Portrait of Melba by Henry Walter Barnett

Dame Nellie Melba GBE (19 May 1861 – 23 February 1931), born Helen "Nellie" Porter Mitchell, was an Australian operatic soprano. She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian Era and the early 20th century. She was the first Australian to achieve international recognition as a classical musician.

Melba studied singing in Melbourne and made a modest success in performances there. After a brief and unsuccessful marriage, she moved to Europe in search of a singing career. Failing to find engagements in London in 1886, she studied in Paris and soon made a great success there and in Brussels. Returning to London she quickly established herself as the leading lyric soprano at Covent Garden from 1888. She soon achieved further success in Paris and elsewhere in Europe, and later at the Metropolitan Opera, New York, debuting there in 1893. Her repertoire was small; in her whole career she sang no more than 25 roles and was closely identified with only ten. She was known for her performances in French and Italian opera, but sang little German opera.

During the First World War, Melba raised large sums for war charities. She returned to Australia frequently during the 20th century, singing in opera and concerts, and had a house built for her near Melbourne. She was active in the teaching of singing at the Melbourne Conservatorium. Melba continued to sing until the last months of her life and made a legendary number of "farewell" appearances. Her death, in Australia, was news across the English-speaking world, and her funeral was a major national event.

Life and career[link]

Early years[link]

Melba was born in Richmond, Victoria, the eldest of seven children of David Mitchell and his wife Isabella née Dorn.^[1] Mitchell, a Scot, had emigrated to Australia in 1852, becoming a successful builder there. Melba was taught to play the piano and first sang in public at the age of about six.^{[n 1]} She was educated at a local boarding school and then at the Presbyterian Ladies' College.^[3] She studied singing with Mary Ellen Christian (a former pupil of Manuel García) and Pietro Cecchi, an Italian tenor, who was a respected teacher in Melbourne.^[1] Melba continued to perform, in her teens, in amateur concerts in and around Melbourne, and she also played the organ at church. Her father encouraged her in her musical studies, but he strongly disapproved of her taking up singing as a career.^[4] Melba's mother died suddenly in 1880, and she moved to Queensland.^[4]

In December 1882, Melba married Charles Nesbitt Frederick Armstrong (1858–1948), the youngest son of Sir Andrew Armstrong. They had one child, a son, George, born in 1883.^[5] The marriage was not a success; Charles reportedly beat his wife more than once.^[4] The couple separated after little more than a year,^[1] and Melba returned to Melbourne determined on a singing career, debuting professionally in concerts in 1884.^[4] On the strength of local success, she travelled to London in search of an opportunity.^{[n 2]} Her debut at the Princes' Hall in 1886 made little impression, and she sought work unsuccessfully from Sir Arthur Sullivan, Carl Rosa and Augustus Harris.^[2][6] She then went to Paris to study with the leading teacher Mathilde Marchesi, who instantly recognised the young singer's potential: she exclaimed, "J'ai enfin une étoile!" – "I have a star at last!". Melba made such rapid progress that she was allowed to sing the "Mad Scene" from Ambroise Thomas's Hamlet at a matinée musicale in Marchesi's house in December the same year, in the presence of the composer.^[2]

The young singer's talent was so evident that, after less than a year with Marchesi, she was given a ten-year contract with the impresario Maurice Strakosch. After she had signed, she received a better offer from the Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels, but Strakosch was not inclined to release her. She was in despair when the matter was resolved by Strakosch's sudden death.^[7] She made her operatic debut as Gilda in Rigoletto at La Monnaie on 12 October 1887.^[2] The critic Herman Klein described her Gilda as "an instant triumph of the most emphatic kind ... followed ... a few nights later with an equal success as Violetta in La Traviata."^[2] It was at this time, on Marchesi's advice, that she adopted the stage name of "Melba", a contraction of the name of her native city.^{[n 3]}

London, Paris and New York debuts[link]

Melba made her Covent Garden début in May 1888, in the title role in Lucia di Lammermoor. She received a friendly but not excited reception. The Musical Times wrote, "Madame Melba is a fluent vocalist, and a quite respectable representative of light soprano parts; but she lacks the personal charm necessary to a great figure on the lyric stage."^[8] She was offended when Augustus Harris, then in charge at Covent Garden, offered her only the small role of the page Oscar in Un ballo in maschera for the next season.^[9] She left England vowing never to return. The following year, she performed at the Opéra in Paris, in the role of Ophélie in Hamlet; The Times described this as "a brilliant success", and said, "Madame Melba has a voice of great flexibility ... her acting is expressive and striking."^[10]

