août 1921, à l'âge de 48 ans. L'Italie décrète un deuil national. Il est inhumé à Naples dans une chapelle à son nom.

==Postérité==
1951, ''Le Grand Caruso'' (''The Great Caruso''), avec Mario Lanza.

210px|thumb|Enrico Caruso.
'''Enrico Caruso''' (born ''Errico Caruso''; Italian opera singer and one of the greatest tenors in history. Caruso was also the most popular singer in any genre in the first two decades of the 20th Century and one of the most important pioneers of recorded music. Caruso's popular recordings and his extraordinary voice, known for its mature power, beauty and unequalled richness of tone, made him perhaps the best-known operatic star of his era. Such was his influence on singing style, virtually all subsequent Italianate tenors (and many non-Italian tenors) have been his heirs to a greater or lesser extent. He remains famous, though he predated the publicity that would aid later stars of opera,<ref>"I was able to do it with television and radio and media and all kinds of assists.  The popularity that Caruso enjoyed without any of this technological assistance is astonishing."  Beverly Sills, ''Enrico Caruso: The Voice of the Century'' (A & E Biography, 1998).</ref> although it should be noted that Caruso was a client of Edward Bernays (the father of public relations) in the latter's tenure as a press agent in the USA.

==Life== 
During his career, Enrico Caruso made over 260 recordings and made millions of dollars from the sale of his Covent Garden in London, he is best known as the leading tenor at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City for 17 years. Maestro Arturo Toscanini, who conducted some of the operas that Caruso sang in at the Met, considered him one of the greatest artists with whom he ever worked. Caruso's technique and style combined in a unique way the finest aspects of elegant, technically-polished 19th Century tenor singing with the emotionally-charged delivery and exciting, thrusting timbre demanded by the Verismo composers of the early 20th Century.

Caruso was baptized in the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo on Giordano's ''Fedora'', at the Teatro Lirico in Cilea's ''Adriana Lecouvreur''.
<div style="float:left;width:350px;">
<gallery>
Image:carusoO.jpg|The medal that Enrico Caruso gave to Pasquale Simonelli, his New York City impresario<br>'''Obverse:'''<br>Caruso facing left.<br>Lower right:<br> Salanto, medal maker’s signature. 
Image:carusoR.jpg|'''Reverse:'''<br>Music Muse with lira on the left,<br>over PER RICORDO (memento).
Around the rim:<br>TIFFANY & Co.  . GOLD Y <small>(<small>27 mm)</small></small>.
</gallery>
</div>

In 1903, with the help of his agent, the banker Verdi's ''Rigoletto''. The following year Caruso began his lifelong association with the Victor Talking-Machine Company; his star relationships with both the Metropolitan and Victor would last until 1920. Caruso himself commissioned Tiffany & Co. to produce a 24 carat gold medal with his profile, as a memento (PER RICORDO) for his friends of his Metropolitan performances.

In April 1906, Caruso and members of the Metropolitan Opera Company came to San Francisco to give a series of performances at the Tivoli Opera House.  The night after Caruso's performance in ''Carmen,'' the tenor was awakened in the early morning in his Palace Hotel suite by a strong jolt.  San Francisco had been hit by a major earthquake, which led to a series of fires that eventually destroyed most of the city.  The Metropolitan lost all of the sets and costumes it had brought.  Clutching an autographed photo of President Theodore Roosevelt, Caruso made an effort to get out of the city, first by boat and then by train, and vowed never to return to San Francisco; he kept his word.<ref>William Bronson, ''The Earth Shook, The Sky Burned''</ref>

On November 16, 1906, Caruso was charged with an indecent act committed in the monkey house of New York's Central Park Zoo. He was said to have pinched the bottom of a woman described as "pretty and plump", causing outrage amongst New York high society. Caruso claimed a monkey pinched the lady's bottom. Caruso was eventually found guilty before appeal, and fined 10 dollars. Later it came out that the woman was friends with the cop who arrested him and that the whole thing was a setup.

On Puccini's ''La fanciulla del West''.

In 1917, he was elected as an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, the national fraternity for men in music, by the fraternity's Alpha chapter at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.

In 1918 Caruso married Dorothy Park Benjamin, who was then aged 25, the daughter of an old-established New York family. They had one daughter, Gloria. Dorothy published two books about Caruso, one in 1928, the other in 1945, which includes many of his letters to her. 

In September 1920, Caruso recorded several discs in Victor's Trinity Church studio, including sacred music by Rossini; these recordings were his very last. On December 11, 1920, during the performance of ''Halévy's ''La Juive'', on December 24, 1920.

Caruso died in 1921 in Naples, at age 48. The cause of death was likely peritonitis, due to the bursting of an abscess. He is buried in an elaborate tomb at Naples. 
Caruso was portrayed by Mario Lanza in a highly fictionalized 1951 Hollywood film biography, ''The Great Caruso''. In 1987, Caruso was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

==Other==
<!--THIS AIN'T TRIVIA, BUT LIFE ANEDOCTES... IF YOU'RE GOING TO ADD REFERENCES IN ALBUMS, FILMS, ETC., RE-CREATE THE (DISCOURAGED) TRIVIA SECTION-->
*Caruso was the third of seven children born to the same parents and one of only three to survive infancy.  The myth of 17 or 18 dead children promulgated by biographers such as Francis Robinson and Pierre Key was proven false some years ago and may originally have been the result of a mistranscription as Caruso dictated his memoirs to Key for his official biography. When he was 18, he used fees earned by singing at an Italian resort to buy his first pair of shoes.  He is pictured wearing a bedsheet, draped like a toga, in his first publicity photograph because his only shirt was in the laundry.
*Caruso's birthplace in Naples, Via San Giovanella agli Ottocalli 7, still stands next to the church where he was baptized.  His remains were interred in a mausoleum at the cemetery of Santa Maria del Pianto.
*During a performance in Naples, early in his career, Caruso was booed by the audience because he ignored the custom of hiring a claque to cheer for him.  Afterwards, he said he would never again go to Naples to sing, but "only to eat spaghetti".
*Caruso performed in ''Carmen'' in Palace Hotel in San Francisco when the earthquake struck. His eyewitness account can be seen [http://www.sfmuseum.org/1906/ew19.html here].<ref>An account of the earthquake by Caruso's lifelong friend Antonio Scotti, including his observations of Caruso's behavior, is found in Pierre Key's biography of Caruso, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=TgktAAAAMAAJ&printsec=titlepage&source=gbs_summary_r Enrico Caruso: A Biography]'' free online at Google Books, pp. 228-229.</ref>
*At a performance of Puccini's ''La Boheme'', the basso on stage lost his voice and Caruso reputedly began to sing his aria "Vecchia zimarra" while the basso mouthed the song. His performance was so appreciated he even went to record it but later asked for it to be destroyed. This recording was recovered and has had several incarnations on LP, including a recital disc published by Club 99 in the 1970s (CL99-60).  
*Caruso's voice extended to the Tenor C in his prime but this note never came easily to him. Therefore, in his recordings of the tenor's Act I aria of Puccini's ''La Boheme'', the high C is replaced by high B {there is no high 'C' in the score it is a high 'B' - the 'C' is a personal interlop by a singer}
*While in Gounod's ''Faust'' he sings the high C of ''Salut demeure'' in a stylistically appropriate head (not chest) voice. This contrasts with the performances of these arias by, say, the young Jussi Björling, and others, who had naturally high-lying tenor voices which were less robust and golden-toned than Caruso's. .
*Since his death, numerous compilation albums of his work have been created.
*Enrico Caruso was said to be able to shatter a crystal goblet by singing a note of just the right frequency at full voice.

