Maria Malibran

Thursday, March 24, 2022

Maria Malibrán (1808-1836) was born on this day 214 years ago. The German Wikipedia page calls her the “first diva in opera history” but this gives an inadequate sense of the talents of this versatile musician. A few key biographical facts are striking. Malibran was a true European. As the daughter of the Spanish tenor Manuel del Pópulo Vicente García (1775-1832), she was born in Paris and died way to early in Manchester. After finding success in London and then during a one-year stay in New York, she was celebrated in Paris and later especially in Italy. She was not only an outstanding singer but she was also a brilliant pianist and harpist. A look at the RISM online catalog also reveals that “La Malibran” was an active composer: 47 of the 77 Malibran sources in RISM are her compositions. One of these is the romance Au bord de la mer. A digitized version of it can be found through the Eda Kuhn Loeb Music Library (Harvard University).

Image: Maria Malibran as Desdemona in Rossini’s Otello. From Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Category: Musical anniversaries