Johanna Gadski was a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 soprano

Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...

 blessed with a secure, powerful, ringing voice, fine musicianship and an excellent technique. These attributes enabled her to enjoy a top-flight career in New York City and London, performing heavy dramatic roles in the German and Italian repertoires.

Life & singing career

Gadski was born in Anklam

Anklam

Anklam is a town in the Western Pomerania region of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. It is situated on the banks of the Peene river, just 8 km from its mouth in the Kleines Haff, the western part of the Stettin Lagoon. Anklam has a population of 14,603 and was the capital of the former...

, Prussia

Prussia

Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...

. After receiving a musical education in Stettin, she made her operatic debut in Berlin in 1889 in the role of Undine

Undine

Undine, Undina or Ondine are sometimes interchangeable and may refer to:* Ondine , a water nymph from mythology- In literature and painting :* Undine , a novella by Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué...

. Highlights of her subsequent career in Germany included appearances in Wagner's works at the 1899 Bayreuth Festival

Bayreuth Festival

The Bayreuth Festival is a music festival held annually in Bayreuth, Germany, at which performances of operas by the 19th century German composer Richard Wagner are presented...

 and at the 1905-06 Munich Festival.

However, it was in English-speaking countries that Gadski built her international reputation as a diva. She made her successful American debut in New York in 1895 (with the Damrosch

Damrosch

Damrosch is a surname, and may refer to:* Clara Mannes , a musician, sister of Walter* Frank Damrosch , Silesian-American conductor, music-educator...

 Company) and became popular, too, in England. She sang in London 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...

, in 1899, 1900, 1901 and 1906. Some sources credit her with appearing at England's Worcester Festival but this is an error. Actually, she sang at America's Worcester festivals, held in the American state of Massachusetts during the late 1890s.

Gadski was an extremely popular recitalist and, in 1899-1900, she capitalised on this business opportunity by embarking on a concert tour of the United States. She had also joined the star-studded roster of singers at the New York 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...

, singing there in 1898-1904 and again in 1907-17. Around 1902 she met Mabel Riegelman, a young soprano in San Francisco, and brought Mabel and her chaperone/accompianist Ruby Riegelman to Berlin in 1903 as her guest, then settling the two sister in Stettin to continue their musical studies. In 1911 Gadski and Mabel Riegelman took the Kaiser Wilhelm II to New York City, where Gadski arranged for her star pupil Mabel Riegelman to debut as Gretal in Engleburt Humperdinck's "Hansel and Gretal". At the height of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, however, she was obliged to resign from the Metropolitan Opera because of her German links. Legend has it that she was deported from the United States as an alien enemy but this is not true. She spent the duration of the war living quietly in New York and Lake Spofford, New Hampshire, and did not revisit Germany until 1922.

Meanwhile, Gadski had resumed her professional concert career in the United States in 1921. She did not return to the operatic stage, however, until the late 1920s; her first such appearance being in a 1928 production of 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...

mounted by the Washington National Opera

Washington National Opera (1919–1936)

For the present company of the same name, see Washington National Opera.The Washington National Opera Association, founded in 1919 as "Washington Community Opera", was a low-budget opera company, comprising professional principals supported by amateurs, active in Washington, DC until 1936; it was...

, a semi-professional company not related to its present namesake. Thereafter, in the years 1929-1931, she toured as the star of the German Grand Opera Company. By this late date, however, her voice had been eroded by advancing age, retirement rust and lots of strenuous use in her early years. A United States citizen since 1925, she was visiting Germany when she died in a car accident in Berlin in 1932.

During her prime, Gadski was particularly celebrated on both sides of the Atlantic as a Wagnerian singer; but she was equally splendid as a performer of the more taxing Italian operatic roles such as 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...

by Verdi. She had a beautiful voice in her prime, with auditorium-filling high notes and a remarkably nimble technique for such a large vocal instrument. Gadski made numerous, impressive recordings in the United States prior to World War One. These have been re-issued complete by Marston Records on two multi-disc sets of CDs. These sets also contain the Mapleson Cylinders

Mapleson Cylinders

The Mapleson Cylinders are a group of more than 100 phonograph cylinders recorded live at the Metropolitan Opera, primarily in the years 1901–1903, by the Met librarian Lionel Mapleson ....

 of her voice that were cut live at the Met during the opening years of the 20th century.

External links

• Discography of Johanna Gadski on Victor Records
  Victor Talking Machine Company
  The Victor Talking Machine Company was an American corporation, the leading American producer of phonographs and phonograph records and one of the leading phonograph companies in the world at the time. It was headquartered in Camden, New Jersey....
  
  from the Encyclopedic Discography of Victor Recordings (EDVR)