Mario Filippeschi was born on 7 June 1907 at Montefoscoli, a small town in the province of Pisa, Tuscany, the fourth son of Silvestro, farmer, and Palmira Benvenuti, housewife. He spent his childhood in the serenity of the Tuscan valley. Although opera was a very popular pastime in that period, it had no meaningful place within the Filippeschi family, Montefoscoli being a small town out of reach of even small operatic companies. Mario’s contact with singing was limited to the church choir, which accompanied religious functions during the festivities. At the age of seventeen, he studied the clarinet for two years and at twenty joined military service lasting three years. Mario used to take the stage and sing Tuscan songs with great acclaim by his military companions and superiors. It was during this time that the young soldier became convinced that he had a voice to consider seriously.

One day after military discharge, Mario read a newspaper announcement that Mr. Vicidomini, a Neapolitan teacher, prepared in Milan young singers for their debut on the operatic stage. After an audition, Vicidomini offered Mario a series of singing lessons free of charge. For five long years, the teacher, a perfectionist, restricted his pupil to voice development through exercises and vocalizations, with particular attention to top notes, which were easy and brilliant by nature. Suddenly, Vicidomini, left without enough pupils because of his mania for perfectionism, transferred from Milan to Rome, at the Vatican, to teach singing to the Swiss guards. Filippeschi turned then to another teacher, Mr. Pessina, begging him to teach him operatic scores for a possible stage debut. Some choir members of the Teatro alla Scala heard the young tenor and recommended him to an impresario who was organizing an opera season in various Italian provinces. The impresario engaged Filippeschi for the role of Edgardo in the opera Lucia di Lammermoor.

Mario Filippeschi made his operatic debut as a lyric tenor on 19 July 1937 at Colorno, near Parma, in the Donizetti’s opera. It was a success. He was thirty years of age. The local paper reviewed the new tenor performance as follows: The tenor Mario Filippeschi sustained the role of Edgardo with great honour and gave rise to prolonged applauses. He distinguished himself particularly in the curse scene and the aria “Tu che a Dio spiegasti l’ali”. The following day, again as a lyric tenor, he sang the role of the Duke of Mantua in Rigoletto. More significantly, he repeated the role on 24 July 1937 co-starring the legendary Lina Pagliughi as Gilda, in the main square of Busseto, Piazza Verdi, and the Corriere Emiliano had this to say: The tenor Filippeschi gave proof of excellent vocal qualities and as a beginner he has a brilliant artistic future ahead of him. Mario Filippeschi continued his ascendancy to notoriety with other debut roles in the lyric repertory: Pinkerton in Butterfly, Rodolfo in Boheme, Alfredo in Traviata and Faust in Mefistofele. At the beginning, his voice had a silvery timbre with easy passage to squilli but limited volume. As performances kept increasing, Filippeschi’s instrument began to develop; yet, he was wise not to take advantage of a more robust voice and kept himself within the extreme limits of lirico-spinto roles in Adriana Lecouvreur and, specially, Tosca, making his debut in both operas in early 1940.

He was in Spain on tour for the first time in early June 1940 when Italy entered World War II. He found refuge at Bursajot, near Valencia (Spain), as a guest of Lauri-Volpi’s home, where the two tenors got better acquainted. He returned to Italy after a grueling trip through France. He met Anna Pucci, the very young daughter of a leather goods proprietor, in March 1942 at La Spezia and married her a few months later in Genova. In the same year, he sang Pinkerton at the Rome Opera House in the presence of the Japanese Emperor Hiro Hito. During the war years, he toured Greece, Spain and Germany in difficult times and through many perils. Twice in 1944, the Germans and Italian black brigades arrested him in Liguria. In both cases, the captors immediately released him after hearing him sing in order to establish his identity. His voice saved him both times!

The years 1945 and 1946 were the turning point in the Tuscan tenor‘s repertory with debuts in Cavalleria and Aida. His voice, maintaining the initial clarity of timbre and extension, had acquired substance in the middle register and volume. The progressive approach to heroic and dramatic roles was, therefore, a natural consequence to his instrument’s maturity.

After the war, between 1946 and 1950, Filippeschi toured Portugal, Spain, where he was extremely popular, well paid and acclaimed as one the greatest tenors of the period, South America and Mexico. At Al Palacio De Bellas Artes, Filippeschi earned the greatest accolades of his career, starting with a famous Tosca co-starring Maria Callas. The Mexican public showed themselves very warm and enthusiastic. They paid tribute to the singers in a very unusual way. At the end of the performance, they showered the stage with confetti, thrown from all parts of the theatre. This is what El Redondel had to say: Mario Filippeschi is the prototype of Italian tenors, born to sing opera. He has a beautiful voice under easy command and he feels the music. “Recondita armonia” was excellent although there was no applause. “E lucevan le stelle” was magnificent and he encored it amidst enthusiastic applause by the audience. Filippeschi sang the first act duet with great participation and interpreted with efficacy the dramatic moments of the second act.