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I suppose you could split the audience regarding opera into three groups: the ones who hate opera with a passion – the ones who are passionate about opera and everything about it and the ones who have heard about it, never been to one and who could go either way in appreciating it or heaping disdain on it.
The post today is more for the ones who are passionate about Opera and everything it stands for; primarily a historic one because the lecturer represents what has been casually referred to as the “Golden era” of Opera – that period, at least preserved via recordings made during the dawn of preserving historic performances.
One of the legendary figures in the area of Opera was Soprano Mary Garden, who made her debut in Paris in 1900 and who achieved worldwide recognition, not only for her singing but for her life’s devotion to making Opera available to everyone throughout the world.
Mary Garden (20 February 1874 – 3 January 1967) was a Scottish-American operatic lyric soprano, then mezzo-soprano with a substantial career in France and America in the first third of the 20th century. She spent the latter part of her childhood and youth in the United States and eventually became an American citizen, although she lived in France for many years and eventually retired to Scotland, where she spent the last 30 years of her life and died.
Described as “the Sarah Bernhardt of opera”, Garden was an exceptional actress as well as a talented singer. She was particularly admired for her nuanced performances which employed interesting uses of vocal color. Possessing a beautiful lyric voice that had a wide vocal range and considerable amount of flexibility, Garden first arose to success in Paris during the first decade of the 20th century. She became the leading soprano at the Opéra-Comique; notably portraying roles in several world premieres, including Mélisande in Claude Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande (1902). She worked closely with Jules Massenet, in whose operas she excelled. Massenet notably wrote the title role in his opera Chérubin (1905) for her.
In 1907, Oscar Hammerstein convinced Garden to join the Manhattan Opera House in New York where she became an immediate success. By 1910 she was a household name in America and Garden appeared in operas in several major American cities; including performing with the Boston Opera Company and the Philadelphia Opera Company. Between 1910 and 1932 Garden worked in several opera houses in Chicago. She first worked with the Chicago Grand Opera Company (1910–1913) and then joined the Chicago Opera Association in 1915, ultimately becoming the company’s director in 1921. Although director for only one year, Garden was notably responsible for staging the world premiere of Sergei Prokofiev’s The Love for Three Oranges before the company went bankrupt in 1922. Shortly thereafter she became the director of the Chicago Civic Opera where she commissioned the opera Camille by 28-year-old composer Hamilton Forrest. She sang roles at the Civic Opera until 1931, notably in several United States and world premieres.
Mary Garden died in Aberdeen Scotland on January 3, 1967.
Here is a lecture she gave at University of Illinois on November 18, 1949.