Melba had a strong supporter in London, Lady de Grey, whose views carried weight at Covent Garden. Melba was persuaded to return, and Harris cast her in Roméo et Juliette (June 1889) co-starring with Jean de Reszke. She later recalled, "I date my success in London quite distinctly from the great night of 15 June 1889."^[3] After this, she returned to Paris as Ophélie, Lucia in Lucia di Lammermoor, Gilda in Rigoletto, Marguerite in Faust, and Juliette.^[1] In French operas her pronunciation was poor,^[2] but the composer Delibes said that he did not care whether she sang in French, Italian, German, English or Chinese, as long as she sang.^{[n 4]}

Philippe, Duke of Orléans

In the early 1890s, Melba embarked on an affair with Prince Philippe, Duke of Orléans. They were seen frequently together in London, which excited some gossip, but far more suspicion arose when Melba travelled across Europe to St Petersburg to sing for Tsar Nicholas II: the Duke followed closely behind her, and they were spotted together in Paris, Brussels, Vienna and St Petersburg. Armstrong filed divorce proceedings on the grounds of Melba's adultery, naming the Duke as co-respondent; he was eventually persuaded to drop the case, but the Duke decided that a two-year African safari (without Melba) would be appropriate. He and Melba did not resume their relationship.^[3][12] In the first years of the decade, Melba appeared in the leading European opera houses, including Milan, Berlin and Vienna.^[1]

Melba sang the role of Nedda in Pagliacci at Covent Garden in 1893, soon after its Italian premiere. The composer was present, and said that the role had never been so well played before.^[13] In December of that year, Melba sang at the Metropolitan Opera in New York for the first time. As at her Covent Garden debut, she appeared as Lucia di Lammermoor, and as at Covent Garden, it was less than a triumph. The New York Times praised her performance – "one of the loveliest voices that ever issued from a human throat ... simply delicious in its fullness, richness and purity" – but the work was out of fashion, and the performances were poorly attended.^[14] Her performance in Roméo et Juliette, later in the season, was a triumph and established her as the leading prima donna of the time in succession to Adelina Patti.^[1] She had at first been nonplussed by the impenetrable snobbery at the Metropolitan; the author Peter Conrad has written, "In London she hobnobbed with royalty; in New York she was a singing menial." Assured of critical success, she set herself to achieve social recognition, and succeeded.^[15]

Melba as Marguerite in Faust

From the 1890s, Melba played a wide range of parts at Covent Garden, mostly in the lyric soprano repertoire, but with some heavier roles also. She sang the title roles in Herman Bemberg's Elaine^[16] and Arthur Goring Thomas's Esmeralda.^[17] Her Italian parts included Gilda in Rigoletto,^[18] the title role in Aida,^[19] Desdemona in Otello,^[20] Luisa in Mascagni's I Rantzau,^[21] Nedda in Pagliacci,^[22] Rosina in The Barber of Seville,^[23] Violetta in La traviata,^[24] and Mimi in La bohème.^[25] In the French repertoire, she sang Juliette in Roméo et Juliette,^[26] Marguerite in Faust,^[27] Marguerite de Valois in Les Huguenots,^[28] the title role in Saint-Saëns's Hélène, which was written for her,^[1] and Micaëla in Carmen.^[29]

Some writers expressed surprise at Melba's playing the last of these roles, since it was merely a supporting part in the opera. She played it on many occasions, saying in her memoirs, "Why on earth a prima donna should not sing secondary rôles I could not see then and am no nearer seeing to-day. I hate the artistic snobbery of it."^[9] She sang the role opposite the Carmens of Emma Calvé,^[2] Zélie de Lussan^[29] and Maria Gay.^[30] Marguerite de Valois, too, is not the leading female role in Les Huguenots, but Melba was willing to undertake it as seconda donna to Emma Albani.^[2] She was generous in support of singers who did not rival her in her favoured roles, but was, as her biographer J. B. Steane put it, "pathologically critical" of other lyric sopranos.^[1]

Melba was not known as a Wagner singer, although she occasionally sang Elsa in Lohengrin and Elisabeth in Tannhäuser. She received a certain amount of praise in these roles, although Klein found her unsuited to them,^[2] and Bernard Shaw thought she sang with great skill but played artificially and without sensibility.^[31] In 1896 at the Metropolitan, she attempted the role of Brünnhilde in Siegfried, in which she was not a success.^[1] Her most frequent role in that house was Marguerite in Gounod's Faust, which she had studied under the supervision of the composer.^[1] She never essayed any of Mozart's operas, for which some thought her voice ideally suited.^[11] Her repertoire across her entire career amounted to no more than 25 roles, of which, The Times obituarist wrote, "only some 10 parts are those which will be remembered as her own."^[11]

Melba's marriage to Armstrong was finally terminated when, having emigrated to the United States with their son, he divorced her in Texas in 1900.^[5]

20th century[link]

