Blanche Thebom
Encyclopedia
Blanche Thebom was an American
opera
tic mezzo-soprano
, voice teacher
, and opera director. She was part of the first wave of American opera singers that had highly successful international careers. In her own country she had a long association with the Metropolitan Opera
in New York City
which lasted 22 years. Opera News
stated, "An ambitious beauty with a velvety, even-grained dramatic mezzo, Thebom was a natural for opera: she commanded the stage with the elegantly disciplined hauteur of an old-school diva, relishing the opportunity to play femmes du monde such as Marina in Boris Godunov
, Herodias
and Dalila
."
While Thebom sang a broad repertoire which encompassed everything from Handel
and Mozart
to Verdi
and Debussy
, she was best known for her performances in the operas of Richard Wagner
. Two Wagner roles with which she was particularly associated were Fricka in Die Walküre
and Brangaene in Tristan und Isolde
. She notably sang the latter role in a famous 1952 recording made in London with Kirsten Flagstad
, Ludwig Suthaus
, and conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler
. In addition to several other recordings, she also appeared in two feature films during her career: Irish Eyes Are Smiling
(1944) and, with Mario Lanza
, The Great Caruso
(1951).
After retiring from the stage in 1967, Thebom worked as an opera director in Atlanta for 6 years. She then taught singing both privately and on the music faculties of the University of Arkansas
and San Francisco State University
. She also co-founded the Opera Arts Training Program of the San Francisco Girls Chorus and served on the board of the Metropolitan Opera for nearly four decades.
in 1915, Thebom was the daughter of Swedish parents who had immigrated to the United States. Her year of birth is sometimes incorrectly given as 1918. She was raised in Canton, Ohio
where she studied ballet and was active as a singer in her church's choir. She continued to take ballet lessons into her 40s. She completed business college and then took a job as a secretary at an industrial firm in Canton.
In 1938, while working as a secretary, Thebom traveled with her parents to Sweden. During the boat trip from America to Europe, she was overheard singing in the ship's lounge by pianist Kosti Vehanen
. Vehanen was Marian Anderson
's regular accompanist and vocal coach, and he was highly impressed with Thebom's talent. Accordingly, he arranged for Thebom to become a pupil of Giuseppe Boghetti
in New York, who was Anderson's voice teacher, and also eventually got her signed with talent manager Sol Hurok
who also managed Anderson's career. After Boghetti's death in July 1941, she studied with retired Metropolitan Opera mezzo-sopranos Edyth Walker
and Margarete Matzenauer
in New York City.
under conductor Eugene Ormandy
with fellow guest the University of Pennsylvania Glee Club at the Academy of Music
in Philadelphia. She then spent the next three years performing in concerts and recitals throughout the United States. She also sang at the Academy of Music for her professional opera debut on 28 November 1944; portraying the role of Brangäne in Wagner's Tristan und Isolde for an out of town engagement of New York's Metropolitan Opera
. She repeated that role for her first appearance on the New York stage at the Metropolitan Opera House
on the following 14 December.
Thebom sang with the Metropolitan Opera for the next 22 seasons, giving a total of 357 performances with the company during her career. Her most frequently assailed role at the Met was Amneris in Giuseppe Verdi
's Aida
; a part she played in 80 performances
opposite such Aidas as Gloria Davy
, Florence Kirk
, Zinka Milanov
, Herva Nelli
, Delia Rigal, Antonietta Stella
, Renata Tebaldi
, and Ljuba Welitsch
among others. She also excelled in Wagner's operas at the Met, portraying the roles of Erda in Das Rheingold
, Magdalene in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
, Ortrud in Lohengrin
, Venus in Tannhäuser
, Waltraute in Götterdämmerung
, and Fricka in both Die Walküre
and Das Rheingold.
In 1951 Thebom appeared as Dorabella in the premiere of Alfred Lunt
's popular English-language production of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
's Così fan tutte
at the Met. She also appeared in two United States premieres at the Met; singing the roles of Baba the Turk in Igor Stravinsky
's The Rake's Progress
(1953) and Adelaide in Richard Strauss
' Arabella
(1955). Other roles she performed at the Met included Adalgisa in Norma
, Azucena in Il trovatore
, Dalila in Samson and Delilah
, Eboli in Don Carlos
, Geneviève in Pelléas et Mélisande
, Giulietta in The Tales of Hoffmann, Herodias in Salome
, Klytämnestra in Elektra
, Laura Adorno in La Gioconda, Marfa in Khovanshchina
, Marina in Boris Godunov
, the Old Baroness in Vanessa
, Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus
, and the title roles in Carmen
and Mignon
. Her final performance at the Met was as the Countess in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
's The Queen of Spades
on March 6, 1967. That was the only production that she appeared in at the then newly built Metropolitan Opera House
at Lincoln Center.
