Carole Farley (born November 29, 1946) is an American soprano and a principal singer at the Metropolitan Opera. [1]
Farley was born in Le Mars, Iowa on November 29, 1946. [2] She began her vocal training with Dorothy Barnes in Moscow, Iowa. [3] She graduated from Indiana University School of Music in Bloomington with a bachelor's degree in music in 1968. [4] There she studied singing with William Shriner. [2] She was awarded a Fulbright scholarship and studied at the Hochschule für Musik in Munich in 1968-1969 [4] under Marianne Schech. [2] She later studied singing privately in New York City with Cornelius Reid. [5]
She is married to conductor José Serebrier. [4]
Farley began her performance career in 1968, and that year performed Richard Strauss's Four Last Songs with the Cleveland Philharmonic with her husband conducting. [6] In 1969 she made her New York concert debut year at The Town Hall [5] performing Benjamin Britten's song cycle Les Illuminations . [7] That same year she made her opera debut as Formica in Peter Ronnefeld's Die Ameise at the Linz State Theatre in Germany, [5] and performed the role of Magda Sorel in Spain's first production of Gian Carlo Menotti's The Consul in Madrid under the composer's direction. [7] She sang leading roles at both La Monnaie and the Welsh National Opera in 1971 and 1972, and was resident artist at the Cologne Opera from 1972-1975. [5]
In 1975 Farley made her debut with the Metropolitan Opera in a matinee performance as Mimi in La bohème . [8] In 1977 she sang the title role in the Metropolitan Opera's premiere of Lulu . [9] In the late 1970s and 1980s she was known for singing demanding roles such as Lulu and the solo role in Poulenc's La voix humaine . [10]
Farley has been collaborating in recent years with contemporary American classical composers including Ned Rorem, William Bolcom, and Lowell Liebermann on multiple concert and recording projects. [10]
Renata Scotto was an Italian soprano, opera director, and voice teacher. Recognised for her sense of style, her musicality, and as a remarkable singer-actress, Scotto is considered to have been one of the preeminent opera singers of her generation.
Teresa Stratas is a Canadian operatic soprano and actress of Greek descent. She is especially well known for her award-winning recording of Alban Berg's Lulu. She has now formally retired.
Magda Olivero, was an Italian operatic soprano. Her career started in 1932 when she was 22, and spanned five decades, establishing her "as an important link between the era of the verismo composers and the modern opera stage". She has been regarded as "one of the greatest singers of the twentieth century".
The Telephone, or L'Amour à trois is an English-language comic opera in one act by Gian Carlo Menotti, both words and music. It was written for production by the Ballet Society and was first presented on a double bill with Menotti's The Medium at the Heckscher Theater, New York City, February 18–20, 1947. The Broadway production took place on May 1, 1947, at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. The Metropolitan Opera Company presented it once, at the Lewisohn Stadium, on July 31, 1965.
Judith Blegen is an American soprano, particularly associated with light lyric roles of the French, Italian and German repertories.
Nicole Cabell is an American opera singer. She is best known as the 2005 winner of the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition.
La voix humaine is a forty-minute, one-act opera for soprano and orchestra composed by Francis Poulenc in 1958. The work is based on the play of the same name by Jean Cocteau, who, along with French soprano Denise Duval, worked closely with Poulenc in preparation for the opera's premiere. Poulenc's tragédie lyrique was first performed at the Théâtre National de l'Opéra-Comique in Paris on 6 February 1959, with Duval as the solo singer and Georges Prêtre conducting; the scenery, costumes and direction were by Cocteau.
Karan Armstrong was an American operatic soprano, who was celebrated as a singing actress. After winning the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 1966, she was given small roles at the Metropolitan Opera, and appeared in leading roles at the New York City Opera from 1969, including Conceptión in Ravel's L'heure espagnol, Blonde in Mozart's Die Entführung aus dem Serail, and the title roles in Verdi's La traviata, Offenbach's La belle Hélène and Puccini's La fanciulla del West. After she performed in Europe from 1974, first as Micaëla in Bizet's Carmen, and then as a sensational Salome at the Opéra du Rhin, she enjoyed a career at major opera houses, appearing in several opera recordings and films. Armstrong was for decades a leading soprano at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, where her husband Götz Friedrich was director. She appeared in world premieres, including Gottfried von Einem's Jesu Hochzeit, Luciano Berio's Un re in ascolto and York Höller's Der Meister und Margarita. She was awarded the title Kammersängerin twice.
