"prompted her to change her name to a more benign one in order to avoid an accidental obscenity (which could have been exacerbated by her status as a sex symbol). Some types of music are more associated with stage names than others. For example, hip hop and EDM artists almost always use stage names, whereas ""classical"" composers and performers virtually never do. Classical violinist Amadéus Leopold (born in South Korea as Yoo Hanbin) and opera singers Beverly Sills (born Belle Miriam Silverman) and Nellie Melba (born Helen Porter Mitchell) are rare exceptions. Some Algerian raï musicians use the prefix Cheb"
"Marion Hood Marion Hood (1 April 1854 – 14 August 1912) was an English soprano who performed in opera and musical theatre in the last decades of the 19th century. She is perhaps best remembered for creating the role of Mabel in Gilbert and Sullivan's ""The Pirates of Penzance"" in London. Born Sarah Ann Isaac in Liverpool. Hood was a music hall performer as a child by the age of 11 under the name Marion Isaac. She married a Mr. Hunt of the Alhambra Palace Music Hall in Kingston upon Hull. In 1876, she had moved to London to study"
"1954. Retiring from the stage, she became a teacher and vocal coach. She died, aged 86, from heart disease at the Isabella Geriatric Center in Manhattan. Helen Phillips Helen L. Phillips (circa 1919 – 27 July 2005) was an American dramatic lyric soprano who broke through racial barriers as a concert singer and—almost in passing—on the opera stage. She was born in St. Louis, Missouri, the daughter of a Baptist minister, the Rev. James Phillips. She attended Sumner High School in St. Louis and Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Missouri, and did graduate studies in music and in sociology at"
"Helen Roberts Helen Florence Roberts (15 July 1912 – 12 December 2010), later known as Betty Roberts and by her married name, Betty Walker, was an English singer and actress, best known for her performances in soprano roles of the Savoy Operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. After beginning her career touring in Italy and then England in grand opera, Roberts joined the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company as a principal soprano in 1938. She remained with that company for ten years, marrying another company member, the baritone Richard Walker, in 1944. After four more years of theatre in Britain,"
"Catherine Hayes (soprano) Catherine Hayes, married name Catherine Bushnell, (1818? – 11 August 1861) was a world-famous Irish soprano of the Victorian era. According to London's ""Daily Express"", ""Hayes was the 'Madonna' of her day; she was the 19th-century operatic equivalent of the world's most famous pop star."" Hayes was baptised on 8 November 1818, in St Mary's Cathedral, Limerick. She was born of humble Anglo-Irish parentage at 4 Patrick Street, Limerick. Her father was the musician Arthur Williamson Hayes; abandoned the family in 1823, and Catherine Hayes, aged 5, grew up very poor with her mother, Mary Carroll, and"
"Leona Mitchell Leona Mitchell (born October 13, 1949, Enid, Oklahoma) is an American operatic soprano and an Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame inductee. She is also a Grammy Award-winning soprano who sang for 18 seasons as a leading spinto soprano at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. In her home state of Oklahoma, Miss Mitchell has been awarded many honors. These include the Oklahoma Hall of Fame, the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame, the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame and the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame. Her home town of Enid has a street named after her called Leona Mitchell"
"Helen Phillips Helen L. Phillips (circa 1919 – 27 July 2005) was an American dramatic lyric soprano who broke through racial barriers as a concert singer and—almost in passing—on the opera stage. She was born in St. Louis, Missouri, the daughter of a Baptist minister, the Rev. James Phillips. She attended Sumner High School in St. Louis and Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Missouri, and did graduate studies in music and in sociology at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. At the age of 14 she was one of the soloists at the dedication of the Municipal Auditorium in St. Louis."
