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Ingvar Wixell was one of the leading operatic baritones of the 20th century. He had a commanding stage presence and dark baritone voice that made him suited for the most dramatic roles, but was also highly effective in comic roles.

He studied in Stockholm. His first operatic appearance was as Papageno in Mozart's The Magic Flute. His first international appearance came when the Stockholm Royal Opera visited London's Covent Garden in 1960. Then he performed as Ruggiero in Handel's Alcina.

His first appearance at Glyndebourne Festival Opera was as Guglielmo in Così fan tutte. Later that year, he sang the same role at the Deutsche Oper, Berlin, and was thereupon invited to join it. He became a member of the company in 1963. In 1965 he sang in the popular Eurovision Song Contest. In 1966 he created the role of Pentheus in the world premiere of Hans Werner Henze's The Bassarids at Salzburg. His American debut was in San Francisco as Belcore in L'elisir d'amore, and first sang at the Met in 1973 as Rigoletto.

The Deutsche Oper was the company with which he was most closely associated. He remained on its roster for 35 years, leaving it after his final performance as Scarpia in Puccini's Tosca on November 9, 1998. Scarpia might have been his signature role, but he also sang many Verdi roles, including Don Carlo in La forza del destino, Simon Boccanegra, and Rigoletto. Others of his most important roles were Eugene Onegin, Mandryka in Strauss's Arabella, and the Count in Mozart's Marriage of Figaro. In the later part of his career he became a memorable exponent of Verdi's Falstaff, and in 1998 received raves for his singing and comic acting in Donizetti's Viva la Mamma! as Mamma Agatha.

American soprano Jessye Norman was one of the most important figures of the 20th and early 21st century opera. In her performances of prominent operatic roles, as well as a celebrated recital and recording career, she was well regarded throughout the world.

Norman was born on September 15, 1945, in Augusta, Georgia. She started singing spirituals at the age of four at Mount Calvary Baptist Church; one Saturday, while doing her chores, she heard an opera for the first time, broadcast on the radio. She became an instant opera fan and started listening to recordings of Marian Anderson and Leontyne Price. Nat "King" Cole was also a major inspiration for her. At 16, Norman began studying at Howard University, where her voice teacher was Carolyn Grant. She sang in the university chorus and worked as a soloist at the Lincoln Temple United Church of Christ. In 1965, she won the National Society of Arts and Letters singing competition. She continued her studies at Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore and at the University of Michigan, where her most important teachers were Elizabeth Mannion and Pierre Bernac.

In 1968, Norman won the Munich Competition, leading to her operatic debut as Elisabeth in Wagner's Tannhäuser in Berlin. A major European operatic career quickly developed: she appeared in Meyerbeer's L'Africaine at Maggio Musicale in Florence in 1971, Verdi's Aïda at La Scala in Milan in 1972, and in Berlioz's Les Troyens at London's Covent Garden the same year. These roles bespeak a major part of Norman's stage persona: a commanding and noble bearing, partly due to her uncommon height and size. However, this was more a function of her unique, rich, and powerful voice. She had an uncommonly wide range, encompassing all female voice registers from contralto to the high dramatic soprano.

As her operatic career developed, Norman also made important recital debuts, including London and New York in 1973. She made an extensive North American concert debut in 1976 and 1977 but did not appear in opera in the U.S. until 1982. This was with the Opera Company of Philadelphia, in a double bill as Dido in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas and Queen Jocasta in Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex. Her Metropolitan Opera debut was as Cassandra in 1983, the opening night of the Met's centennial season.

Her interpretation of Strauss' Four Last Songs was legendary. Its slowness was controversial, but the tonal qualities of her voice were ideal for these final works of the great Romantic German lieder tradition. She also sang Schoenberg's Gurrelieder and his opera Erwartung; she sang this on a memorable double bill at the Met with Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle, which was broadcast nationally. She appeared on live broadcasts of season-opening concerts of the New York Philharmonic.