. She made her debut with the San Francisco Opera
(SFO) the following year singing Amneris to the Aida of Stella Roman
. She was heard frequently in San Francisco through 1963; notably portraying the role of Mother Marie in the United States premiere of Francis Poulenc
's Dialogues of the Carmelites
at the SFO in 1957. Other roles she performed in San Francisco were Brangän, Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro
, Carmen, Dalila, Fricka, Giulietta, Laura Adorno, Marina, Octavian in Der Rosenkavalier
, and Orfeo in Orfeo ed Euridice
. She also sang Dalila to the Samson of Giovanni Martinelli
at the Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company
in 1950.
Thebom made her European debut in 1950 as Dalila at the Royal Swedish Opera
(RSO). She returned to the RSO several times, singing such roles as Amneris, Eboli and — in what The Times
described as "a not especially successful attempt at a soprano role" — as Elisabeth in Tannhäuser. She made her first appearance in the UK with the Glyndebourne Festival Opera
in the Summer of 1950 as Dorabella. In 1957 she came to London
to sing Dido in the much lauded 1957 production of Hector Berlioz
's Les Troyens
at the Royal Opera House
, Covent Garden
. It was the first time that this opera was staged by a professional company. In this production she made effective use of her spectacularly long hair, allowing it to fall down her back as she ascended the funeral pyre at the end.
In 1957, at the pinnacle of the Cold War
, Thebom became the first American to perform at the Bolshoi Theatre
in Moscow, where she portrayed the title role in a three week run of Carmen. She soon after gave a concert tour of Russia. She also gave performances in Greece, including a concert in front of the Parthenon
with thousands in attendance. In 1960 she appeared at the Dallas Opera
as Ruggiero in a celebrated production of George Frideric Handel
's Alcina
, with Joan Sutherland
in the title role. She also portrayed Orlofszky (1965 and 1967) and Brangäne (1967) with the Philadelphia Grand Opera Company
.
. In June 1967 she was appointed director of the opera division at the Atlanta Municipal Theatre. When that organization went bankrupt in 1969, she founded her own opera company: Atlanta's Southern Regional Opera. She remained General Director of that company until 1973 when it ceased operating.
While working in Atlanta, Thebom began actively working as a voice teacher. She also appeared in summer theatre revivals of Broadway musicals in Atlanta portraying roles like the Mother Abbess in The Sound of Music
. In 1973 she moved to Little Rock to join the music faculty at the University of Arkansas
. She taught singing and was director of the opera program there until the Spring of 1980 when she was appointed director of the opera program at San Francisco State University
(SFSU).
While teaching at SFSU and later privately, Thebom served as chair of the Pacific Region Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions
for fifteen years. In the late 1980s she co-founded the Opera Arts Training Program of the San Francisco Girls Chorus with Elizabeth Appling. She continued to lead that organization up into the early 2000s. Several of the girls who attended the program later became professional opera singers. Thebom also served on the board of the Metropolitan Opera from 1970–2008, and was a judge for the national level of the Miss America
pageant.
At the age of 94, Blanche Thebom died of heart failure at her home in San Francisco on Tuesday, March 23, 2010.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
tic mezzo-soprano
Mezzo-soprano
A mezzo-soprano is a type of classical female singing voice whose range lies between the soprano and the contralto singing voices, usually extending from the A below middle C to the A two octaves above...
, voice teacher
Voice teacher
A voice teacher or singing teacher is a musical instructor who trains adults and children in the art of singing. This generally involves training in breath control and support, proper tone production, pitch control and musical intonation, proper formation of vowels and consonants as well as...
, and opera director. She was part of the first wave of American opera singers that had highly successful international careers. In her own country she had a long association with the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
which lasted 22 years. Opera News
Opera News
Opera News is an American classical music magazine. It has been published since 1936 by the Metropolitan Opera Guild, a non-profit organization located at Lincoln Center which was founded to support the Metropolitan Opera of New York City...
stated, "An ambitious beauty with a velvety, even-grained dramatic mezzo, Thebom was a natural for opera: she commanded the stage with the elegantly disciplined hauteur of an old-school diva, relishing the opportunity to play femmes du monde such as Marina in Boris Godunov
Boris Godunov (opera)
Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
, Herodias
Salome (opera)
Salome is an opera in one act by Richard Strauss to a German libretto by the composer, based on Hedwig Lachmann’s German translation of the French play Salomé by Oscar Wilde. Strauss dedicated the opera to his friend Sir Edgar Speyer....
and Dalila
Samson and Delilah (opera)
Samson and Delilah , Op. 47, is a grand opera in three acts and four scenes by Camille Saint-Saëns to a French libretto by Ferdinand Lemaire...
