Obituary,
Teresa Żylis-Gara (1930-2021)
The versatile Polish soprano Teresa Żylis-Gara, whose wide repertoire ranged from Cavalieri to Chausson, has died aged 91.
Born in Landwarów in 1930, Żylis-Gara trained in Łódź and made her professional debut as Moniuszko’s Halka in Kraków in 1956; early career successes included prizes at major vocal competitions in Warsaw, Toulouse and Munich, after which she relocated to Germany to join the ensemble of the Theater Oberhausen. Contracts at Oper Dortmund and the Deutsche Oper am Rhein followed, and in 1965 she gave her first performance at Glyndebourne as Octavian (opposite Montserrat Caballé’s Marschallin) in Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier, returning two years later as Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni. (A live recording of Der Rosenkavalier was released on the festival’s own label in 2011, with the Sunday Times deeming her ‘gloriously sung’ Knight of the Rose the highlight of the production and Gramophone observing that ‘the Eastern-European robustness in Teresa Żylis-Gara's voice is a definite plus for Octavian’).
In the second half of the 1960s Żylis-Gara made a number of important international debuts, including Violetta at Covent Garden, and Donna Elvira in Paris and at the Salzburg Festival, San Francisco Opera and Metropolitan Opera. She went on to sing over 200 performances at the Met, where her repertoire included Mozart’s Countess and Pamina, Wagner’s Elisabeth and Elsa, Puccini’s Tosca, Liù, Mimì, Butterfly, Manon Lescaut and Suor Angelica, and Verdi’s Amelia (Un ballo in Maschera), Leonora (Il trovatore) and Desdemona.
As well as enjoying enormous success in a wide range of core repertoire, Żylis-Gara frequently ventured off the beaten track on the concert-platform and in the studio, championing songs by Lalo, Paderewski, Moniusko and Szymanowski and singing the role of Genièvre (Guinevere) on Armin Jordan’s 1986 Erato recording of Chausson’s Le roi Arthus to great acclaim. Her bright, flexible soprano was also well-suited to baroque music, as evinced by recordings of Bach’s St Matthew Passion (with Wolfgang Gönnenwein in 1968) and Emilio de’ Cavalieri’s Rappresentatione di anima et di corpo under Charles Mackerras in 1970.
Żylis-Gara gave her final performance at the Metropolitan Opera (as Puccini’s Manon Lescaut) in 1984, but taught extensively in Europe and the US for many years after retiring from the stage. Her awards and honours included honorary doctorates from the Karol Lipinski Academy in 2004 and from her alma mater in Łódź two years later; a sculpture of her stands in Poland’s Radziejowice Park. She died in Monaco (her home since the 1980s) on 28th August.
Teresa Żylis-Gara - a selected discography
Sherrill Milnes (Don Giovanni), Walter Berry (Leporello), Anna Tomowa-Sintow (Donna Anna), Peter Schreier (Don Ottavio), Teresa Żylis-Gara (Donna Elvira), Edith Mathis (Zerlina), Dale Dasing (Masetto), John Macurdy (Commendatore)
Wiener Staatsopernchor & Wiener Philharmoniker, Karl Böhm
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Gundula Janowitz (Ariadne), James King (Bacchus), Teresa Żylis-Gara (Komponist), Sylvia Geszty (Zerbinetta), Hermann Prey (Harlekin), Peter Schreier (Tanzmeister/Scaramuccio), Theo Adam (Musiklehrer)
Staatskapelle Dresden, Rudolf Kempe
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Gino Quilico (Arthus), Teresa Żylis-Gara (Genièvre), Gösta Winbergh (Lancelot)
Nouvel Orchestre Philharmonique, Choeurs de Radio France, Armin Jordan
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Franco Bonisolli (Benvenuto Cellini), Teresa Żylis-Gara (Teresa), Wolfgang Brendel (Fieramosca), Robert Amis El Hage (Le Pape Clément VII), Gino Sinimberghi (Francesco), James Loomis (Bernadino), Tommaso Frascati (Pompeo), Fernandino Jacopucci (Cabaretier), Elisabeth Steiner (Ascanio)
RAI Roma, Seiji Ozawa
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Nicolai Ghiaurov (Mosè), Mario Petri (Faraone), Shirley Verrett (Sinaìde), Teresa Żylis-Gara (Anaìde), Franco Ventriglia (Osiride), Fernandino Jacopucci (Aufide), Ottavio Garaventa (Aménofi), Giampaolo Corradi (Elisero), Giovanni Gusmeroli (Una voce misteriosa)
RAI Roma, Wolfgang Sawallisch
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Bruno Prevedi (Don Carlo), Teresa Żylis-Gara (Elisabetta), Nicolai Ghiaurov (Filippo II), Piero Cappuccilli (Rodrigo), Fiorenza Cossotto (Eboli), Massimo Valentini (Tebaldi), Dimiter Petkov (Il Grande Inquisitore)
RAI Orchestra, Thomas Schippers
Available Format: 3 CDs
Arleen Augér, Teresa Żylis-Gara, Edda Moser, Sylvia Geszty (sopranos), Tatiana Troyanos (mezzo), Paul Esswood (countertenor), Kurt Equiluz (tenor), Hermann Prey (baritone), Theo Adam, Herbert Lackner, Ernst Gutstein (basses)
Ensemble Wolfgang von Karajan, Wiener Kammerchor, Sir Charles Mackerras
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Theo Altmeyer (Evangelist), Franz Crass (Jesus), Teresa Żylis-Gara (soprano), Julia Hamari (contralto), Nicolai Gedda (tenor), Hermann Prey (baritone)
Consortium Musicum, Süddeutscher Madrigalchor, Wolfgang Gönnenwein
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Katherine Cooper - Head of Editorial
