Fascinating and tragic:
This beautiful voice that sang with Muzio, and according to the youtube info for her died in 1980 being murdered in a metro station in Chicago. Breaks my heart, as this is a first class instrument that worked with Raisa, John Charles Thomas, and Flagstad. Two lovely people are being inerviewed, graciously, by someone not listed. Her life escaping the German horror as a Jew, with such a tragic ending of her life, is an opera in itself. What a great sound though, listen as she lives again in the wonder of this cyber world. Maria Hussa….
Soprano MARIA HUSSA, Austrian/American, 83 years old, in Chicago 4/19/80.
In 1917 she made her debut at the Vienna Volksoper, and appeared at the Vienna Staatsoper the following year. She sang in Berlin from 1923 to 1926, and was a member of the Hamburg State
Opera 1926-32, where she assumed major roles.During that time she also sang the soprano leads in the premieres of Korngold’s Das Wunder der Heliane and Respighi’s La Campana sommersa. She emigrated to the United States in 1934, sang the role of the Marschallin at the Metropolitan Opera in 1940, and the same role as well as Sieglinde in Chicago during the same season. Later she taught at the Sherwood Music School.
SPc photo by Willinger Wien of the smiling soprano Wien 1936. She was a pupil of Elizza and sang in Vienna, Prague and all the German houses including Hamburg 1926-1932 where she created Korngold’s “Der Wunder der Heliane” and Resphigi’s “La Campana Sommersa”. She emigrated to Chicago in the late 1930s sang with the Chicago Opera and one Marschallin at the Met in 1940. She opened a successful voice studio in the windy city and lived there till 1980. Some Homochord and HMV records. Lovely artist.
