BORN
19 May 1861, Richmond, Victoria, Australia
DIED
23 February 1931, Darlinghurst, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Dame Nellie Melba GBE
“Vocalist Nellie Melba (1861-1931) rose from a childhood in provincial Australia to become a world-renowned opera soprano who performed regularly at London’s Covent Garden and the Metropolitan Opera in New York. A diva with a commanding stage presence and a beautiful voice, Melba was the outstanding coloratura of her era and one of the biggest celebrities of the early 20th century.”
Born in Melbourne, Australia, in 1861 as Helen Porter Mitchell, the future opera star was the third-born and first surviving child of Isabella and David Mitchell. Seven more children would follow. Melba grew up in the country estate of Lilydale, near Melbourne.
Her entire family was musically inclined, but Melba was the only child who persisted in music. She attended Presbyterian Ladies College in Melbourne, where Peitro Cecchi recognized her singing talent as a powerful and lilting soprano.
For her stage name she took the name Melba, short for Melbourne; Nellie was the family’s nickname for her. She made her debut in Brussels in 1887, playing the role of Gilda in Rigoletto.
In 1888, Melba made her London debut at Covent Garden, playing the title role in Lucia di Lammermoor. Until 1926, she would be a fixture at the famous London opera house. She also debuted in the United States in the role of Lucia, singing at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, where she would also perform regularly until she was in her mid-sixties.
For most of the nearly four decades of her career, Melba was the greatest diva of her time, even though she was not a great stage actress. Her immaculate, unforced coloratura singing was immortalized in a series of recordings made between 1907 and 1916, including a moving scene from Hamlet.
At her impressive home she entertained many of Europe’s royal families and was a powerful personality and celebrity. When she had an affair with the Duke of Orleans in 1900, her husband divorced her. She did not remarry and had no other children. During World War I, she was unstinting in her war work, often performing at benefit concerts, and in 1918 she was made a Dame of the British Empire.
Melba bade farewell to her native Australia in 1924, releasing a letter that said: “I have tried to keep faith with my art … to make the big world outside, through me, understand something of the spirit of my beloved country.” She then made farewell tours and concerts worldwide, so many so, in fact, that a sarcastic expression arose: “More farewells than Nellie Melba.” She sang at the opening of the nation’s Parliament House in Canberra in 1927, and her final concert in Australia was in 1928. In 1931, refusing to accept her aging, Melba got a facelift, but the operation resulted in a blood infection, and she died in St. Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney, the cause of her death not released to the public.
Ever concerned about her public perception, Melba had even orchestrated her funeral in advance. She had had a photograph taken of her portraying the dead Juliet of Romeo and Juliet, and after her death she was made up to look like the photo, with her bed strewn with frangipani, before anyone was allowed to see her. The funeral attracted national and international dignitaries to Melbourne, and she was buried at Lilydale Cemetery under a monument that depicts her reported last words: “Addio! Senzor Rancor”—”Farewell, without bitterness.”
