Bidu Sayao

Born in Rio de Janeiro in 1902 into an affluent family, Bidu Sayão revealed an early gift for singing that would establish her as the leading Brazilian soprano of the 1940s, celebrated for an ethereal timbre, impeccable phrasing, and vivid dramatic presence. Her parents initially opposed a professional path, considering it inappropriate for someone of her background. At thirteen her uncle secured lessons with Romanian soprano Elena Theodorini, and Sayão accompanied her teacher to Romania as a protégé. She made her operatic debut in 1920 at Rio’s Teatro Municipal as Lucia in Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor; the success persuaded her family to back her career. Two years later she moved to France to work on recital repertoire with retired Polish tenor Jean de Reszke, whose pure vocal timbre shaped her own technique. After his death she returned to Rio in 1926 to sing Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia, launching a period of frequent engagements throughout South America, Paris, Rome, and La Scala. Toscanini encountered her Violetta in Verdi’s La Traviata and invited her to New York, where her American debut took place with the New York Philharmonic in 1935. Following two more years of performances in Brazil she returned in 1937 for a celebrated Toscanini-led production of Massenet’s Manon. During the next fifteen years she appeared in more than two hundred Metropolitan Opera performances, becoming opera’s most prominent soprano. She also collaborated with Heitor Villa-Lobos, persuading him to score Bachiana Brasileiras No. 5 for wordless soprano; the resulting work became his most widely known composition, and her 1945 recording of the vocalise remained her signature release. Shortly before turning fifty in 1952 she left the Met, retiring from the stage altogether in 1954. Villa-Lobos coaxed her back into the studio a few years later for his Forest of the Amazon, and she gave occasional performances until a final farewell recital in Rio in 1958. She then settled in Lincolnville, Maine, with her husband Giuseppe Danise. After his death in 1963 she enjoyed the company of her cats, card games with friends, and trips to New York for concerts and special events. A near-fatal stroke struck in 1993, yet she recovered. Returning to Rio in 1995, she was honored when the Beija-Flor Samba School featured her life story in its Carnival parade. Four years later, at age ninety-six, she died of pneumonia at Penobscot Bay Medical Center in Rockport, Maine. Many of her recordings have subsequently been reissued by Sony Classical, Cembal d’amour, and Cantus Classics.