Sara Elizabeth Flower (c) 1820 - 1865) is a British-born contralto singer who became the first opera star in Australia. He began his musical career in London in the 1840s, but moved to Australia in late 1849, when his professional future seemed secure. Soon after his arrival in Melbourne in early 1850 he began his career as an Australian vocal phenomenon of that era. In 1852 he appeared in Sydney on the first production in Australia from Bellini opera Norma . Flowers is the first diva in Australia.
Video Sara Flower
Origins
Sara Flower was born in Grays, Essex, the English market town of the Thames and is situated on the edge of the Tilbury swamp. In 1821 it had a population of 742, supporting six public houses. Flower's maternal grandfather, Daniel Granger, owns Rising Sun's public home. However, near, overlooking the Thames, Belmont Castle of the 18th century has had a major influence on social and cultural life in the wider region, more specifically, it is the focus of the influential musical circle of metropolitan status.
Sara's father, William Lewis Flower (c.1800-1847), was listed in the Essex Directory in 1823 as a fabric trader, dealer and agent for Phoenix Fire & Life. In 1841, after the inclusion of his daughter, Sara, to the Royal Academy of Music, he could declare that he "had no job", therefore, status as a gentleman. His eldest brother, Robert Flower (1779? -1832), was by 1824 the foreman of a local brick but was described in parish records in 1817 as a yeoman, showing the previous lineage of tenant farmers or small owners, as well as a decline in social status. With the enslavement movement after the Napoleonic Wars, the conditions for this socio-economic group were very difficult, which might explain Robert's occupation change.
His mother, Ruth Flower, is Grays collector daughter, Daniel Granger. There is nothing else known about him, except the possibility that he might be a prototype in the first novel Alice Diehl published Eden Garden for the mother of a fictional opera singer whose miserable prophecy prophecies.
Sara is not the only professional singer in the family. Her sister, soprano Elizabeth Flower, also became a public singer, and the two sisters had a considerable London and regional concert career in the 1840s, performing, often as a duo, to get lots of praise, especially for Sara, with her startling voice. In 1847, Elizabeth married a prominent lawyer, Timms Augustine Sargood and resigned from public life. However, in the 1860s at their home in London's Bloomsbury district (Gordon Square), she and her husband were the hosts of a high-enough music circle in which Alice Diehl took part and what she recalled in her autobiographical works.
The two musical princesses of William Lewis Flower are often confused with two very gifted daughters from political writer Benjamin Flower, Sarah Fuller Flower Adams and Eliza Flower, who are recognized as poets and composers. It was the confusion that followed Sara to the grave and beyond. It is not impossible, given their similar economic, social and regional background, that there may indeed be a blood relation between the two families even though no one has ever been established.
Education and training
From late October 1841, Flower was trained, or at least, 'completed' at the Royal Academy of Music (RAM) under Domenico Crivelli (1794-1857), who, through his teacher's father, singer Gaetano Crivelli (1774-1836). ), may be derived in some of the 'secrets' of the 'golden age' of Italian castrati, among them, almost certainly, falsetto exploits, technical skills that might explain the ability of the Flower protean to cross the entire range of opera voice singing, as in Bellini's Norma , from the dramatic soprano Norma. through mezzo Adalgisa; and, at least, the role of tenor Pollioni. He also performed a baritone role and was able to please the provincial colonial audience with his 'amazing' yodeling songs.
Maps Sara Flower
Initial career
The first interest came to public notice, however, in the Psalms of the 1830s and 40s in London when, on November 4, 1839, the World of Music noted that Sara and his sister Elizabeth both appeared at a lecture given at Hoxton National School Room in North London by Charles Henry Purday (1799-1885), was involved, perhaps, to demonstrate the Purday lecture argument, entitled, 'The Proper Object of Music'. The movement in Britain is associated with names like Sarah Ann Glover, John Hullah and John Curwen. He has an independent religious tendency, or an unconformist Congregationalist, and a strong utilitarian sociology. Flowers are also believed to be linked to John Hullah's unusually successful singing class at Exeter Hall in London, and perhaps with "Music for the Million", school singing Joseph Mainzer (1801-1851). It has been modeled, in essence, along the lines of Guillaume's highly structured monitorial methods Louis Bocquillon Wilhem [1781-1842] and 'OrphÃÆ'Â © on' choir) as a means of teaching the large masses of illiterate people to see-from the notation sheet. While it is socially rather than musically motivated, and largely a non-conformist socio-religious project, it has an effect in the long-term revitalization of music education in a wider scope, at least, within the established Anglican Church itself.
If the Purday/Hullah connection suggests Flower's link to non-conformity and/or Psalm Movement, it may also point the way to a music career, consistent with parental anxiety about public profile trap, as a teacher in the Movement not as a professional soloist, let alone opera. But the post-1847 memorial plaque on the walls of St. Parish church. Peter and St. Paul does not indicate a strong non-conformist relationship. Nor is he R.A.M. career under the dictatorship of his President, John Fane, Lord Burghersh (1784-1859).
Voice
There followed the choice of 19th century attempts to describe the sounds of the Flowers and the vowel effects that came from the English and Australian newspaper reports of that period:
Volume; melody; compass; resonance; sonorousness; simplicity; planting; strong; exquisite; flexible; rich; full; different; nervous; rare; delicious; sweet; soft; liquid; pooled; gushing; great; expressive; clean; dazzling; perfect; fun; great; extraordinary; tense; electrifying; melancholy; noble; pure; beautiful; magnificent; noble; surprisingly; authoritative; big; proficient; power of expression; sensation; harmony; charm; liveliness; defuse; heartache; depth of feeling; emotional strength; softness; own host; divine; beyond praise; heaven; a treasure trove; great contralto.
