Signor Mario (1810-1883)

Giovanni Matteo Mario, Cavaliere de Candia, the Italian tenor, made his London debut as Gennaro in Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia on 6 June 1839 and was seen in that role by Queen Victoria two days later: she found his voice 'very fine and full of feeling' and noticed that he was 'tall, quite young and very handsome'. During the next twenty-eight years the Royal Family heard Mario on many occasions, sometimes at Covent Garden, where he sang from 1847, and sometimes in concerts performed at Buckingham Palace.