Marietta Alboni

The Italian contralto Marietta Alboni was born at Cesena (Romagna) on 6 March 1826. She was trained in music at Bologna, where she studied under Rossini and made her début as Orsini in Lucrezia Borgia. She had a magnificent contralto voice and in 1843 made her first appearance at La Scala in Milan, immediately becoming a favourite with the opera-going public. In England her reputation was established by her appearance at Covent Garden in 1847, which she followed with a string of brilliant successes in leading roles across Europe. In 1853 she repeated these triumphs in the United States. With the exception of Malibran, she had no peer among the contraltos of the nineteenth century.

She married first Count Pepoli, who died in 1866, and then secondly, in 1877, a French officer by the name of Ziegler. After her first marriage, she lived in Paris.

Marietta Alboni died at Ville d'Avray on 23 June 1894.

Photographed by Disdéri of Paris.