Emma Calvé, born Rosa Emma Calvet (15 August 1858 – 6 January 1942) was a French operatic dramatic soprano.
Calvé was probably the most famous French female opera singer of the Belle Époque. Hers was an international career, and she sang regularly at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York, and the Royal Opera House, London.
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi (Italian: [dʒuˈzɛppe ˈverdi]; 9 or 10 October 1813 – 27 January 1901) was an Italian composer best known for his operas. He was born near Busseto to a provincial family of moderate means, receiving a musical education with the help of a local patron, Antonio Barezzi. Verdi came to dominate the Italian opera scene after the era of Gioachino Rossini, Vincenzo Bellini, and Gaetano Donizetti, whose works significantly influenced him.
In his early operas, Verdi demonstrated sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy. He also participated briefly as an elected politician. The chorus "Va, pensiero" from his early opera Nabucco (1842), and similar choruses in later operas, were much in the spirit of the unification movement, and the composer himself became esteemed as a representative of these ideals. An intensely private person, Verdi did not seek to ingratiate himself with popular movements. As he became professionally successful, he was able to reduce his operatic workload and sought to establish himself as a landowner in his native region. He surprised the musical world by returning, after his success with the opera Aida (1871), with three late masterpieces: his Requiem (1874), and the operas Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893).
His operas remain extremely popular, especially the three peaks of his 'middle period': Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata. The bicentenary of his birth in 2013 was widely celebrated in broadcasts and performances.
Renée Lynn Fleming (born February 14, 1959) is an American soprano, known for performances in opera, concerts, recordings, theater, film, and at major public occasions. A recipient of the National Medal of Arts, Fleming has been nominated for 18 Grammy Awards and has won five times. In June 2023, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts announced that Fleming would be one of the five artists recognized at the 2023 Kennedy Center Honors, which she received in December 2023. Other notable honors won by Fleming have included the Crystal Award from the World Economic Forum in Davos, the Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur from the French government, Germany's Cross of the Order of Merit, Sweden's Polar Music Prize and honorary membership in England's Royal Academy of Music. Unusual among artists whose careers began in opera, Fleming has achieved name recognition beyond the classical music world. In May, 2023, Fleming was appointed by the World Health Organization as a Goodwill Ambassador for Arts and Health.Fleming has a full lyric soprano voice. She has performed coloratura, lyric, and lighter spinto soprano operatic roles in Italian, German, French, Czech, and Russian, aside from her native English. A significant portion of her career has been the performance of new music, including world premieres of operas, concert pieces, and songs composed for her by André Previn, Caroline Shaw, Kevin Puts, Anders Hillborg, Nico Muhly, Henri Dutilleux, Brad Mehldau, and Wayne Shorter. In 2008, Fleming became the first woman in the 125-year history of the Metropolitan Opera to solo headline a season opening night gala. Conductor Sir Georg Solti said of Fleming: "In my long life, I have met maybe two sopranos with this quality of singing; the other was Renata Tebaldi."Beyond opera, Fleming has sung and recorded lieder, chansons, jazz, musical theatre, and indie rock, and she has performed with a wide range of artists, including Luciano Pavarotti, Lou Reed, Wynton Marsalis, Paul Simon, Andrea Bocelli, Sting and John Prine. A 2018 Tony Award nominee, Fleming has acted on Broadway and in theatrical productions in London, Los Angeles and Chicago. Fleming has also recorded songs for the soundtracks of several major films, two of which won the Academy Award for Best Picture (The Shape of Water and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King). Fleming has made numerous television appearances, and she is the only classical singer to have performed the U.S. National Anthem at the Super Bowl.
Fleming has also become a frequent public speaker about the impact of music on health and neuroscience, winning a Research!America Award for her advocacy in this field.
Lisbeth Balslev (born 21 February 1945) is a Danish operatic soprano with an international career, especially in Wagnerian operas.
Balslev was born in Aabenraa and originally trained as a nurse. She then studied singing, first at the Academy of Music and Music Communication in Esbjerg, then at the opera academy of the Royal Danish Theater in Copenhagen. In 1976, she made her debut at the Royal Danish Theater as Yaroslavna in Prince Igor.After two years, Balslev left the Royal Danish Theater and had her international breakthrough as Senta in Harry Kupfer's staging of Wagner's Der fliegende Holländer at the 1978 Bayreuth Festival. From 1979 to 1983 she sang at the Hamburg State Opera, after which she has worked freelance at La Scala, the Vienna State Opera and Bayreuth among others.In addition to her professional work, Balslev was in 1992 among the founders of an organization which supports orphanages in Romania and provides summer and Christmas vacations for the children.Balslev has received several awards and honors, including Tagea Brandt Rejselegat (1996) and the Reumert Prize, of which she was the first recipient (1999). In 1993, she was made a Dame of the Order of the Dannebrog.
Célestine Galli-Marié (15 March 1837 – 22 September 1905) was a French mezzo-soprano who is most famous for creating the title role in the opera Carmen.
Helen Vanni (née Spaeth; January 30, 1924 – March 5, 2023) was an American opera singer who performed mezzo-soprano and soprano roles.
Maria Hart (née Barbara Ann McGhee; May 28, 1923 in Los Angeles, California – August 9, 2012, Canoga Park, California ) was an American actress and singer.
Günther Treptow (22 October 1907 in Berlin – 28 March 1981 in Berlin) was a German operatic tenor, best known for Wagner roles.
Treptow began his vocal studies in Berlin as a baritone under the Italian bass, Giovanni Scarneo. Treptow was since 1926 a member of the SA and Nazi Party (membership number 38 579) until the discovery in 1934 of his mother's Jewish heritage. He was banned from performing until being granted special permission to do so from Joseph Goebbels on 6 June 1935. He made his stage debut in Berlin, as the Italian singer in Der Rosenkavalier, in 1936. He sang at the Vienna Volksoper in 1938, as Florestan in Fidelio. He appeared at the Sopot Festival in 1939, in the title role of Tannhäuser. He made his debut at the Munich State Opera in 1940, the Vienna State Opera in 1947, and the Bayreuth Festival in 1951.
He quickly established himself as one of the leading heldentenors of his generation, in roles such as Siegmund in Die Walküre, Siegfried in Siegfried and Götterdämmerung, Walther von Stolzing in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg and Tristan in Tristan und Isolde. Besides Wagner, he also sang such roles as Max in Der Freischütz, Steva in Jenůfa, Canio in Pagliacci, and the title role in Otello.
On the international scene, he made guest appearances at La Scala in Milan, La Monnaie in Brussels, the Royal Opera House in London, the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, the Metropolitan Opera in New York, also appearing in Leningrad and Moscow.
He sang at the Deutsche Oper Berlin from 1961 until his retirement in 1972.
June Preston (December 29, 1928 – May 11, 2022) was an American child actress in the 1930s and early 1940s, who began her film career at RKO Pictures, with a minor role as Mrs. Blewett's daughter in the 1934 film Anne of Green Gables.
As a child star, she was promoted with heavy marketing and merchandising, including a clothing line, to position her as a child star rival to Shirley Temple.Preston appeared in film shorts of Meglin Kiddies and Our Gang and had small cameos in feature films It Happened One Night, Christmas in July and Strawberry Blonde.Preston performed as a soprano singer in the United States and in recitals in Latin America and Europe.