."
While Thebom sang a broad repertoire which encompassed everything from Handel
George Frideric Handel
George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
and Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
to Verdi
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
and Debussy
Claude Debussy
Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
, she was best known for her performances in the operas of Richard Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
. Two Wagner roles with which she was particularly associated were Fricka in Die Walküre
Die Walküre
Die Walküre , WWV 86B, is the second of the four operas that form the cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen , by Richard Wagner...
and Brangaene in Tristan und Isolde
Tristan und Isolde
Tristan und Isolde is an opera, or music drama, in three acts by Richard Wagner to a German libretto by the composer, based largely on the romance by Gottfried von Straßburg. It was composed between 1857 and 1859 and premiered in Munich on 10 June 1865 with Hans von Bülow conducting...
. She notably sang the latter role in a famous 1952 recording made in London with Kirsten Flagstad
Kirsten Flagstad
Kirsten Målfrid Flagstad was a Norwegian opera singer and a highly regarded Wagnerian soprano...
, Ludwig Suthaus
Ludwig Suthaus
Ludwig Suthaus was a German opera singer , who was born in Cologne and died in West Berlin.- Biography :...
, and conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler
Wilhelm Furtwängler
Wilhelm Furtwängler was a German conductor and composer. He is widely considered to have been one of the greatest symphonic and operatic conductors of the 20th century. By the 1930s he had built a reputation as one of the leading conductors in Europe, and he was the leading conductor who remained...
. In addition to several other recordings, she also appeared in two feature films during her career: Irish Eyes Are Smiling
Irish Eyes Are Smiling
Irish Eyes Are Smiling is a 1944 musical film which chronicles the life of popular Irish song composer Ernest R. Ball. The screenplay by Earl Baldwin and John Tucker Battle is based on a story by E. A. Ellington. The film was directed by Gregory Ratoff and produced by Damon Runyon for 20th Century...
(1944) and, with Mario Lanza
Mario Lanza
right|thumb|[[MGM]] still, circa 1949Mario Lanza was an American tenor and Hollywood movie star of the late 1940s and the 1950s. The son of Italian emigrants, he began studying to be a professional singer at the age of 16....
, The Great Caruso
The Great Caruso
The Great Caruso is a 1951 biographical film made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by Richard Thorpe and produced by Joe Pasternak with Jesse L. Lasky as associate producer from a screenplay by Sonya Levien and William Ludwig. The original music was by Johnny Green and the cinematography by...
(1951).
After retiring from the stage in 1967, Thebom worked as an opera director in Atlanta for 6 years. She then taught singing both privately and on the music faculties of the University of Arkansas
University of Arkansas
The University of Arkansas is a public, co-educational, land-grant, space-grant, research university. It is classified by the Carnegie Foundation as a research university with very high research activity. It is the flagship campus of the University of Arkansas System and is located in...
and San Francisco State University
San Francisco State University
San Francisco State University is a public university located in San Francisco, California. As part of the 23-campus California State University system, the university offers over 100 areas of study from nine academic colleges...
. She also co-founded the Opera Arts Training Program of the San Francisco Girls Chorus and served on the board of the Metropolitan Opera for nearly four decades.
Early life and education
Born in Monessen, PennsylvaniaMonessen, Pennsylvania
Monessen is a city in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 8,669 at the 2000 census. In 1940, 20,257 people lived there. In 1990 the population was 13,026. Steel-making was a prominent industry in Monessen, which was a Rust Belt borough in the "Mon Valley" of...
in 1915, Thebom was the daughter of Swedish parents who had immigrated to the United States. Her year of birth is sometimes incorrectly given as 1918. She was raised in Canton, Ohio
Canton, Ohio
Canton is the county seat of Stark County in northeastern Ohio, approximately south of Akron and south of Cleveland.The City of Caton is the largest incorporated area within the Canton-Massillon Metropolitan Statistical Area...
where she studied ballet and was active as a singer in her church's choir. She continued to take ballet lessons into her 40s. She completed business college and then took a job as a secretary at an industrial firm in Canton.
