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Life
1884-1945; b. Athlone, Co. Westmeath; trained as tenor; won Gold Medal, 1902 Feis Cheoil, Dublin (when James Joyce also sang); sang at Covent Garden, 1907; played Cavalleria Rusticana; played La Traviata, 1909, NY; made 500 recordings; became citizen of USA, 1919; m. Lily Foley, the Dublin-born singer; sold more than 200 million records;
created hereditary Papal Count, 1928; sang “Panis Angelicus” at Eucharistic Congress, Dublin, June 1932 - and widely heard on newly-bought radios throughout Ireland; rented Moore Abbey, the seat of the Earls of Drogheda, aftewards sold to Sisters of Charity as a hospital; McCormack settled finally at “Glena”, his home on Merrion Rd. [Booterstown], Co. Dublin; a grandson is a successful Dublin restauranteur. DIB DIH
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Criticism
Gordon T. Ledbetter, John McCormack: The Great Irish Tenor (Dublin: Townhouse 2003), 288pp., ill.; Pádraic O’Hara, The Greaetest Irish Tenor: JohnMcCormack - A Life in Letters (Knock, Co. Mayo Priv. 2008), 166pp.
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