Shirley Verrett (May 31, 1931 -- November 5, 2010) was an African-American operatic mezzo-soprano who successfully transitioned into soprano roles i.e. soprano sfogato. Verrett enjoyed great fame from the late 1960s through the 1990s, particularly well known for singing the works of Verdi and Donizetti. Born into an African-American family of devout Seventh-day Adventists in New Orleans, Louisiana, Verrett was raised in Los Angeles, California. She sang in church and showed early musical abilities, but initially a singing career was frowned upon by her family. Later Verrett went on to study with Anna Fitziu and with Marion Szekely Freschl at the Juilliard School in New York. In 1961 she won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She appeared in the first concert ever televised from Lincoln Center in 1962, and also appeared that year in the first of the Leonard Bernstein Young People's Concerts ever televised from that venue, in what is now Avery Fisher Hall. She made her debut at the Metropolitan Opera in 1968, with Carmen, and at La Scala in 1969 in Samson and Dalila. Verrett's mezzo roles included Cassandra and Didon (Berlioz's Les Troyens)-including the Met premiere, when she sang both roles in the same performance, Giuseppe Verdi's Ulrica, Amneris, Eboli, Azucena, Saint-Saëns' Dalila, Donizetti's Elisabetta I in "Maria Stuarda", Leonora in La favorita, Gluck's Orpheus, and Rossini's Neocles (L'assedio di Corinto) and Sinaide in Moïse. Many of these roles were recorded, either professionally or privately. Beginning in the late 1970s she began to tackle soprano roles, including Selika in L'Africaine, Judith in Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle, Lady Macbeth Macbeth, Madame Lidoine in Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites (Met1977), Tosca, Norma ( from Boston 1976 till Messina 1989), Aida (Boston 1980 and 1989), Desdemona (Otello) (1981), Leonore (Fidelio) (Met 1983), Iphigénie (1984--85), Alceste (1985), Médée (Cherubini) (1986)...
Lyrics & English Translation
O pure Goddess, who silver
These sacred ancient plants,
Turn thy beautiful semblance on us
Unclouded and unveiled...
Temper, o Goddess,
The brave zeal
Of the ardent spirits,
Scatter on the earth the peace
Thou make reign in the sky...
Complete the rite : and the sacred wood
Be clear of the laity.
When the irate and gloomy God
Asks for the Roman's blood
My voice will thunder
From the Druidic temple.
He will fall; I can punish him
(But my heart is unable to do so).
(Ah! Return to me beautiful
In your first true love ;
I'll protect you
Against the entire world.
With your serene ray;
I'll have life, sky
And homeland in your heart.
Ah, return again as you were then,
When I gave you my heart then,
Ah, come back to me.)
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