Maria Jeritza

Maria Jeritza (6 October 1887 – 10 July 1982) was an Austrian-born American soprano. She was described by John Rockwell in The New York Times as a spinto soprano who was "the golden girl of opera's golden age". While she appeared at many theaters globally as a guest artist, her career was chiefly based in Vienna and New York City. She had a long association with the Vienna State Opera (1912–1935 and 1950–1953) and the Metropolitan Opera ("Met", 1921–1932 and 1951). She performed more than 60 roles during her career; 20 of which were sung at the Met. She is remembered today for originating roles in several notable operas; among them Ariadne auf Naxos and Die Frau ohne Schatten by Richard Strauss and Die tote Stadt by Erich Wolfgang Korngold. She was also the first singer to perform the title roles of Giacomo Puccini's Turandot and Leoš Janáček's Jenůfa in the United States. Sometime in her early 20s, she changed her name to Maria Jeritza. However, this is contradicted in the Großes Sängerlexikon which gives a history of performances over the six years prior to this. According to Karl-Josef Kutsch and Leo Riemens, Jeritza first performed professionally as a member of the chorus at the Brno City Theatre beginning in 1904. There she quickly progressed into singing minor parts in operettas. Her first leading role was as Elsa, but not in 1910 in Olomouc but in 1906 at the .

In 1906–1907, Jeritza was a resident soprano at Theater Dortmund, and in 1909 she was committed to the Munich Art Theatre. While performing at the latter theatre she was scouted by Rainer Simons, director of the Vienna Volksoper (VV), who poached her for his theater. She have her performance at the VV as Elisabeth in Wagner's Tannhäuser, This was soon followed that same year by a performance of Minnie in the first staging in Vienna of Giacomo Puccini's La fanciulla del West. She rapidly became a house favorite, and her sudden rise to super stardom in Vienna gained her the moniker "The Moravian Thunderbolt". She a regular performer at the VSO through 1935.

Not long after her debut at the VSO, Jeritza began an association of long standing with composer Richard Strauss. On October 25, 1912 she created the role of Ariadne in the world premiere of Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos at the Staatsoper Stuttgart; a role she later repeated for the premier of its revised version at the VSO in 1916. Korngold's Violanta (November 5, 1927) and Strauss's Die Ägyptische Helena (November 6, 1928). Her most frequently performed roles at the Met were Elisabeth in Tannhäuser, Elsa von Brabant in Lohengrin, Minnie in La fanciulla del West, Octavian in Der Rosenkavalier, Santuzza in Cavalleria rusticana, Sieglinde in Die Walküre, Turandot, and the title role in Tosca. and Massenet's Thaïs. These latter two roles and the part of Tosca were considered some of her best roles on the Met stage. Brünnhilde was the heaviest role she sang during her career, and she never tackled the larger dramatic repertoire.

Other work

Jeritza periodically appeared as a guest artist at opera houses in Denmark, England, France, Hungary, and Russia during her career. Some of the theaters she appeared as a guest artist at included the Berlin State Opera, Hungarian State Opera House, the Odesa Opera and Ballet Theatre, Prague State Opera, the Royal Swedish Opera, and Theater Bremen. She performed at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden in a total of seven roles in the years 1925-1926. In 1948 she married New Jersey businessman Irving B. Seery, and remained married to him until his death in 1966. She and Irving lived in a mansion in the Forest Hill neighborhood of Newark, New Jersey, where she lived until her death at the age of 94.

Jeritza died at St. Mary's Hospital in Orange, New Jersey on 10 July 1982. A Roman Catholic, she was buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in North Arlington, New Jersey.