Gina Cigna

Gina Cigna ( March 6, 1900 in Paris, † 26 June 2001 in Milan, born Genevieve Cigna ) was an Italian- French soprano and singing teacher.

Life

Education, career start and breakthrough

Cigna was the daughter of a father of Italian origin in Paris. They first turned to the piano and studied at the Conservatoire de Paris Alfred Cortot at. In 1923 she married the tenor Maurice Sens, who discovered her exceptional voice. Then she took singing lessons with Emma Calve. First, she tried as a mezzo soprano, but moved a little later to soprano.

She made her debut in 1927 at La Scala as Freia in Wagner's Das Rheingold. Here she appeared under her married name Ginette Sens, however, adopted the stage name Gina Cigna, when, after engagements at other Italian opera houses returned two years later to La Scala to represent the Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni. These and the following role as Elisabeth in Tannhäuser and the Singers' Contest at Wartburg helped her career breakthrough.

At the height of

In the next few years, they showed the world their skills, including in Paris, New York City, Berlin, Vienna and Chicago, as well as in the major opera houses of Italy. Important performances they had in 1935 in the opera Norma in Bellini's birth city of Catania on the occasion of its 100th anniversary and in Aida at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden on May 12, 1937 the coronation of the British King George VI .. The latter caused some listeners for disapproval, since they would have preferred to see the Englishwoman Eva Turner on stage.

Performances in operas by Giacomo Puccini took the majority of their career: Total Cigna was about five hundred in Turandot and around to see four hundred in Tosca. She sang in two world premieres: on the one Respighi's La fiamma 1934, and secondly in 1939 in Panizza's opera Bizancio.

Move away from the stage and last years

Unexpectedly, she had to end her career in 1947 when she suffered a heart attack as a result of a car accident. Afterwards she worked as a singing teacher, were among her students Fiorenza Cossotto and Gena Dimitrova. 101- year she died in 2001 in Milan.