Discover Top Posts Tagged with #mario lanza

Rita Moreno-Mario Lanza "Las redes del amor" (The toast of New Orleans) 1950, de Norman Taurog.

#Rita Moreno #Mario Lanza #Norman Taurog

Ann Blyth and Mario Lanza publicity stills for THE GREAT CARUSO (Richard Thorpe, 1951)

#ann blyth #mario lanza #classic movies

CUNTY VINTAGE DIVA TOURNEY - ROUND ONE

Tim Curry

Mario Lanza

Voting ended onAug 14, 2025

Vote for the artist you think is the cuntiest of all (or of the two.)

Tim Curry (1946-) solo - primarily an actor Songs: "Sweet Transvestite," "Brontosaurus" Propaganda: see visual

Mario Lanza (1921-1959) solo - primarily an actor Songs: "Be My Love," "Because You're Mine" Propaganda: "Described as 'rebellious, tough, and ambitious' as well as the 'last of the great romantic performers.' Only performed opera on stage twice in his lifetime, but still considered one of the greatest."

#tim curry #mario lanza #cunty vintage diva tourney #round one #Youtube

Mario Lanza singing Nessun Dorma in Serenade (1956).

#mario lanza #serenade 1956 #nessun dorma #vincent price #joan fontaine #sara montiel #youtube #Youtube

Mario Lanza working out with trainer

(Peter Stackpole. 1949)

#Life #Mario Lanza #workout #trainer #medicine ball

I am also asking about Reindeer Serenade 👀

There's a song I loved as a kid, called "Donkey Serenade" by Mario Lanza, and originally I considered it for Sanji but last month it occurred to me that it could also work really well for Brook!

The premise of the song is that the man is trying to serenade a lady but she isn't paying attention to him and/or doesn't have any interest. They're being pulled by a mule, who the man says he might as well be singing to since the lady doesn't seem to care that he's pouring his heart out in song.

I considered that the donkey from the song could, in this case, be Chopper instead. The lady I wasn't sure of at first but I think it could be cute if it were Robin. I'm not a hardcore Brook/Robin shipper but I could see Brook developing some (possibly one-sided) feelings for her. In true Brook fashion, I feel like he would really play up the performance even if Robin does take notice and/or humors him. He'd be all "the fair lady doesn't even notice me" and Robin is all 🤭 so he sings "to Chopper" who is like "🤩 wow Brook you're really good this is a really pretty song!"

Anyway, it's a really nice song (especially if you like older songs and/or opera) and I recommend it! It's also originally from a musical from the 30s called Firefly (but I haven't seen that yet)

I have started working on it, but I'm trying very hard not to make it a "songfic" even though singing is part and parcel with Brook's character, so I'm trying to find a way to make it work without seeming trite. In all fairness, I think it would work better as a comic or animatic but that would necessitate honing my art skills and undoubtedly take a lot more time 😅

Thanks for asking about this one; I didn't think it would pull much interest so I appreciate you humoring me!

WIP game

#brook #soul king brook #nico robin #chopper #one piece #mario lanza #the donkey serenade #my post #wip #ask #asks

The Italian Connection (part 1) - It’s Now or Never

Welcome to the first post of a series I'll call The Italian Connection. From an idea hooked-on-elvis gave me some time ago, I'll write a few posts about Elvis connections to Italy, because I'm an Italian fan who lives in the Elvis wasteland (aka Europe) and it gives me joy to write about this. You’re welcome to suggest some topics for my next Italian connections.

I first heard Elvis' "It's Now or Never" on the car radio about 3 years ago, before becoming an Elvis fan. I'm sure I had heard it before, but I wasn't conscious of it, if that makes sense. I remember thinking: "Oh, it's 'O sole mio' with English lyrics. Who sang this?". I swear I thought the car radio was broken when I saw "It's Now or Never - Elvis Presley" appearing on the screen, but then I listened better and I recognized his voice. Even as a non fan, he had the most recognizable voice of all singers. I just didn't know that he sang this kind of songs, as I mostly knew him for the rock 'n roll classics and a few ballads.

It's kind of surprising to me that “It’s Now or Never”, recorded in April 1960, is actually Elvis' best-selling song and it's among the top ten best-selling physical singles of all time, with 20 million copies sold. It's ranked at #7, together with Whitney Houston's version of "I Will Always Love You" and the charity single "We Are the World", written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Ritchie.

