Barrier-breaking mezzo-soprano Grace Bumbry, whose expansive vocal range and transcendent stage presence have made her a towering figure in opera, was one of the first and biggest black stars to perform in Vienna on Sunday. died in She was 86 years old.
Her death was confirmed after a stroke in October in a statement At New York’s Metropolitan Opera, she was a longtime mainstay, performing more than 200 times in 20 years.
Growing up in St. Louis during segregation, Bumbry came of age at a time when African-American singers were rarely seen on the opera stage, despite the breakthroughs of celebrities like Leontyne Price and Marian Anderson. Did.
But with her fiery impulses and outsized charisma, Bumbry came to international prominence when she sang Amneris in Verdi’s “Aida” at the Paris Opera in 1960 at the age of 23. rice field.
The following year she landed on something national scandal In West Germany, Richard Wagner’s grandson, Wieland Wagner, cast her as Venus, the Roman goddess of love, in a modern version of Wagner’s Tannhäuser at the prestigious Bayreuth Festival.
She was cast as a character typically portrayed as a Nordic ideal in an opera written by a composer known for her anti-Semitism and German nationalism, and was the first black woman to perform at the festival. Newspapers were flooded with letters claiming that the composer would “return to his grave.”
Mr. Bumbry did not flinch. Indeed, she was well prepared.
“Everything you learned as a child is now being put to the test,” she recalled in a 2021 interview with St. Louis Magazine. ”
Audiences shared no such concerns, and Ms. Bumbry was applauded for half an hour. The Cologne regional newspaper Kölnische Rundschau tells her, “an artistic triumphand Die Welt called her a “great discovery”.
Her breakthrough performance helped land her a $250,000 contract (now worth over $2.5 million) with opera impresario Sol Hulock.
A performance at the White House in February 1962 earned her another honor. On the advice of a European friend who had seen Ms. Bumbry in her Bayreuth, her first her Lady Jacqueline Kennedy invited her to sing at a state dinner she attended. President John F. Kennedy and Mrs. Kennedy, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson, Chief Justice Earl Warren and other power brokers in Washington.
Suddenly she became a star.
Claudia Cassidy wrote for the Chicago Tribune in her review of Aria, recorded the same year, “If there’s a new voice more exciting than Grace Bumbry’s surge, I haven’t heard it.” increase. “This is a glorious voice. By the grace of the gods, we have been given the opportunity to bring out its full beauty.”
Alan Rich of The New York Times gave a limited review of his Carnegie Hall debut in November 1962, noting that “Miss Bumbry has a gorgeous, clear, ringing voice that she manages well.” Admitted.
“She can swoop from brilliant high notes to beautifully resonant chests without the slightest effort,” he wrote.
Ms. Bumbry transcended not only racial perceptions, but voice classifications as well.Originally a mezzo-soprano, she made an impressive departure by taking on her soprano part as well, appearing in Richard Strauss’ Salome and Puccini’s Tosca..”
“She was proud to have acted both roles In Verdi’s “Aida,” Fred Plotkin wrote in a 2013 letter of appreciation to the website of WXQR, New York’s public radio station. “She could be Tosca and Salome, she could be Carmen and Eboli.”
Ms. Bumbry has a wide range of roles to choose from. In 1985, she played the role of Bess in the Metropolitan Opera’s 50th Anniversary production of George Gershwin to critical acclaim. “Porgy and Besswhere unflattering black stereotypes prevail, despite her conflicted feelings about the folk opera set in a Charleston, South Carolina tenement.
“I thought so under me“I felt like I had gone too far to go back to 1935. My way of processing it was that it was really Americana, a piece of American history.” It was to make sure it was part or not. Whether I sang it or not, it was supposed to be there.”
Grace Merzia Bumbry was born in St. Louis on January 4, 1937, the youngest of three children to railroad freight forwarder Benjamin Bumbry and schoolteacher Melzia Bumbry.
A musical prodigy in her youth, she honed her skills in the choir of the St. Louis Union Memorial Church and played Chopin on the piano at a women’s tea party. When she was 16, she saw a performance by her mentor, Ms. Anderson, who inspired her to enter a singing contest on a local radio station. She received top honors, including a $1,000 wartime bond and a scholarship to the St. Louis Conservatory of Music. Nevertheless, she was refused admission because of her race.
In an interview with The Boston Globe, Bumbry said, “Reality has hurt.” “But when it happened, I also thought I was the winner. You can’t change that. My talent is superior.”
Embarrassingly, radio contest organizers arranged for her to appear on the national radio and television program “Talent Scouts” hosted by Arthur Godfrey. After she heard a heartbreaking rendition of “King of Destiny” from Verdi’s “Don Carlo”, Mr. Godfrey told the audience, “Her name will one day be one of the most famous names in music.” said.
Exposure put her on the path to Boston University and later Northwestern University, where she was placed under the tutelage of German opera luminary Lotte Lehmann, who said that Ms. As I moved towards my debut in Paris, I became another valuable mentor.
As her star continued to rise over the years, Ms. Bumbry was not afraid to live in the role of prima donna not only behind the scenes, but also Yves Saint Laurent and Oscar de la Renta. I wrapped myself in a Lamborghini and drove around.
After marrying tenor singer Erwin Yackel in 1963, she settled in a villa in Lugano, Switzerland. The couple divorced in 1972. Mr. Bumbry immediately had no survivors.
Beyond her prodigious singing ability, Ms. Bumbry brought a famous sensuality to her role. She capitalized on her reputation in the 1970 production of Salome at the Royal Opera House in London.
She leaked to the press that she would strip off all seven veils, down to, as she puts it, “jewels and perfumes” for the racy “Dance of the Seven Veils,” The New York Times noted. As such, it’s enough to function as a “modest bikini”.
It hardly mattered. “In the history of Covent Garden,” Mr. Bumbry said in his 1985 interview with People magazine: lots of binoculars”
