Martina Arroyo facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Martina Arroyo
|
|
|---|---|
.jpg)
Arroyo in 2013
|
|
| Born | February 2, 1937 New York City, U.S.
|
| Occupation |
|
| Organization | Metropolitan Opera |
Martina Arroyo was born on February 2, 1937. She is an American opera singer known for her powerful soprano voice. She had a very successful career around the world from the 1960s to the 1980s. Martina Arroyo was one of the first Black opera singers to become widely famous.
She first became well-known at the Zurich Opera from 1963 to 1965. Then, she was a main singer at the Metropolitan Opera (Met) in New York City. She sang there from 1965 to 1978. During these years, she also performed in many famous opera houses worldwide. These included La Scala in Italy and Covent Garden in London. She also sang at the Opéra National de Paris and the Vienna State Opera.
Martina Arroyo is especially famous for singing Italian spinto roles. These roles need a strong, dramatic voice. She was amazing at playing heroines in operas by Verdi and Puccini. Her last opera performance was in 1991. After that, she started teaching singing at universities in the United States and Europe. On December 8, 2013, she received a special award called a Kennedy Center Honor.
Contents
Early Life and Music
Martina Arroyo was born in New York City. She was the younger of two children. Her father, Demetrio Arroyo, was from Puerto Rico. Her mother, Lucille Washington, was from Charleston, South Carolina. Her family lived in Harlem, a neighborhood in New York City. Her father was an engineer and earned enough money for her mother to stay home.
His job also allowed the family to enjoy New York's culture. They often visited museums, went to concerts, and saw plays. Seeing Broadway shows in the 1940s first made Martina want to be a performer. Her mother supported her dreams. She let Martina take ballet classes. Her mother also played the piano well and taught Martina. Martina also sang in her Baptist church choir. She sang in choirs while attending Hunter College High School.
College and Voice Training
After high school, Martina Arroyo went to Hunter College in 1953. She earned a degree in Romance languages in 1956. She was nineteen years old. While there, she took voice lessons as a hobby. She joined an opera workshop with Joseph Turnau. He saw that Martina had a great talent. She just needed the right training.
After the workshop, Turnau introduced her to a voice teacher named Marinka Gurewich. Marinka immediately took Martina as a student. At first, Martina did not take her singing lessons very seriously. Her teacher eventually threatened to stop teaching her. Martina said this was a "wake-up call." She realized she needed to take singing more seriously. She explained that at that time, most big opera houses did not hire Black singers. So, she thought opera was "not a real possibility" for her. But her teacher's threat made her work harder. She continued to study with Marinka Gurewich until her teacher passed away in 1990.
Working as a Social Worker
After college, Martina Arroyo found it hard to work and study singing at the same time. Her mother suggested she become an English teacher. So, she taught at Bronx High School in 1956. But it was difficult to balance teaching with her voice training. She decided to leave teaching. Instead, she became a social worker at the East End Welfare Center.
For two years, she helped many people who needed welfare. She also continued her voice training. Martina found the social work rewarding. She said, "My life had been centered on music for so long. Suddenly there I was, deeply involved in other people's problems."
Joining the Metropolitan Opera
In 1957, Martina Arroyo tried out for the Metropolitan Opera. But she was not accepted. She felt a bit sad. She thought about becoming a scholar instead. She started working on a master's degree at New York University. The next year, she tried out for the Metropolitan Opera again. This time, she won the Audition of the Air competition. This competition was a step towards the Met's National Council Auditions. She won $1,000 and a scholarship to the Met's Kathryn Long School.
She left New York University and joined the Kathryn Long School in 1957. There, she studied singing, acting, German, English speaking, and fencing. While at the school, she got a role in an opera. It was the first time Murder in the Cathedral by Ildebrando Pizzetti was performed in America. The first concert was rained out. So, it was moved to Carnegie Hall on September 17, 1958. This was Martina's first professional opera performance. The New York Times newspaper praised her. They said she had "remarkable potential" and a "voice of amplitude and lovely color."
In February 1959, Martina sang the main role in Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride. This was a concert version with the Little Orchestra Society. Soon after, she made her official debut on the opera stage. This was at the Metropolitan Opera. She sang the Celestial Voice in Verdi's Don Carlo on March 14, 1959. This was the start of her long connection with the Met. It was also the beginning of her long opera career.
Opera Career in Europe and Beyond
After her Met debut, Martina Arroyo moved to Europe. She started singing in smaller roles at different opera houses in 1959. While in Italy that year, she met her future husband, Emilio Poggioni, a violist. They later divorced. She then married Michel Maurel, who passed away in 2011. For several years, Martina mostly worked in Europe. She often sang smaller roles. The bigger roles she did get were usually in less famous operas. From 1961 to 1962, she traveled between Europe and the Metropolitan Opera often. Her roles at the Met during this time were in Wagner's Ring cycle and in repeat performances of Don Carlo.
In 1963, Martina Arroyo got her first big break. She was offered a contract to join the Zurich Opera as a main soprano. She made her debut there in the main role of Verdi's Aida. She was very well received. She continued to sing regularly at that opera house until 1968.