Norman was acclaimed in her singing of Mussorgsky songs in the original Russian, the German Romantic lieder repertoire, and French music from Berlioz to contemporary composers. Another major part of her musical life was in the performance of American music. These included jazz standards, the sacred music of Duke Ellington, African American spirituals, and woman.life.song., a song cycle composed by Judith Weir, commissioned for Norman by Carnegie Hall.

Throughout her life, Norman was asked to perform in many important ceremonies in the U.S. and abroad. These include singing the French national anthem for the 200th anniversary of the French revolution, the funeral of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, the opening ceremony of the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, and singing America, the Beautiful at the dedication of the memorial columns of light at the site of the World Trade Center in New York.

Norman had an extensive and successful recording career, mainly recording on the Philips label. She released albums of opera, recital, jazz, and Christmas music. She won five Grammy awards, including the "Grammy for Lifetime Achievement" in 2006.

Jessye Norman died in New York on September 30, 2019, following complications from a spinal cord injury suffered in 2015. ~ Joseph Stevenson & Keith Finke

Mirella Freni was the textbook example of a lyric soprano who expanded wisely to the spinto roles, conserving her voice so that even in her sixties, she still possessed enough vocal freshness and bloom that she made a credible Mimi in theaters all over the world. (In Italy, one of her nicknames was "La Prudentissima," or "the most prudent one.") She was also a highly sympathetic actor in both comedies and more serious roles.

Freni was born on February 27, 1935, in Modena, Italy. In an amusing coincidence, she and Luciano Pavarotti shared the same wet nurse as a child (both of their mothers worked in a tobacco factory, making their milk unsuitable), and she later joked that he obviously got the bigger share of the milk. Freni was a child prodigy, singing "Sempre libera" in her first public performance at the age of ten. At 12, she made her broadcast debut singing "Un bel di" in a radio competition. Beniamino Gigli, a competition judge, warned her that she could damage her voice if she continued to sing opera with her voice still so undeveloped. She waited until she was 17 to begin studying again. Her new teacher was Ettore Campogalliani, whose most-celebrated student had been Renata Tebaldi.

In 1955, Freni made her stage debut as Micaela in Carmen, one of her favorite and most effective roles. She briefly postponed further career development when she married conductor Leone Magiera and had a child (whom she named Micaela), but resumed singing again in 1958, when she won the Viotti Competition in Vercelli, Italy. The prize was the role of Mimi in La bohème in Turin, a role in which she later made her Met, La Scala, Chicago, and San Francisco debuts. In 1960, she made her Glyndebourne debut as Zerlina, in 1961, her Covent Garden debut as Nanetta in Falstaff, and in 1963, her La Scala debut as Mimi in the now-famous Zeffirelli production La bohème; Herbert von Karajan was the conductor for this production, and he became one of her prominent supporters. He encouraged her to move toward heavier repertoire, such as Desdemona in Otello, which she first sang with him in 1970; she later filmed Otello with Jon Vickers and Peter Glossop, which was directed and conducted by Karajan. At that time, he declared that he had waited 40 years to hear such a Desdemona. She started to add more lirico-spinto roles to her stage repertoire and also filmed the title role of Madama Butterfly with Karajan. However, she refused to sing the title role of Turandot when he asked her in 1980, and he subsequently refused to work with her again.

In 1981, she married Nicolai Ghiaurov, who encouraged her to examine the Russian repertoire. She began to add Russian songs to her recitals, with his coaching, and then in the late 1980s, she sang the role of Tatiana in Eugene Onegin. In 1990, she took on Lisa in The Queen of Spades. In the mid-'90s, she started singing Giordano roles for the first time, not only Fedora, a role typically beloved by divas toward the end of their careers, but the title role of Madame Sans-Gêne, a comedic, even occasionally farcical role. Her final stage performance came in 2005 at age 70, at the Washington National Opera, where she performed the teenaged lead role of Ioanna in The Maid of Orléans. That same year, she was honored by the Met, celebrating the 40th anniversary of her Met debut and the 50th anniversary of her stage debut. Following a long illness, Freni died in her home in Modena on February 9, 2020.

In 1990, she received the order Cavaliere di Gran Croce della Repubblica Italiana, and in 1993, the Légion d'Honneur. ~ Anne Feeney