Song · Elvis Presley · 2002

It is based on the classic Neapolitan song “‘O Sole Mio”, written in 1898, and to this day performed in Italy and in the rest of the world by opera singers, gondoliers and everything in between. The lyrics of the song were written by Giovanni Capurro, but the music was composed by Eduardo di Capua, perhaps while he was on tour in Odessa, a city on the Black Sea. It's a hymn to the sunshine of Naples and a love song at the same time, in the melodramatic style characteristic of traditional Neapolitan music.

"O' sole mio" is ubiquitous in Italy, it's almost like a national anthem, especially in Naples. In October of 1960, Elvis' version made it to #3 in Italy in the weekly charts, which was overwhelmingly made of Italian musica leggera (pop music). It also reached #17 in the annual chart of 1960, which is not bad at all for an American artist. I wouldn't say that Elvis' is the most famous version of the song, though, merely because "O' Sole Mio" is a favorite among opera singers, including Luciano Pavarotti, who used to sing a great version of it.

Elvis most likely knew the famous version by Italian tenor Enrico Caruso, recorded in 1916 (it was said to be a favorite record of his mother) and the version recorded by Mario Lanza, an Italian American tenor who was popular in the 1950s. Elvis shared his love for Lanza's operatic singing, displayed in successful movies like “The Great Caruso”, with a young Priscilla Beaulieu. When Elvis met her in the autumn of 1959, they must have talked about him, because he had just died, at the tender age of 38, after years of bad health and a controversial sleep diet (!). It’s possible that Elvis decided to record "It's Now or Never" in 1960 as a homage to him.

Song · Enrico Caruso · 1903

When Elvis recorded this song he was fresh out of the army and had filmed the Sinatra special the month before, in March 1960. I think it’s important to note that in 1957, Sinatra was rather skeptical about Elvis' vocal abilities. He said: "Elvis has no training at all. When he goes into something serious, a bigger kind of singing, we’ll find out if he is a singer". As we all know, Elvis had a lot of time to work on his singing while he was in the army, with the help of Charlie Hodge.

That’s probably why in 1960, eager to show off his extended vocal range with a "bigger kind of singing", Elvis decided to tackle this song. There was already a version with English lyrics, called “There’s No Tomorrow”, recorded by Tony Martin in 1949. He had dabbled with it a little bit in Germany, as proven by the home recordings that have surfaced. Nevertheless, he decided to have new lyrics written for him, as the song was in the public domain in the US.

With this choice in a way he was signaling that he intended to explore different genres, branching out from rock 'n roll in other words. As Shane Brown wrote in “Reconsider Baby” about his new vocal abilities, “the often out-of-control vibrato was successfully controlled, Elvis switched from singing with full power to barely a whisper like flipping a switch”. The Jordanaires begin the song with their layered harmonies, while a guitar cleverly imitates the sound of an Italian mandolin. Elvis sings this the way it is done in Italy, easing into the song and then building it up to a roar in the chorus.

So why did Elvis like Neapolitan music so much? According to Mark Duffett, it “allowed [him] to dramatically express assertive and passionate masculinity”. As a matter of fact, I find the dichotomy of tenderness and assertiveness that Elvis manages to express in this song, so masterfully expressed in the lyrics (“tomorrow will be too late / it’s now or never / my love won’t wait”) , a perfect fit for Elvis’ voice and personality.

Needless to say, the song was challenging to record. It took Elvis a few takes to nail the long high note at the end, as well as the right tone for it. He must have been satisfied with the result, though, because more than 10 years later, in 1972, during the Madison Square Garden press conference, he said that it was his favorite record of his. Elvis included “It’s Now or Never” in his concerts immediately after recording it (he performed it during the Pearl Harbor concert in 1961) and then again in February 1970, at the end of that engagement. In that occasion, it must have been a surprise choice, because he uncharacteristically instructs the TCB band on how to finish the song. I love this soulful version, with its gospel-like ending.

I wish Elvis had taken the time to learn the words and sung some of the original lyrics like he did with “Santa Lucia”, also a Neapolitan classic. In the 1970s, Elvis sometimes allowed one of this backup singers, Sherrill Nielsen, to sing the first verse of the Italian version, although with approximate lyrics. Goofing around like he often did, but also maybe hinting at the fact that the song was really old, in December 1976 Elvis introduced the song by saying: “Sherrill Nielsen is going to do the Italian version and I’m going to do the ancient Hindu version”. In this recording from one of Elvis' last concerts, Nielsen's singing is overindulgent to say the least and I wonder what Elvis thought of it. Can you decipher his expressions and let me know?