By now established as a leading star in Britain and America, Melba made her first return visit to Australia in 1902–03 for a concert tour, also touring in New Zealand.^{[3][n 5]} The profits were unprecedented; she returned for four more tours during her career.^[35] In Britain, Melba campaigned on behalf of Puccini's La bohème. She had first sung the part of Mimi in 1899, having studied it with the composer. She argued strongly for further productions of the work in the face of the distaste expressed by the Covent Garden management at this "new and plebeian opera".^[1] She was vindicated by the public enthusiasm for the piece, which was bolstered in 1902 when Enrico Caruso joined her in the first of many Covent Garden performances together.^[2] She sang Mimi for Oscar Hammerstein I at his opera house in New York, in 1907, giving the enterprise a needed boost.^[1] After her initial successes in Brussels and Paris in the 1880s, Melba sang infrequently on the European continent; only the English-speaking countries welcomed her wholeheartedly.^[36]

Although she called Covent Garden "my artistic home", her appearances there became less frequent in the 20th century. One reason for this was that she did not get on well with Sir Thomas Beecham, who was in control of the opera house for much of the period from 1910 until her retirement. She said, "I dislike Beecham and his methods",^[37] and he thought that while she had "nearly all the attributes inseparable from great artistry ... she was wanting in a genuine spiritual refinement."^[38] Another factor in her reduced appearances at Covent Garden was the appearance on the scene of Luisa Tetrazzini, a soprano ten years her junior, who became a great success in London and later in New York in roles previously associated with Melba.^[3] A third reason was her decision to spend more time in Australia. In 1909 she undertook what she called a "sentimental tour" of Australia, covering 10,000 miles (16,093 km) and including many remote towns.^[3] In 1911 in partnership with the J. C. Williamson company, she appeared in an operatic season.^[35] Her attitude to her tour concerts and the audiences attending was summed up in the advice that Clara Butt said Melba gave her apropos of a planned Australian tour: "Sing 'em muck; it's all they can understand."^{[n 6]} To another colleague and compatriot, Peter Dawson, she described his home city of Adelaide as "that city of the three P's – Parsons, Pubs and Prostitutes."^[40]

	Sempre libera From La traviata, 1904 Ah, fors e lui From La traviata, 1907
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In 1909, Melba bought property at Coldstream, a small town near Melbourne, and around 1912 she had Coombe Cottage built. She also set up a music school in Richmond, which she later merged into the Melbourne Conservatorium. She was in Australia when the First World War broke out, and she threw herself into fund-raising for war charities, raising £100,000.^{[1][n 7]} In recognition of this, she was created a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in March 1918, "for services in organising patriotic work".^{[n 8]}

After the war, Melba made a triumphant return to the Royal Opera House, in a performance of La bohème conducted by Beecham, which re-opened the house after four years of closure. The Times wrote, "Probably no season at Covent Garden has ever started with quite the thrill of enthusiasm which passed through the house."^[43] In her many concerts, however, her repertoire was regarded as trite and predictable. After one of them The Musical Times wrote:

The real musical interest of the afternoon, however, was supposed to centre in the "Jewel Song" from Faust, Puccini's "Addio," Lieurance's "By the waters of Minnetonka," and Tosti's "Good-bye," and in the encores, thoughtfully announced beforehand – "Home, sweet Home" and "Annie Laurie." Look again at the last batch of head-lines. "The Diva to go home." By all means. Why not? As the Diva has melodiously declared (only too often), there's no place like it. "And teach 100 girls herself." If the Dame can give those hundred girls her own beautiful voice, well and good, but for heaven's sake let a musician be called in to attend to their repertoire. We cannot lightly face the prospect of a hundred débutantes let loose on us a year hence full to the epiglottis with "Minnetonkas," "Jewel Songs," and "Home, sweet Homes."^[44]

In 1922 Melba returned to Australia, where she sang at the immensely successful "Concerts for the People" in Melbourne and Sydney, with low ticket prices, attracting 70,000 people.^[3] In 1924 for another Williamson opera season, she caused resentment among local singers by importing an entire chorus from Naples.^[45] In 1926 she made her farewell appearance at Covent Garden, singing in scenes from Roméo et Juliette Otello, and La bohème.^[1] She is well remembered in Australia for her seemingly endless series of "farewell" appearances, including stage performances in the mid-1920s and concerts in Sydney on 7 August 1928, Melbourne on 27 September 1928 and Geelong in November 1928.^[3] From this, she is remembered in the vernacular Australian expression "more farewells than Dame Nellie Melba".^[3]

In 1929 she returned for the last time to Europe and then visited Egypt, where she contracted a fever that she never entirely shook off.^[3] Her last performance was in London at a charity concert on 10 June 1930.^[46] She returned to Australia but died in St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney in 1931, aged 69, of septicaemia which had developed after facial surgery in Europe some time before.^[3] She was given an elaborate funeral from Scots' Church, Melbourne, which her father had built and where as a teenager she had sung in the choir.^[3][47] The funeral motorcade was over a kilometre long, and her death made front-page headlines in Australia, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Europe. Billboards in many countries said simply "Melba is dead". Part of the event was filmed for posterity. Melba was buried in the cemetery at Lilydale, near Coldstream. Her headstone bears Mimì's farewell words: "Addio, senza rancor" (Farewell, without bitterness).^[48]

