Vittorio Arimondi

Vittorio Arimondi was an Italian bass who created Pistol in Verdi's Falstaff at La Scala in 1893. He studied singing while training for business and made his debut at Varese in 1883 in Gomes's Il Guarany. His international career began at Covent Garden in 1894, as Don Basilio to Patti's Rosina, and took him to the Metropolitan Opera, to St Petersburg and to Hammerstein's Manhattan Opera, where he was the first American Arkel. Méphistophélès was his greatest success. He sang with the Chicago Opera from 1910, and later taught. He was also an accomplished watercolourist.