Eleanor Steber | |
|---|---|
 Steber in 1952. | |
| Background information | |
| Born | July 17, 1914 Wheeling, West Virginia, U.S. |
| Died | October 3, 1990(1990-10-03) (aged 76) Langhorne, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Occupation | Opera singer (soprano) |
| Years active | 1940–1990 |
| Labels | RCA Victor,Columbia,VAI |
Spouse(s) | Edwin Lee Bilby Gordon Andrews m.1958 div.1967 |
Eleanor Steber (July 17, 1914[1] – October 3, 1990) was an Americanoperaticsoprano. Steber is noted as one of the first major opera stars to have achieved the highest success with training and a career based in the United States.
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Eleanor Steber was born inWheeling, West Virginia on July 17, 1914. She was the daughter of William Charles Steber, Sr. (1888–1966) and Ida Amelia (née Nolte) Steber (1885–1985). She had two younger siblings – William Charles Steber, Jr. (1917–2002) and Lucile Steber Leslie (1918–1999). As a child Eleanor studied piano in Wheeling and also studied voice with her mother. After graduating from Warwood High School, she attended and graduated from the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, where she studied under William L. Whitney, himself a student of Luigi Vannuccini.
She made her debut at theMetropolitan Opera in 1940 and was one of its leading artists through 1961. She was known for her large, flexible silvery voice, particularly in the high-lying soprano roles ofRichard Strauss. She was equally well known for her lyrical portrayals ofMozart's heroines, many in collaboration with conductorsKurt Adler,Bruno Walter. Beyond Mozart and Strauss her repertoire was quite varied.
She was noted for success in the music ofWagner,Hector Berlioz,Alban Berg,Giacomo Puccini and also in French opera. Steber sang the lead in the world premiere of the American operaVanessa bySamuel Barber. She was also featured in a number of Metropolitan Opera premieres, including Strauss'sArabella, Mozart'sDie Entführung aus dem Serail, and Berg'sWozzeck.
Outside the Metropolitan her career included a 1953 engagement at theBayreuth Wagner Festival, where her performance as Elsa inLohengrin was highly acclaimed and recorded byDecca Records. She sang withArturo Toscanini in his 1944 NBC Symphony broadcast ofBeethoven'sFidelio. In 1954 at theFlorence May Festival she sang a celebrated performance of Minnie in Puccini'sLa fanciulla del West with conductorDimitri Mitropoulos. WithSerge Koussevitzky and theBoston Symphony Orchestra she sang the world premiere in 1948 of Samuel Barber'sKnoxville: Summer of 1915, a work which she commissioned.
Beyond the opera, Steber was popular with radio and television audiences in frequent appearances onThe Voice of Firestone,The Bell Telephone Hour and other programs. Her extensive recording output included many popular ballads and operetta tunes in addition to arias, art songs and complete operas.
In 1973 she recorded a live album of arias and songs forRCA Red Seal at theContinental Baths in New York City where a youngBette Midler was then a regular performer. At the same time she was still heard in recital atCarnegie Hall and sang a noted late-career performance of Strauss'sFour Last Songs withJames Levine and theCleveland Orchestra.
While she was known as an artist of the highest standards, her musical life was often disrupted by marital discord and alcohol.[2]
Upon retiring from singing, she taught on the faculty of theCleveland Institute of Music and theJuilliard School & Master classes in Philadelphia Music Academy in 1975 and maintained a private voice studio. A graduate of theNew England Conservatory of Music (1938), she also coached a limited number of students (vocal performance majors) there in a "master class" format at least in the years 1975-1977. She established the Eleanor Steber Vocal Foundation with an annual contest to assist young singers in launching their careers. Her many recordings are still available, as are audio and visual tapes of her radio and television broadcasts forThe Voice of Firestone. Her papers are held by Houghton Library at Harvard University.
Steber struggled at times with asthma and alcoholism.[3] She was married twice. Her first husband was pianist Edwin Lee Bilby. Her second husband was Colonel Gordon Andrews, whom she married in 1958, at the time she created the role ofVanessa at the Metropolitan Opera. Andrews managed her career and started the STAND record company, a joint venture that produced numerous recordings of Steber's performances. They were married for nine years. She had three stepchildren: Marsha Andrews, an opera singer who studied with her at the Cleveland Institute of Music and in New York and who also sang at the Metropolitan Opera for 12 seasons; Gordon Andrews Jr., retiree from GM, now deceased; and Michelle Andrews Oesterle, a choral conductor, singer and founder of the very successful Manhattan Girls Chorus.[citation needed]
She died on October 3, 1990, inLanghorne, Pennsylvania, followingheart valve surgery and is interred atGreenwood Cemetery, Wheeling, West Virginia.[3]
