Teresa Stolz

Teresa Stolz trained at the Prague Conservatory and, from 1856, in Trieste with Luigi Ricci, later her brother-in-law, before debuting at Tbilisi in 1857 and touring Odessa, Constantinople and Italy. Verdi chose her for the revised La forza del destino at La Scala in 1869 and the first Italian Aida there in 1872, the same year she created Élisabeth de Valois in the revised Italian Don Carlo at Naples. She was soprano soloist at the premiere of his Requiem in 1874. Once engaged to the conductor Angelo Mariani, she became Verdi's companion after 1897.