In 1938, while working as a secretary, Thebom traveled with her parents to Sweden. During the boat trip from America to Europe, she was overheard singing in the ship's lounge by pianist Kosti Vehanen
Kosti Vehanen
Kosti Vehanen was a Finnish pianist and composer. As a pianist he performed in more than 3 000 concerts on four continents...
. Vehanen was Marian Anderson
Marian Anderson
Marian Anderson was an African-American contralto and one of the most celebrated singers of the twentieth century...
's regular accompanist and vocal coach, and he was highly impressed with Thebom's talent. Accordingly, he arranged for Thebom to become a pupil of Giuseppe Boghetti
Giuseppe Boghetti
Giuseppe Boghetti was an American voice teacher and tenor. He was the teacher of several famous American opera singers, including Marian Anderson, Jan Peerce, Blanche Thebom, and Helen Traubel.-Life and career:...
in New York, who was Anderson's voice teacher, and also eventually got her signed with talent manager Sol Hurok
Sol Hurok
Sol Hurok was a world-famous 20th century American impresario.-Biography:...
who also managed Anderson's career. After Boghetti's death in July 1941, she studied with retired Metropolitan Opera mezzo-sopranos Edyth Walker
Edyth Walker
Edyth Walker was an American opera singer who had an active international career from the 1890s through the 1910s. She began her career performing roles from the mezzo-soprano repertory, but later successfully added several soprano parts to her repertoire as well...
and Margarete Matzenauer
Margarete Matzenauer
Margaret Matzenauer was a mezzo-soprano singer with an opulent timbre and a wide range to her voice...
in New York City.
Early career and performing at the Metropolitan Opera
Thebom's first prominent engagement as a performer came in November 1941 when she made her first appearance as a soloist with the Philadelphia OrchestraPhiladelphia Orchestra
The Philadelphia Orchestra is a symphony orchestra based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. One of the "Big Five" American orchestras, it was founded in 1900...
under conductor Eugene Ormandy
Eugene Ormandy
Eugene Ormandy was a Hungarian-born conductor and violinist.-Early life:Born Jenő Blau in Budapest, Hungary, Ormandy began studying violin at the Royal National Hungarian Academy of Music at the age of five...
with fellow guest the University of Pennsylvania Glee Club at the Academy of Music
Academy of Music (Philadelphia)
The Academy of Music, also known as American Academy of Music, is a concert hall and opera house located at Broad and Locust Streets in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was built in 1857 and is the oldest opera house in the United States that is still used for its original purpose...
in Philadelphia. She then spent the next three years performing in concerts and recitals throughout the United States. She also sang at the Academy of Music for her professional opera debut on 28 November 1944; portraying the role of Brangäne in Wagner's Tristan und Isolde for an out of town engagement of New York's Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
. She repeated that role for her first appearance on the New York stage at the Metropolitan Opera House
Metropolitan Opera House (39th St)
The Metropolitan Opera House was an opera house located at 1411 Broadway in New York City. Opened in 1883 and demolished in 1967, it was the first home of the Metropolitan Opera Company.-History:...
on the following 14 December.
Thebom sang with the Metropolitan Opera for the next 22 seasons, giving a total of 357 performances with the company during her career. Her most frequently assailed role at the Met was Amneris in Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
's Aida
Aida
Aida sometimes spelled Aïda, is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette...
; a part she played in 80 performances
opposite such Aidas as Gloria Davy
Gloria Davy
Gloria Davy is an African-American soprano. She was the first black artist to sing in Aida at the New York Metropolitan Opera on February 1958, to a positive reception from the audience, and providing a breakthrough to drawing attention to black classical singers...
, Florence Kirk
Florence Kirk
Florence Kirk was an American soprano. Raised in Germantown, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Kirk graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1931 with degrees in music and education. She then entered the Curtis Institute of Music where she studied opera...
, Zinka Milanov
Zinka Milanov
Zinka Milanov was a Croatian-born operatic spinto soprano who had a major career centred on the New York Metropolitan Opera.-Biography:...
, Herva Nelli
Herva Nelli
Herva Nelli was an Italian-born operatic soprano.-Biography:Named after the French socialist Gustave Hervé, she was born in Florence, where she attended a convent school...
, Delia Rigal, Antonietta Stella
Antonietta Stella
Antonietta Stella is an Italian operatic soprano, one of the finest Italian spinto sopranos of the 1950s and 1960s, possessing a beautiful and ample voice, and particularly associated with Verdi and Puccini roles.Stella studied at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, and made her...
, Renata Tebaldi
Renata Tebaldi
Renata Tebaldi was an Italian lirico-spinto soprano popular in the post-war period...