Teacher and patron[link]

Despite the antipathy Melba inspired in some of her peers, she helped the careers of younger singers. She taught for many years at the Conservatorium in Melbourne and looked for a "new Melba". She published a book about her methods, which were based on those of Marchesi. The book opens:

It is easy to sing well, and very difficult to sing badly! How many students are really prepared to accept that statement? Few, if any. They smile, and say: "It may be easy for you, but not for me." And they seem to think that there the matter ends. But if they only knew it, on their understanding and acceptance of that axiom depends half their success. Let me say the same in other words: In order to sing well, it is necessary to sing easily.^[49]

	"O soave fanciulla" from Puccini's La bohème, sung by Enrico Caruso and Nellie Melba in 1906.
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Others also benefited from Melba's praise and interest. She passed her own cadenzas on to a young Gertrude Johnson, a valuable professional asset. In 1924, Melba brought the new star Toti Dal Monte, fresh from triumphs in Milan and Paris but still unheard in England or the United States, to Australia as a principal of the Melba-Williamson Grand Opera Company. After sharing the Covent Garden stage in a 1923 night of operatic extracts with another Australian soprano, Florence Austral (who, as a dramatic soprano, posed no threat to Melba, a lyric soprano), Melba was effusive with her praise, describing the younger woman as "one of the wonder-voices of the world".^[50] She similarly described the American contralto Louise Homer as possessing "the world's most beautiful voice". She gave financial assistance to the Australian painter Hugh Ramsay, living in poverty in Paris^[51] and also helped him to forge connections in the artistic world.^[48] The Australian baritone John Brownlee and tenor Browning Mummery were both protégés: both sang with her in her 1926 Covent Garden farewell (recorded by HMV), and Brownlee sang with her on two of her last commercial recordings later that year (a session arranged by her in part to promote Brownlee).

Recordings and broadcasts[link]

Melba's first recordings were made around 1895, recorded on cylinders at the Bettini Phonograph Lab in New York. A reporter from Phonoscope magazine was impressed: "The next cylinder was labelled 'Melba' and was truly wonderful, the phonograph reproducing her wonderful voice in a marvellous manner, especially the high notes which soared away above the staff and were rich and clear." Melba was less impressed: "'Never again,' I said to myself as I listened to the scratching, screeching result. 'Don't tell me I sing like that, or I shall go away and live on a desert island.'" The recordings never reached the general public – destroyed on Melba's orders, it is suspected – and Melba would not venture into a recording studio for another eight years.^[52] Melba can be heard singing on several Mapleson Cylinders, early attempts at live recording, made by the Metropolitan Opera House librarian Lionel Mapleson in the auditorium there during performances. These cylinders are often poor in quality, but they preserve something of the quality of the young Melba's voice and performance that is sometimes lacking from her commercial recordings.^{[n 9]}

Melba made numerous gramophone (phonograph) records of her voice in England and America between 1904 (when she was already in her 40s) and 1926 for the Gramophone & Typewriter Company^[54] and the Victor Recording Company. Most of these recordings, consisting of operatic arias, duets and ensemble pieces and songs, have been re-released on CD.^[55] The poor audio fidelity of the Melba recordings reflects the limitations of the early days of commercial sound recording. Melba's Acoustical recordings (especially those made after her initial 1904 session) fail to capture vital overtones to the voice, leaving it without the body and warmth it possessed – albeit to a limited degree – in life. Despite this, they still reveal Melba to have had an almost seamlessly pure lyric soprano voice with effortless coloratura, a smooth legato and accurate intonation.^[55] Melba had perfect pitch; the critic Michael Aspinall says of her complete London recordings issued on LP, that there are only two lapses from pitch in the entire set.^[56] Like Patti, and unlike the more vibrant-voiced Tetrazzini, Melba's exceptional purity of tone was probably one of the principal reasons why British audiences, with their strong choral and sacred music traditions, idolised her.^[57]

Melba's farewell to Covent Garden on 8 June 1926 was recorded by HMV, as well as broadcast. The programme included Act 2 of Roméo et Juliette (not recorded because the tenor Charles Hackett was not under contract to HMV), followed by the opening of Act 4 of Otello (Desdemona's "Willow Song" and "Ave Maria") and Acts 3 and 4 of La bohème (with Aurora Rettore, Browning Mummery, John Brownlee and others). The conductor was Vincenzo Bellezza. At the conclusion Lord Stanley of Alderley made a formal address and Melba gave an emotional farewell speech. In a pioneering venture, eleven sides (78rpm) were recorded via a landline to Gloucester House (London), though in the event only three of these were published. The full series (including both speeches) was included in a 1976 HMV reissue.^[56]

