Stefan Zucker as Salvini in the world premiere of Bellini’s fourth version of Adelson e Salvini, at The Town Hall in New York City, September 12, 1972. In this performance he sang an A above high C, for which the Guinness Book of World Records named him “The World’s Highest Tenor.” In ad-dition to the A he also sang two G-naturals, five F-naturals, nine E-natu-rals, six E-flats, four D-sharps, 31 D-naturals, one D-flat and six C-sharps above high C as well as 51 high Cs. In some performances of “A tanto duol...Ascolta, o padre i gemiti” from Bellini’s Bianca e Fernando he interpolat-ed not only an A but also a sustained B-flat above high C.

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Stefan Zucker appears in ten films: Bella Figura, aka Müssen Sänger dick sein (with Plácido Domingo, Nathan Gunn, Renata Scotto, Sha-ron Sweet, Deborah Voigt and Anthony Tommasini, Marieke Schro-eder, director), Aïda’s Brother’s and Sister’s: Black Voices in Opera and Concert (with Grace Bumbry, Simon Estes, Barbara Hendricks, Reri Grist, George Shirley, Shirley Verrett, Camilla Williams and Bobby McFerrin, Jan Schmidt-Garre and Marieke Schroeder, directors), Opera Fanatic: Stefan and the Divas (with Iris Adami Corradetti, Fe-dora Barbieri, Anita Cerquetti, Gina Cigna, Gigliola Frazzoni, Car-la Gavazzi, Leyla Gencer, Magda Olivero, Marcella Pobbe and Gi-ulietta Simionato, Jan Schmidt-Garre, director) and the series The Tenors of the 78 Era, aka Die Tenöre der Schellackzeit, including the films Caruso, Schipa, Gigli, Slezak, McCormack, Schmidt and The Gramophone—in which he sings as well as talks. Stefan is principal English-language commentator. (Others include Alan Bilgora, Iris Adami Corradetti, Rodolfo Celletti, Anita Cerquetti, Will Crutch-field, Rina Gigli, Jürgen Kesting, Magda Olivero, Michael Scott, Gi-ulietta Simionato, John Steane and Robert Tuggle, Jan Schmidt-Garre, director. Stefan interviews Adami Corradetti, Cerquetti, Rina Gigli, Olivero and Simionato for the Gigli film.) Stefan has lectured on the history of singing at the Mannes Col-lege of Music and the Museum of Modern Art (New York). He is the author of The Origins of Modern Tenor Singing (Bel Canto Soci-ety, 1997) and more than 650 articles and reviews in American Record Guide, Globe & Mail, International Dictionary of Opera, Opera News,

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The Opera Quarterly, Professione Musica and many other publications as well as on the Bel Canto Society website. He is the producer of more than 1,000 LPs, videos, CDs and DVDs and is the president of Bel Canto Society. He was the editor of Opera Fanatic magazine and hosted the ra-dio program “Opera Fanatic,” on the Columbia University radio sta-tion, on which he interviewed guests ranging from Lorenzo Alva-ry, Francisco Araiza, Klara Barlow, Carlo Bergonzi, Bianca Berini, Grace Bumbry, Nedda Casei, John Cheek, Giuliano Ciannella, Franco Corelli (11 times), Eugenio Fernandi, Salvatore Fisichella, Marisa Galvany, Dénes Gulyás, Aage Haugland, Jerome Hines (12 times), Rita Hunter, Alfredo Kraus, Kathleen Kuhlmann, Theodore Lambrinos, Franz Mazura, Adelaide Negri, Leo Nucci, Ticho Par-ly, Claudia Pinza, Louis Quilico, Nicola Rossi Lemeni, Bidú Sayão, Maria Spacagna, Cheryl Studer, Ferruccio Tagliavini, Gabriella Tucci and Virginia Zeani to Schuyler Chapin, Carlo Felice Cillar-io, John W. Freeman, Rudy Giuliani (most famously), Laszlo Halasz, Albert Innaurato, Arthur Kaptainis, Charles Ludlam, Ethan Mord-

With Magda Olivero during a break in the filming of Opera Fanatic, Oc-tober 1996

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den, Henry Pleasants, Everett Quinton, Ira Siff, Stephen Simon, Jo-hannes Somary, Frederic Spotts, Richard Woitach, Bill Zakariasen and many others. Stefan appeared five times in An Evening in the Theater With Franco Corelli and Stefan Zucker. He is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as “The World’s Highest Tenor.” He performed a number of times each in New York City’s Avery Fisher Hall, Florence Gould Hall, The Danny Kaye Playhouse, Merkin Concert Hall, The Town Hall and at Columbia and Harvard Universities and gave a seven-concert tour of Roma-nia under the auspices of the U.S. Department of State and the Ro-manian Government. Among singers with whom he has sung in ga-las are Lucine Amara, Russell Christopher, Jerome Hines, Theodore Lambrinos, Ronald Naldi, Adelaide Negri and Arturo Sergi. He has sung on ABC-TV, NBC-TV and RAI-TV—a highlight was an ex-cerpt from I puritani, with Rosina Wolf, on L’altra Domenica (Ita-ly’s 60 Minutes, four hours long), hosted by Isabella Rossellini. He has appeared extensively on radio stations up and down the East and West coasts—highlights include three installments of “The Lis-tening Room,” hosted by Bob Sherman on WQXR—and on RAI-

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radio, seven installments of “La barcaccia” (one with Corelli), host-ed by Enrico Stinchelli and Michele Suozzo. He was under contract for five years to RCA Records and recorded the album Stefan Zuck-er: The World’s Highest Tenor. Through a teacher-to-teacher genealo-gy he traces his vocal technique back to Giovanni Battista Rubini and Giacomo David—hence his tone quality and extended range. After studies at a number of conservatories in the US and Eu-rope he obtained a Bachelor of Science in philosophy from Colum-bia University and completed the course work for the Ph.D. in that subject, at New York University. He was president of the NYU Phi-losophy Association for four years. While a graduate student he taught philosophy at several New York area colleges. His principal philosophical interests are epistemology, logical empiricism and the philosophy of Rudolf Carnap.

Interviewing Leyla Gencer during the filming of Opera Fanatic, La Sca-la, October 1996.SZ: The other divas were against using chest voice. LG: This from them who used chest voice all their lives! They have short memories.

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