Elizabeth Fretwell
Encyclopedia
Elizabeth Fretwell OBE
(13 August 1920 - 5 June 2006) was an Australia
n soprano
. She was the prima donna
at London's
Sadler's Wells
Opera (English National Opera
) through much of the 1950s and 1960s.
, a suburb of Melbourne
. As a child she had hoped to become a ballerina. However, she grew too big for this profession. She focussed instead on singing, taking vocal studies in Melbourne. Her operatic career began in 1950. In 1954, she sang Antonia in Offenbach
's The Tales of Hoffmann before Queen Elizabeth II
who was on her first tour of Australia. In order to gain greater skill she moved to London to study under the tenor
Joseph Hislop
who had also coached Jussi Björling
and Birgit Nilsson
.
After returning to Australia she quickly started to make a name for herself, taking soprano roles in operas by Mozart
and Puccini
, amongst others. It was while on an Australian national tour of Tosca
that she had an extramarital affair with the Australian baritone Robert Simmons (they were later to marry), with whom she later had a son, John Simmons, now a Melbourne architect, and a daughter Geraldine 'Geri' Roggiero née Simmons now a Sydney wildlife artist. This caused a scandal in 1950s Australia so she and Simmons headed for the United Kingdom
.
company. Her performances there came to the attention of Sadler's Wells
and in 1955 they engaged her services as principal soprano. It was at this point she became known as Elizabeth Fretwell. Sadler's was where Fretwell's finest performances were given, and she gained rave reviews. This was no small achievement given that at that time Maria Callas
was dominant on the London opera stage. From the early 1960s to 1970 she went back and forth between Australia and the UK performing. In 1965 she gave her only performances at the Royal Opera House
, Covent Garden
, in Aida
and Il tabarro
. She also performed with Scottish and Canadian companies and in North America.
in Falstaff
, finally joining the ensemble of The Australian Opera
in 1970. During 1973 she sang in the opening season of the Sydney Opera House
. She remained a member of the Australian Opera (now Opera Australia
) until her retirement. In her later career she took on smaller roles, to give up-and-coming singers there a chance to further their careers as principal singers.
Her retirement was very low key; no one in the company knew of her impending retirement before she left. She did not want any fanfare or accolades at her last performance, and therefore only the management of the Australian Opera knew of her decision to retire in the late 1980s. She simply gave her last performance, then quietly went to her dressing room, packed up her makeup and personal belongings, and went home to her beloved house at Bayview, on the northern beaches of Sydney, and reverted to her married name of Betty Simmons. She later served on the Opera Foundation's board for a number of years.
She was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire
in 1977. On 5 June 2006 she died suddenly at her Bayview home, from a ruptured cerebral artery aneurysm
, aged 85. She was survived by her son and daughter, and four grandchildren.
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(13 August 1920 - 5 June 2006) was an Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n soprano
Soprano
A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...
. She was the prima donna
Prima donna
Originally used in opera or Commedia dell'arte companies, "prima donna" is Italian for "first lady." The term was used to designate the leading female singer in the opera company, the person to whom the prime roles would be given. The prima donna was normally, but not necessarily, a soprano...
at London's
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
Sadler's Wells
Sadler's Wells Theatre
Sadler's Wells Theatre is a performing arts venue located in Rosebery Avenue, Clerkenwell in the London Borough of Islington. The present day theatre is the sixth on the site since 1683. It consists of two performance spaces: a 1,500 seat main auditorium and the Lilian Baylis Studio, with extensive...
Opera (English National Opera
English National Opera
English National Opera is an opera company based in London, resident at the London Coliseum in St. Martin's Lane. It is one of the two principal opera companies in London, along with the Royal Opera, Covent Garden...
) through much of the 1950s and 1960s.
Early life and career
She was born Betty Drina Fretwell in MurrumbeenaMurrumbeena, Victoria
Murrumbeena is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 13 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Glen Eira...
, a suburb of Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
. As a child she had hoped to become a ballerina. However, she grew too big for this profession. She focussed instead on singing, taking vocal studies in Melbourne. Her operatic career began in 1950. In 1954, she sang Antonia in Offenbach
Jacques Offenbach
Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....
's The Tales of Hoffmann before Queen Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom
Elizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
who was on her first tour of Australia. In order to gain greater skill she moved to London to study under the tenor
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
Joseph Hislop
Joseph Hislop
Joseph Hislop was a lyric tenor who appeared in opera and oratorio and gave concerts around the world....
who had also coached Jussi Björling
Jussi Björling
Johan Jonatan "Jussi" Björling was a Swedish tenor. One of the leading operatic singers of the 20th Century, Björling appeared frequently at the Royal Opera House in London, La Scala in Milan, and the Metropolitan Opera in New York City as well as at other major European opera...
and Birgit Nilsson
Birgit Nilsson
right|thumb|Nilsson in 1948.Birgit Nilsson was a celebrated Swedish dramatic soprano who specialized in operatic and symphonic works...
.
