Maria Jeritza

Maria Jeritza was born Marie Jedličková in Brno and trained there and in Prague before her stage debut at Olomouc in 1910 as Elsa. She joined the Vienna Volksoper and, from 1912, the Vienna Court Opera, quickly becoming one of the city's most celebrated sopranos for two decades. She created Ariadne in both versions of Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos, at Stuttgart in 1912 and Vienna in 1916, and the Empress in Die Frau ohne Schatten in 1919, then introduced Puccini's Turandot and Strauss's Die ägyptische Helena to New York after her 1921 Metropolitan Opera debut, singing 290 performances in 20 roles there over the following decade. She later became a naturalized American citizen.