PARA PAR@ ` TEXT ` ⌡Nordica, Lillian1857╨1914opera singerBorn in Farmington, Maine, on December 12, 1857, Lillian Norton grew up from the age of six in Boston. At fourteen she began studying voice at the New England Conservatory of Music, and after her graduation in 1876 she continued her studies for a time in New York City. She made her formal debut in concert with Patrick S. Gilmore╒s band at Madison Square Garden in September 1876, and she toured with the band in America and Europe until 1878. She then resumed her studies in Paris with Franìois Delsarte and Emilio Belari and then in Milan with Antonio Sangiovanni, who secured for her an operatic debut in Don Giovanni at the Manzoni Theatre, Milan, in March 1879 and who gave her her stage name. She sang for two seasons in St. Petersburg, appeared in Danzig, Berlin, and other cities, and made her debut at the Paris OpÄra in July 1882, when she sang the part of Marguerite in Gounod╒s Faust to great acclaim. Having become the first American operatic singer to win renown in the demanding houses of Europe, Nordica returned home under the management of English impresario Colonel James H. Mapleson. She sang Marguerite in her American operatic debut at the New York Academy of Music in November 1883. Thereafter she was one of the most sought-after sopranos in America, in England, and on the Continent. Her London debut occurred at Covent Garden in March 1887 in La Traviata. Between operatic engagements she sang frequently in concerts and oratorios. In 1893 she became a regular singer at the Metropolitan Opera. Not content with her command of much of the French and Italian repertoires, a short time later she left the stage for several months to study Wagnerian opera. Her appearance in Lohengrin under Cosima Wagner╒s direction at Bayreuth in 1894 was a success, and her Isolde to Jean de Reszke╒s Tristan at the Metropolitan in November 1895 was a triumph. Despite Nordica somewhat undeveloped dramatic bent and her clear, lyric soprano, her great successes in subsequent years were usually in Wagnerian roles, notably those of Elsa, Isolde, and the three Brunnhildes. The great success she enjoyed was largely the product of tireless effort. in November 1909 she appeared in the Gioconda that inaugurated the Boston Opera House. Her final appearance at the Met was in Tristan und Isolde, with Toscanini conducting, in December 1909. She continued to appear elsewhere in the United States and abroad in opera and in concert. Her final full operatic performance was a Boston production of Tristan in March 1913, and her last American appearance was in concert in Reno, Nevada, in June of that year. She then set out on a concert tour that was to take her around the world. She appeared in Australia in November, but shortly afterward her ship grounded in the Gulf of Papua in December. She contracted pneumonia and died of complications of the disease in Batavia, Java, on May 10, 1914. Lillian Nordica╒s Hints to Singers, which included many of her letters, was published in 1923. εstyl ` ! ¬ 5¬ 5¬ ) !I ì !I Ö !I ¿ !I ¡ !I ┬ 5¬ ├ !I ì !I ÿ !I ┌ !I π !I ê 5¬ ë !I ═ !I ╒ !I ' !I 9 !I
