Clamma Dale

Clamma Churita Dale (born 1948) is an African-American operatic soprano. She is best known for portraying "Bess" in the highly successful 1976 Houston Grand Opera production of Porgy and Bess. The show was transferred from Houston to Broadway where Dale was awarded a Drama Desk Award and received a Tony Award nomination.

Biography

Born and raised in Chester, Pennsylvania. Her father was a jazz musician and she received much of her early musical training from him, playing the clarinet, cello, saxophone, piano, and guitar during her youth as well as singing in the school choir. She studied music at Philadelphia's Settlement Music School and then pursued voice studies at the Juilliard School in New York City and graduated in 1970. She went on to earn her master's degree from the Juilliard School in 1975.

After graduating from school she worked as a first grade music teacher in Brooklyn until her singing career began to take off.

Dale made her professional opera debut on February 20, 1973 as St. Teresa I in Virgil Thomson's Four Saints in Three Acts at the Vivian Beaumont Theater in a production mounted by the Metropolitan Opera. In 1974 she portrayed Bess for the first time at the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera. In 1975 she won the Walter W. Naumburg Foundation's music competition which led to her New York City recital debut at Town Hall in May 1976. She returned to the NYCO several times in the late 1970s to portray such roles as the Countess in The Marriage of Figaro, and Nedda in Leoncavallo's Pagliacci. In 1975 she signed a three-year contract with the New York City Opera (NYCO) and made her NYCO debut in October 1975 as Antonia in Jacques Offenbach's Les Contes d'Hoffmann. She returned to the NYCO several times in the late 1970s to portray such roles as the Countess in The Marriage of Figaro, and Nedda in Leoncavallo's Pagliacci.

George Gershwin

George Gershwin (/ˈɡɜːrʃ.wɪn/; September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known. Among his best-known works are the orchestral compositions Rhapsody in Blue (1924) and An American in Paris (1928) as well as the opera Porgy and Bess (1935).

Gershwin studied piano under Charles Hambitzer and composition with Rubin Goldmark and Henry Cowell. He began his career as a song plugger, but soon started composing Broadway theatre works with his brother Ira Gershwin, and Buddy DeSylva. He moved to Paris to study with Nadia Boulanger, where he began to compose An American in Paris. After returning to New York City, he wrote Porgy and Bess with Ira and the author DuBose Heyward. Initially a commercial failure, Porgy and Bess is now considered one of the most important American operas of the twentieth century.

Gershwin moved to Hollywood and composed numerous film scores until his death in 1937 from a brain tumor.