The Human Voice is a monodrama first staged at the Comédie-Française in 1930, written two years earlier by Jean Cocteau. It is set in Paris, where a still-quite-young woman is on the phone with her lover of the last five years. He is to marry another woman the next day, which causes her to despair. The monologue triggers the woman's crippling depression.
Denise Duval was a French soprano, best known for her performances in the works of Francis Poulenc on stage and in recital. During an international career, Duval created the roles of Thérèse in Les mamelles de Tirésias, Elle in La voix humaine, and excelled in the role of Blanche de la Force in Dialogues of the Carmelites, leaving recordings of these and several other of her main roles.
Nuccia Focile is an Italian operatic soprano.
Miriam Gauci is a Maltese operatic soprano, particularly associated with lyric Italian roles.
Jean Kraft was an American operatic mezzo-soprano. She began her career singing with the New York City Opera (NYCO) during the early 1960s, after which she embarked on a partnership with The Santa Fe Opera from 1965 through 1987. In 1970 she joined the roster of singers at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City where she remained a fixture until 1989. She also performed as a guest of many other opera companies throughout the United States. In 2005 Opera News called her "a gifted mezzo and observant, imaginative actress who lent distinction to a wide range of character roles. By the end of her Met tenure, she had sung nearly 800 performances and become a solid audience favorite."
Beverly Bower was an American operatic soprano who had an active international opera career from the mid-1950s through the early 1970s. She began her opera career at the New York City Opera where she sang between 1956 and 1963. She later worked mainly as a freelance artist with important opera companies throughout the United States and with a few opera companies in Europe.
Maralin Niska was an American operatic soprano. Well known as a singing-actress, she was a mainstay of the New York City Opera during the 1960s and 1970s. She was also a regular performer at the Metropolitan Opera from 1970 to 1977.
June Card is an American soprano and stage director who had an active career in operas and concerts from 1959 through today. She began her career as a chorus girl on Broadway before moving into opera.
Eilene Hannan AM was an Australian operatic soprano with an international reputation. She was particularly associated with opera sung in English, although she also sang in other languages. She was as well known as an actress as she was a singer. Her repertoire included Mozart's Pamina, Susanna, Cherubino, Dorabella and Zerlina; Mimì in Puccini's La bohème; Natasha Rostova in Prokofiev's War and Peace; Tatiana in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin; Marzelline in Beethoven's Fidelio; Mélisande in Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande; Blanche in Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites; the title roles in Janáček's Káťa Kabanová, Jenůfa and The Cunning Little Vixen; the Marschallin in Richard Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier; Princess Eboli in Verdi's Don Carlos; Pat Nixon in Adams' Nixon in China; Wagner's Sieglinde and Venus; Salome in Massenet's Hérodiade; and Monteverdi's Poppea.
Joanna Mary Bruno, also known as Joanna Bruno-Clarke, is an American operatic soprano who had an active international career during the 1960s and 1970s. A lyric soprano, she often performed in operas by Giacomo Puccini and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
Thomas Jamerson is an American baritone who had an active international career as an opera and concert performer from the 1960s through the 1990s. He first drew distinction in the field of opera in 1968 when he recorded the role of Baron Douphol in Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata for RCA with conductor Georges Prêtre, the RCA Italiana Orchestra, and Montserrat Caballé as Violetta and Carlo Bergonzi as Alfredo. In 1969 he portrayed roles in the United States premieres of two operas at the Santa Fe Opera: Der Auserwählte in Arnold Schoenberg's Die Jakobsleiter and Captain of the Royal Guard in Hans Werner Henze's The Bassarids. He was a principal artist with the New York City Opera from 1969 to 1984. In 1971 he notably created the role of Professor Bolental in the world premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti's The Most Important Man. He currently teaches voice on the faculty at the Music Conservatory of Westchester in White Plains, New York.
Alexandra von der Weth is a German operatic soprano and voice teacher.