URIO, Michele [IALOMITEANU, Mihai]

This chapter presents a biography of mid- to late-19th-century Victorian vocalist Signor Michele Urio. Michele Urio turned up in London in 1869, with no descriptive claims attached to his name, and vanished again around 1881 after a full and mostly satisfying career, leaving no forwarding address. An article written in 1861 speaks of Mihai Ialomiteanu, 'the first tenor to come out of the Romanian nation', who went to Milan some two years earlier to study and who metamorphosed into 'Michele Urio'. Urio had been engaged by Mr Gye for the Italian Opera at Covent Garden, where he made his debut on 17 May 1870, as Lionel in Martha, opposite the Henrietta of Patti and with Scalchi and Graziani making up the quartet. At the end of the season and the Prussian war, Urio again departed British shores, and the following season he did not return. In early 1872 he joined the company at the Théâtre des Italiens.