Maria d'Apparecida

Maria d'Apparecida Marques (17 January 1926 – 4 July 2017) was a Brazilian opera singer. She began her working career as a primary school teacher in Rio de Janeiro before becoming an announcer on various Brazilian radio broadcast stations. D'Apparecida had become a singer just as she was told she not join the city's Theatro Municipal because she was black and faced racial discrimination in Brazil. She relocated to Europe, giving recitals, appearing in concerts, at festivals and in major French opera houses. D'Apparecida was the first black female Latin American to play Carmen at the Paris Opera and the first black Latin American woman to perform with the company. She was a recipient of various awards and decorations such as the Officier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, the Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur, the Medal of the City of Paris and the Medal of the Order of Rio Branco.

Early life and education D'Apparecida was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on 17 January 1926; (who became pregnant by her employer's son in São Paulo), Following the death of D'Apparecida's mother of tuberculosis when her daughter was eight and lost contact with her father because of him becoming distant, she was raised by her paternal middle-class family in Tijuca, although she was never legally adopted by them. She was educated at the Normal School of Rio de Janeiro, Between 1955 and 1958, D'Apparecida worked as an announcer at various Brazilian radio stations. In 1961, she joined the Théâtre de l'Odéon, performing recitals of Brazilian melody songs. She also performed the role of Dido in Henry Purcell's Dido and Aeneas and Georges Bizet's Carmen at the Grand Théâtre de Bordeaux in 1962, the latter washer first major performance in a French theatre.

In 1977, D'Apparecida recorded the album Maria D'Apparecida et Baden Powell with the guitarist Baden Powell and 20 others. and recorded more than 20 albums. The Consulado-Geral do Brasil em Paris in Paris had difficulty locating one of her relatives until the Federal Police of Brazil were contacted and it located a nephew. She was buried at the Cimetière parisien de Bagneux in Paris' southern outskirts on the afternoon of 8 September 2017 and a mass to honour her memory took place the following morning at Saint-Pierre-de-Chaillot in Paris. An association called Les amis de Maria d'Apparecida (The friends of Maria d'Apparecida) was established to preserve her memory and the poem A Voz by Carlos Drummond de Andrade was dedicated to her. D'Apparecida is portrayed by Dione Carlos in the 2021 five-episode web series Maria d'Apparecida: Luz Negra.

Awards She was decorated with awards from both Brazil and France. D'Apparecida was appointed as Officier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and the Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur from François Mitterrand, the President of France. She was given the Medal of the City of Paris by Jacques Chirac, the then Mayor of Paris. D'Apparecida was given a Medal of the Order of Rio Branco. Other awards she received were the Grand Prize of the ; the gold medal and Honorary Diploma of Brazilian Merit Carlos Gomes; Orphee d'Or (1969); Spring of Sweden Prize (1971); the Printemps en Suède (1972); Honorary Citizen of the City of Rio de Janeiro (1981); the Grand Prix International du record from the Académie Charles Cros for the record Brasileirissimo (1988) and the .