Caterina Valente

Caterina Valente0:00

This download is the only extract the BBC has of this edition of Desert Island Discs. The presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:08

Katerina, I believe your family goes back several generations in show business.

Caterina Valente0:11

That's right. Uh we are the seventh.

Presenter0:14

Seventh.

Caterina Valente0:15

Mm-hmm.

Presenter0:15

Ovalente, of course, is an Italian name.

Caterina Valente0:17

Yes, a typical Italian name.

Presenter0:20

Yes. What sort of work did your parents do? What sort of act?

Caterina Valente0:23

Ah, well, my mother was a comedian. You see, she she was the act, actually. And the artist family goes from her side of the family. My father was a.

Caterina Valente0:31

A musician, he was actually the first one to play classical music on an accordion.

Presenter0:36

Mm.

Caterina Valente0:36

But uh the act was a very funny one.

Presenter0:36

Uh

Presenter0:39

And you play it mostly in in vaudeville or sometimes in circus?

Caterina Valente0:41

Uh my mother did sometimes in circus, but uh most of the time uh we were playing vaudeville.

Presenter0:46

Yes. Where were you born?

Caterina Valente0:48

I was born in Paris, France.

Presenter0:50

Yes. And you have brothers and sisters?

Caterina Valente0:52

Oh yes, I have two brothers uh and a sister.

Presenter0:55

When did you start to work in the family area?

Caterina Valente0:57

Oh, a long time ago.

Caterina Valente0:59

Ah, when I was five. Five? Yes, I was the one that always made so much noise.

Presenter1:00

When I was five.

Caterina Valente1:05

backstage that my mother said, All right, if you want to be on stage, you're gonna be on stage.

Caterina Valente1:10

And I started at five and uh I have never stopped since.

Presenter1:13

What did you do in the Acted Five?

Caterina Valente1:15

Oh, I danced. I danced a gavot and I sang, of course. I I sang. I was I little when I was a boy.

Presenter1:22

Yeah. And when did you start to play the guitar?

Caterina Valente1:26

All that was after the war, after the war when I uh really heard

Caterina Valente1:31

Jungle Reinhardt playing the guitar and uh

Presenter1:32

Yeah.

Caterina Valente1:33

I played a ukulele of course and I was playing with my brother and then he says

Caterina Valente1:38

You're a big girl now, and if you don't start to play the guitar, a six string guitar, I'll never play with you.

Caterina Valente1:43

So I really started to play and believe me very fast.

Presenter1:46

Yeah.

Presenter1:47

And you were traveling about Europe. All over Europe, yes. How many languages did you grow up to speak?

Caterina Valente1:49

All over Europe, you know.

Caterina Valente1:52

Uh well, actually in the family only two, uh French and Italian.

Caterina Valente1:57

But then much later on I I learned English and then German and then Swedish and then Spanish.

Presenter2:03

Mm. Where did you learn English?

Caterina Valente2:06

Uh actually I learned English in France. Um I I bought a book, it was the The Hound of the Baskervilles from Sir Conan Doyle.

Caterina Valente2:15

And uh I had a dictionary.

Caterina Valente2:17

And I read the book six times and after the sixth time I I could speak some English.

Presenter2:22

Well done.

Presenter2:24

Now I know that as a little girl you had a terribly rough war and and that's something we won't go into, but there was one incident just after the war

Presenter2:33

When I believe you had to wait for three months to get a railway engine repaired.

Presenter2:38

Would you like to incredible?

Caterina Valente2:38

That's right. Oh well, it's incredible. But uh we really made it afterwards. It was so funny when they told us, you know, you have to stay here. It was a little town near Kiev, it was called Slavuta.

Presenter2:49

Yeah.

Caterina Valente2:50

And we say, Why? Well, you have to stay overnight because the engine broke. Aha We we have a place to sleep says yes, yes, and about I don't know, about four or five miles there is a camp, so you can stay there overnight.

Caterina Valente3:02

We stayed there about three months instead overnight, and then one day they came and says, Oh, the engine is repaired.

Caterina Valente3:08

That was three months after, and then we all went back to France.

Presenter3:11

Yes. Well it shows the complete kind of chaos there must have been. Three months to get the locomotive fixed. But during that time, while you were stranded in this, what, displaced persons camp, I suppose?

Caterina Valente3:21

Yeah.

Presenter3:22

Uh you entertain.

Caterina Valente3:23

Oh, yes. We went to uh to hospitals to entertain the Russians, then we entertained the French. So you see, we we worked and we enjoyed it.

Presenter3:33

Well, the wartime horrors were over, and all those wanderings. Back to France and to the Family Act, was it easy to get started again?

Caterina Valente3:42

No, it was not very easy to to get started, but uh my mother went from uh theatre to theatre.

Caterina Valente3:48

And uh the last one she did was the Olympia.

Caterina Valente3:52

And she went up and said, I would like uh to have an audition. So what's your name? Maria Valenti.

Caterina Valente3:58

What you do?

Caterina Valente3:59

And she's comedy.

Caterina Valente4:01

And the gentleman sitting at the desk said What? Maria Valenti?

