[Tuoksu]

How many similar names can you think of? Examples below:

Francesco Albanese and Licia Albanese
Maria Galvany and Marisa Galvany
Margaret Price and Leontyne Price
Lilli Lehmann and Lotte Lehmann
Battistini and Bastianini
Pons and Ponselle
De Lucia and De Luca
Scacciati and Stracciari

 

[davidglasgow]

When I was just learning about different opera singers , a few names sounded very much alike to me even though the voices were so different e.g. Tagliabue and Tagliavini, Taddei and Tozzi, Bonci/Borgioli/Bergonzi as well as Smirnov and Sobimov.

I think Alan Blyth mentioned the Italian sopranos whose names might be mixed up e.g. Sciutti + Scotto + Moffo (Millo could be there as well)

 

[SixFootScowl]

Margherita Carosio and Enrico Caruso.

 

[The Conte]

I often do a double take when I see the names of Francesco Meli (a tenor singing today) and the incomparable tenor Francesco MeRli. Both Tenors and only one letter different.

N.

 

[Tuoksu]

When I was just learning about different opera singers , a few names sounded very much alike to me even though the voices were so different e.g. Tagliabue and Tagliavini, Taddei and Tozzi, Bonci/Borgioli/Bergonzi as well as Smirnov and Sobimov.

I think Alan Blyth mentioned the Italian sopranos whose names might be mixed up e.g. Sciutti + Scotto + Moffo (Millo could be there as well)

Margherita Carosio and Enrico Caruso.

I often do a double take when I see the names of Francesco Meli (a tenor singing today) and the incomparable tenor Francesco MeRli. Both Tenors and only one letter different.

N.

How could I forget these?? Great entries!

 

[Bellinilover]

Has anyone ever noticed how a number of the names in the "American baritone line" are almost comically similar? I mean, there's...

Mack Harrell
Robert Merrill
Cornell MacNeil
Sherrill Milnes

A lot of double "l"'s and rhyming in there! Moreover, even Lawrence Tibbett, Leonard Warren and Quinn Kelsey all have double letters in their names.

Incidentally, Robert Merrill made his stage name by, basically, switching around the letters in his real last name, "Miller" (which was in turn derived from "Milstein"; his real first name was "Moishe"), and Leonard Warren's real last name was "Warenoff." Sherrill Milnes' first name is actually the last name of an Episcopal bishop his father admired: Reverend Henry Knox Sherrill.

 

[Bellinilover]

When I was just learning about different opera singers , a few names sounded very much alike to me even though the voices were so different e.g. Tagliabue and Tagliavini, Taddei and Tozzi, Bonci/Borgioli/Bergonzi as well as Smirnov and Sobimov.

I think Alan Blyth mentioned the Italian sopranos whose names might be mixed up e.g. Sciutti + Scotto + Moffo (Millo could be there as well)

J.B. Steane mentioned that second point, too (he may have been quoting Alan Blyth).

 

[Bellinilover]

Richard Tucker and Richard Tauber
Leontyne Price and Leona Mitchell
June Anderson and Joan Sutherland

 

[SixFootScowl]

Worse is when an opera singer can be confused by name with a pop singer"

Ann Murray (Irish mezzo opera singer born in 1949)

Anne Murray (Canadian pop and country singer born in 1945)

 

[BBSVK]

Mario del Monaco and Jose Maria lo Monaco
The siblings Peter, Miroslav and Pavol Dvorsky

 

[gsdkfasdf]

Not even classical musicians...but I mentioned Audrey Luna to a friend who was confused and asked me if she was a pop singer. Then he corrected himself and was like "oh I was thinking of Audrey Nuna" 😂

 

[nina foresti]

Opolais-Oropesa

 

[ColdGenius]

Olga Borodina (lyric mezzo), Tatiana Borodina (soprano).

 

[The Conte]

Maria Galvany and Marisa Galvany

You mean these are two different people?

🤭

There's Ferruccio Tagliavini and Roberto Tagliavini.
And moving away from singers and onto characters, what about those similarly named bel canto heroines: Adina and Amina? Elivira is a character in I Puritani, Ernani and Don Giovanni. Rodolfo is the hero of both Luisa Miller and La Boheme. And let's not get into all those English queens, Elisabetta di Whatnot anyone?

N.

 

[The Conte]

Olga Borodina (lyric mezzo), Tatiana Borodina (soprano).

And then the male form of this surname, Borodin, is, of course the composer of the opera Prince Igor.

N.

 

[ColdGenius]

And then the male form of this surname, Borodin, is, of course the composer of the opera Prince Igor.

N.

😄 He didn't leave descendants. And these two are not relatives.

 

[ColdGenius]

You mean these are two different people?

🤭

There's Ferruccio Tagliavini and Roberto Tagliavini.
And moving away from singers and onto characters, what about those similarly named bel canto heroines: Adina and Amina? Elivira is a character in I Puritani, Ernani and Don Giovanni. Rodolfo is the hero of both Luisa Miller and La Boheme. And let's not get into all those English queens, Elisabetta di Whatnot anyone?

N.

Most Spanish girls in operas are called Leonora.

 

[MAS]

Most Spanish girls in operas are called Leonora.

Even Fidelio is really called Leonore.

 

[BBSVK]

Most Spanish girls in operas are called Leonora.

And their confidantes are called Inez.

 

[Seattleoperafan]

Speech to text: Maria Callus