, and Ljuba Welitsch
Ljuba Welitsch
Ljuba Welitsch was a celebrated Bulgarian, later Austrian, operatic soprano.She studied singing at Sofia Conservatory with professor Georgi Zlatev-Cherkin. After specializing in Vienna, she first appeared in Sofia in 1936...
among others. She also excelled in Wagner's operas at the Met, portraying the roles of Erda in Das Rheingold
Das Rheingold
is the first of the four operas that constitute Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen . It was originally written as an introduction to the tripartite Ring, but the cycle is now generally regarded as consisting of four individual operas.Das Rheingold received its premiere at the National Theatre...
, Magdalene in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg is an opera in three acts, written and composed by Richard Wagner. It is among the longest operas still commonly performed today, usually taking around four and a half hours. It was first performed at the Königliches Hof- und National-Theater in Munich, on June 21,...
, Ortrud in Lohengrin
Lohengrin (opera)
Lohengrin is a romantic opera in three acts composed and written by Richard Wagner, first performed in 1850. The story of the eponymous character is taken from medieval German romance, notably the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach and its sequel, Lohengrin, written by a different author, itself...
, Venus in Tannhäuser
Tannhäuser (opera)
Tannhäuser is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg...
, Waltraute in Götterdämmerung
Götterdämmerung
is the last in Richard Wagner's cycle of four operas titled Der Ring des Nibelungen...
, and Fricka in both Die Walküre
Die Walküre
Die Walküre , WWV 86B, is the second of the four operas that form the cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen , by Richard Wagner...
and Das Rheingold.
In 1951 Thebom appeared as Dorabella in the premiere of Alfred Lunt
Alfred Lunt
Alfred Lunt was an American stage director and actor, often identified for a long-time professional partnership with his wife, actress Lynn Fontanne...
's popular English-language production of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
's Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte, ossia La scuola degli amanti K. 588, is an opera buffa by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart first performed in 1790. The libretto was written by Lorenzo Da Ponte....
at the Met. She also appeared in two United States premieres at the Met; singing the roles of Baba the Turk in Igor Stravinsky
Igor Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ; 6 April 1971) was a Russian, later naturalized French, and then naturalized American composer, pianist, and conductor....
's The Rake's Progress
The Rake's Progress
The Rake's Progress is an opera in three acts and an epilogue by Igor Stravinsky. The libretto, written by W. H. Auden and Chester Kallman, is based loosely on the eight paintings and engravings A Rake's Progress of William Hogarth, which Stravinsky had seen on May 2, 1947, in a Chicago...
(1953) and Adelaide in Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss
Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...
' Arabella
Arabella
Arabella is a lyric comedy or opera in 3 acts by Richard Strauss to a German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, their sixth and last operatic collaboration. It was first performed on 1 July 1933, at the Dresden Sächsisches Staatstheater....
(1955). Other roles she performed at the Met included Adalgisa in Norma
Norma (opera)
Norma is a tragedia lirica or opera in two acts by Vincenzo Bellini with libretto by Felice Romani after Norma, ossia L'infanticidio by Alexandre Soumet. First produced at La Scala on December 26, 1831, it is generally regarded as an example of the supreme height of the bel canto tradition...
, Azucena in Il trovatore
Il trovatore
Il trovatore is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Salvadore Cammarano, based on the play El Trovador by Antonio García Gutiérrez. Cammarano died in mid-1852 before completing the libretto...
, Dalila in Samson and Delilah
Samson and Delilah (opera)
Samson and Delilah , Op. 47, is a grand opera in three acts and four scenes by Camille Saint-Saëns to a French libretto by Ferdinand Lemaire...
, Eboli in Don Carlos
Don Carlos
Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
, Geneviève in Pelléas et Mélisande
Pelléas et Mélisande (opera)
Pelléas et Mélisande is an opera in five acts with music by Claude Debussy. The French libretto was adapted from Maurice Maeterlinck's Symbolist play Pelléas et Mélisande...
, Giulietta in The Tales of Hoffmann, Herodias in Salome
Salome (opera)
Salome is an opera in one act by Richard Strauss to a German libretto by the composer, based on Hedwig Lachmann’s German translation of the French play Salomé by Oscar Wilde. Strauss dedicated the opera to his friend Sir Edgar Speyer....
, Klytämnestra in Elektra
Elektra (opera)
Elektra is a one-act opera by Richard Strauss, to a German-language libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, which he adapted from his 1903 drama Elektra. The opera was the first of many collaborations between Strauss and Hofmannsthal...
