Born: 10 July 1844, Austria
Died: 18 January 1918
Country most active: Germany, Austria
Also known as: Amalia, Amalie Friedrich-Materna
The following is excerpted from Famous Women: An Outline of Feminine Achievement Through the Ages With Life Stories of Five Hundred Noted Women, written by Joseph Adelman, published 1926 by Ellis M Lonow Company.
Amalie Materna, an Austrian opera singer. Her début occurred in 1869, when she sang at the Imperial Opera in Vienna as Selika in L’Africaine.
She made such a favorable impression that Wagner chose her to create the role of Brunhilda, and later the parts of Kundry in Parisifal.
She became one of the greatest sopranos of the early Wagnerian opera, and was for some years a favorite singer at the Metropolitan Opera house, New York City.
Mme. Materna retired in 1897.
The following is excerpted from A Dictionary of Music and Musicians, published in 1900 and edited by George Grove.
MATERNA, Amalie (Frau Friedrich), a distinguished prima donna in German opera, was born at St. Georgen, Styria [App. p.715 “1847”], where her father was a schoolmaster. Her first stage-appearances were made at the Thalia-Theater, Gratz, about 1864. She married soon afterwards Karl Friedrich, a popular German actor, and together with him was engaged at the suburban Karls theater, Vienna, where she sang for some time in operetta. But her qualifications for the higher lyrical walks could not long remain undiscovered, and in 1869 she made her debut at the Imperial Opera House as Selika in the ‘Africaine,’ with signal success, at once winning for herself the high position she has since maintained among opera-singers of the German school. With a soprano voice of unusual volume, compass, and sustaining power, a fine stage presence, and much musical and dramatic intelligence, Frau Materna leaves nothing to be desired in certain rôles. At the Wagner Festival at Baireuth, 1876, she may be said to have earned a world-wide reputation by her really magnificent impersonation of Brunnhilde in the Niebelungen Trilogy, an exceptional part for which she was exceptionally qualified, and in which she is unlikely to meet with a rival. She sang in England with great success at the Wagner concerts at the Albert Hall in 1877. [App. p.715 “she sang the part of Kundry at the first performance of ‘Parsifal,’ July 28, 1882.”]