Margarethe Siems

A German soprano of unusually wide range, who created three Strauss roles in four years. She studied at the Dresden Conservatory with Aglaja Orgeni, a pupil of Pauline Viardot, and made her debut at Prague in 1902 as Marguerite de Valois in Meyerbeer's Les Huguenots. At Dresden from 1908 she created Chrysothemis in Elektra and the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier, and at Stuttgart in 1912 Zerbinetta in the first Ariadne auf Naxos. She sang the Queen of the Night, Isolde and Aida alike. Strauss thought her the ideal Marschallin, and she sang the role for the last time in 1925.