As was the case in many of her performances, most of Melba's recordings were made at "French Pitch" (A=435 Hz), rather than the British early 20th century standard of A=452 Hz, or the modern standard of A=440 Hz. This, and the technical inadequacies of the early recording process (discs were frequently recorded faster or slower than the supposed standard of 78rpm, whilst the conditions of the cramped recording studios – kept very warm to keep the wax at the necessary softness when cutting – would wreak havoc with instrumental tuning during recording sessions), means that playing her recordings back in the speed and pitch she made them at is not always a simple matter.

In June 1920 Melba was heard in a pioneering radio broadcast from Guglielmo Marconi's factory in Chelmsford, singing two arias and her famous trill. She was the first artist of international renown to participate in direct radio broadcasts. Radio enthusiasts across the country heard her, and the broadcast was reportedly heard from as far away as New York. People listening on the radio barely heard a few scratches of the trill and two arias she sang. Further radio broadcasts would include her Covent Garden farewell performance, and a 1927 Empire Day broadcast (broadcast throughout the British Empire, by radio station 2FC, Sydney, on Monday 5 September 1927; it was relayed by the BBC London on Sunday 4 September).^[58]

Honours, memorials and legacy[link]

Statue of Melba at Waterfront City, Melbourne Docklands

Melba was appointed Dame Commander of the British Empire in 1918, along with May Whitty the first stage performer to receive this order, for her charity work during World War I, and was elevated to Dame Grand Cross of the British Empire in 1927.^[3] She was the first Australian to appear on the cover of Time magazine, in April 1927.^[59] A stained glass window commemorating Melba was erected in 1962 in the Musicians' Memorial Chapel of the Church of St. Sepulchre, London, known as "the musicians' church".^[60] She is one of only two singers with a marble bust on the grand staircase of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. The other is Adelina Patti.^{[citation needed]}

Melba was closely associated with the Melbourne Conservatorium, and this institution was renamed the Melba Memorial Conservatorium of Music in her honour in 1956. The music hall at the University of Melbourne is known as Melba Hall. The Canberra suburb of Melba is named after her. The current Australian 100 dollar note features the image of her face,^[61] and her likeness has also appeared on an Australian stamp.^[4] Sydney Town Hall has a marble relief bearing the inscription "Remember Melba", unveiled during a World War II charity concert in memory of Melba and her First World War charity work and patriotic concerts.^{[citation needed]}

Melba's name is associated with four foods, all of which were created in her honour by the French chef Auguste Escoffier:

• Peach Melba, a dessert
• Melba sauce, a sweet purée of raspberries and red currant
• Melba toast, a crisp dry toast
• Melba Garniture, chicken, truffles and mushrooms stuffed into tomatoes with velouté sauce.^[62]

Books, films and television[link]

Melba's autobiography "Melodies and Memories" was published in 1925, largely ghost-written by her secretary Beverley Nichols.^[1] There are several full-length biographies devoted to her, including those by John Hetherington (1967), Thérèse Radic (1986) and Ann Blainey (2009).

A novel Evensong by Nichols (1932) was based on aspects of Melba's life, drawing an unflattering portrait.^[1] The 1934 motion picture adaptation of Evensong, starring Evelyn Laye as the character based on Melba, was for a time banned in Australia.^[63] Melba makes an appearance in the 1946 novel Lucinda Brayford by Martin Boyd. She is depicted as attending a garden party thrown by Julie and Fred Vane, mother of the eponymous heroine: "Melba sang two or three songs, "Down in the Forest", Musetta's song from La bohème, and finally "Home, Sweet Home." She is described as having the "loveliest voice in the world".^[64]

In 1946–1947 Crawford Productions produced a popular radio series on Melba starring Glenda Raymond, who became one of the foundation singers of the Australian Opera (later Opera Australia) in 1956. In 1953 a biopic entitled Melba was released by Horizon Pictures and directed by Lewis Milestone. Melba was played by the soprano Patrice Munsel.^[65] In 1987 the Australian Broadcasting Corporation produced a mini-series, Melba, starring Linda Cropper miming to the singing voice of Yvonne Kenny.

