Artur Rodziński was a Polish-American conductor of orchestral music and opera. He began his career after World War I in Poland, where he was discovered by Leopold Stokowski, who invited him to be his assistant with the Philadelphia Orchestra. This engagement led to Rodziński becoming music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He also prepared the NBC Symphony Orchestra for Arturo Toscanini before the Italian conductor's debut with them. A dispute in Chicago led to Rodziński's dismissal in 1948, whereupon he shifted his career to Europe, eventually settling in Italy, although continuing to maintain a home in Lake Placid, New York. In November 1958, beset by heart disease, he made his professional return to the United States for the first time in a decade, conducting acclaimed performances of Richard Wagner's Tristan und Isolde with the Lyric Opera of Chicago. Exhausted, he checked into Massachusetts General Hospital where he died 11 days later.
Jan Wiktor Kiepura was a Polish singer and actor.
Charles Manners was a British bass singer and opera company manager. His earliest performances were with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, first as a chorus member and then as a principal, creating the role of Private Willis in Iolanthe in 1882. After leaving D'Oyly Carte the following year, he sang with several opera companies, most notably the Carl Rosa Opera Company and Covent Garden. In 1898, he and his wife, the singer Fanny Moody, set up their own company, dedicated to presenting opera in English.
The Academy of Music was a New York City opera house, located on the northeast corner of East 14th Street and Irving Place in Manhattan. The 4,000-seat hall opened on October 2, 1854. The review in The New York Times declared it to be an acoustical "triumph", but "In every other aspect ... a decided failure," complaining about the architecture, interior design and the closeness of the seating; although a follow-up several days later relented a bit, saying that the theater "looked more cheerful, and in every way more effective" than it had on opening night.
Edmund Law Rogers, also known by the stage name Leslie Edmunds, was an American stage actor. He was also a founding father of the Kappa Sigma fraternity at the University of Virginia.
Rose Bampton was an American opera singer who had an active international career during the 1930s and 1940s. She began her professional career performing mostly minor roles from the mezzo-soprano repertoire in 1929 but later switched to singing primarily leading soprano roles in 1937 until her retirement from the opera stage in 1963.
George Fleming Houston was an American B-western film actor and accomplished singer in the early half of the 20th century.
The National Conservatory of Music of America was an institution for higher education in music founded in 1885 in New York City by Jeannette Meyers Thurber. The conservatory was officially declared defunct by the state of New York in 1952, although for all practical pedagogical purposes, it had ceased to function much earlier than that. Between its founding and about 1920, however, the conservatory played an important part in the education and training of musicians in the United States, and for decades Thurber attempted to turn it into a federally-supported national conservatory in a European style. A number of prominent names are associated with the institution, including that of Victor Herbert and Antonín Dvořák, director of the conservatory from Sep. 27, 1892 to 1895.
Emma Fursch-Madi, also given as Emmy Fursch-Madi, was a French operatic soprano. She was born in Bayonne, France, and studied at the Paris Conservatory and made her debut at the Paris Opera in 1871 in Gounod's Faust. At the end of her second season at the Grand Opera, she was chosen by Verdi to be the first representative of Aida in Europe. It opened at the Theatre Royal in Brussels and was a great success, running for 72 straight performances.
Dorothy Kirsten was an American operatic soprano.
Max Bendix was an American concert violinist, conductor, and teacher. He was the first concertmaster of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and was also the concertmaster of the Metropolitan Opera orchestra. Bendix wrote several works for orchestra and some incidental music as well as songs. In 1899, the Musical Courier called Bendix "the finest American violinist".
Mary McCormic was an American operatic soprano and a professor of opera at the University of North Texas College of Music (1945–1960).
Vladimir Sergeyevich Rosing, also known as Val Rosing, was a Russian-born operatic tenor and stage director who spent most of his professional career in the United Kingdom and the United States. In his formative years he experienced the last years of the "golden age" of opera, and he dedicated himself through his singing and directing to breathing new life into opera's outworn mannerisms and methods.
Gustav Ludwig Wilhelm Hinrichs was a German-born American conductor and composer. He immigrated to the United States at the age of 19, where he became known especially as a conductor of opera in San Francisco, New York, and Philadelphia. His compositions include four operas, many songs and instrumental works, and musical scores for silent films, including the 1925 version of The Phantom of the Opera.
The Max Maretzek Italian Opera Company was a touring American opera company that performed throughout the United States from 1849 to 1878. The first major opera company in Manhattan and one of the first important companies in the United States, it had a long association with the Academy of Music in New York City where it presented an annual season of opera from 1854 until the company's demise in 1878. There the company performed the United States premieres of Rigoletto, Il trovatore, and La traviata among other works.
Martha Atwood was an American operatic soprano and the founder of the Cape Cod Institute of Music. She was awarded the Medal of Honor from the National Society of New England Women.
Ina Bourskaya was a Ukrainian-born American opera singer.
Anne Roselle was an American operatic dramatic soprano.
John R. Gurney was an American bass-baritone who had an active career as an opera, concert, vaudeville, and musical theatre performer from the 1920s through the 1940s. He was a principal artist at the Metropolitan Opera from 1936 through 1945 where he performed a total of 331 times. On the international stage he performed in operas at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires and the Theatro Municipal in Rio de Janeiro. He is best remembered for creating roles in the world premieres of Walter Damrosch's The Man Without a Country and Douglas Moore's The Devil and Daniel Webster. He recorded the role of Don Basilio in Rossini's The Barber of Seville which was released by RCA Camden in 1957. Gurney's son is racecar driver Dan Gurney.
Mary Sybil Kidd Maynard Lewis was an American lyric soprano and actress who an active performance career in musicals, operas, vaudeville, and in film during the first half of the twentieth century. After beginning her career as a chorus girl in 1919, she was signed by the Christie Film Company to star in a series of comedic silent films made in 1920; most notably A Bashful Bigamist. She later appeared in the Vitaphone Varieties, some of the earliest sound films made by Warner Bros., in 1926. Her first major stage role was as a featured singer in the Broadway musical revue Ziegfeld Follies of 1921. In 1923 her career reoriented towards opera, beginning with her opera debut at Vienna State Opera. After performing in European opera houses for a few years, she returned to the United States to join the roster of leading sopranos at the Metropolitan Opera in 1925 where she remained committed through 1930.
