The treasures of Nick Di Vergilio are displayed on the walls of his Village of Lynnhaven home. Two of them are official White House correspondence. In her sorrow, Jackie Kennedy wrote to thank him for singing at President John F. Kennedy’s memorial service at Boston’s Cathedral of the Holy Cross. Jackie Kennedy came within just a few feet of him at the altar during the ceremony, and the effect was evident.
“I don’t know how I sang that,” he remembered, “because I was so physically close to her, and her makeup was running down her cheeks. I could hear her breathing and praying because she was so close.”
A letter from then-President Lyndon B. Johnson, who gave him a Christmas card after his success at the White House, is held in the second photo.
These are only a few of the highlights in the career of a gifted tenor who has shared the stage with all of the era’s opera stars on the most prestigious stages in the United States and Europe. The seed was planted in his youth when he and his father would listen to the Metropolitan Opera on the radio.
His father purchased him a trumpet after hearing the triumphal march in the opera “Aida.” He learned to play it and was a member of the junior high marching band before his trumpet was stolen. After being inspired to sing by his girlfriend, who was a part of the opera in Buffalo, New York, he studied other brass instruments and began practicing his best gift. While waiting for her on a cold winter night, he was greeted. He was hooked after he was cast as a mute in an opera with her as the lead soprano. He began taking voice lessons locally and improved over the course of a few years.
Di Vergilio grew up in the heart of the logging industry in North Tonawanda, New York. If it hadn’t been for his first work out of high school, pasting together boxes at the local mill, he would have ended up in the lumber industry.
When the Korean War began in 1952, he applied to join the Army band. He was taken in because of his ability to play the French horn. The only problem was that the Scottish general preferred his band to be dressed in kilts. In the cold Pennsylvania cold weather, the band was expected to march in review at 5 a.m.
He chuckled as he said, “You try to play the French horn with your teeth chattering and everything else chattering.”
He went to the prestigious Eastman School of Music after his discharge and earned his degree after four years of voice studies.
“At the time, the thing to do was go to New York, get noticed and get work,” he said.
For the big change, his companion at the time, Bill Duvall, had a brother who was a performer, and they were welcome to join him in New York with another actor. Robert Duvall, who shared a room with Dustin Hoffman, was the brother. “Dusty” was a high school janitor, and the two were in the “A View From the Bridge” play at night.
He got a job at a Village clothing store and pursued singing opportunities over the next nine months.
He performed truncated operas for high schools in the state after entering the Metropolitan Studio, a testing ground for the big stage. At a time when the Met’s management was shifting, he made his debut as the lead in “Madame Butterfly.”
“It’s a momentum thing,” he said. “People employ you, and your popularity grows.”
His big break came when he was cast in Leonard Bernstein’s “War Requiem.”
“When you get a boss, he throws you out to whoever is available because you’re new,” he explained.
His first opera, “The Love of Three Kings,” was broadcast on NBC.
As a result, he signed with an agent and began performing at numerous events throughout the world. His voice was in high demand. He sang with big symphonies after performing in Miami, Dallas, Seattle, San Francisco and Denver. He premiered a brand new opera house in San Diego with a performance of “La Boheme.”
He went on to appear at major opera houses over the next several decades, including three years at the San Francisco Opera. When Luciano Pavarotti was diagnosed with laryngitis, he was asked to fill in for him. He also performed for the Shah of Iran shortly before he was deposed from office.
He left the opera world in 1976 to take a position as a professor at the University of Illinois, where he taught opera and directed performances for more than 50,000 students over the course of his 29-year career.
The nurse was listening to one of his performances on her phone while giving him his second COVID-19 vaccine.
“I was astonished,” he said. “How do they do it?”
– Attributed Source, The Villages Daily Sun