Mattiwilda Dobbs
Mattiwilda Dobbs (July 11, 1925 – December 8, 2015) was an American coloratura soprano and was one of the first black singers to enjoy a major international career in opera. She was the first black singer to perform at La Scala in Italy, the first black woman to receive a long-term performance contract and to sing a lead role at the Metropolitan Opera, New York and the first black singer to play a lead role at the San Francisco Opera.
Mattiwilda Dobbs
July 11, 1925
December 8, 2015 (aged 90)
Music and Spanish degree, Spelman College, 1946
Opera singer
1951–1974
First successful African-American woman at the Metropolitan Opera
Spaniard Luis Rodriguez (1954–1955) Bengt Janzon (1957–1997)
- John Wesley Dobbs (father)
Recordings[edit]
Dobbs's coloratura soprano was praised for its freshness and agility, as well as tonal beauty, and was considered an ideal voice for sound recording.[16] However, she can be heard in relatively few recordings, as she spent her early career in Europe. When she returned to the United States in 1954 Roberta Peters had become a top soprano recording artist.[16]
Dobbs's notable recordings include Die Entführung aus dem Serail (in English), opposite Nicolai Gedda (who was born the same day as she was, July 11, 1925),[4] and conducted by Yehudi Menuhin, Les pêcheurs de perles conducted by René Leibowitz, and a recital of opera arias and songs, released in 1998 by Testament Records.[17] She sang both Olympia and Antonia in a complete recording of The Tales of Hoffmann featuring Leopold Simoneau and Heinz Rehfuss, and conducted by Pierre-Michel Le Conte, which was issued in 1958 by Epic in stereo in the USA and by Concert Hall in Europe, and reissued on CD in 2008. She also recorded the title role of Zaide under Leibowitz in Paris in 1952, and excerpts from Rigoletto alongside Rolando Panerai.[18]
Recognition[edit]
In 1954, the King and Queen of Sweden awarded Dobbs the Order of the North Star.[5]
In 1979, Dobbs received an honorary doctorate of fine arts from Spelman College.[8]
In 1980, the Library of Congress held an exhibition on her life.[19]
In 1983, Dobbs received the James Weldon Johnson Award in Fine Arts from the Atlanta National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).[19]
Personal life[edit]
Martin Luther King Sr. wanted his son, Martin Luther King Jr., to marry Dobbs, as her father was an active civil rights activist and a friend of his.[4][20]
Dobbs was married twice. Her first husband, Spaniard Luis Rodriguez, died of a liver ailment in June 1954, fourteen months after their wedding.[4] In late 1957, she married Bengt Janzon, a Swedish newspaperman and public relations executive. Janzon died in 1997.[1] Dobbs was the aunt of the first black Mayor of Atlanta, Maynard Jackson, and sang at his inauguration in January 1978.[1]
Dobbs died from cancer on December 8, 2015, at her home in Atlanta at the age of 90.[21]