Walfredo Toscanini is the son of Walter Toscanini, the only surviving
son of conductor Arturo Toscanini. He holds a Masters degree
in architecture from the Yale School of Art and Architecture, and
practiced as an architect in the New York area until 2007. Among his
projects, while working for Harrison and Abramowitz in the 1960s,
were plans for Philharmonic Hall and the Metropolitan Opera House
at Lincoln Center. Mr. Toscanini has continued his father’s work
preserving and promoting his grandfather’s legacy in both videos and
recordings.
Harvey Sachs, writer and music historian, has published nine books,
including Toscanini (1978) Rubinstein (1995), Music in Fascist Italy
1988), Virtuoso (1982), Reflections on Toscanini (1991), The Letters of
Arturo Toscanini (2002), and most recently, The Ninth: Beethoven and
the World in 1824. He has also co-authored the memoirs of Plácido
Domingo (My First Forty Years, 1983) and Sir Georg Solti (Memoirs,
1997). He has been a Guggenheim Fellow and a Fellow of the New
York Public Library’s Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, and
he has been awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities
fellowship for 2010-11 in order to produce a completely new
biography of Toscanini that will make use of all the information that
has emerged since the 1978 version was published.
David Rosen, Professor Emeritus of Music at Cornell University,
specializes in Italian opera of the 19th and early 20th centuries,
though he has research interests in Mozart concerti, grand opéra,
and film music as well. He edited Verdi’s Messa da Requiem in the
Works of Giuseppe Verdi and wrote the Cambridge Music Handbook
about the composition. More recent work includes a study of the
contemporary staging manual (disposizione scenica) of Verdi’s Un
ballo in maschera, a co-edited Festschrift for Andrew Porter, essays
about Verdi, Puccini, the Italian censorship of La muta di Portici, and a
1942 British documentary film.
Simonetta Puccini, daughter of the composer’s son Antonio, is
the only direct descendant of Giacomo. After taking her degree
in literature at the University of Milan, she taught literary subjects
(Latin, Italian, history and geography) in the Italian school system.
In 1973, she gave up teaching to devote herself to fostering
understanding of her grandfather and his work. In 1979 she founded
the Institute of Puccini Studies, which has now become La Fondazione
Simonetta Puccini – Istituto di Studi Pucciniani; in 1996, she also
created the Association Friends of the Homes of Giacomo Puccini.
Ms. Puccini has edited five volumes of the journal Studi pucciniani,
published numerous articles and prepared many exhibitions,
including Puccini e i pittori, Puccini a Milano, and The Puccini Family.
supported by
The Boston University Humanities Foundation
and The Licia Albanese Puccini Foundation
“FANCIULLA DEL WEST”
a Symposium honoring the Centenary of
the World Premiere of Giacomo Puccini’s
Celebrating Puccini
Fanciulla 100:
present
BOSTON UNIVERSITY
Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center
and the College of Fine Arts