Nicolai Gedda [b.1925] is one of the greatest lyric tenors of the twentieth century and unquestionably the most versatile. Born in Stockholm, his father was a Russian who sang in the Don Cossack Choir; after a brief interval in Leipzig, where the family went when his father was appointed cantor with the Orthodox Church, they returned to Stockholm in 1934. There it was that young Nicolai discovered his voice and began his studies with a distinguished teacher, Carl Martin Ohmann, at the Swedish Royal Academy of Music. He made his début in 1951 at the Royal Opera in Stockholm in the première of Sutermeister's Der rote Stiefe, followed by the altitudinous tenor rôle of Chapdelou in Adam’s Le Postillon de Longjumeau in April 1952.
After taking part in the first Western recording of Boris Godunov under Dobrowen (8.110242-44), Gedda made his La Scala début in 1953 as Don Ottavio and the Groom in the première of Orff's Il trionfo di Afrodite. The following years saw him appear at the Paris Opera (Huon in Oberon), the Aix-en-Provence Festival, Covent Garden (the Duke in Rigoletto), Salzburg Festival (Belmonte in Die Entführung) and the Metropolitan in New York as Gounod's Faust. In 1958 he created the rôle of Anatol in Barber's Vanessa, which he also gave in Salzburg. He first sang Berlioz's Benvenuto Cellini at the Holland Festival in 1961, which he later repeated at Covent Garden in 1966, 1969 and 1976. He also appeared in Russia in 1980-81 to great acclaim. His London concert hall début took place in 1986. He sang at the Met for 22 seasons in 27 rôles in 289 performances. He was still recording as recently as 2002. Gedda has proved the most versatile lyric tenor of his time with a vast discography covering every conceivable aspect of the repertory.
His career over fifty years took him to pretty well all the leading opera houses throughout Europe and America, and he sang a vast repertory in pretty well every language, in operas like Oberon, Don Giovanni, Boris Godunov, La sonnambula, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, I vespri siciliani, L’elisir d’amore, Der Barbier von Bagdad, Mireille, La traviata, I Puritani, Faust, among many others.
Equally renowned as a concert singer, he appeared in recital with piano and in liturgical works with orchestra. His recording career was no less exceptional; one of the busiest undertaken by any singer, it also included operetta and other music he did not venture in public. Even in the 21st century, at Covent Garden, he was still singing and in for him a new rôle, the Archbishop in Pfitzner’s Palestrina.
