4 - June 2012 GRAPEVINE GRAPEVINE June 2012 - 5

Puccini's Enchantress: Margaret Burke-Sheridan by Francis Pettitt

friend complained it was who was born in Bombay. (Conductors ob- played the part of the heroine in Madame Verme theatre () in 1919. This was hard for her, an English so- viously do not have the same problems as Butterfly, Puccini was completely be- followed by La Bohème and Mephisto- prano, to pursue a career on singers, and Mehta continues to direct the witched by her voice and preferred it pheles, the latter with the protagonist sung Italy's operatic stage. She had Maggio Musicale Fiorentino; indeed, has above all others for this role. As he wrote by De Angelis. A been made an honorary citizen of the city in one of his letters: "she is full of charis- She continued at the San Carlo theatre sung in several works (including Nabucco) and received praiseworthy re- of the lily.) matic intensity and childlike appeal." It is with Madame Butterfly and La Wally, an views in the newspapers (an intense de- It was not always so. Two of the greatest also said that an Italian, rejected in love by by another great lucchese, Alfredo light for the audience) but her difficulties Puccini singers came from the British Margaret, shot himself in the head during Catalani. It was with La Wally that she remained. As the 2012 Torre del Lago op- Isles. I refer to Eva Turner and Margaret a performance at and that, after made her debut at La Scala on April 6, era season approaches us I can only think Sheridan. The latter was of Irish descent this tragedy, Sheridan never again sang in 1922. In 1923, she sang in Andrea of Rosalind Plowright, who first sang and was Puccini's favourite Cio-Cio-San. public. She died, almost forgotten, a resi- Chenier with Gigli in Rimini. Gigli made Puccini's there in 1980, as Years ago, in a second-hand shop in a dent of the Shelbourne Hotel , in his debut at Covent Garden with this a living English singer who "made it" with murky suburb, I found an album 1958 (exactly 100 years after the birth of work in 1930 together with Sheridan. Italian audiences. of 78 rpm discs – a complete recording, on Puccini) and was buried in Glasnevin cem- In 1923 the world premiere of Respighi's It remains true, without a doubt, that thirty-four sides, of Madame Butterfly. etery in that city. I have been told that Belfagor took place at La Scala with most Italians want their own compatriots Listening to these discs through the siz- Margaret Sheridan expired during the Sheridan, Merli and Stabile. Margaret was to sing their operatic repertoire. The oppo- zling noise of shellac under the needle of Italian opera season of Dublin and that the also invited to sing in America but never site (i.e. for Italian singers to perform in an old gramophone player, I detected an singers from Italy in the company sang a took up this offer. To sum up, "Maggie England) is, fortunately, not true. extraordinarily beautiful voice singing the requiem (perhaps Puccini's Requiem?) at from Mayo" was highly thought of in Italy Otherwise, there would have been no part of Cio-Cio-San; a voice which be- her funeral service at a Franciscan church for several years and sang with most of the Callas, Freni or Bartoli on the Covent longed to Margaret Burke-Sheridan. out of respect for a star they had known best known tenors of that era: Gigli, Pertile, Garden stage, to mention only three Burke-Sheridan was born on October and esteemed as "one of them" for so Lauri-Volpi, Smirnoff, Zanelli, Merli, names – to say nothing of the Italian cas- 15, 1889 in Castlebar, Co. Mayo, Ireland, many years. Hackett and Borgioli. trati that took the London operatic stage the youngest of five children. Her mother "Maggie from Mayo" was certainly one Sheridan's repertoir