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Nina Koshetz (30 December 1891 - 14 May 1965) was a Ukrainian, later American, soprano
Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately 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....
 opera
Opera

Opera is an Performing arts in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work which combines a text and a musical score. Opera is part of the Western classical music tradition....
 and recital singer.

She was born into a family of intellectuals in Kiev
Kiev

Kiev, also known as Kyiv , is the Capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River....
, then moved to Moscow and became an opera singer. Having received voice lessons in France from the retired dramatic soprano
Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately 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....
 Felia Litvinne
Félia Litvinne

F?lia Litvinne was a Russian-born, French-based dramatic soprano. She was particularly associated with Wagnerian roles, although she also sang a wide range of parts by other opera composers....
, she sang leading roles in opera and performed in principal opera houses across Russian and Europe.

In 1920 she went to America and joined the Chicago Opera Association
Chicago Opera Association

The Chicago Opera Association was a company that produced seven seasons of opera in Chicago?s Auditorium Building from 1915 to 1921. The founding artistic director and principal conductor was Cleofonte Campanini, while the general manager and chief underwriter was Harold Fowler McCormick....
 where she sang in the premiere of The Love for Three Oranges (1921).






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Nina Koshetz (30 December 1891 - 14 May 1965) was a Ukrainian, later American, soprano
Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately 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....
 opera
Opera

Opera is an Performing arts in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work which combines a text and a musical score. Opera is part of the Western classical music tradition....
 and recital singer.

She was born into a family of intellectuals in Kiev
Kiev

Kiev, also known as Kyiv , is the Capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River....
, then moved to Moscow and became an opera singer. Having received voice lessons in France from the retired dramatic soprano
Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately 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....
 Felia Litvinne
Félia Litvinne

F?lia Litvinne was a Russian-born, French-based dramatic soprano. She was particularly associated with Wagnerian roles, although she also sang a wide range of parts by other opera composers....
, she sang leading roles in opera and performed in principal opera houses across Russian and Europe.

In 1920 she went to America and joined the Chicago Opera Association
Chicago Opera Association

The Chicago Opera Association was a company that produced seven seasons of opera in Chicago?s Auditorium Building from 1915 to 1921. The founding artistic director and principal conductor was Cleofonte Campanini, while the general manager and chief underwriter was Harold Fowler McCormick....
 where she sang in the premiere of The Love for Three Oranges (1921). She late performed for the Russian Opera Company in New York
New York

The State of New York is a U.S. state in the Mid-Atlantic States and Northeastern United States regions of the United States and is the nation's List of U.S....
 and on tour in South America. At the end of the 1920s she was active in France, where she appeared in the French premiere of Sadko
Sadko (opera)

Sadko is an opera in seven scenes by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. The libretto was written by the composer, with assistance from Vladimir Belsky, Vladimir Stasov, and others....
.

Known for her overly-extravagant life style, her vocal powers declined in the 1930s and in 1940 she retired to Hollywood where she made a living as a voice teacher and restaurateur (a venture that ended in bankruptcy in 1942). She also appeared in bit parts in several Hollywood movies. She died in Santa Ana
Santa Ana

Santa Ana or Santa Anna may refer to:...
, California
California

California is a U.S. state on the West Coast of the United States of the United States, along the Pacific Ocean. It is bordered by Oregon to the north, Nevada to the east, Arizona to the southeast, and to the south the Mexico state of Baja California....
 in 1965.

Nina's daughter Marina Koshetz (also known as Marina Schubert) (1912-2001) was a soprano
Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately 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....
 opera singer who appeared with the San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera

San Francisco Opera is the second largest opera company in North America after the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. It was founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola ....
 as well as the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera

The Metropolitan Opera Association of New York City, founded in April 1880, is a major presenter of all types of opera including Grand Opera. Peter Gelb is the company's general manager and James Levine is music director....
, New York. She sang in films and wrote a biography of her mother and a screenplay about Nina's love affair with Rachmaninoff both titled The Last Love Song.