"Helen Lemmens-Sherrington Helen Lemmens-Sherrington (4 October 1834 – 9 May 1906) was an English concert and operatic soprano prominent from the 1850s to the 1880s. Born in northern England, she spent much of her childhood and later life in Belgium, where she studied at the Brussels Conservatory. After engagements in mainland Europe she made her London debut in 1856. Her singing career was mostly in concert, but in the first half of the 1860s she appeared in opera at Covent Garden and other leading London theatres. After she retired from performing, Lemmens-Sherrington became a teacher, at her old music college"
"work) and, in her last years, at Gillingham, Dorset, in a retirement home where her two sisters lived. She died at The Malthouse, Gillingham, in December 2010, aged 98. Her remains were cremated at Salisbury Crematorium. Helen Roberts Helen Florence Roberts (15 July 1912 – 12 December 2010), later known as Betty Roberts and by her married name, Betty Walker, was an English singer and actress, best known for her performances in soprano roles of the Savoy Operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. After beginning her career touring in Italy and then England in grand opera, Roberts joined the"
"Helen Landis Helen Landis (20 March 1923 – 22 March 2015) was an English singer and actress, known for her performances in musical theatre, operetta and opera, especially roles in early British productions of Rodgers and Hammerstein's and Ivor Novello's musicals and the contralto roles in the Savoy operas with the Gilbert and Sullivan for All company, with whom she toured extensively for more than 20 years. Landis was born in Bolton, Lancashire. She began her career with the Carl Rosa Opera Company, singing mezzo-soprano roles with them for three years. She then appeared in operetta, playing the Princess in"
"America"", CBS Night watch, The Charlie Rhodes Show, Public Television along with many PBS ""Live from Lincoln Center Broadcasts"",""Live from the Met series"" and The Kennedy Center Honors. Notes Sources Leona Mitchell Leona Mitchell (born October 13, 1949, Enid, Oklahoma) is an American operatic soprano and an Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame inductee. She is also a Grammy Award-winning soprano who sang for 18 seasons as a leading spinto soprano at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. In her home state of Oklahoma, Miss Mitchell has been awarded many honors. These include the Oklahoma Hall of Fame, the Oklahoma Music"
"Elisabetta Pilotti-Schiavonetti Elisabetta Pilotti-Schiavonetti ( – 5 May 1742) was an Italian operatic soprano who was associated with the House of Hanover. She was one of the leading prima donnas at the Queen's Theatre in the Haymarket (it later became the ""King's Theatre"" after King George I's accession in 1714) from 1710 to 1717. She is best remembered today for creating roles in at least four operas by George Frideric Handel, possibly five. Three of the roles that Handel wrote specifically for her were sorceresses, and the demands of those roles indicate that she possessed an exceptional voice capable of"
"Little Buttercup in ""H.M.S. Pinafore"", the Fairy Queen in ""Iolanthe"", Dame Hannah in ""Ruddigore"", the Duchess of Plaza Toro in ""The Gondoliers"", Katisha in ""The Mikado"", Ruth in ""The Pirates of Penzance"" and Dame Carruthers in ""The Yeomen of the Guard"". She sang several Sullivan songs on a 1972 Pearl disc called ""Sullivan"". Helen Landis Helen Landis (20 March 1923 – 22 March 2015) was an English singer and actress, known for her performances in musical theatre, operetta and opera, especially roles in early British productions of Rodgers and Hammerstein's and Ivor Novello's musicals and the contralto roles in the"
"followed by Elisabetta in 1742. Elisabetta Pilotti-Schiavonetti Elisabetta Pilotti-Schiavonetti ( – 5 May 1742) was an Italian operatic soprano who was associated with the House of Hanover. She was one of the leading prima donnas at the Queen's Theatre in the Haymarket (it later became the ""King's Theatre"" after King George I's accession in 1714) from 1710 to 1717. She is best remembered today for creating roles in at least four operas by George Frideric Handel, possibly five. Three of the roles that Handel wrote specifically for her were sorceresses, and the demands of those roles indicate that she possessed"
"describe herself as Miss Young until 1769. Isabella Young Isabella Young (also Isabella Scott) (17?, London – 12 August 1791, London) was an English mezzo-soprano and organist who had a successful career as a concert performer and opera singer during the latter half of the eighteenth century. Young became particularly associated with the works of George Frideric Handel and was a favorite singer of the composer during the last years of his life. She was also a part of a well-known English family of musicians that included several professional singers and organists during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Isabella Young"
"Phyllis Curtin Phyllis Curtin (née Smith; December 3, 1921 – June 5, 2016) was an American classical soprano who had an active career in operas and concerts from the early 1950s through the 1980s. She was known for her creation of new roles such as the title role in the Carlisle Floyd opera ""Susannah"", Catherine Earnshaw in Floyd's ""Wuthering Heights"", and in other works by this composer. She was a dedicated song recitalist and retired from singing in 1984. She was named Boston University's Dean Emerita, College of Fine Arts in 1991. Born Phyllis Smith in Clarksburg, West Virginia, Curtin"
