Francesco D'Auria

D'Auria, Francesco

Francesco (Mariano) D'Auria. Conductor, composer, teacher, b Naples 1841, d after 1913. D'Auria was the conductor for the US tour 1881-2 of the soprano Adelina Patti, and worked in New York and Cincinnati before joining the TCM in 1887 as a voice teacher. W.H. Hewlett, Edith Miller, and J.D.A. Tripp studied with him. During the 1890s he established a Toronto Symphony Orchestrawhich gave several concerts but faltered because of inadequate financing. D'Auria joined the Winnipeg Cons in 1895 but by 1897 he had moved to Minneapolis. He was a teacher and choir conductor 1904-13 in Vancouver. He composed songs published 1888-93 by Suckling and Nordheimer and an anthem published by Whaley Royce, and also completed the large-scale cantatas The Sea King's Bride (performed 1890 in Toronto) and Gulnare, or the Crusader's Ransom (Suckling 1891). Gulnare, a dramatic cantata with words by Mrs Edgar Jarvis of Toronto, is an elaborate piece with considerable variety of harmony and modulation, quite advanced for its time. It was performed 29 Mar 1892 by the Toronto Choral Society.