Notes and references[link]

Notes

References

Sources[link]

• Beecham, Thomas (1959). A Mingled Chime. London: Hutchinson. OCLC 470511334. 
• Boyd, Martin (1946). Lucinda Brayford. London: Cresset Press. OCLC 558461603. 
• Conrad, Peter (1987). A Song of Love and Death – The Meaning of Opera. London: Chatto and Windus. ISBN 0-7011-3274-4. 
• Jefferson, Alan (1979). Sir Thomas Beecham – A Centenary Tribute. London: Macdonald and Jane's. ISBN [[Special:BookSources/0-354-04305-X|0-354-04305-X]]. 
• Lucas, John (2008). Thomas Beecham – An Obsession with Music. Woodbridge: Boydell Press. ISBN 978-1-84383-402-1. 
• Shaw, Bernard; Dan H. Laurence (ed.) (1981). Shaw's Music – The Complete Musical Criticism of Bernard Shaw, Volume 2 (1890–1893). London: The Bodley Head. ISBN 0-370-31271-6. 

Further reading[link]

• Blainey, Ann (2008). I am Melba. Melbourne: Black Inc. ISBN 978-1-86395-183-8.  (US edition (2009) published as Marvelous Melba: The Extraordinary Life of a Great Diva. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee. ISBN 978-1-56663-809-8)
• Hetherington, John (1967). Melba, a Biography. London: Faber and Faber. OCLC 7389273. 
• Melba, Nellie (1926). Melba Method. London & Sydney: Chappell. OCLC 5309485. 
• Melba, Nellie (1925). Melodies and Memories. London: Butterworth. OCLC 556835777. 
• Murphy, Agnes (1909). Melba: A Biography. London: Chatto & Windus. OCLC 563034777. 
• Radic, Thérèse (1986). Melba: the voice of Australia. Basingstoke: Macmillan. ISBN 0-333-41478-0. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Nellie Melba

• International Jose Guillermo Carrillo Foundation – digitally remastered MP3 files from Melba's recordings 1905–1910.
• Links to recordings, images and information about Melba
• YouTube: 1904 recording of Lucia mad scene
• Nellie Melba – link to 1906 recording of the Aubade from the opera Le Roi d'Ys
• 1902 portrait Madame Melba, painted by Rupert Bunny
• Photo of Melba, her father and niece
• Bio; photo of dress worn by Dame Nellie Melba
• Nellie Melba at the National Film and Sound Archive
• Dame Nellie Melba in Queensland - John Oxley Library Blog, State Library of Queensland

Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga performing on The Monster Ball Tour in 2010
Background information
Birth name	Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta
Born	(1986-03-28) March 28, 1986 (age 26) New York, New York, U.S.
Genres	Pop, dance, electronic
Occupations	Singer-songwriter, performance artist, record producer, dancer, businesswoman, activist
Instruments	Vocals, piano, keyboards
Years active	2005–present
Labels	Def Jam, Cherrytree, Streamline, Kon Live, Interscope
Website	LadyGaga.com Lady Gaga's signature

Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (/ˈstɛfəniː dʒʌrməˈnɑːtə/ STE-fə-nee jurr-mə-NAH-tə; born March 28, 1986), known by her stage name Lady Gaga, is an American singer and songwriter. Born and raised in New York City, she primarily studied at the Convent of the Sacred Heart and briefly attended New York University's Tisch School of the Arts before withdrawing to focus on her musical career. She began performing in the rock music scene of Manhattan's Lower East Side, and was signed with Streamline Records by the end of 2007. During her employment as a songwriter for the record company, her vocal abilities captured the attention of recording artist Akon, who signed her to his label Kon Live Distribution.

Lady Gaga came to prominence as a recording artist following the release of her debut album The Fame (2008), which was a critical and commercial success that topped charts around the world and included the international number-one singles "Just Dance" and "Poker Face". After embarking on the The Fame Ball Tour, she followed the album with The Fame Monster (2009), which spawned the worldwide hit singles "Bad Romance", "Telephone" and "Alejandro". The album's success allowed her to embark on the eighteen-month long Monster Ball Tour, which later became one of the highest-grossing concert tours of all time. Her most recent album Born This Way (2011) topped the charts of most major markets and generated more international chart-topping singles, including "Born This Way", "Judas" and "The Edge of Glory". Besides her musical career, she involves herself with humanitarian causes and LGBT activism.

Influenced by David Bowie, Michael Jackson, Madonna and Queen, Lady Gaga is recognized for her flamboyant, diverse and outré contributions to the music industry through her fashion, performances and music videos. She has sold an estimated 23 million albums and 64 million singles worldwide, making her one of the best-selling music artists of all time and her singles are some of the best selling worldwide.^[1] Her achievements include five Grammy Awards and 13 MTV Video Music Awards. Lady Gaga has consecutively appeared on Billboard magazine's Artists of the Year (scoring the definitive title in 2010), ranked fourth in VH1's list of 100 Greatest Women in Music, is regularly placed on lists composed by Forbes magazine and was named one of the most influential people in the world by Time magazine.^[2][3] In 2012, Gaga was ranked at number four on Billboard's list of top moneymakers of 2011, grossing more than $25 million.^[4]

Biography[link]

1986–2004: Early life[link]

Manhattan's Upper West Side, where Gaga grew up, has been an inspiration for many of her songs.

