Varnay, Astrid

▪ 2007

Ibolyka Astrid Maria Varnay 

      Swedish-born American opera singer (b. April 25, 1918, Stockholm, Swed.—d. Sept. 4, 2006, Munich, Ger.), was one of the leading Wagnerian sopranos of her day. Born to Hungarian parents who were both opera singers, Varnay moved with her family as a child to Buenos Aires and later to New York. She began studying piano, but the power and beauty of her voice soon became evident, and she shifted to professional voice training. Her breakthrough came in storybook fashion: she was fourth alternate for the role of Sieglinde at the Metropolitan Opera's Saturday broadcast performance of Wagner's Die Walküre when, on Dec. 6, 1941, soprano Lotte Lehmann fell ill and the other replacements were unavailable. Varnay's performance—accomplished without as much as a stage rehearsal—was a triumph. Moreover, she repeated the feat under similar circumstances six days later when she filled in at the Met for Helen Traubel as Brünnhilde. Varnay went on to perform at the Met some 200 times. In the 1950s she began to sing in European houses more frequently, and in the 1960s, as her voice began to darken, she made the unusual career move of accepting smaller mezzo-soprano character roles because, as she confessed, she just loved being on the stage.

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