Alphabetic-L Encyclopedia of Chicago UC-Enc-v.cls May , :
LYRIC OPERA
Further reading: Andreas, A. T. History of Cook At Krainik’s death in January she was W W I, and after a long lull, resumed County Illinois. . • Benedetti, Rose Marie. Village succeeded by William Mason, the company’s in the decades after W W II. In the first on the River, –. . • Lyons Diamond Ju- director of operations, artistic and produc- stage, thousands of Macedonians left the Old bilee, –. . tion. As the Lyric entered the early twenty-first Country in the wake of the bloody Ilin- century, it remained internationally respected den Uprising against Ottoman control, which Lyric Opera. From to ,seven as a theater of high performance standards rest- ended with the ruin of some villages and companies—several merely different ing on an enviably secure financial base. exposed many Macedonian men to conscrip- names for the same reorganized company— John von Rhein tion in the Ottoman army. The rest came as presented seasons at Chicago’sA male labor migrants who sought to improve See also: Classical Music; Entertaining Chicagoans T and the Civic Opera House. All their families’ grim economic fortunes by re- Further reading: Cassidy, Claudia. Lyric Opera of turning home with earnings from American sunk in a sea of debt. From to the Chicago. . • Davis, R. Opera in Chicago. . city had no resident opera company. Three factories. After World War I, with their home people changed everything: Carol Fox, a stu- country divided between Bulgaria, Serbia, and dent singer; Lawrence Kelly, a businessman; Greece, the thousands of Chicago-area Mace- and Nicola Rescigno, a conductor and vocal donians recognized that they would not re- teacher. With money from friends and Fox’s turn to Europe. Reluctantly, wives and chil- father, the three formed the Lyric Theatre of dren joined their husbands and fathers, laying Chicago in . Their plan was to restore the groundwork for stable Macedonian com- the city to the front ranks of international munities in North America. opera companies by building a roster of Eu- Prior to the creation of a Macedonian ropean singers whom the Metropolitan and republic in , most Macedonian immi- San Francisco operas had overlooked or ig- grants viewed themselves as ethnically B- nored. On February , , the Lyric The- M and often referred to themselves as MacArthur Foundation. The John D. and ater presented its “calling card,” a starry per- Macedonian-Bulgarians or simply Bulgarians. Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation was cre- formance of Mozart’s Don Giovanni at the While immigration records failed to list Mace- ated in through the bequest of John Civic Opera House. The success of that pro- donians as a separate category, approximately D. MacArthur, a Pennsylvania native who duction made possible a three-week season three-quarters of those listed as Bulgarians amassed a great fortune in the busi- in autumn of consisting of perfor- were from the regions of Kostur and Bitola ness and in real-estate investments in Florida. mances of operas; of those performances in Macedonia. These immigrants, and those The bulk of his fortune, both company shares sold out the ,-seat theater. The inaugural from Bulgaria proper, typically settled together and real estate, was left to the foundation, season brought the American debut of the fiery in the pre–World War II years, and established whose endowment had surpassed $ billion American-born Greek soprano Maria