Lady Gaga was born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta on March 28, 1986 in New York City to parents Cynthia (née Bissett) and Joseph Germanotta, an Internet entrepreneur.^[5][6] Descending from Italian and more distant French-Canadian roots, Gaga is the elder of two children.^[7][8] Her sister, Natali, a fashion student, was born in 1992.^[9][10] Despite her seemingly affluent upbringing in the family home in Manhattan's Upper West Side, Gaga has stressed that she did not come from a wealthy background, stating that her parents "both came from lower-class families, so we've worked for everything—my mother worked eight to eight out of the house, in telecommunications, and so did my father."^[11][12]

From the age of 11, Gaga – who was raised Roman Catholic – attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart, a private all-girls Roman Catholic school on Manhattan's Upper East Side.^[13][14][15] She described her academic life in high school as "very dedicated, very studious, very disciplined" but also "a bit insecure": "I used to get made fun of for being either too provocative or too eccentric, so I started to tone it down. I didn't fit in, and I felt like a freak."^[16][17] Acquaintances dispute that she did not fit in at school. "She had a core group of friends; she was a good student. She liked boys a lot, but singing was No. 1," recalled a former high school classmate.^[18] Gaga began playing the piano at the age of 4, went on to write her first piano ballad at 13, and started to perform at open mike nights by the age of 14.^[19][20] Her passion for musical theatre brought her lead roles in high school productions, including Adelaide in Guys and Dolls and Philia in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.^[21] She also appeared in a very small role as a mischievous classmate in the television drama series The Sopranos in a 2001 episode titled "The Telltale Moozadell" in addition to unsuccessfully auditioning for parts in New York shows.^[11][22]

When her time at the Convent of the Sacred Heart came to an end, her mother encouraged her to apply for the Collaborative Arts Project 21 (CAP21), a musical theatre training conservatory at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.^[11] After becoming one of twenty students to gain early admission, she eventually lived in an NYU dorm on 11th Street by the age of 17.^[21] CAP21 prepared her for her future career focus in "music, art, sex and celebrity" where, in addition to sharpening her songwriting skills, she composed essays and analytical papers on art, religion, social issues and politics, including a thesis on pop artists Spencer Tunick and Damien Hirst.^[20][23][24] With CAP21, she also tried out for and won auditions, including the part of an unsuspecting diner customer for MTV's Boiling Points, a prank reality television show.^[11][25] But Gaga felt more creative than some of her classmates. "Once you learn how to think about art, you can teach yourself," she said.

2005–07: Career beginnings[link]

Gaga (right) performing with Lady Starlight (left) at Lollapalooza 2007

Gaga withdrew from CAP21 at 19, in the second semester of her sophomore year, deciding to focus on her musical career.^[26] Her father agreed to pay her rent for a year, on the condition that she re-enroll at Tisch if unsuccessful. "I left my entire family, got the cheapest apartment I could find, and ate shit until somebody would listen," she remembers.^[21] Settled in a small apartment on Rivington Street towards the summer of 2005, Gaga recorded a couple of songs with hip-hop singer Grandmaster Melle Mel, for an audio book accompanying the children's book The Portal in the Park, by Cricket Casey.^[11][27] She also began a band called the Stefani Germanotta Band (SGBand) with some friends from NYU – guitarist Calvin Pia, bassist Eli Silverman, drummer Alex Beckham and booking manager Frank Fredericks – in September of that year.^[11][21] The band played a mixture of songs: some self-penned alongside classic rock numbers like Led Zeppelin's "D'yer Mak'er".^[11] Playing in bars like the Greenwich Village's The Bitter End and the Lower East Side's the Mercury Lounge, the band developed a small fan base and caught the eye of music producer Joe Vulpis.^[11] Soon after arranging time in Vulpis' studio in the months that followed, SGBand were selling their extended plays Words and Red and Blue (both 2005) at gigs around New York while becoming a local fixture of the downtown Lower East Side club scene.^[21]

SGBand reached their career peak at the 2006 Songwriters Hall of Fame New Songwriters Showcase at The Cutting Room in June where Wendy Starland, a musician, appeared as a talent scout for music producer Rob Fusari. Starland informed Fusari – who was searching for a female singer to front a new band – of Gaga's ability and contacted her. With SGBand disbanded, Gaga traveled daily to New Jersey to work on songs she had written and compose new material with the music producer.^[11] While in collaboration, Fusari compared some of her vocal harmonies to those of Freddie Mercury, lead singer of Queen.^[28] It was Fusari who helped create the moniker Gaga after the Queen song "Radio Ga Ga". Gaga was in the process of trying to come up with a stage name when she received a text message from Fusari that read "Lady Gaga."^[29] He explained, "Every day, when Stef came to the studio, instead of saying hello, I would start singing 'Radio Ga Ga'. That was her entrance song" and that the text message was the result of a predictive text glitch that changed "radio" to "lady". She texted back, "That's it," and declared, "Don't ever call me Stefani again."^[29][30] The New York Post, however, has reported that this story is incorrect, and that the name resulted from a marketing meeting.^[18]