After returning to Australia she quickly started to make a name for herself, taking soprano roles in operas by Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
and Puccini
Giacomo Puccini
Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian composer whose operas, including La bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, and Turandot, are among the most frequently performed in the standard repertoire...
, amongst others. It was while on an Australian national tour of Tosca
Tosca
Tosca is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. It premiered at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome on 14 January 1900...
that she had an extramarital affair with the Australian baritone Robert Simmons (they were later to marry), with whom she later had a son, John Simmons, now a Melbourne architect, and a daughter Geraldine 'Geri' Roggiero née Simmons now a Sydney wildlife artist. This caused a scandal in 1950s Australia so she and Simmons headed for the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
.
Sadler's Wells
Once in Britain, Fretwell's first professional engagement was for Dublin's Grand OperaGrand Opera
Grand opera is a genre of 19th-century opera generally in four or five acts, characterised by large-scale casts and orchestras, and lavish and spectacular design and stage effects, normally with plots based on or around dramatic historic events...
company. Her performances there came to the attention of Sadler's Wells
Sadler's Wells Theatre
Sadler's Wells Theatre is a performing arts venue located in Rosebery Avenue, Clerkenwell in the London Borough of Islington. The present day theatre is the sixth on the site since 1683. It consists of two performance spaces: a 1,500 seat main auditorium and the Lilian Baylis Studio, with extensive...
and in 1955 they engaged her services as principal soprano. It was at this point she became known as Elizabeth Fretwell. Sadler's was where Fretwell's finest performances were given, and she gained rave reviews. This was no small achievement given that at that time Maria Callas
Maria Callas
Maria Callas was an American-born Greek soprano and one of the most renowned opera singers of the 20th century. She combined an impressive bel canto technique, a wide-ranging voice and great dramatic gifts...
was dominant on the London opera stage. From the early 1960s to 1970 she went back and forth between Australia and the UK performing. In 1965 she gave her only performances at the Royal Opera House
Royal Opera House
The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply "Covent Garden", after a previous use of the site of the opera house's original construction in 1732. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The...
, Covent Garden
Covent Garden
Covent Garden is a district in London on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St. Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit and vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist site, and the Royal Opera House, which is also known as...
, in Aida
Aida
Aida sometimes spelled Aïda, is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette...
and Il tabarro
Il tabarro
Il tabarro is an opera in one act by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Giuseppe Adami, based on Didier Gold's play La houppelande. It is the first of the trio of operas known as Il trittico...
. She also performed with Scottish and Canadian companies and in North America.
Later career and death
In 1969 Fretwell sang opposite Tito GobbiTito Gobbi
Tito Gobbi was an Italian operatic baritone with an international reputation.-Biography:Tito Gobbi was born in Bassano del Grappa and studied law at the University of Padua before he trained as a singer. Giulio Crimi, a well-known Italian tenor of a previous generation, was Gobbi's teacher in Rome...
in Falstaff
Falstaff (opera)
Falstaff is an operatic commedia lirica in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi, adapted by Arrigo Boito from Shakespeare's plays The Merry Wives of Windsor and scenes from Henry IV. It was Verdi's last opera, written in the composer's ninth decade, and only the second of his 26 operas to be a comedy...
, finally joining the ensemble of The Australian Opera
Opera Australia
Opera Australia is the principal opera company in Australia. Based in Sydney, its performance season at the Sydney Opera House runs for approximately eight months of the year, with the remainder of its time spent in the The Arts Centre in Melbourne...
in 1970. During 1973 she sang in the opening season of the Sydney Opera House
Sydney Opera House
The Sydney Opera House is a multi-venue performing arts centre in the Australian city of Sydney. It was conceived and largely built by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, finally opening in 1973 after a long gestation starting with his competition-winning design in 1957...
. She remained a member of the Australian Opera (now Opera Australia
Opera Australia
Opera Australia is the principal opera company in Australia. Based in Sydney, its performance season at the Sydney Opera House runs for approximately eight months of the year, with the remainder of its time spent in the The Arts Centre in Melbourne...
) until her retirement. In her later career she took on smaller roles, to give up-and-coming singers there a chance to further their careers as principal singers.
Her retirement was very low key; no one in the company knew of her impending retirement before she left. She did not want any fanfare or accolades at her last performance, and therefore only the management of the Australian Opera knew of her decision to retire in the late 1980s. She simply gave her last performance, then quietly went to her dressing room, packed up her makeup and personal belongings, and went home to her beloved house at Bayview, on the northern beaches of Sydney, and reverted to her married name of Betty Simmons. She later served on the Opera Foundation's board for a number of years.
She was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
in 1977. On 5 June 2006 she died suddenly at her Bayview home, from a ruptured cerebral artery aneurysm
Aneurysm
An aneurysm or aneurism is a localized, blood-filled balloon-like bulge in the wall of a blood vessel. Aneurysms can commonly occur in arteries at the base of the brain and an aortic aneurysm occurs in the main artery carrying blood from the left ventricle of the heart...
, aged 85. She was survived by her son and daughter, and four grandchildren.