_by_Jack_Mitchell.jpg "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leontyne_Price_(color)_by_Jack_Mitchell.jpg")
Mary
Violet Leontyne Price (born February
10, 1927) is an American soprano.
Born and raised in Laurel, Mississippi,[1] she rose to international acclaim in the
1950s and 1960s, and was one of the first African
Americans to
become a leading artist at the Metropolitan
Opera.[2][3][4]
One
critic characterized Price's voice as "vibrant", "soaring" and "a Price beyond
pearls", as well as "genuinely buttery, carefully produced but firmly under
control", with phrases that "took on a seductive sinuousness."[5] Time magazine called her voice "Rich, supple and
shining, it was in its prime capable of effortlessly soaring from a smoky mezzo
to the pure soprano gold of a perfectly spun high C."[6]
A lirico
spinto (Italian
for "pushed lyric") soprano, she was considered especially well suited to the
roles of Giuseppe
Verdi and Giacomo
Puccini, as well as several in operas by Wolfgang
Amadeus Mozart.
After
her retirement from the opera stage in 1985, she continued to appear in recitals
and orchestral concerts for another 12 years.
Among
her many honors are the Presidential
Medal of Freedom (1964), the Spingarn
Medal (1965),[7] the Kennedy Center
Honors (1980),
the National
Medal of Arts (1985), numerous honorary degrees, and
nineteen Grammy
Awards, 13 for operatic or song recitals, five for full
operas, and a special Lifetime
Achievement Award in 1989, more than any other classical
singer. In October 2008, she was one of the recipients of the first Opera Honors
given by the National
Endowment for the Arts. Wikipedia.
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