Rosa Sucher née Hasselbeck, was a German 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...

tic 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...

 renowned for her Wagnerian performances.

Her debut occurred in Munich in 1871 as Waltraute in Die Walküre

Die Walküre

Die Walküre , WWV 86B, is the second of the four operas that form the cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen , by Richard Wagner...

and engagements followed in Berlin and Leipzig. She married Josef Sucher (1844-1908), a well-known conductor and composer in 1876, when he was conductor at the Leipzig

Leipzig

Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...

 city theatre.

Frau Sucher soon became famous for her interpretations of Wagner

Richard Wagner

Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...

's operatic roles, with her seasons in London

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...

 in 1882 and 1892 proving her great capacity both as singer and actress. In 1886 and 1888 she sang at Germany's Bayreuth

Bayreuth Festspielhaus

The or Bayreuth Festival Theatre is an opera house north of Bayreuth, Germany, dedicated solely to the performance of operas by the 19th-century German composer Richard Wagner...

, and in later years she was principally associated with the opera stage in Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

, retiring in 1903.

Her rendering of the part of Isolde in Wagner's opera

Tristan und Isolde

Tristan und Isolde is an opera, or music drama, in three acts by Richard Wagner to a German libretto by the composer, based largely on the romance by Gottfried von Straßburg. It was composed between 1857 and 1859 and premiered in Munich on 10 June 1865 with Hans von Bülow conducting...

 was especially acclaimed. Her other roles included Agathe, Euryanthe

Euryanthe

Euryanthe is a German "grand, heroic, romantic" opera by Carl Maria von Weber, first performed at the Theater am Kärntnertor, Vienna on 25 October 1823...

, Elsa, Eva, Brünnhilde, Kundry, and Desdemona in Otello

Otello

Otello is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Shakespeare's play Othello. It was Verdi's penultimate opera, and was first performed at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, on February 5, 1887....

. Unfortunately, she left no gramophone recordings of her singing.

Sources

• The Oxford Dictionary of Opera, by John Warrack and Ewan West (1992), 782 pages, ISBN 0-19-869164-5