Raisa, Rosa (real name, Raisa or Rose Burschstein)
Raisa, Rosa (real name, Raisa or Rose Burschstein)
Raisa, Rosa (real name, Raisa or Rose Burschstein ), outstanding Polish soprano; b. Bialystok, May 23, 1893; d. Los Angeles, Sept. 28, 1963. In order to escape the horrors of anti-Semitic persecution, she fled to Naples at the age of 14; on Lombardi’s advice she entered the Cons. San Pietro a Majella, where she studied under Barbara Marchisio. She made her operatic debut as Leonora in Verdi’s Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio in Parma on Sept. 6, 1913; then sang 2 seasons at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome. In 1914 she made her first appearance at Covent Garden in London. She sang with increasing success in Rio de Janeiro, Montevideo, São Paulo, and Milan. In 1920 she married the baritone Giacomo Rimini, with whom she founded a singing school in Chicago in 1937. Raisa was one of the finest dramatic sopranos of her day, excelling in the Italian repertoire; she created the title role in Puccini’s Turandot at Milan’s La Scala (April 25, 1926), her husband taking the role of Ping.
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire