Leo Slezak

Early years

Born in Šumperk (then known as Mährisch-Schönberg), the son of a miller, Slezak worked briefly as a blacksmith,^[4] an engineer's fitter and served in the army before taking singing lessons with the first-class baritone and pedagogue Adolf Robinson. He made his debut in 1896 in Brno (Brünn) and proceeded to sing leading roles in Bohemia and Germany, appearing at Breslau and, in 1898–99, at Berlin. From 1901 onwards he was a permanent member of the Vienna State Opera's roster of artists, achieving star status. While in Vienna he was initiated into Freemasonry.^[5]

International career

Slezak's international career commenced in London at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, where he sang Siegfried (a punishing role that he would soon drop from his repertoire) and Lohengrin in 1900. (He would return to Covent Garden in 1909 after undertaking further vocal studies in Paris the previous year with a great tenor of a previous era, Jean de Reszke.)

Slezak secured a three-year contract with the New York Metropolitan Opera in 1909. Met audiences acclaimed him in performances of works by Wagner and Verdi. Along with Italy's Giovanni Zenatello, he became one of the most famous Otellos of his generation, famously performing the role at the Met with Arturo Toscanini conducting.

Many anecdotes reveal his sense of humour. The best-known being, during a performance of Wagner's Lohengrin, a stage hand pulled the swan off the stage too early, before the tenor could hop aboard. Seeing his feathered transportation disappear into the wings, Slezak ad-libbed to the audience: "Wann fährt der nächste Schwan?" ("When does the next swan leave?").

Slezak had a versatile repertory, which embraced 66 roles. They included Rossini's Guillaume Tell, Manrico, Radames, Walter, Tannhäuser, Hermann, as well as Otello and Lohengrin. He sang 44 roles in Vienna alone, where he made 936 stage appearances in 1901–12 and 1917–27 and gained considerable fame.

Vocal characteristics

A tall, barrel-chested man, Slezak possessed a large and attractive lyric-dramatic voice which enabled him to undertake all but the very heaviest Wagnerian parts such as Tristan or Parsifal. He had a distinctive tonal quality, which became markedly darker after his studies with de Reszke in 1908. Slezak was a master of mezza-voce singing and he could also deliver haunting head notes. With time and hard use, his top register developed a strained and unsteady quality when used at full volume.

He made hundreds of disc and cylinder recordings, beginning in the early 1900s and ending in the 1930s. They were produced by several different record companies and include arias, duets and songs by a wide selection of composers, ranging from Mozart to Wagner. Most of his best records have been released on CD compilations. Some of his film work as an actor survives as well.