Grace Bumbry - Early Life and Career

Early Life and Career

Grace Bumbry was born in St Louis, Missouri, to a family of modest means. In a BBC radio interview she recalled that her father was a railroad porter and her mother a housewife. She graduated from the prestigious Charles Sumner High School, the first black high school west of the Mississippi. She first won a local radio competition at age 17, singing Verdi's demanding aria "O don fatale" (from Don Carlo). One of the prizes for first place was a scholarship to the local music conservatory; however, as the institution was segregated, it would not accept a black student. Embarrassed, the contest promoters arranged for her to study at Boston University instead. She later transferred to Northwestern University, where she met the German dramatic soprano and noted Wagnerian singer Lotte Lehmann, with whom she later studied at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California, and who became her mentor in her early career. She also studied with renowned teacher Armand Tokatyan. In 1958, she was a joint winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions with soprano Martina Arroyo; later that year, she made her recital debut in Paris. Bumbry made her operatic debut in 1960 when she sang Amneris at the Paris Opéra; that same year she joined the Basel Opera.

She gained international renown when she was cast by Wieland Wagner (Richard Wagner's grandson) as Venus at Bayreuth in 1961, at age 24, the first black singer to appear there, which earned her the title "Black Venus". The cast also included Victoria de los Angeles as Elisabeth and Wolfgang Windgassen as Tannhäuser. Conservative opera-goers were outraged at the idea, but Bumbry's performance was so moving that by the end of the opera she had won the audience over and they applauded for 30 minutes, necessitating 42 curtain calls. The ensuing furore in the media made Bumbry an international cause célèbre. She was subsequently invited by Jacqueline Kennedy to sing at the White House. (She returned to the White House in 1981, singing at the Ronald Reagan inauguration.) Having begun her operatic career on such a high note, she achieved the rare feat of never falling back on small or comprimario roles.

Bumbry made her Royal Opera House, Covent Garden debut in 1963; her La Scala debut in 1964; and her Metropolitan Opera debut as Princess Eboli in Verdi's Don Carlo in 1965. In 1964, Bumbry appeared for the first time as a soprano, singing Verdi's Lady Macbeth in her debut at the Vienna State Opera. In 1966 she appeared as Carmen opposite Jon Vickers's Don José in two different lauded productions, one with conductor Herbert von Karajan in Salzburg and the other for Bumbry's debut with the San Francisco Opera. In 1967 she sang Carmen again in her debut with the Philadelphia Lyric Opera Company and returned to the San Francisco Opera in 1967 for her first performance of Laura Adorno in La Gioconda with the great Leyla Gencer as Gioconda, Renato Cioni as Enzo Grimaldi, Maureen Forrester as La Cieca and Chester Ludgin as Barnaba.

In 1963, she married the Polish-born tenor Erwin Jaeckel. They divorced in 1972.