Mary LeSawyer was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

 singer of Ukrainian descent who had an active international career during the 1940s through the 1960s. A lyric soprano

Lyric soprano

A lyric soprano is a type of operatic soprano that has a warm quality with a bright, full timbre which can be heard over an orchestra. The lyric soprano voice generally has a higher tessitura than a soubrette and usually plays ingenues and other sympathetic characters in opera. Lyric sopranos have...

, LeSawyer studied opera at the Juilliard School

Juilliard School

The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...

 before beginning her singing career. She had a long and fruitful partnership with the New York City Opera

New York City Opera

The New York City Opera is an American opera company located in New York City.The company, called "the people's opera" by New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, was founded in 1943 with the aim of making opera financially accessible to a wide audience, producing an innovative choice of repertory, and...

 from 1949 through 1961. With the NYCO she appeared in productions of Carmen

Carmen

Carmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...

, La Traviata

La traviata

La traviata is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La dame aux Camélias , a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The title La traviata means literally The Fallen Woman, or perhaps more figuratively, The Woman...

, Madame Butterfly, Manon

Manon

Manon is an opéra comique in five acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Henri Meilhac and Philippe Gille, based on the 1731 novel L’histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut by the Abbé Prévost...

, The Marriage of Figaro

The Marriage of Figaro

Le nozze di Figaro, ossia la folle giornata , K. 492, is an opera buffa composed in 1786 in four acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte, based on a stage comedy by Pierre Beaumarchais, La folle journée, ou le Mariage de Figaro .Although the play by...

, The Consul

The Consul

The Consul is an opera in three acts with music and libretto by Gian Carlo Menotti, his first full-length opera. Its first performance was on March 1, 1950, at the Shubert Theatre in Philadelphia with Patricia Neway as the lead heroine Magda Sorel, Gloria Lane as the secretary of the consulate,...

, and Ariadne auf Naxos

Ariadne auf Naxos

Ariadne auf Naxos is an opera by Richard Strauss with a German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. Bringing together slapstick comedy and consuming beautiful music, the opera's theme is the competition between high and low art for the public's attention.- First version :The opera was originally...

among other operas. She notably took part in the company's celebrated 1960 national tour, performing in four American operas: Susannah

Susannah

Susannah is an opera in two acts by American composer Carlisle Floyd, who wrote the libretto and music while a member of the piano faculty at Florida State University. Floyd adapted the story from the Apocryphal tale of Susannah and the Elders, though the latter story has a more positive ending...

, The Ballad of Baby Doe

The Ballad of Baby Doe

The Ballad of Baby Doe is an opera by the American composer Douglas Moore that uses an English-language libretto by John Latouche. It is Moore's most famous opera and one of the few American operas to be in the standard repertory...

, Street Scene

Street Scene (opera)

Street Scene is a Broadway musical or, more precisely, an "American opera" by Kurt Weill , Langston Hughes , and Elmer Rice...

and Six Characters in Search of an Author

Six Characters in Search of an Author (opera)

Six Characters in Search of an Author is an opera in three acts by composer Hugo Weisgall. The work uses an English libretto by Denis Johnston that is based on the play of the same name by Luigi Pirandello. The opera was commissioned by the New York City Opera under the leadership Julius Rudel...

.

LeSawyer was married for many years to Joseph LeSawyer, president of the Ukrainian National Association

Ukrainian National Association

The Ukrainian National Association is a North American fraternal organization founded in Shamokin, Pennsylvanian in 1894 when the first wave of immigrants from Ukraine came to the United States and Canada...

 from 1961-1978. Mary was also active with the UNA and with the Ukrainian National Women's League of America

Ukrainian National Women's League of America

The Ukrainian National Women's League of America is a charitable and cultural organization that unites women of Ukrainian descent as well as those who are active in the Ukrainian communities of the United States...

. The couple lived in Scotch Plains, New Jersey

Scotch Plains, New Jersey

Scotch Plains is a township in Union County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 Census, the township population increased to a record high of 23,510.-History:...

 before moving to Venice, Florida

Venice, Florida

Venice is a city in Sarasota County, Florida, United States. According to the U.S. Census Bureau's 2007 estimates, the city had a population of 21,015. It is noted for its large snowbird population. Its newspaper is the Venice Gondolier Sun...

when they retired. They had no children.