Jean de Reszke was one of those singers who changed voice in mid career. Born in Warsaw in 1850, he first studied singing with Ciaffei and Cotogni as a baritone. His professional début was in Venice and he also sang with success in London and Paris.
But in 1884, he emerged from a period of retraining, as John the Baptist, a tenor rôle, in the opera Hérodiade by the French composer, Massenet. His vocal transformation completed, he went on to create the title rôle in Massenet's Le Cid in which he sang with his brother, the bass, Edouarde de Reszke (Edouarde stayed as a bass all his life).
With his beautiful voice and fine musicianship Jean was unsurpassed at the time in the French repertoire, but he also sang worldwide in most of the lyric-dramatic roles including, eventually, VerdiΓÇÖs Otello. Finally he took on the Wagner roles with distinction. He died in Nice in 1925.
