Margaret Price
Biography
Margaret Price was born into a musical family and began early to sing. Actually, she was not going to make the music profession, but wanted to be a biology teacher. On the recommendation of her music teacher, she sang at the age of 15 years, Charles Kennedy Scott, who gave her a scholarship. He was able to persuade her to study with him at Trinity College of Music in London, where she was initially mistaken for a mezzo- soprano.
The father of the singer, who had initially been against their choice of profession, managed to give her an engagement at the Welsh National Opera in Cardiff. There, she made her debut in 1962 as Cherubino in Mozart's " Le nozze di Figaro ".
A year later, Margaret Price was engaged at the Royal Opera House in London. After she was first used here in small roles, came to her big moment when Teresa Berganza had to cancel at short notice a performance of The Marriage of Figaro illness. Margaret Price was allowed - again as Cherubino - jump in and started with this performance her career.
On the recommendation of conductor and pianist James Lockhart Price took in the aftermath once again singing lessons and developed her luminous height, which should make it one of the most popular lyric sopranos of the 70s and 80s.
From the mid- 1960s, she had an advocate in the great conductor Otto Klemperer, with whom she made her first major recordings, including a complete recording of " Così fan tutte " in which she recorded her first starring role of Fiordiligi.
In the following years she gave guest performances all over the world, for example, from 1985 at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, but always looked for a solid base, where they spent the better part of the year. From 1971, their parent companies were the operas in Cologne and especially in Munich, where she lived until her retirement from the stage in 1999.
For her achievements, she received the title of a Bavarian Chamber singer and was knighted in their home country in 1993 to " lady ". Last lived the singer, who said of himself that she was a Porsche freak, again in a small town in Wales and bred dogs.
Repertoire
The emphasis in the stage repertoire of the singer always formed the major roles in Mozart operas, especially the Donna Anna in " Don Giovanni ," the Contessa in " Marriage of Figaro", Fiordiligi in " Così fan tutte " and Pamina in "The Magic Flute ".
Later batches of Giuseppe Verdi were added, especially the Amelia in " Masked Ball ", Elisabetta in " Don Carlos " and Desdemona in Otello. By Richard Strauss Price sang especially the Marschallin in " Der Rosenkavalier " and Ariadne in " Ariadne auf Naxos ". Although she accepted as Adriana Lecouvreur by Cilea unusual roles, their repertoire was relatively small because they feared to overtax her voice.
The second focus of her work were always recitals in particular with works by Franz Schubert, Felix Mendelssohn and Richard Strauss.
Price has during her long career included many boards, both operas and songs. Your Perhaps the most famous recording is the complete recording of Richard Wagner's " Tristan and Isolde " by Carlos Kleiber in which she sang Isolde, a role that she - also out of consideration for her voice - has never ventured on stage, even though they after publication the plate got many offers.