Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 31.djvu/373

 1815, and educated by his father. About 1837 he appeared at the King's Theatre, London, in Italian opera, and afterwards frequently sang at Manchester with Mario, Grisi, and Favanti. In 1844 he took a part in ‘Così fan tutte’ at Her Majesty's Theatre, and in 1846 in ‘Il Matrimonio Segreto.’ He played the part of Count Rodolphe to Jenny Lind's Amina on her first visit to Manchester, 28 Aug. 1847, and he also appeared with her in other characters under the management of Michael Balfe in 1849. About 1865 he withdrew from the stage, and devoted himself to teaching. He died at 51 Albany Street, Regent's Park, London, 30 Jan. 1887. His son, Luigi Lablache, is a well-known actor.

His wife, (d. 1877), vocalist, whose maiden name was Wilton, was born in Scotland, studied at the Royal Academy of Music, London, 1836–7, and then made her début at the Lyceum Theatre, afterwards appearing at Her Majesty's Theatre. She was a serviceable vocalist and a teacher of much skill. After her marriage she retired from the stage, and died in Paris 23 Sept. 1877.

[Times, 4 Feb. 1887, p. 11; Theatre, March 1887, p. 173; Brown's Biog. Dict. of Musicians, 1886, p. 369.]  LABLACHE, LUIGI (1794–1858), vocalist, son of Nicholas Lablache, merchant, of Marseilles, by an Irish lady, was born at Naples 6 Dec. 1794. He was educated from 1806 at the Conservatorio della Pietà de' Turchini, where Gentili taught him the elements of music, and Valesi instructed him in singing, while at the same time he studied the violin and violoncello. His voice was a beautiful contralto, and just before it broke he sang the solos in the requiem of Mozart on the death of Haydn in 1809. Before long he became possessed of a magnificent bass, which gradually increased in volume until at the age of twenty it attained a compass of two octaves from E flat below to E flat above the bass stave. In 1812, when only eighteen, he was engaged at the San Carlo Theatre, Naples, and appeared in ‘La Molinara’ of Fioravanti. Two years later he married Teresa Pinotti, the daughter of an actor. In 1817, at La Scala in Milan, he took the part of Dandini in ‘Cenerentola.’ The opera of ‘Elisa e Claudio’ was now (1821) written for him by Mercadante; his position was made, and his reputation spread throughout Europe. From Milan he went to Turin, returned to Milan in 1822, then appeared at Venice, and in 1824 at Vienna. Going back to Naples after an absence of twelve years, he created a great sensation as Assur in ‘Semiramide.’ On 30 March 1830, under Ebers's management, he was first heard in London as Geronimo in ‘Il Matrimonio Segreto,’ and thenceforth appeared there annually, also singing in many provincial festivals. His success in England was assured from the first. His voice was at all times extraordinarily powerful, but he could produce comic, humorous, tender, or sorrowful effects with equal ease and mastery. As an actor he excelled equally in comic and tragic parts. His chief rôles were Leporello (his greatest part), Geronimo the Podestà in ‘La Gazza Ladra,’ Dandini in ‘La Prova d' un' Opera Seria,’ Henry VIII in ‘Anna Bolena,’ the Doge in ‘Marino Faliero,’ and Oroveso in ‘Norma.’ Towards the close of his career he played two new characters of quite different types with great success, Shakespeare's Caliban and Gritzenko, the Kalmuck, in Scribe's ‘L'Etoile du Nord.’ At the funeral of Beethoven in 1827 he was one of the thirty-two torchbearers who surrounded the coffin. He taught singing to Queen Victoria. He died at Naples 23 Jan. 1858, and was buried at Maison-Lafitte, Paris.

[Grove's Dict. of Music, 1880, ii. 79–81; Dramatic and Musical Rev. 1844, iii. 267–8, 377–9; You have Heard of Them, by Q., 1854, pp. 82–90; Lumley's Reminiscences of the Opera, 1864, pp. 135–8, 369; L. Engel's From Mozart to Mario, 1886, i. 23, ii. 81, 373; Illustrated London News, 1842 i. 124 (with portrait), 1843 ii. 275 (with portrait); Morley's Journal of a London Playgoer, 1866, pp. 91 et seq.]  LABOUCHERE, HENRY, (1798–1869), elder son of Peter Cæsar Labouchere of Hylands, Essex, and Over Stowey, Somerset, by his wife, Dorothy Elizabeth, third daughter of Sir Francis Baring, bart., was born on 15 Aug. 1798. The family of Labouchere left France at the time of the edict of Nantes, and established themselves in Holland. Peter Cæsar Labouchere, a partner in the great mercantile firm of Hope, was the first of his family who settled in England. His son Henry was educated at Winchester, and on 24 Oct. 1816 matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford, where he took a first class in classics Easter term 1820, and graduated B.A. 1821, and M.A. 1828. He was admitted a member of Lincoln's Inn on 30 April 1817, but was never called to the bar. In 1824 he travelled with Stanley, Denison, and Stuart Wortley, afterwards Lords Derby, Ossington, and Wharncliffe, through Canada and the United States. At a by-election in April 1826 Labouchere was returned to the House of Commons for Michael Borough in the whig interest, and at the general election in the following June was re-elected. His first reported speech in the house was made during the debate on the