Operatic career:
Born Alfredo Arnold Cocozza in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he was exposed to opera and singing at a young age, and by the age of 16 his vocal talent became apparent. Starting out in local operatic productions in Philadelphia, he later came to the attention of conductor Serge Koussevitzky, who provided young Cocozza with a full student scholarship to the Berkshire Music Festival at Tanglewood in Massachusetts. Koussevitzky would later tell Lanza that, "Yours is a voice such as is heard once in a hundred years."
His operatic debut, as Fenton in Otto Nicolai's The Merry Wives of Windsor, was at Tanglewood on August 7, 1942, after just six weeks of study with conductors Boris Goldovsky and Leonard Bernstein. It was here that Cocozza adopted his stage name from his mother Maria's maiden name of Lanza. His performances at Tanglewood won him critical acclaim, with Noel Straus of The New York Times hailing the 21-year-old tenor as having "few equals among tenors of the day in terms of quality, warmth, and power."
His operatic career was interrupted by World War II, when he was assigned to Special Services in the U.S. Army Air Corps. He appeared on the wartime shows On the Beam and Winged Victory while in the Air Corps.
He resumed his singing career in October 1945 on the CBS radio program Great Moments in Music, where he made six appearances singing various operatic selections. He later studied under Enrico Rosati for fifteen months, then embarked on an 86-concert tour of the United States, Canada and Mexico between July 1947 and May 1948 with George London and Frances Yeend. In April 1948, he sang Pinkerton in the New Orleans Opera's Madama Butterfly. A concert at the Hollywood Bowl brought Lanza to the attention of MGM's Louis B. Mayer, who signed Lanza to a seven-year film contract with Metro Goldwyn Mayer. This would prove to be a turning point in the young singer's career.
Film career:
MGM's contract with Lanza required him to commit to the studio for six months, and at first Lanza was able to combine his film career with his operatic one, singing two acclaimed performances as Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly for the New Orleans Opera Association in April 1948. He also continued to perform in concert, both in solo appearances and as part of the Bel Canto Trio with George London and Frances Yeend. In May 1949, he made his first commercial recordings with RCA Victor. However, his first two films, That Midnight Kiss and The Toast of New Orleans, were very successful, as was his recording career, and Lanza's fame increased dramatically.
In 1951, Lanza portrayed Enrico Caruso in The Great Caruso, which proved to be an astonishing success. At the same time, his popularity exposed Lanza to intense criticism by music critics, including those who had praised his work years earlier.
In 1954, Lanza was dismissed by MGM after he had pre-recorded the songs for The Student Prince. The film was subsequently made with actor Edmund Purdom miming to Lanza's vocals. During this period Lanza came very close to bankruptcy as a result of poor investment decisions made by his former manager. Owing about $250,000 in back taxes to the IRS, Lanza withdrew from the public eye for a time.
Mario Lanza at home.He returned to an active film career in 1956 in Serenade; despite its strong musical content, it was not as successful as his previous films. Lanza then moved to Rome, Italy in May 1957, where he worked on the film Seven Hills of Rome and returned to live performing in a series of acclaimed concerts throughout Britain, Ireland and the European Continent. In early 1958, he auditioned for the management of La Scala in Milan, and was immediately offered a minimum two-year contract to sing at that theatre. The opera initially discussed was Puccini's Tosca. Later that year, Lanza also agreed to open the 1960/61 season at the Rome Opera as Canio in Pagliacci. At the same time, however, his health began to decline, with the tenor suffering from a variety of ailments, including phlebitis and acute high blood pressure. The following year, in April 1959, Lanza suffered a minor heart attack, followed by double pneumonia in August. He died in Rome in October of that year at the age of 38 from a pulmonary embolism. His widow moved back to Hollywood with their four children and died of a drug overdose five months later; the younger of their two sons died of a heart attack at the age of 37. When Lanza died rumors spread that the notorious mob boss Lucky Luciano (Salvatore Luciano) had had him killed after he refused to perform for him but those rumors quickly died down because they simply were not true. Soprano Maria Callas would later say of him, "My biggest regret is not to have had the opportunity to sing with the greatest tenor voice I've ever heard."
Lanza's short career covered opera, radio, concerts, recordings, and motion pictures. He was the first artist for RCA Victor Red Seal to receive a gold disc. He was also the first artist to sell two and half million albums. A highly influential artist, Lanza has been credited with inspiring the careers of successive generations of opera singers, including Plácido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti, Leo Nucci and Jose Carreras, as well as those of singers with seemingly different backgrounds, and influences, his RCA Victor label-mate Elvis Presley being the most notable example. In 1994, tenor José Carreras paid tribute to Lanza in a worldwide concert tour, saying of him, "If I'm an opera singer, it's thanks to Mario Lanza."
Night And Day
Mario Lanza Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Of the tom-tom;
When the jungle shadows fall,
Like the tick, tick, tock
Of the stately clock,
As it stands against the wall,
Like the drip, drip, drip,
Of the raindrops,
So a voice within me
Keeps repeating,
You, you, you
Night and day
You are the one,
Only you
Beneath the moon
And under the sun.
