Frederick Ranalow

Frederick Ranalow (7 November 1873 – 8 December 1953) was an Irish baritone who was distinguished in opera, oratorio, and musical theatre, but whose name is now principally associated with the role of Captain Macheath in the ballad opera The Beggar's Opera, which he sang close to 1,500 times. He was also a minor film actor and writer of songs.

Frederick Baring Ranalow was born in Kingstown, County Dublin. He was taken to England when quite young, and by age 10 he was a chorister at St Paul's Cathedral in London; he later went to Westminster School and studied under Arthur Oswald and Alberto Randegger at the Royal Academy of Music. He was later named a Fellow of the RAM in honour of his distinguished musical career.

As early as 1895 he was singing in oratorios and cantatas at the Queen's Hall, the Royal Albert Hall and at the principal provincial festivals. Between 1904 and 1929, he sang at the Proms on 21 occasions, in songs and operatic excerpts. He toured Australia and New Zealand in 1909 with Dame Nellie Melba.

Ranalow sang with the Beecham Opera Company in such roles as Figaro, Papageno, Hans Sachs, Falstaff and Prince Igor, being particularly renowned for his Figaro during the First World War. (In 1919 Peter Warlock wrote to Frederick Delius of his admiration for Ranalow's Falstaff in a performance under Eugène Goossens, fils.) Ranalow also appeared in The Tales of Hoffmann, Die Fledermaus,La bohème, Tristan und Isolde, Tannhäuser, The Secret of Susanna,Louise, and Götterdämmerung.

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