Relationship with Rachmaninoff

She had a relationship with composer Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Rachmaninoff

Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conducting. He was one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, the last great representative of Russian late Romantic music in classical music....
 during the 1910s, and he composed a cycle of six romantic songs dedicated to her (opus 38). Rachmaninoff also played piano accompaniment for Nina Koshetz who preferred a Blüthner
Blüthner

Bl?thner, formally Julius Bl?thner Pianofortefabrik GmbH, is a piano-manufacturing company founded by Julius Bl?thner in 1853 in Leipzig Germany....
 piano for its mellower, softer tone.

Recordings

  • The Nina Koshetz Edition - 1916-1941
Songs by Mussorgsky
Modest Mussorgsky

Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky , one of the Russian composers known as the Five, was an innovator of Music of Russia. He strove to achieve a uniquely Russian musical identity, often in deliberate defiance of the established conventions of Western music....
, Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Gretchaninov
Alexander Gretchaninov

Alexander Tikhonovich Gretchaninov was a Russian Romantic music composer....
, Varlamov, Rachmaninoff, Anton Arensky
Anton Arensky

Anton Stepanovich Arensky , was a Russian composer of Romantic music, a pianist and a professor of music....
, Martini
Giovanni Battista Martini

Giovanni Battista Martini, also known as Padre Martini was an Italy musician....
, Ponce
Manuel Maria Ponce

Manuel Mar?a Ponce Cu?llar was a distinguished Mexico composer active in the 20th century. His work as a composer, music educator and scholar of Mexican music connected the concert scene with a usually forgotten tradition of popular song and Mexican folklore....
, Ravel, and Chopin etc.; arias from Sadko
Sadko (opera)

Sadko is an opera in seven scenes by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. The libretto was written by the composer, with assistance from Vladimir Belsky, Vladimir Stasov, and others....
, The Demon
The Demon (opera)

The Demon is an opera in 3 acts by Russian composer Anton Rubinstein. The work dates from 1871. The libretto was by Pavel Viskovatov, based on the poem of the same name by Mikhail Lermontov....
, Dobrynia Nikititch, The Fair at Sorochyntsi, Pique Dame
The Queen of Spades (opera)

The Queen of Spades, Op. 68 is an opera in 3 acts by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky to a Russian libretto by the composer's brother Modest Ilyich Tchaikovsky, based on a The Queen of Spades by the poet Alexander Pushkin....
 and Prince Igor
Prince Igor

Prince Igor is an opera by Alexander Borodin, written in four acts with a prologue. The composer adapted the libretto from the East Slavic peoples epic The Tale of Igor's Campaign, which recounts the campaign of Russian prince Igor Svyatoslavich against the invading Polovtsian tribes in 1185....
. CD released 1993 (Opal/Pavilion Records, 9855)

  • Nina Koshetz – Complete Victor and Schirmer recordings 1928/29 and 1940 (and Odarka Trifonieva Sprishevskaya – Victor recordings)
Songs and arias by Borodin
Alexander Borodin

Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin was a Russian composer of Georgian people-Russian people parentage who made his living as a notable chemistry. He was a member of the group of composers called The Five , who were dedicated to producing a specifically Russian kind of art music....
, Rimsky-Korsakov, Ravel, Ponce, Martini, Chopin, Gretchaninov, Rachmaninoff, Arensky, Tchaikovsky. (Nimbus Prima Voce CD NI 7935-36)

Films

She appeared as 'Countess Vorontsov' opposite Ivan Mozzhukhin
Ivan Mozzhukhin

Ivan Ilyich Mozzhukhin was a leading Russian-France silent film actor....
 in the silent film Casanova (1927), and as 'Fatme' in Geheimnisse des Orients (1928). After her retirement from the operatic and concert stage, she appeared in bit parts in Algiers
Algiers (film)

Algiers is a 1938 in film film directed by John Cromwell and starring Charles Boyer, Sigrid Gurie, and Hedy Lamarr. The Walter Wanger production was a remake of the successful 1937 in film France film P?p? le Moko, which derived its plot from the Henri La Barthe novel of the same name....
 (1938), The Chase
The Chase (1946 film)

The Chase is a 1946 in film film, shot in black and white, directed by Arthur Ripley. The screenplay is based on the Cornell Woolrich novel The Black Path of Fear....
 (1946), Captain Pirate (1952) and Hot Blood (1956).

Further reading

  • Scott, M (1979), The Record of Singing II pp 23-25


External links