==Repertoire==

thumbnail|right|300px|Caruso signing his autograph
* ''L'Amico Francesco'' (Morelli) - Napoli, 15 March 1895 (Creation);
* ''Faust'' - Caserta, 28 March 1895;
* ''Cavalleria Rusticana'' - Caserta, April 1895;
* Camoens (Musoni)- Caserta, May 1895;
* ''Rigoletto'' - Napoli, 21 July 1895;
* ''La Traviata'' - Napoli, 25 August 1895;
* ''Lucia di Lammermoor'' - Cairo, 30 October 1895;
* ''La Gioconda'' - Cairo, 9 November 1895;
* ''Manon Lescaut'' - Cairo, 15 November 1895;
* ''I Capuleti e i Montecchi'' - Napoli, 7 December 1895;
* Malia - Trapani, 21 March 1896;
* ''La sonnambula'' - Trapani, 24 March 1896;
* Marriedda - Napoli, 23 June 1896;
* ''I puritani'' - Salerno, 10 September 1896;
* ''La Favorita'' - Salerno, 22 November 1896;
* A San Francisco - Salerno, 23 November 1896;
* ''Carmen'' - Salerno, 6 December 1896;
* Un Dramma in vendemmia - Napoli, 1 February 1897;
* Celeste - Napoli, 6 March 1897 (Creation);
* Il Profeta Velato - Salerno, 8 April 1897;
* ''La Bohème'' - Livorno, 14 August 1897;
* ''La Navarrese'' - Milano, 3 November 1897;
* Il Voto - Milano, 10 November 1897 (Creation);
* ''L'Arlesiana'' - Milano, 27 November 1897 (Creation);
* ''Pagliacci'' - Milano, 31 December 1897;
* ''La bohème'' (Leoncavallo) - Genova, 20 January 1898;
* ''The Pearl Fishers'' - Genova, 3 February 1898;
* Hedda - Milano, 2 April 1898 (Creation);
* ''Mefistofele'' - Fiume, 4 March 1898;
* Sapho - Trento, 3? June 1898;
* ''Fedora'' - Milano, 17 November 1898 (Creation);
* ''Iris'' - Buenos Aires, 22 June 1899;
* ''La Regina di Saba'' (Goldmark) - Buenos Aires, 4 July 1899;
* Yupanki - Buenos Aires, 25 July 1899;
* ''Aida'' - St. Petersburg, 3 January 1900;
* ''Un ballo in maschera'' - St. Petersburg, 11 January 1900;
* ''Maria di Rohan'' - St. Petersburg, 2 March 1900;
* ''Manon'' - Buenos Aires, 28 July 1900;
* ''Tosca'' - Treviso, 23 October 1900;
* Le Maschere - Milano, 17 January 1901 (Creation);
* ''L'elisir d'amore'' - Milano, 17 February 1901;
thumbnail|right|195px|Caruso's sketch of himself as Don José in ''[[Carmen'', 1904]]
* ''Lohengrin'' - Buenos Aires, 7 July 1901;
* Germania - Milano, 11 March 1902 (Creation);
* ''Don Giovanni'' - London, 19 July 1902;
* ''Adriana Lecouvreur'' - Milano, 6 November 1902 (Creation);
* ''Lucrezia Borgia'' - Lisboa, 10 March 1903;
* ''Les Huguenots'' - New York, 3 February 1905;
* ''Martha'' - New York, 9 February 1906;
* ''Carmen'' - San Francisco, 17 April 1906 (the night before the great earthquake after which Caruso vowed never to return to San Francisco)
* ''Madama Butterfly'' - London, 26 May 1906;
* ''L'Africana'' - New York, 11 January 1907;
* ''Andrea Chénier'' - London, 20 July 1907;
* ''Il Trovatore'' - New York, 26 February 1908;
* ''Armide'' - New York, 14 November 1910;
* ''La fanciulla del West'' - New York, 10 December 1910 (Creation);
* Julien - New York, 26 December 1914;
* ''Samson et Dalila'' - New York, 24 November 1916;
* ''Lodoletta'' - Buenos Aires, 29 July 1917;
* ''Le Prophète'' - New York, 7 February 1918;
* ''L'amore dei tre re'' - New York, 14 March 1918;
* ''La forza del destino'' - New York, 15 November 1918;
* ''La Juive'' - New York, 22 November 1919.

At the time of his death, the tenor was preparing the title role in Verdi's ''Otello''.<ref>[http://www.classical.net/music/comp.lst/works/verdi/otello/otinterp.html#Car Classical Net - Verdi - Famous Interpretors of Otello<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Though he never performed the role, he recorded two magnificent selections from the opera: Otello's aria, "Ora e per sempre addio," and the duet with Iago, "Sì, pel ciel marmoreo, giuro", where he is partnered by the magnificent baritone Titta Ruffo.

Caruso also had a repertoire of some 521 songs, ranging from classical to traditional Italian folk songs and popular songs of the day. The most often purchased song by Caruso at itunes is the Neapolitan sailor's song Santa Lucia and the universally famous song 'O Sole Mio.

==Recordings==
Caruso was one of the first star vocalists to make numerous recordings. He and the disc Leoncavallo's ''Pagliacci'' was the world's first gramophone record to sell a million copies . Many of Caruso's recordings have remained in print since their original issue a century ago.