Tamaki Miura
Encyclopedia
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese opera singer famous for her performances as Cio-Cio-San in Puccini's Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. Puccini based his opera in part on the short story "Madame Butterfly" by John Luther Long, which was dramatized by David Belasco...
.
Miura made her operatic debut in Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
in 1911 and the same year went to Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
to perform and study. She was first cast as Cio-Cio-San by the innovative director Vladimir Rosing
Vladimir Rosing
Vladimir Sergeyevich Rosing , aka Val Rosing, was a Russian-born operatic tenor and stage director who spent most of his professional career in England and the United States...
as part of his Allied Opera Season held in May and June 1915 at the London Opera House.
In the autumn of 1915, she performed the role in America for the first time in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
. Positive reviews led to further performances in both Madama Butterfly and Mascagni's Iris
Iris (opera)
Iris is an opera in three acts by Pietro Mascagni to an original Italian libretto by Luigi Illica. Its first performance was at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome on 22 November 1898.The opera is through-composed and set in Japan during legendary times...
in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, San Francisco and Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, before returning to 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...
to work with the Beecham
Thomas Beecham
Sir Thomas Beecham, 2nd Baronet CH was an English conductor and impresario best known for his association with the London Philharmonic and the Royal Philharmonic orchestras. He was also closely associated with the Liverpool Philharmonic and Hallé orchestras...
company. In 1918 she returned to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
where for two seasons she performed both Madame Butterfly and André Messager
André Messager
André Charles Prosper Messager , was a French composer, organist, pianist, conductor and administrator. His stage compositions included ballets and 30 opéra comiques and operettas, among which Véronique, had lasting success, with Les p'tites Michu and Monsieur Beaucaire also enjoying international...
's Madame Chrysanthème. The latter was not well-received, being viewed as a warmed-over Butterfly. In 1920 she was a guest performer at opera houses in Monte Carlo
Monte Carlo
Monte Carlo is an administrative area of the Principality of Monaco....
, Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
, Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
and Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
. Upon her return to Japan from this tour, she stopped in Nagasaki in 1922 to see places connected with the opera and to give a concert.
In 1924 Miura returned to the United States to perform with the San Carlo Opera Company
San Carlo Opera Company
The San Carlo Opera Company was the name of two different opera companies active in the United States during the first half of the twentieth century.-History:...
. Two years later she again went to Chicago to create the title role in Aldo Fanchetti's Namiko-San. After this she took part in various tours and sang in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
( march 1931 she performed at the Teatro Verdi of Pisa with the famous tenor Armando Bini , at Carani in Sassuolo, Modena in Livorno , Florence , Lucca , Pistoia , Torino , Novi Ligure , Rimini ) before returning to Japan in 1932.
Her statue, with that of Puccini, can be seen in Nagasaki's Glover Garden
Glover Garden
thumb|right|250px|Glover House known as Ipponmatsu from a drawing of 1863. The tree was chopped down in the early 1900s is a park in Nagasaki, Japan built for Thomas Blake Glover, a Scottish entrepreneur who contributed to the modernization of Japan in shipbuilding, coal mining, and many other...
.
While being highly praised for the "authenticity" of her performance of Cio-Cio-San, Miura's voice has been described variously as "somewhat thin and unsupported" and "rather small and white".