Margarete Matzenauer

A fantastic singer and a force unto herself, Margarete Matzenauer sang dramatic jobs in both mezzo-soprano and soprano registers. Although some sensed that her huge, weighty device was at its greatest in the mezzo fach, she sang through a reasonably long profession with her tone of voice essentially intact regardless of the considerable amount of Wagnerian soprano shows she offered. Upon pension, she became a well known teacher. The child of two professional music artists, Matzenauer started her voice teaching with Georgine von Januschowsky in Graz before starting further research with Franz Emerich and Antonia Mielke in Berlin and Ernst Preuse (whom she later on wedded) in Munich. She produced her debut as Puck in Weber’s Oberon in the Strasbourg Stadttheater in 1901. Her achievement in that creation resulted in an present from Munich’s Hofoper and from 1905 to 1911, Matzenauer sang there, building her repertoire of dramatic functions. In 1911, she made an appearance in the Bayreuth Event and, later on that 12 months, she produced her Metropolitan Opera debut, performing Amneris inside a November 13 Aida, a season-opening overall performance carried out by Arturo Toscanini. Her overall performance received the admiration of both audience as well as the critics. Many mentioned the scale and beauty of her tone of voice as well as the artistry with which it had been deployed. Matzenauer continued to be in the Metropolitan for twenty years, noticed in both mezzo and soprano functions, co-mingling them week-to-week. In 1914, Matzenauer was once again in the starting night cast, this time around as Ulrica to Emmy Destinn’s Amelia and Caruso’s Riccardo. Toscanini once again conducted, his last opening night in the theatre. For the 3rd successive 12 months, Matzenauer opened the growing season when she became a member of Caruso in Samson et Delilah on November 18, 1915. She was praised for the heat of her performing, even if it had been somewhat taken off authentic French design. January 1917 brought an outright failing as Matzenauer sang the Figaro Countess, transposing a lot of the music and becoming referred to as “stolid.” Matzenauer’s repertoire grew to encompass such additional jobs as Leonore in Fidelio, Isolde, all three Brünnhildes, Kundry, Sélika, Orfeo, Carmen, Princess Eboli, Marina in Boris Godunov, Fidès in Le Prophète, and Donna Elvira. Critic Philip Hale lavished this compliment on her behalf Isolde: “Her shades are of uncommon beauty…in one of the most passionate occasions, she didn’t shriek, she had not been explosive. She continuously sang and in her performing expressed the feelings of Isolde.” During her years on the Metropolitan Opera, Matzenauer performed somewhere else as well, performing in Boston from 1912 to 1914, in Buenos Aires (1912), and in London where she initial made an appearance as Ortrud in 1914, earning recognition among the leading German mezzo-sopranos of your day. Her Kundry during her one London period was considered a sensation in support of the outbreak from the First Globe War avoided her having an extended relationship with this movie theater. Later in her profession, she made an appearance in Philadelphia where she sang Clitemnestre in 1930. Matzenauer retired through the Metropolitan in 1930, her farewell function that of her debut 2 decades before. She trained in LA, then surfaced from pension to sing Delilah within an open-air efficiency at New York’s Lewisohn Stadium. Some more years of pension implemented before she provided a recital at Carnegie Hall in 1938. Although she was after that 56, the brand new York Moments could still compose of her “sumptuous timbre and opulent resonance” as well as the “power and awareness of her musicianship.” Pursuing that event, she trained in NY and California.