Frank Guarrera, who died Friday at 83, was an operatic heavy lifter who appeared in 680 performances at the Metropolitan Opera.

Perhaps most memorable for his stamina and versatility in an era of famous baritones, he also distinguished himself with accomplished acting. He holds the Met record as its most prolific Escamillo in “Carmen” (84 performances) and Guglielmo in “Cosi Fan Tutti” (86), which he first performed in a Rudolph Bing production of 1951 that shocked opera traditionalists with its English libretto.

Guarrera’s career stretched to 28 seasons, starting in 1948, when he won the radio broadcast “Metropolitan Opera Auditions of the Air” — a tonier era’s “American Idol.” His victory over 800 other contestants came with a silver tray and something more valuable, a contract to sing at the Met for a season. Guarrera debuted as Escamillo on December 14, 1948. Guarrera’s audition-winning rendition of Ford’s monologue in “Faust” also caught the ear of conductor Arturo Toscanini, who was so impressed with what he heard over the radio at his Riverdale apartment that he called to invite Guarrera to audition at his NBC studio. The upshot was that before the young baritone took the stage at the Met, he spent the summer singing at the La Scala Opera House in Milan. “Now I’m really starting on my career,” he told the New York Times in an understatement. His only prior onstage experience had been in a single role with the City Opera. Guarrera liked to tell the story of being so surprised that Toscanini called him personally that he told him to quit faking the accent.

Guarrera grew up in South Philadelphia, where his Sicilian parents spoke Italian in the home, giving him a slight advantage in learning many of his best roles. A voice scholarship to the Curtis Institute of Music was interrupted by service stateside in the Navy during World War II. His singing became a popular feature of parties at the Port Hueneme, Calif., base where he was stationed, and he also played mellophone in the marching band. He picked up his education after the war, and was still at Curtis when he won the Met auditions.

Although Guarrera lacked the power and vocal distinction of baritones like his Met contemporaries Leonard Warren, Robert Merrill, and Sherrill Milnes, he nevertheless performed more than 35 lead roles. He also became a favorite cover artist, on hand to take over when another lead was unable to perform. When Merrill offended Bing by acting in a Hollywood film in 1951, Merrill was exiled and Guarrera took over all of Merrill’s appearances as Figaro in “The Barber of Seville.” Guarrera also replaced Warren in the Met’s 1960 production of “Simon Boccanegra” after Warren dropped dead on stage mid-aria. Reviews were glowing, but Bing eventually gave the role to others. “He came to me and said, ‘Frank, I’m going to have another person come in. You know, you’re not big enough,'” Guarrera said in a 2003 interview with Opera News. “I was sad, but I knew what he meant,” Guarrera added. “Who the hell can sing like Warren?” Bing and Guarrera remained close after Guarrera retired in 1976 and took a music professorship in Seattle at the University of Washington.

He retired to Philadelphia with his wife, Adelina Di Cintio, his high-school sweetheart to whom he remained devoted. One spring day in 2003, he was on hand at the unveiling of a three-story-high mural of his greatest Met roles on the side of a building on Broad Street in South Philadelphia. He emerged from a limousine and sang “The Impossible Dream” to an audience of admirers and colleagues.

Frank Guarrera

Born December 3, 1923, in Philadelphia; died November 23 in Philadelphia; survived by a son, a daughter, and two grandchildren.