Valesi, Giovanni (real name, Johann Evangelist Walleshauser)

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Valesi, Giovanni (real name, Johann Evangelist Walleshauser)

Valesi, Giovanni (real name, Johann Evangelist Walleshauser), German tenor and singing teacher; b. Unterhattenhofen, Upper Bavaria, April 28, 1735; d. Munich, Jan. 10, 1816. He was a student of Placius von Camerloher. After briefly singing as a bass, he became a tenor and was a court singer to the Prince-Bishop Johann Theodor of Freising and Liège (1754-56) and subsequently to Duke Clemens in Munich. From 1770 to 1798 he was a leading member of the Munich Court Opera. He also sang in Amsterdam and Brussels (1755), Italy (from 1758), where he adopted the name Giovanni Valesi, and Prague, Dresden, and Berlin (1777-78). Valesi was chosen to create the role of the High Priest of Neptune in Mozart’s Idomeneoin Munich on Jan. 29, 1781. Among his numerous pupils were five of his own children, as well as such notable musicians as Carl Maria von Weber and Valentin Adamberger.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire

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