At New Zealand’s Jubilee Institute for the Blind, she taught the piano and encouraged her students to believe that visual impairment was no impediment to music. Using Braille, she guided them through their examinations and produced several high-quality musicians.
Italian contralto singer
She was one of the first New Zealand women to enter the male-dominated field of film-making.
Columnist, newspaper editor and promoter of the Irish language
Coming from a family of renowned singers, she acquired a great number of traditional ballads, learnt from both sides of her family. Possessing a beautifully articulated voice with a considerable range, she was extensively recorded with other members of her family in 1952 by Sean O’Boyle and Peter Kennedy for the BBC. She was important for passing on a wide range of material to the younger generation, a great deal of which could have been forgotten at a time when folk music had apparently fallen out of fashion.
Violinist Wilma Smith maintained a strong profile as soloist and chamber musician in Australasia.
Rosina Buckman is remembered for her infinite capacity for taking pains, for allowing nothing to interfere with her work, and above all for her unwavering dedication to the art of singing.
Soprano Malvina Major sang Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia at the 1968 and 1969 Salzburg Festivals in Austria and attracted the interest of Covent Garden and Glyndebourne in England. However, she chose to live in her home country, where she built up a large and devoted audience.
IW note: Major established the Dame Malvina Major Foundation in 1991 to support education through awards and provide training for young New Zealanders in the performing arts.
From the 1990s soprano Margaret Medlyn managed to fulfil engagements with such companies as Covent Garden, the English National Opera and the Vienna State Opera from her home base in New Zealand.
Janetta McStay (1917–2012), born in Invercargill, was sought after in Australia and New Zealand as an accompanist and solo artist, performing concerti with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and other orchestras. She taught at the University of Auckland from 1963 until retirement.