John Amadio

John Amadio (15 November 1883 - 4 April 1964) was an Australian flute player who performed with a number of orchestras around the world, made a career as an international soloist and accompanied operatic sopranoes with flute obbligatos. "He owed the beginnings of his extraordinary career to a prevailing public taste for operatic soprano arias with florid flute obbligatos."

Personal life

Amadio was born in Christchurch, New Zealand to Samuel Biddle Taylor and Eliza Taylor. When the boy was one year old, his father died and Eliza took the family to Wellington where, in 1890 at the age of 39, she married a 22 year old carpenter and amateur flute player, Henry Antonio Amadio. John assumed his stepfather's surname and began learning the flute, showing early promise.

In 1900 the family moved to Sydney, Australia then to Melbourne, where in 1901 the young Amadio gained his first position as a professional flute player.

Amadio married a pianist, Leonora Soames Roberts in 1916 but they separated in 1918 and divorced in 1925. Shortly after, he married the Australian operatic soprano, Florence Austral.

From 1959 he lived in Melbourne in semi-retirement to care for an invalid sister, Evelyn Gunderson. He died in Mebourne in 1964 at the age of 80 a few moments after finishing a performance of the Mozart D major flute concerto at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl.

Career

Amadio's first professional job as principal flute was with J. C. Williamson's Italian Opera Company. There, in 1902 he accompanied the French-American operatic soprana Clementine de Vere Sapio who presented him with the ruby ring from her finger and a bouquet of flowers after their performance of the "Mad Scene" from Lucia di Lamermoor. Later he was principal flute in Nellie Melba opera orchestra when she toured Australia in 1911. From 1903 - 1912 he played in the Marshall Hall orchestra and from 1909 - 1920 taught flute at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music. Among his students were the later Australian virtuosi, Victor McMahon, Leslie Barklamb and his nephew Neville Amadio who was principal flute with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra for 50 years.

In 1919 he began his international career accompanying Luisa Tetrazzini and playing with the The Hallé Orchestra, where Henry Wood described Amadio's playing as "the finest tone I have ever heard". From then until 1947, Amadio was based in London, touring with his new wife, Florence Austral and accompanying well-known operatic sopranoes of the day such as Emma Calve, Frieda Hempel, Lily Pons and Amelita Galli-Curci. In 1925, Amadio and Austral visited the United States for the first time and from then until 1936 they spent six months of every year touring there, performing in many cities including Washington DC, Chicago, Cleveland, Boston, San Francisco and New York City. Amadio often shared the stage with performers like the tenors Tito Schipa and Richard Crooks, the bass Ezio Pinza and violinist Alfredo Campoli. "In the US, Australia and England they were commonly met by crowds of thousands. They would consistently sell out the choir lofts and require extra seating on the stage."

Amadio played a Radcliff system flute which sounds the same as a Boehm flute but with a much different fingering system.