The role of Aida became very important for Martina early in her career. It helped her get noticed by many major opera houses in the 1960s. She sang Aida for her first performance at the Hamburg State Opera in 1963. She also sang it at the Deutsche Oper Berlin and the Vienna State Opera in 1964. In February 1965, she sang Aida as her first starring role at the Met. She was a last-minute replacement for another singer. Her performance received amazing reviews. The New York Times called her voice "one of the most gorgeous voices before the public today." Rudolf Bing, the Met's director, immediately offered her a contract. She became one of the company's main sopranos for several years.
Martina Arroyo also did something new in 1964. She appeared on national television. This was in a show called Feliz Borinquen for the CBS Repertoire Workshop.
Martina Arroyo started the 1965-1966 season at the Met. She gave a highly praised performance as Elisabetta in Don Carlo. She quickly became a favorite singer at the Met. She mostly played Verdi heroines. The Met became her main home for performances until 1978. During these thirteen years, her other roles at the Met included Aida. She also sang Amelia in Verdi's Un ballo in maschera. She played Cio-Cio-San in Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly. She was also the first Black person to play the role of Elsa in Wagner's Lohengrin in 1968. This was a first not just at the Met, but in all of opera history.
International Performances
While at the Met, Martina Arroyo often traveled to perform at other opera houses. She sang in the United States and around the world. In 1968, she sang for the first time in Israel. She also made her first appearance in the United Kingdom. This was as Valentine in a concert performance of Meyerbeer's Les Huguenots. Later that year, she debuted at the Royal Opera House. She also sang for the Philadelphia Lyric Opera Company. Both times, she sang the role of Aida. She returned to both companies many times in the 1970s. She sang Verdi heroines and roles like the main parts in Puccini's Tosca.
She sang Amelia in Un ballo in maschera for her debuts. These were with the San Francisco Opera (1971) and the Lyric Opera of Chicago (1972). In 1972, she sang Aida for her debut at La Scala in Italy. She performed with Plácido Domingo. In 1973, she made her first appearances at the Opéra National de Paris and the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires. She remained very busy in the world's major opera houses until 1979. She mostly sang heroines by Verdi, Puccini, and Strauss. Martina Arroyo also appeared as herself in an episode of The Odd Couple. This episode aired on January 16, 1975.
Retirement and Teaching
By 1980, Martina Arroyo started choosing her roles more carefully. She returned to the Met in 1983. She sang for the company's 100th anniversary celebration. She sang Aida and Santuzza again. Her last performance at the Met was on October 31, 1986. This was her 199th performance there. In 1987, she sang her last performance of the main role in Puccini's Turandot with the Seattle Opera. In 1989, she announced she was retiring from the opera stage.
She came out of retirement in 1991 for one last performance. This was in the first-ever performance of Blake by Leslie Adams. This opera tells a story set in America before the Civil War, when slavery existed.
Throughout her career, Martina Arroyo also performed many concerts. She sang with many of the world's best symphony orchestras. She often performed with the New York Philharmonic. The conductor Leonard Bernstein especially loved her voice. She sang in works like Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.
Martina Arroyo's talents also included live television. In 1964, she appeared with the CBS Symphony Orchestra. This was on the CBS Repertoire Workshop episode "Feliz Borinquen."
Martina Arroyo received an Opera Honors Award in 2010. This award is from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Recordings
.jpg)
Martina Arroyo performed in major opera houses. She also sang with the greatest symphony orchestras. She left behind many recordings. These include:
- Handel's Judas Maccabeus and Samson
- Mozart's Don Giovanni
- Beethoven's Missa solemnis and Ninth Symphony
- Verdi's I vespri siciliani, Un ballo in maschera, La forza del destino, and the Requiem
- Mahler's Eighth Symphony
She also recorded important music from the 20th century. This includes Schoenberg's Gurre-Lieder. She sang in the first performances of two works: Stockhausen's Momente and Samuel Barber's Andromache's Farewell.
Martina Arroyo's recordings are impressive. However, they do not include all the roles she sang on stage. For example, at the Metropolitan Opera alone, she performed many operas that were never recorded. These include Verdi's Ernani, Macbeth, and Il trovatore.
Teaching and Honors
Since officially retiring from singing in 1989, Martina Arroyo has taught a lot. She taught at places like Louisiana State University and UCLA. She also taught at the International Sommerakademie-Mozarteum in Salzburg. In 1993, she joined the faculty of the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University. She became a Distinguished Professor there. She retired as a Distinguished Professor Emerita in May 2007. While teaching at Indiana University, she created a course on preparing for opera roles. This course was very successful. It led to her starting The Martina Arroyo Foundation in 2003.
She has given special teaching classes, called master classes, around the world. She has also been a judge for several competitions. These include the George London Competition.
In 1976, President Gerald Ford appointed her to the National Council of the Arts. She founded the Martina Arroyo Foundation in 2003. This foundation helps young opera singers develop their skills. It gives them full training for opera roles. She is also active on the boards of Hunter College and Carnegie Hall. In 2002, she was chosen as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Martina Arroyo was always honest about how people saw her. She was sometimes seen as second-best to another great Black soprano, Leontyne Price. Once, a doorman at the Met greeted her as "Miss Price." Martina sweetly replied, "No, honey, I'm the other one."
In 2020, Martina Arroyo was inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame.
See also
In Spanish: Martina Arroyo para niños
- List of Puerto Ricans
- History of women in Puerto Rico