, Laura Adorno in La Gioconda, Marfa in Khovanshchina
Khovanshchina
Khovanshchina is an opera in five acts by Modest Mussorgsky. The work was written between 1872 and 1880 in St. Petersburg, Russia. The composer wrote the libretto based on historical sources...
, Marina in Boris Godunov
Boris Godunov (opera)
Boris Godunov is an opera by Modest Mussorgsky . The work was composed between 1868 and 1873 in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is Mussorgsky's only completed opera and is considered his masterpiece. Its subjects are the Russian ruler Boris Godunov, who reigned as Tsar during the Time of Troubles,...
, the Old Baroness in Vanessa
Vanessa (opera)
Vanessa is an opera in three acts by Samuel Barber with an original English libretto by Gian-Carlo Menotti. It was composed in 1956–1957 and was first performed at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City on January 15, 1958 under the baton of Dimitri Mitropoulos in a production designed by...
, Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus
Die Fledermaus
Die Fledermaus is an operetta composed by Johann Strauss II to a German libretto by Karl Haffner and Richard Genée.- Literary sources :...
, and the title roles in Carmen
Carmen
Carmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...
and Mignon
Mignon
Mignon is an opéra comique in three acts by Ambroise Thomas. The original French libretto was by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, based on Goethe's novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. The Italian version was translated by Giuseppe Zaffira. The opera is mentioned in James Joyce's The Dead,...
. Her final performance at the Met was as the Countess in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
's The Queen of Spades
The Queen of Spades (opera)
The Queen of Spades, Op. 68 is an opera in 3 acts by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky to a Russian libretto by the composer's brother Modest Tchaikovsky, based on a short story of the same name by Alexander Pushkin. The premiere took place in 1890 in St...
on March 6, 1967. That was the only production that she appeared in at the then newly built Metropolitan Opera House
Metropolitan Opera House (Lincoln Center)
The Metropolitan Opera House is an opera house located on Broadway at Lincoln Square in the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. Part of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, the theater opened in 1966. It replaced the former Metropolitan Opera House at Broadway and 39th St...
at Lincoln Center.
Other performance work
Outside of the Met, Thebom had actively performed as a guest artist with opera companies throughout the United States and abroad. In 1946 she made her stage debut in Chicago as Brangäne with the Chicago Opera CompanyChicago Opera Company
The Chicago Opera Company was a grand opera company in Chicago, organized from the remaining assets of the bankrupt Chicago City Opera Company, that produced six seasons of opera at the Civic Opera House from 1940 to 1946 . Fausto Cleva was artistic director 1944-1946, and until 1945 Fortune Gallo...
. She made her debut with the San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera is an American opera company, based in San Francisco, California.It was founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola and is the second largest opera company in North America...
(SFO) the following year singing Amneris to the Aida of Stella Roman
Stella Roman
Stella Roman was a Romanian operatic soprano whose career brought her leading roles in Italy and the United States.-Background and training:...
. She was heard frequently in San Francisco through 1963; notably portraying the role of Mother Marie in the United States premiere of Francis Poulenc
Francis Poulenc
Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc was a French composer and a member of the French group Les six. He composed solo piano music, chamber music, oratorio, choral music, opera, ballet music, and orchestral music...
's Dialogues of the Carmelites
Dialogues of the Carmelites
Dialogues of the Carmelites , is an opera in three acts by Francis Poulenc. In 1953, M. Valcarenghi approached Poulenc to commission a ballet for La Scala in Milan; when Poulenc found the proposed subject uninspiring, Valcarenghi suggested instead a screenplay by Georges Bernanos, based on the...
at the SFO in 1957. Other roles she performed in San Francisco were Brangän, Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro
The Marriage of Figaro
Le nozze di Figaro, ossia la folle giornata , K. 492, is an opera buffa composed in 1786 in four acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte, based on a stage comedy by Pierre Beaumarchais, La folle journée, ou le Mariage de Figaro .Although the play by...
, Carmen, Dalila, Fricka, Giulietta, Laura Adorno, Marina, Octavian in Der Rosenkavalier
Der Rosenkavalier
Der Rosenkavalier is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to an original German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It is loosely adapted from the novel Les amours du chevalier de Faublas by Louvet de Couvrai and Molière’s comedy Monsieur de Pourceaugnac...
, and Orfeo in Orfeo ed Euridice
Orfeo ed Euridice
Orfeo ed Euridice is an opera composed by Christoph Willibald Gluck based on the myth of Orpheus, set to a libretto by Ranieri de' Calzabigi. It belongs to the genre of the azione teatrale, meaning an opera on a mythological subject with choruses and dancing...