"Mary Beth Peil Mary Beth Peil (born June 25, 1940) is an American actress and singer. Peil (pronounced ""peel"") was born in 1940 in Davenport, Iowa. She trained as an opera singer at Northwestern University under Lotte Lehmann. There she became a member of the Gamma Phi Beta sorority. In 1964 she won both the Young Concert Artists International Auditions and the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. During the 1960s, Peil toured with Boris Goldovsky's opera company and the Metropolitan Opera's national company singing such roles as Susanna in Mozart and da Ponte's ""The Marriage of Figaro"". She also sang"
"Her will was proved on 26 August, the personalty being sworn under £16,000. Sources Catherine Hayes (soprano) Catherine Hayes, married name Catherine Bushnell, (1818? – 11 August 1861) was a world-famous Irish soprano of the Victorian era. According to London's ""Daily Express"", ""Hayes was the 'Madonna' of her day; she was the 19th-century operatic equivalent of the world's most famous pop star."" Hayes was baptised on 8 November 1818, in St Mary's Cathedral, Limerick. She was born of humble Anglo-Irish parentage at 4 Patrick Street, Limerick. Her father was the musician Arthur Williamson Hayes; abandoned the family in 1823, and"
"Lyndsie Holland Lyndsie Holland (12 March 1939 – 2 April 2014) was an English singer and actress, known for her performances in the contralto roles of the Savoy Operas. After beginning her singing career in the chorus of the Sadler's Wells Opera in 1968, Holland starred in the Gilbert and Sullivan contralto roles with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company for seven years, beginning in 1970. In later years, she performed in musical theatre and concerts. Holland was born Margaret Foster in Pedmore, a suburb of Stourbridge, the youngest of eight children. She attended Stourbridge High School and began clerical work"
"for her musical impersonations of singers of the day. She also played in Victorian burlesque and other theatrical roles, among the best known of which was her Lady Macbeth at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 1869. Various composers wrote songs for her to premiere. After ""The Sorcerer"", Gilbert and Sullivan cast Mrs Paul in their next opera, ""H.M.S. Pinafore"", but her vocal abilities had declined so much by that point that they cut parts of her role, and she resigned from the production. Mrs Howard Paul was born as Isabella Hill at Dartford in Kent, the daughter of George"
"on June 8, 1988. Carolyn Long Carolyn Long (June 13, 1915 - October 3, 1991) was an American operatic soprano and concert singer. She was born as Carolyn Elizabeth Creighton in Cambridge, Maryland. She studied piano as a child, winning a scholarship to study piano at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore in 1932 at the age of 16. Her singing voice soon proved to be a greater gift, however, and she changed to vocal studies two years later. She was said to have made her stage debut in Baltimore while still a student in ""The Old Maid and the Thief"""
"Mrs Howard Paul Isabella Hill (1 April 1833 – 6 June 1879), better known as Mrs Howard Paul, was an English actress, operatic singer and actress-manager of the Victorian era, best remembered for creating the role of Lady Sangazure in the Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera ""The Sorcerer"" (1877). Her stage career began in 1853 in London in ballad operas, such as ""The Beggar's Opera"". In 1854 she married the American writer Henry Howard Paul, in whose comic entertainments the two performed for much of the next two decades, often on tour, both in Britain and America. She was popular"
"Abbie Mitchell Abriea ""Abbie"" Mitchell Cook (25 September 1884 – 16 March 1960), also billed as Abbey Mitchell, was an American soprano opera singer who sang the role of ""Clara"" in the premier production of George Gershwin's ""Porgy and Bess"" in 1935, and was also the first to record ""Summertime"" from that musical. Mitchell was the daughter of an African-American mother and a Jewish-German father from New York City's Lower East Side. She was reared by a maternal aunt, Alice Payne, in Baltimore, Maryland, where she attended a convent school. After finishing her school education in Baltimore, she started studying"
"Musical Theatre"", Macmillan, vol.I, London, 1986. Fanny Holland Fanny Holland (14 September 1847 – 18 June 1931) was an English singer and comic actress primarily known as the creator of principal soprano roles in numerous German Reed Entertainments. Holland was born in London and trained at the Royal Academy of Music. She was the daughter of John Holland and his wife Meriel Ann ""nee"" Marshall. For several years, she was a popular concert singer in London and the British provinces. Frederic Clay engaged her for a part in an operetta he had written. It was performed in Canterbury and included"
