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Centenary of Jarmila Novotná, Prague State Opera Honorary Member

Recalling one-hundredth anniversary of the birth of the PSO’s first Honorary Member, chamber singer Jarmila Novotná (b. Sept. 23, 1907; d. Feb. 9, 1994), we are above all bringing back the memories of a world famous Czech singer and stage actress, star of opera houses in Berlin and Vienna, and for many years a leading soloist of New York’s Metropolitan Opera. She stood on the operatic stage from the age of seventeen, when she made her debut at Prague’s National Theatre as Mařenka and Violetta. Though she was ideally predisposed for asserting her physical beauty and acting talent on the film screen as well, she declined even offers from Hollywood, and devoted herself wholly to service to opera.

After studies in Italy, she started her career at Verona, Naples, Florence, and Milan. From Berlin and Vienna her charm would spread on, to Paris and Salzburg. She sang with utter assurance both the Queen of the Night and Pamina, the Countess and Cherubino, Olympia, Giulietta and Antonia. At the same time, she was an equally accomplished operetta singer, as Rosalinda and Orlofsky, Giuditta and Frasquita. Dominating her Italian repertoire were creations of Gilda, Adina, Alice and Madama Butterfly, whereas her Czech gallery came to include the parts of Karolina and Rusalka. She possessed an unfailing feeling for style, an was just as brilliant as a concert hall song recital singer. At the Metropolitan Opera, where she was introduced by Arturo Toscanini, she was instrumental in making a headway for The Bartered Bride with her Mařenka, sung in English, and through no fewer than sixteen seasons took part in making a great epoch for the company, as Eurydice, Elvira, Violetta, Mimi, Manon, Mélisande and Octavian. During the Second World War she toured all across the United States, appearing in dozens of functions organized in support of her native country. However, her qualities as an artist and as a person left the communist regime in Czechoslovakia unimpressed. Back home, her family lost all their property, and the only choice she was left with was to emigrate. That notwithstanding, she never hardened her heart to her beloved ancestral home. After the Velvet Revolution, she published a book of memoirs here, made two recital records, as well as concert appearances at Prague’s Music Theatre and Academy of Sciences for the local Jeunesse Musicale, her reminiscences were featured by radio and television, was granted freedoms by the community of Lázně Toušeň and by her native city of Prague, and in a ceremony at Prague Castle received the T. G. Masaryk Order. She was loved here, and she was happy.

Shortly before her 85th birthday, her voice sounded for the first and last time at the Prague State Opera: on September 1, 1992, from a recording, as a prelude to a gala performance of Rigoletto, and then live, in a personal address thanking for the PSO honorary membership, a distinction she truly and profoundly appreciated.

Jan Králík

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The Prague State Opera - Theatre History in Pictures and Dates - Book cover
The Prague State Opera – Theatre History in Pictures and Dates
Tomáš Vrbka
The Prague State Opera in cooperation with the Slovart publishing house publishes a representative book tracking the history of this significant cultural institution since its opening in 1888 till the end of the 2002/2003 season. The publication called The Prague State Opera – Theatre History in Pictures and Dates is focusing solely on the opera featured at the scene, even though the theatre under various names also served to presentation of drama plays, operettas and ballet. The Prague State opera plans to publish the volumes concentrating on those genres in the next years.

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