. She also sang Dalila to the Samson of Giovanni Martinelli
Giovanni Martinelli
Giovanni Martinelli was a celebrated Italian operatic tenor. He was particularly associated with the Italian lyric-dramatic repertory, although he performed French operatic roles to great acclaim as well...
at the Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company
Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company
The Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company was an American opera company located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania that was actively performing at the Academy of Music between 1950 and 1955. Fausta Cleva served as the company's first General Director and conductor...
in 1950.
Thebom made her European debut in 1950 as Dalila at the Royal Swedish Opera
Royal Swedish Opera
Kungliga Operan is Sweden's national stage for opera and ballet.-Location and Environment:...
(RSO). She returned to the RSO several times, singing such roles as Amneris, Eboli and — in what The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
described as "a not especially successful attempt at a soprano role" — as Elisabeth in Tannhäuser. She made her first appearance in the UK with the Glyndebourne Festival Opera
Glyndebourne Festival Opera
Glyndebourne Festival Opera is an English opera festival held at Glyndebourne, an English country house near Lewes, in East Sussex, England.-History:...
in the Summer of 1950 as Dorabella. In 1957 she came to London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
to sing Dido in the much lauded 1957 production of Hector Berlioz
Hector Berlioz
Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a...
's Les Troyens
Les Troyens
Les Troyens is a French opera in five acts by Hector Berlioz. The libretto was written by Berlioz himself, based on Virgil's epic poem The Aeneid...
at the Royal Opera House
Royal Opera House
The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply "Covent Garden", after a previous use of the site of the opera house's original construction in 1732. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The...
, Covent Garden
Covent Garden
Covent Garden is a district in London on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St. Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit and vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist site, and the Royal Opera House, which is also known as...
. It was the first time that this opera was staged by a professional company. In this production she made effective use of her spectacularly long hair, allowing it to fall down her back as she ascended the funeral pyre at the end.
In 1957, at the pinnacle of the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
, Thebom became the first American to perform at the Bolshoi Theatre
Bolshoi Theatre
The Bolshoi Theatre is a historic theatre in Moscow, Russia, designed by architect Joseph Bové, which holds performances of ballet and opera. The Bolshoi Ballet and Bolshoi Opera are amongst the oldest and most renowned ballet and opera companies in the world...
in Moscow, where she portrayed the title role in a three week run of Carmen. She soon after gave a concert tour of Russia. She also gave performances in Greece, including a concert in front of the Parthenon
Parthenon
The Parthenon is a temple on the Athenian Acropolis, Greece, dedicated to the Greek goddess Athena, whom the people of Athens considered their virgin patron. Its construction began in 447 BC when the Athenian Empire was at the height of its power. It was completed in 438 BC, although...
with thousands in attendance. In 1960 she appeared at the Dallas Opera
Dallas Opera
The Dallas Opera is an opera company located in Dallas, Texas . The company was founded in 1957 as the Dallas Civic Opera by Laurence Kelly and Nicolà Rescigno, both of whom had been active with the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the first as administrator, the second as artistic director.-The company's...
as Ruggiero in a celebrated production of George Frideric Handel
George Frideric Handel
George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...
's Alcina
Alcina
Alcina is an opera seria by George Frideric Handel. Handel used the libretto of L'isola di Alcina, an opera that was set in 1728 in Rome by Riccardo Broschi, which he acquired the year after, during his travels in Italy...
, with Joan Sutherland
Joan Sutherland
Dame Joan Alston Sutherland, OM, AC, DBE was an Australian dramatic coloratura soprano noted for her contribution to the renaissance of the bel canto repertoire from the late 1950s through to the 1980s....
in the title role. She also portrayed Orlofszky (1965 and 1967) and Brangäne (1967) with the Philadelphia Grand Opera Company
Philadelphia Grand Opera Company
The Philadelphia Grand Opera Company was the name of four different American opera companies active at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the twentieth century. The last and most well known of the four was founded in November 1954 with the merger of the Philadelphia Civic...
.
Post opera career
Upon her retirement from the Metropolitan Opera in 1967, Thebom no longer appeared on the opera stage. However, she did periodically sing in concerts and recitals; notably appearing in several recitals with Eleanor SteberEleanor Steber
Eleanor Steber was an American operatic soprano. Steber is noted as one of the first major opera stars to have achieved the highest success with training and a career based in the United States.-Biography:...