"Geraldine Ulmar Geraldine Ulmar (June 23, 1862 – August 13, 1932) was an American singer and actress, best known for her performances in soprano roles of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. Annie Geraldine Ulmar was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts. She began singing in amateur concerts as a child. In 1879, she made her professional debut in the role of Josephine in Gilbert and Sullivan's ""H.M.S. Pinafore"", aboard a ship in a lake in Boston's Oakland Garden. She soon joined the Boston Ideal Opera Company and remained with the company as leading soprano for the"
"Isabella Young Isabella Young (also Isabella Scott) (17?, London – 12 August 1791, London) was an English mezzo-soprano and organist who had a successful career as a concert performer and opera singer during the latter half of the eighteenth century. Young became particularly associated with the works of George Frideric Handel and was a favorite singer of the composer during the last years of his life. She was also a part of a well-known English family of musicians that included several professional singers and organists during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Isabella Young was born in the 1720s or early"
"June Bronhill June Bronhill OBE (26 June 192924 January 2005) was an internationally acclaimed Australian coloratura soprano opera singer, performer and actress, She was well known for light opera and musical theatre in London West End theatres and Australia as well as on the opera stage. Bronhill was born June Mary Gough in the inland Australian city of Broken Hill, New South Wales to George Francis Gough, born in Essex, England and Mary Isobel Daisy Hall. Her stage name, Bronhill, which she used from 1952, was an abbreviation of Broken Hill, which was her way of thanking her home town"
"Maria Callas Maria Callas, Commendatore OMRI (; ; December 2, 1923 – September 16, 1977) was an American-born Greek soprano. She was one of the most renowned and influential opera singers of the 20th century. Many critics praised her ""bel canto"" technique, wide-ranging voice and dramatic interpretations. Her repertoire ranged from classical ""opera seria"" to the ""bel canto"" operas of Donizetti, Bellini and Rossini and further, to the works of Verdi and Puccini; and, in her early career, to the music dramas of Wagner. Her musical and dramatic talents led to her being hailed as ""La Divina"". Born in New"
"Ann Turner Robinson Ann Turner Robinson (née Turner, died in London, 5 January 1741) was an English soprano of the 18th century. She was the youngest daughter of William Turner, a composer and countertenor who was a contemporary of Henry Purcell, and is best remembered for her association with the composer George Frideric Handel, in whose operas she sang. On 6 September 1716 she married the organist John Robinson. They had a daughter who had a singing career, and other children who died young. Her first public performances were in 1718: in the April of that year she sang a"
"oratorios, as an Israelite woman in ""Esther"". Ann Turner Robinson Ann Turner Robinson (née Turner, died in London, 5 January 1741) was an English soprano of the 18th century. She was the youngest daughter of William Turner, a composer and countertenor who was a contemporary of Henry Purcell, and is best remembered for her association with the composer George Frideric Handel, in whose operas she sang. On 6 September 1716 she married the organist John Robinson. They had a daughter who had a singing career, and other children who died young. Her first public performances were in 1718: in the"
"Bronhill was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the New Year's Honours of 1976, and was later given a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Australian Variety Club. June Bronhill June Bronhill OBE (26 June 192924 January 2005) was an internationally acclaimed Australian coloratura soprano opera singer, performer and actress, She was well known for light opera and musical theatre in London West End theatres and Australia as well as on the opera stage. Bronhill was born June Mary Gough in the inland Australian city of Broken Hill, New South Wales to George Francis Gough,"
"Emelie Hooke Emelie Hooke (24 September 19129 April 1974) was an Australian soprano who was notable in opera, oratorio and concert, and sang in Australia, England, Europe and South Africa. Emelie Victoria Georgina Hooke was born in 1912 in Melbourne, where she was schooled. Her advanced musical training was at the University of Melbourne Conservatorium. She sang frequently in opera and oratorio in Australia, and for two years was engaged by the Australian Broadcasting Commission. In 1931 and 1932 she sang in Handel's ""Messiah"" with the Royal Melbourne Philharmonic; the latter performance was with John Brownlee, the orchestra being conducted"
"in both the traditional big-scale Handelian style and the emerging smaller-scale ""period performance"" style, recording the soprano part in ""Messiah"" for both Sir Malcolm Sargent, a traditionalist, and Charles Mackerras, whose 1967 recording was a landmark in period performance. There is a recording of ""Rigoletto"" from Sadler's Wells Opera, in English, with Elizabeth Harwood, Donald Smith, Peter Glossop, Donald McIntyre, with the Sadler's Wells Orchestra conducted by James Lockhart - possibly 1963. Elizabeth Harwood Elizabeth Harwood (27 May 1938 – 21 June 1990) was an English lyric soprano. After a music school, she enjoyed an operatic career lasting for over"