Octavian Naghiu

Opera Singer. A tenor, he is remembered for his performances at major venues on both sides of the Atlantic. Raised in the small Transylvanian village of Rucar, he learned to sing in the Greek Orthodox church of which his father was priest, studied at the Bucharest Conservatory, and after winning a competition joined the Romanian National Opera of Bucharest. Over the years he sang a varied repertoire of roles ranging from the lyric to the tenore robusto, his characters including Riccardo of Verdi's "Un Ballo en Maschera", the poet Rodolfo in Puccini's "La Boheme", the hapless Edgardo Ravenswood from Donizetti's "Lucia di Lammermoor", LT Pinkerton from Puccini's "Madame Butterfly", the lecherous Duke in Verdi's "Rigoletto", the doomed painter Mario Cavaradossi of Puccini's "Tosca", and two of Verdi's heavyweights, Radames in "Aida" and the tragic title Moor of "Otello". Popular and successful, he found himself in trouble with the Communist regime and in 1965 he was arrested and held for