Great Singers, First Series Faustina Bordoni To Henrietta Sontag

While studying, Angelica went to hear a celebrated cantatrice of the day, and wept at the vanishing strains. "Alas!" she said with sorrowing _naivete_. "I shall never be able to...

In 1731 the celebrated couple accepted an offer from the brilliant Court of Dresden, presided over by Augustus II., as great a lover of art and literature as Goethe's Duke of Sa...

Brydone, who appears to have been fascinated with this siren, has an amusing apology for her carelessness of her duties in England, which he insists was not caprice, but inabili...

Frederick the Great loved war and music with equal fervor, and possessed talents for the one little inferior to his genius for the other. He played with remarkable skill on the...

A story is told of a distinguished critic that he persuaded himself that, with such power of portraying _Medea's_ emotions, Pasta must possess Medea's features. Having been told...

The number of Sophie Arnould's _bon-mots_ is almost legion, and her good nature could rarely resist the temptation of uttering a brilliant epigram or a pungent repartee. Some on...

Mme. Catalani retired from the stage in 1831. Young and brilliant rivals, such as Pasta and Son-tag, were rising to contest her sovereignty, and for several years the critics ha...

Metastasio's interest, unchecked by the disdain of the capricious beauty, succeeded in obtaining for her the position of court singer at Vienna, where the Emperor, Francis I., w...

Elizabeth Weichsel's Runaway Marriage.--_Début_ at Covent Garden.--Lord Mount Edgcumbe's Opinion of her Singing.--Her Rivalry with Mme. Mara.--Mrs. Billington's Greatness in Eng...

In compiling and arranging the material which enters into the following sketches of distinguished singers, it is only honest to disclaim any originality except such as may be in...

"Henrietta's voice was a pure soprano, reaching perhaps from A or B to D in alt, and, though uniform in its quality, it was a little reedy in the lower notes, but its flexibilit...

In spite of the fact that several brilliant singers were in England, and of the desire of the public that the splendid talents of Catalani should be appropriately supported, her...

"When the incomparable Mme. Mara took leave of me on her return to the Continent," says Dr. Kitchener, "I could not help expressing my regret that she had not taken my advice to...

Her reappearance as _Linda_, on July 7, 1849, was the occasion of a cordial and sympathetic reception on the part of a very brilliant and distinguished audience. The first notes...