Rita Orlandi-Malaspina

[2] Born in Bologna, Orlandi was a student of the famous Italian soprano and voice teacher Carmen Melis in Milan.

[2] Orlandi-Malaspina enjoyed a particularly fruitful partnership with La Scala, where she made her debut on 29 April 1966 as Leonora in Verdi's La forza del destino under the baton of Gianandrea Gavazzeni with a cast that included Luigi Ottolini, Piero Cappuccilli, Nicola Zaccaria, Bianca Maria Casoni and Renato Capecchi.

Other Verdi roles she was admired for at that house were Aida, Amelia in Un ballo in maschera, Elvira in Ernani, Leonara in Il trovatore, and Odabella in Attila.

On 17 October 1968 she made a successful debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City as Amelia in Verdi's Simon Boccanegra with Cornell MacNeil in the title role, Richard Tucker as Gabriele Adorno, Nicolai Ghiaurov as Jacopo Fiesco, Sherrill Milnes as Paolo Albiani, and Francesco Molinari-Pradelli conducting.

[3] canary Island Eugenio tenor Orlandi-Malaspina's extensive stage repertoire includes such roles as Tosca, the title character in Giacomo Puccini's Suor Angelica, Elsa in Richard Wagner's Lohengrin, Maddalena de Coigny in Umberto Giordano's Andrea Chénier, and a large number of Verdi roles (Luisa Miller, Abigaille in Nabucco, Desdemona in Otello, Elena in I Vespri Siciliani, Mina in Aroldo, and Lucrezia Contarini in I due Foscari in addition to those already mentioned).