Mary Garden
(prototype for Eden Bower in Coming, Aphrodite! and one of the prototypes
for Kitty Ayrshire in Scandal)
"Scottish American soprano Mary Garden,
the prototype for Eden Bower..." Explanatory Notes p. 379, Youth
and the Bright Medusa by Willa Cather, Willa Cather Scholarly Edition,
University of Nebraska Press 2009
"See the Historical Essay (p.341) for
an account of Mary Garden, the prototype for Eden Bower." ibid. p.385
Geraldine Farrar (one of the prototypes
for Kitty Ayrshire in Scandal and A Gold Slipper and interviewed
by Cather for her article Three American Singers).
"Kitty Ayrshire: See the Historical
Essay (pp. 339-43) for accounts of Geraldine Farrar, Mary Garden, and Sibyl
Sanderson, the prototypes for Kitty Ayrshire." ibid.
p.410
Lillian Nordica (prototype for Cressida
Garnet in The Diamond Mine)
"See the Historical Essay (pp. 334-39)
for an account of Lillian Nordica, the prototype for Cressida Garnet."
ibid. p.395
Olive Fremstad (prototype for Thea Kronborg
in The Song of the Lark and interviewed by Cather for her article Three
American Singers)
The following Cather prototypes with opera connections
have also been identified by Cather scholars, however, no known recordings
were ever made by any of these artists.
Katherine Fisk
(prototype for "a contralto" in
A Death in the Desert): "This probably refers to contralto Katherine
Fisk, who had an extraordinarily strong voice." ibid. Explanatory Notes,
p. 450). Fisk sang with the Metropolitan Opera House circa 1900 and
then toured the country with Lillian Nordica (cf. Chicago Tribune,
June
29, 1926 Obituary). "In 1894 Willa Cather praised Fisk in a series
of articles for the Lincoln Evening News. (cf. Cather, Willa (1970).
The World and the Parish: Willa Cather's Articles and Reviews, 1893-1902,
Volume 2. U of Nebraska Press. p. 640. Retrieved 2 February 2020."
Wikipedia
In 1895 Cather said about her "She is great
enough as a woman to become a great artist" (at the time Fisk was performing
with Nellie Melba in England)." Wikipedia
Sibyl Sanderson, one
of the prototypes for Kitty Ayrshire, made no recordings.
"Kitty Ayrshire: See the Historical
Essay (pp. 339-43) for accounts of Geraldine Farra, Mary Garden, and Sibyl
Sanderson, the prototypes for Kitty Ayrshire,Youth
and the Bright Medusa by Willa Cather, Willa Cather Scholarly Edition,
University of Nebraska Press 2009.
Edison "Famous Artists"
Here's what the UCSB
Cylinder Audio Archive says about Edison's Grand Opera records and Edison's
"famous opera performers of the day":
"While well-known overtures and classical
works figured prominently in Edison's Gold-Moulded and Amberol cylinders,
performances by professionally trained opera singers were largely issued
on several special series of Grand Opera Cylinders...Famous performers of
the day are found here, including Florencio Constantino, Leo Slezak, Josephine
Jacoby, and other well-known opera singers of the time."
(3) Discography of American Historical Recordings
- Latest access dates for each of the prototypes.
Geraldine Farrar: Discography of American
Historical Recordings s.v. "Farrar, Geraldine," accessed May 21, 2022, https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/names/103269.
Ernestine Schumann-Heink: Discography
of American Historical Recordings s.v. "Schumann-Heink, Ernestine," accessed
May 21, 2022, https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/names/105329.
Lillian Nordica: Discography of American
Historical Recordings, s.v. "Nordica, Lillian," accessed May 21, 2022, https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/names/109212.
Olive Fremstad: Discography of American
Historical Recordings, s.v. "Fremstad, Olive," accessed May 21, 2022, https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/names/105758.
Mary Garden: Discography
of American Historical Recordings, s.v. "Garden, Mary," accessed May 21, 2022,
https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/names/102667.
Lucrezia Bori: Discography of American
Historical Recordings, s.v. "Bori, Lucrezia," accessed May 21, 2022, https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/names/103869.
Lucrezia Bori: Discography of American
Historical Recordings, s.v. "Edison matrix 175. Mi chiamano Mimi / Lucrezia
Bori," accessed May 15, 2022, https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/index.php/matrix/detail/2000160158/175-Mi_chiamano_Mimi.
"Opera and drama for the poor workingman
and his family for a nickel..." Thomas Edison
The Talking Machine World,
May 15, 1914, p. 30
"Three
American Singers: Louise Homer, Geraldine Farrar, Olive Fremstad"
McClure's Magazine, 42 (December 1913): 33-48
"THREE women are at this moment dominating
the most critical audience and the most splendid operatic stage in the world—
the Metropolitan Opera House of New York. One of these women came out of
a new, crude country, fought her way against every kind of obstacle, and
conquered by sheer power of will and character. One of them has lived a
sort of fairy-tale of good fortune from the time she began to sing. Each
one has achieved a supremely individual success. The careers of these three
great singers make one of the most interesting stories in the history of
American achievement."
GERALDINE FARRAR
THE story of Geraldine Farrar's early youth
is well known; it is the kind of story that Americans like. We admire success
in which there is a large element of "luck," more than success laboriously
won. We like a rich natural endowment, native "gift," fame in early youth.
The mining-camp ideal obtains widely with us, and Miss Farrar's story is
one that the ranchman or the miner can understand; it gratifies his national
pride, meets his sense of the picturesque. When he puts a "Farrar record"
into his phonograph, he has something of the feeling of part-ownership that
our fathers had when they spoke of Mary Anderson as "our Mary."