Gaga performing in a bar, sporting one of her earlier looks (2008)

Although the musical relationship between Fusari and Gaga was unsuccessful at first, the pair soon set up a company titled Team Lovechild in which they recorded and produced electropop tracks and sent them to music industry bosses.^[11] Joshua Sarubin, the head of A&R at Def Jam Recordings, responded positively and vied for the record company to take a chance on her "unusual and provocative" performance. After having his boss Antonio "L.A." Reid in agreement, Gaga was signed to Def Jam in September 2006 with the intention of having an album ready in nine months.^[11] However, she was dropped by the label after only three months – an unfortunate period of her life that would later inspire her treatment for the music video for her 2011 single "Marry the Night".^[31][32] Devastated, Gaga returned to the solace of the family home for Christmas and the nightlife culture of the Lower East Side.^[11]

She became increasingly experimental: fascinating herself with emerging neo-burlesque shows, go-go dancing at bars dressed in little more than a bikini in addition to experimenting with drugs.^[11][14] Her father, however, did not understand the reason behind her drug intake and could not look at her for several months.^[14][30] "I was onstage in a thong, with a fringe hanging over my ass thinking that had covered it, lighting hairsprays on fire, go-go dancing to Black Sabbath and singing songs about oral sex. The kids would scream and cheer and then we'd all go grab a beer. It represented freedom to me. I went to a Catholic school but it was on the New York underground that I found myself."^[23] It was then when she became romantically involved with a heavy metal drummer in a relationship and break-up she likened to the musical film Grease: "I was his Sandy, and he was my Danny, and I just broke." He later became an inspiration behind some of her later songs.^[33]

During this time, she met performance artist Lady Starlight, who helped mold her on-stage persona.^[34] Starlight explained that, upon their first meeting, Gaga wanted to perform with her to songs she had recorded with Fusari. Like SGBand, the pair soon began performing at many of the downtown club venues like the Mercury Lounge, The Bitter End, and the Rockwood Music Hall. Their live performance art piece was known as "Lady Gaga and the Starlight Revue" and, billed as "The Ultimate Pop Burlesque Rockshow", was a low-fi tribute to 1970s variety acts.^[35][36] Soon after, the two were invited to play at the 2007 Lollapalooza music festival in August that year.^[37] The show was critically acclaimed, and their performance received positive reviews.^[20][35] Having initially focused on avant-garde electronic dance music, Gaga had found her musical niche when she began to incorporate pop melodies and the glam rock of David Bowie and Queen into her music.^[38]

While Gaga and Starlight were busy performing, producer Rob Fusari continued to work on the songs he had created with Gaga. Fusari sent these songs to his friend, producer and record executive Vincent Herbert.^[39] Herbert was quick to sign her to his label Streamline Records, an imprint of Interscope Records, upon its establishment in 2007.^[40] Gaga later credited Herbert as the man who discovered her, adding "I really feel like we made pop history, and we're gonna keep going."^[39] Having served as an apprentice songwriter under an internship at Famous Music Publishing, which was later acquired by Sony/ATV Music Publishing, Gaga subsequently struck a music publishing deal with Sony/ATV.^[41] As a result, she was hired to write songs for Britney Spears and labelmates New Kids on the Block, Fergie, and the Pussycat Dolls.^[41] At Interscope, singer-songwriter Akon recognized her vocal abilities when she sang a reference vocal for one of his tracks in studio.^[42] Akon then convinced Interscope-Geffen-A&M Chairman and CEO Jimmy Iovine to form a joint deal by having her also sign with his own label Kon Live, making her his "franchise player."^[31][43]

As 2007 came to a close, her former management company introduced her to songwriter and producer RedOne, whom they also managed.^[44] The first song she produced with RedOne was "Boys Boys Boys", a mash-up inspired by Mötley Crüe's "Girls, Girls, Girls" and AC/DC's "T.N.T.".^[30][44] Gaga continued her collaboration with RedOne in the recording studio for a week on her debut album and also joined the roster of Cherrytree Records, an Interscope imprint established by producer and songwriter Martin Kierszenbaum, after co-writing four songs with Kierszenbaum including the singles "Christmas Tree" and "Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)".^[41] Despite her secure record deal, she admitted that there was fear about her being too "racy", "dance-orientated" and "underground" for the mainstream market. Her response: "My name is Lady Gaga, I've been on the music scene for years, and I'm telling you, this is what's next."^[15]

[edit] 2008–10: The Fame and The Fame Monster