. In June 1967 she was appointed director of the opera division at the Atlanta Municipal Theatre. When that organization went bankrupt in 1969, she founded her own opera company: Atlanta's Southern Regional Opera. She remained General Director of that company until 1973 when it ceased operating.
While working in Atlanta, Thebom began actively working as a voice teacher. She also appeared in summer theatre revivals of Broadway musicals in Atlanta portraying roles like the Mother Abbess in The Sound of Music
The Sound of Music
The Sound of Music is a musical by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II and a book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse. It is based on the memoir of Maria von Trapp, The Story of the Trapp Family Singers...
. In 1973 she moved to Little Rock to join the music faculty at the University of Arkansas
University of Arkansas
The University of Arkansas is a public, co-educational, land-grant, space-grant, research university. It is classified by the Carnegie Foundation as a research university with very high research activity. It is the flagship campus of the University of Arkansas System and is located in...
. She taught singing and was director of the opera program there until the Spring of 1980 when she was appointed director of the opera program at San Francisco State University
San Francisco State University
San Francisco State University is a public university located in San Francisco, California. As part of the 23-campus California State University system, the university offers over 100 areas of study from nine academic colleges...
(SFSU).
While teaching at SFSU and later privately, Thebom served as chair of the Pacific Region Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions
Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions
The Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions is an annual singing competition sponsored by the Metropolitan Opera. Established in 1954, its purpose is to discover, assist, promote, and develop young opera singers. The competition is held in four stages: Districts, Regional, Semi-Final, and...
for fifteen years. In the late 1980s she co-founded the Opera Arts Training Program of the San Francisco Girls Chorus with Elizabeth Appling. She continued to lead that organization up into the early 2000s. Several of the girls who attended the program later became professional opera singers. Thebom also served on the board of the Metropolitan Opera from 1970–2008, and was a judge for the national level of the Miss America
Miss America
The Miss America pageant is a long-standing competition which awards scholarships to young women from the 50 states plus the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands...
pageant.
At the age of 94, Blanche Thebom died of heart failure at her home in San Francisco on Tuesday, March 23, 2010.
Recordings
- Blanche Thebom, mezzo-soprano: Arias from Don CarlosDon CarlosDon Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...
, La GiocondaLa Gioconda (opera)La Gioconda is an opera in four acts by Amilcare Ponchielli set to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Angelo, tyran de Padoue, a play in prose by Victor Hugo, dating from 1835...
, Tristan und Isolde, Das RheingoldDas Rheingoldis the first of the four operas that constitute Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen . It was originally written as an introduction to the tripartite Ring, but the cycle is now generally regarded as consisting of four individual operas.Das Rheingold received its premiere at the National Theatre...
, Die Walküre, GötterdämmerungGötterdämmerungis the last in Richard Wagner's cycle of four operas titled Der Ring des Nibelungen...
and Samson et DalilaSamson and Delilah (opera)Samson and Delilah , Op. 47, is a grand opera in three acts and four scenes by Camille Saint-Saëns to a French libretto by Ferdinand Lemaire...
; songs of Hugo WolfHugo WolfHugo Wolf was an Austrian composer of Slovene origin, particularly noted for his art songs, or lieder. He brought to this form a concentrated expressive intensity which was unique in late Romantic music, somewhat related to that of the Second Viennese School in concision but utterly unrelated in...
, and Gustav MahlerGustav MahlerGustav Mahler was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt, Bohemia, in what was then Austria-Hungary, now Kaliště in the Czech Republic...
's Songs of a WayfarerLieder eines fahrenden GesellenLieder eines fahrenden Gesellen is Gustav Mahler's first song cycle. While he had previously written other lieder, they were grouped by source of text or time of composition as opposed to common theme...
. Preiser 89559 CD
- Samson et DalilaSamson and Delilah (opera)Samson and Delilah , Op. 47, is a grand opera in three acts and four scenes by Camille Saint-Saëns to a French libretto by Ferdinand Lemaire...
(Camille Saint-SaënsCamille Saint-SaënsCharles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
), 1956, Set SvanholmSet SvanholmSet Svanholm was a Swedish operatic tenor, considered the leading Tristan and Siegfried of the first decade following World War II....
, Blanche Thebom, Sigurd BjörlingSigurd BjörlingSigurd Björling was a Swedish operatic baritone.He made his debut as Alfio in Cavalleria Rusticana in 1935 at Royal Swedish Opera...
, Herbert Sandberg, Royal Swedish Opera Orchestra and Chorus, Caprice; CAT: CAP 22054