Whether near to me or far,
It's no matter,
Darling, where you are
I think of you
Night and day.
Day and night
Why is it so,
That this longing for you follows
Where-ever I go?
In the roaring traffic's boom,
In the silence of my lonely room,
I think of you,
Night and day.
Night and day
Under the hide of me
There's an
Oh, such a hungry yearning,
Burning inside of me.
And its torment won't be through
Til you let me spend my life
Making love to you,
Day and night,
Night and day.
The lyrics to Mario Lanza's "Night and Day" are a poetic expression of intense feelings of longing and desire for someone who occupies the singer's thoughts both day and night. The imagery in the first stanza creates a sense of rhythm and repetition that mimics the steady beating of a tom-tom and the ticking of a clock. The raindrops, too, fall with a steady drip that echoes the refrain of "you, you, you" that the singer can't shake from his mind.
The second stanza of the song reinforces the idea that the object of the singer's desire is constantly on his mind, day and night, no matter where he goes. Even in the midst of the noise of traffic or the quiet of his own room, he can't escape the longing for this person. The final stanza brings the intensity of the emotion to a climax, with the lyrics describing a "hungry yearning, burning inside" the singer that won't be satisfied until he can spend his life making love "day and night, night and day" with this person.
Line by Line Meaning
Like the beat, beat, beat,
Of the tom-tom;
Similar to the rhythmic beats of a tom-tom, there is something inside of me that persists and beats repetitively.
When the jungle shadows fall,
Like the tick, tick, tock
Of the stately clock,
As it stands against the wall,
Just like the sounds emanating from a ticking clock on the wall when night falls in the jungle, there is an insistent ticking inside of me.
Like the drip, drip, drip,
Of the raindrops,
When the summer show'r is through;
Just like the sound of raindrops dripping down after a summer shower ends, a voice in me echoes persistently.
So a voice within me
Keeps repeating,
You, you, you
There is a voice inside of me that keeps repeating your name: You, You, You.
Night and day
You are the one,
Only you
Beneath the moon
And under the sun.
Day and night, you are the one that I am thinking of. You are unique and one-of-a-kind, someone who is with me at all times.
Whether near to me or far,
It's no matter,
Darling, where you are
I think of you
Night and day.
It does not matter where you are, whether close or far away, because at all times day and night, I am thinking of you.
Day and night
Why is it so,
That this longing for you follows
Where-ever I go?
Why is it that this intense longing for you follows me wherever I go, be it day or night?
In the roaring traffic's boom,
In the silence of my lonely room,
I think of you,
Night and day.
Be it in the deafening noise of traffic or the quiet lonely room, I am always thinking of you, day and night.
Night and day
Under the hide of me
There's an
Oh, such a hungry yearning,
Burning inside of me.
Even under my skin, there's an insatiable yearning burning red-hot within me, day and night.
And its torment won't be through
Til you let me spend my life
Making love to you,
Day and night,
Night and day.
This tormented heart of mine won't be satisfied until the day you give in and let me spend the rest of my life making love to you, regardless of whether it's day or night.
Lyrics © Roba Music Verlag GMBH, Red Brick Music Publishing, BMG Rights Management, Universal Music Publishing Group, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd., Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Cole Porter
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Francisco Fernandes
I love Cole Porter music , this particular interpretation by Mário Lanza, is marvelous and one cannot get any better.
Loretta Arzaga
kevin JONES what ?!? I must listen to THAT version. .thank you for heads up..idk why I don't already know of this.
kevin JONES
Francisco, have you ever heard the Javier Solis version in Spanish? It's from his album "Javier Solis en Nueva York," and it called Noche y Día. I love this version, too, but Javier's version is so suevecita! You can find it here on yt.
Susana Marquez
Spectacular voice and a wonderful song.
Vanilla Bean
THIS VERSION IS AWESOME - now one of my favorites.
Roy Bodden
I always had a problem with Mario Lanza. Was he a pop singer who could sing opera or an opera singer who could sing pop songs. No other opera singer excelled in singing pop songs like Mario. What a magnificent voice!
Dave Greene
@Bryan Pabustan
The Three Tenors and others credited Mario with inspiring them.
Bryan Pabustan
I guess, it is safe to say he was a crossover artist through and through. In fact I can confidently say he IS the very first crossover artist. While his roots are Bel Canto opera, he sadly had very little experience in the opera stage. And his career is mostly the movies. Also a bulk of his recordings are by contemporary composers like this one from Cole Porter. It's a wonder someone like Lanza can sing a jazz standard. Yes I agree, he was and STILL IS magnificent! Golly he is still picking up new fans. I am so sure any upcoming opera singer especially tenors have at least learned some stuff from him.
Giovanna Magliaretta
Hermosísima version. Magnifica interpretación de este gran tenor.....!
orchardist65
Two fabulous people Mario and the composer Cole Porter. Thank you.