Caterina Valente4:05

She said, Yes. The Maria Valenti? She said, Well, I think yes Which one do you mean? Says, Well, are you the lady with the xylophone and so on and so on? She says, Yes, that's me He says, I don't believe it. You have to come and audition for us I mean, because this is a a theatre for the for the English, the Americans, the Russians at the time, the Belgians.

Caterina Valente4:26

And they would like to see what kind of an act you do. So my mother said, Well, it's quite hard, because we don't have any dresses, no instruments, nothing.

Presenter4:33

Yeah.

Caterina Valente4:34

So he said, Well, maybe we could borrow some of the instruments and for the dresses, don't worry, just come the way you are.

Caterina Valente4:42

the way we wear were the Russian uniform. We had the whole uniform they gave us as a present. So we did the audition at the Olympia Theatre in Russian uniforms and we were engaged right away.

Presenter4:53

Mm-hmm.

Presenter4:55

What we were doing in the Akhner.

Caterina Valente4:57

Oh uh danced, uh some tap dancing and uh we sang and uh we played uh the guitar.

Caterina Valente5:04

and helped my mother like her assistant.

Presenter5:07

Mhm. Then I believe that working in Germany you did a rather sensational audition at the Sudwester Deutsche Rundpond studios.

Caterina Valente5:15

Uh

Caterina Valente5:16

Well, uh sensational. Was it that sensational?

Presenter5:18

That's a good idea.

Caterina Valente5:20

Well, I mean, it was quite scary. I mean, you know, for for a girl with a guitar all alone in the studio.

Caterina Valente5:28

To make an audition in front of Kut Idelhagen.

Caterina Valente5:31

It's quite a thing. I was scared to death, to tell you the truth.

Caterina Valente5:37

So there I was in the studio with my little guitar, ding ding ding, and I auditioned and uh I was booked.

Presenter5:43

Yes. What sort of songs did you sing at that time?

Caterina Valente5:47

Uh Spanish and uh Portuguese and French and some jazz in English and even one song in German, bad German, because I really didn't speak.

Presenter5:54

Germany, because I really

Caterina Valente5:56

Very well German then. But uh it didn't matter to quote Edelhang, he wanted to hear the voice, which was important for him.

Presenter6:01

Which presumably

Presenter6:03

Say you did some broadcasts.

Caterina Valente6:04

Yes.

Caterina Valente6:06

Trelottes and concerts do with him.

Presenter6:08

Yes.

Presenter6:09

And then you started making records. What did that lead to?

Caterina Valente6:13

Well, recordings, first, uh um T V.

Caterina Valente6:17

In Germany?

Caterina Valente6:18

And in England and in the United States and then movies. I did about uh twelve movies.

Presenter6:24

Where?

Caterina Valente6:25

In Germany, in France and in Switzerland.

Presenter6:28

I don't think any of them have played here. Do you agree with that?

Caterina Valente6:30

No, I don't think so. They were too bad.

Presenter6:33

Oh, not all twelve, sure.

Caterina Valente6:36

But some of them were quite nice. A few comedies were nice. But it was

Presenter6:36

Some of them

Caterina Valente6:40

Strictly German. Mm. So, uh, it's typical for Germany and and kind of musicals. But

Caterina Valente6:46

Uh one was quite international. It was uh Casinot Paris.

Caterina Valente6:50

With Vittorio De Sica and Gilberto.

Presenter6:52

Uh

Caterina Valente6:52

Yeah.

Presenter6:53

Pretty sparkling cast. I'm surprised we didn't get that one. Maybe we did, but I missed it.

Caterina Valente6:57

I played for you one day.

Presenter6:58

Yeah.

Presenter7:00

Now, Katerina, you speak six languages. How many can you sing in?

Caterina Valente7:04

Oh, that's not very difficult, I think, to sing in many I think about twelve.

Presenter7:09

Part twelve. And you sing all kinds of songs, ballads, jazz, folk, Latin American.

Caterina Valente7:13

Latinum

Caterina Valente7:15

Yes, I think I think it's very important for a singer to be able to sing different things because

Caterina Valente7:21

Ah, well, I am a singer, of course, but uh I'm an entertainer too.

Presenter7:26

Where is your home now?

Caterina Valente7:27

Uh Switzerland, Lugano.

Presenter7:29

How much time in the air can you spend there?

Caterina Valente7:32

Oh, well, all put together, I think about three months, a year.

Presenter7:37

That's not very much, is it?

Caterina Valente7:38

No, but I'm glad for every day I can stay home.

Presenter7:42

Where do you spend the major part of your time in the United States?

Caterina Valente7:44

about uh four or five months in the States and the rest I divide with England, France, Italy.

Caterina Valente7:51

And Europe activated.

Presenter7:52

Yeah.

Presenter7:53

Now you talked of your ambition of singing comet. You've done films. Have you done operetta and production shows, musicals?

Caterina Valente8:00

Only on television, but never on stage.

Presenter8:04

And straight acting too? Would you like to do that in the theatre?

Caterina Valente8:06

Beep.

Presenter8:06

Yes.

Caterina Valente8:07

Very much so.

Presenter8:09

You've got an awful lot lined up, haven't you?

Caterina Valente8:11

Oh yes.