Adèle Isaac was a French operatic soprano

Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...

, active in Paris in the late 19th century.

Isaac was born in Calais

Calais

Calais is a town in Northern France in the department of Pas-de-Calais, of which it is a sub-prefecture. Although Calais is by far the largest city in Pas-de-Calais, the department's capital is its third-largest city of Arras....

. After studying with Gilbert Duprez

Gilbert Duprez

Gilbert Duprez was a French tenor, singing teacher and minor composer who famously pioneered the delivery of the operatic high C from the chest. He also created the role of Edgardo in the popular bel canto-era opera Lucia di Lammermoor in 1835.-Biography:Gilbert-Louis Duprez, to give his full...

, her professional debut was in 1870 in Victor Massé

Victor Massé

Victor Massé was a French composer.-Biography:...

's Les noces de Jeannette

Les noces de Jeannette

Les Noces de Jeannette is an opéra comique in one act by Victor Massé to a libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré...

at the Théatre Montmartre. In February 1873 she attracted attention singing the young shepherd in Tannhäuser at La Monnaie (Bruxelles). Her first performance at the Opéra-Comique

Opéra-Comique

The Opéra-Comique is a Parisian opera company, which was founded around 1714 by some of the popular theatres of the Parisian fairs. In 1762 the company was merged with, and for a time took the name of its chief rival the Comédie-Italienne at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, and was also called the...

 was in 1873 as Marie in La fille du régiment

La fille du régiment

La fille du régiment is an opéra comique in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti. It was written while the composer was living in Paris, with a French libretto by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges and Jean-François Bayard.La figlia del reggimento, a slightly different Italian-language version , was...

, going on to sing Mozart and Gounod. On 3 April 1882 she sang Angèle in the 1,000th performance of Le Domino Noir at the Opéra-Comique.

From 1883 to 1885 she appeared at the Opéra

Palais Garnier

The Palais Garnier, , is an elegant 1,979-seat opera house, which was built from 1861 to 1875 for the Paris Opera. It was originally called the Salle des Capucines because of its location on the Boulevard des Capucines in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, but soon became known as the Palais Garnier...

 as Ophélia, Marguerite, Adele, Zerlina and Marguerite de Valois.

She sang in the first Paris revival of Carmen

Carmen

Carmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...

in April 1883, and was chosen for the more restrained, even bland interpretation of the title role she offered.

She created the roles of Olympia and Antonia in Les contes d'Hoffmann

Les contes d'Hoffmann

Les contes d'Hoffmann is an opéra by Jacques Offenbach. The French libretto was written by Jules Barbier, based on short stories by E. T. A...

in 1881, Claire in Egmont by Salvayre in 1886, and Minka in Le roi malgré lui

Le roi malgré lui

Le roi malgré lui is an opéra-comique in three acts by Emmanuel Chabrier with an original libretto by Emile de Najac and Paul Burani. The opera is revived occasionally, but has not found a place in the repertory, mainly because of the poor libretto...

in 1887. Isaac was a great favourite at the Opéra-Comique: she sang Susanna in the 1882, 1886 and 1892 revivals of Le Nozze di Figaro. Her absence for a concert tour in Rome and Monte Carlo in early 1888 delayed repeat performances of Le roi malgré lui, and may have contributed to the end of its first run.

In 1884 Adèle Isaac sang in the annual performances of Beethoven's 9th Symphony given at the Société des Concerts du Conservatoire

Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire

The Orchestre de la Société des concerts du Conservatoire was a symphony orchestra established in Paris in 1828. It gave its first concert on 9 March 1828 with music by Beethoven, Rossini, Meifreid, Rode and Cherubini....

; the following year she sang music from Egmont

Egmont (Beethoven)

Egmont, Op. 84, by Ludwig van Beethoven, is a set of incidental music pieces for the 1787 play of the same name by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. It consists of an overture followed by a sequence of nine additional pieces for soprano, male narrator and full symphony orchestra...

and The Magic Flute

The Magic Flute

The Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....

with the same orchestra.

In 1887 she married businessman Charles Lelong; she retired in 1894. She died in Paris.