Luisa Tetrazzini

Luisa Tetrazzini ( born June 29, 1871 in Florence, † October 2, 1940 in Milan ) was an Italian opera singer, from the 1890s to the 1920s, one of the leading lyric coloratura sopranos.

Tetrazzini was the daughter of a uniform cutter and started early to sing, initially taught by her sister Eva Tetrazzini (1862-1932), a successful singer was also. She studied at the Instituto Musicale in Florence at Ceccherini and made ​​her debut as an opera singer in 1890 in Florence, when she stepped in for the role of Inez in L' Africaine by Giacomo Meyerbeer.

During the 1890s she appeared except in Italy also in St. Petersburg, Spain and South America ( Buenos Aires 1898). After London, Paris and New York, she was initially not invited because their role compartment of the coloratura roles was considered outdated. In 1905 she made her debut in the U.S. in San Francisco. But your actual breakthrough came after a very successful performance of La Traviata in her debut at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in the autumn of 1907 1908 she also sang with great success in New York City at the Manhattan Opera Company of Oscar Hammerstein -. At the Metropolitan Opera she sang only in 1911 and 1912 ( Toscanini refused to cooperate with it from ). After a while due to contract disputes had not been able to sing in New York, she caused a stir when she told a press conference that she would sing it in San Francisco on the road, where you could still sing freely. The promise she released a Christmas 1910 spectators before an estimated 200,000 to 300,000 in Market Street.

She was admired for her vocal technique and voice, not least from the famous soprano Adelina Patti. There are also many recordings for Victor and " His Masters Voice" get. Tetrazzini was small and tended to wealth, so that they only appeared on the concert stage after 1912. She was cheerful and lively temperament. In Covent Garden, she was involved in violent feuds with their rival Nellie Melba. She was married three times. Since her third (much younger ) husband by bringing her wealth, she was later in the 1930s, when her voice had long since degraded, forced to perform in vaudeville. She died impoverished in Milan. Tetrazzini also taught; among other things, they discovered Lina Pagliughi.

Trivia

The courts " turkey Tetrazzini " ( Tacchino alla Tetrazzini ) and Spaghetti Tetrazzini are named after her. She appears in the novel " Where Angels fear to Tread " by EM Forster.