When he debuted in the opera in London, 'anonymously', in Drury Lane on January 7, 1843, as Felix (Pippo) an all-not-for-nothing singer for Annette Sabilla Novello (the youngest daughter of music publisher Vincent Novello) in a hybrid Macready opera production Rossini La gazza ladra ( The Thieving Magpie ) 'is little more than melodrama with multiple streams interspersed', in the first music entry - recitative phrase introduces duet 'Ebben per mia 'with Annette:
'The notes are so rich and full, the articulation is so amazing, the rare quality in British recital singers, that the audience is really shocked, and utters loud and persistent applause, which is often affirmed as the very superior quality of his voice on display in the duet journey'.
The reviewer describes his voice later as a single-volume mezzo-soprano, with some excellent contralto notes, which he touches with firmness'. He may not be 23 by this time. Unusually however, it transcends its own critical autonomist to call, not on the true description of the sound, but in the reaction (authority) of the audience. It was a spectator who screamed spontaneously in some recital bars.
Contemporary London's comments attributed the sound of Flowers to the sound of Marietta Brambilla (1807-1875) as having 'the voice of contralto [...] the exhilarating qualities of favor'. Six years later in Australia, Flower's voice is described as a living being
like one of the male voices a person has encountered in a person's life and remembers it forever, so clear, full, and nervous, and such volume and compass.
English Professional English career: 1843-48
SF = Sara Flower
Dates for theater roles are only for the first show.
- c. November 4, 1839 - London - Hoxton National School Room - assist at C.H. Purday gave a lecture on 'The Proper Object of Music'.
- October 21, 1841 - London - age 21, recommended by Lord Burghersh to the Royal Academy of Music exam. Acknowledge October 29 to learn to sing.
- January 7, 1843 - London - Royal Drury Lane Theater - La gazza ladra (Rossini) - SF opera debut as Felix (Pippo) under the management of Macready with Sabilla Novello as Annette.
- April 17, 1843 - London - Princess's Theater (PT) - Tancredi (Rossini) - SF as Tancredi.
- July 17, 1843 - London PT La gazza ladra (Rossini) 'with all music' - Emma Albertazzi as Annette - SF as Felix (Pippo).
- October 11, 1843 - London PT - L'elisir d'amore - SF as Adina (first) - Mr Barker as Nemorino - Paul Bedford as Dulcamara, Rebecca Isaacs as Floretta.
- c. May 15, 1844 - London - Ancient concert, dir. earl of Cawdor, leader of Mssrs Cramer and Loder, cond. Sir H. R. Bishop: Miss SF, 'O Salutaris' (Cherubini).
- March 5, 1845 - London Lyceum - SF's last appearance in London was recorded until October 28, 1846, when he reportedly studied in Italy.
- October 28, 1846 - London PT - Emperor Night (Edward Loder) - Emma Albertazzi as Giselle, SF as Bertha. Quoted as his first public appearance since the return of SF from Italy.
- December 19, 1846 - PT London - Seven Servants of Munich (George H.B. Rodwell) - SF as Ernestine.
- January 12, 1847 - London - PT - Anna Bolena (Donizetti) - Louisa Bassano as Anna Bolena, SF as Smeaton.
- April 23, 1847 - London PT - Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare) - SF as Oberon.
- January 20, 1848 - Lond. The Young Guard (Edward Loder) - Anna Thillon, SF as Donna Olympia.
- July 24, 1848 - London - Surrey Zoological Gardens [SZG] - Monstre Concert - Louis Antoine Jullien - SF's first performance.
- September 28, 1848 - London - SZG - possible last SF appearance in London before departure to Australia at the end of 1849 per Clifton .
Notes and references
- Beedell, A.V. 2000, 'Silence Terminal: Sara Flower and Enigma Diva: Explorations of Voice and the Maternal in Operatic Experience in Australian Colonial History ca. 1850-1865 'in 2 volumes. Ph.D. Faculty of Art, Griffith University, Queensland.
- Diehl, Alice [1897] Memories of Music , (London)
- Diehl, Alice [1905] The Real Life Story of My Life. An Autobiography , (London)
- Music Dictionary and Musician Grove 1961, 6th ed. edited by Eric Blom (London, Macmillan)
- Gyger, Alison, "Flowers, Sara Elizabeth", Dictionary of Australian Language Biography , Online Edition (accessed January 18, 2010)
- World of Music (London 1836-91)
- Poizat, Michel 1992, The Angel's Cry. Outside the Fun Principle in Opera , trans. Arthur Denner (Ithaca and London)
- Rainbow, Bernarr 1970, The Choral Revival in the Anglican Church (1839-1872) . (London, Barrie & Jenkins)
- Stendhal (Henri Beyle) 1956 [1824] The life of Rossini trans. Richard N. Coe, London
- Times, The (London)
External reference
- 'Cowgill, Rachel and Peter Holman 2007, Music in the British Province 1690-1914 (Ashgate)'
- 'Inheritance of Thurrock - Factfiles [Alice Diehl]' www.thurrock.gov.uk/heritage
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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