Muses and Divas - A series of online talks by Patrick Bade

Alma Schindler-Mahler-Gropius-Werfel (1879-1964) was dubbed “the most beautiful girl in Vienna” at a time when Vienna was one of the greatest intellectual and cultural hubs in the history of Europe. Alma was a gifted composer whose relatively small output of songs can stand comparison with the finest male song writers of her age. However, thanks in part to song written about her by Tom Lehrer she has become more famous for a long list of husbands and lovers that included Gustav Mahler, Walter Gropius, Franz Werfel, Alexander Zemlinsky, Gustav Klimt and Oskar Kokoschka.

It was hotly debated at the time whether Sarah Bernardt (1844-1923) was the greatest actress of her time. What was not in doubt was that she was the most famous. Indeed, she was probably the most famous woman in the world. This was more down to her gift for self-publicity than to her innate skills as an actress. Deftly exploiting the innovations of the 19th century, from photography and steam travel to mass circulation newspapers and, at the end of her career, even recording and cinema, she cultivated and frequently changed her image. Her legacy was more in the opera house than in the theatre. Plays written expressly for her talents, such as Tosca, Fedora and L’Aiglon inspired operas that have outlived the plays and her highly operatic style of acting has lasted in the opera house while disappearing from the theatre.

Misia Godebski, Natanson, Edwards, Sert (1872-1950) was highly musical and gifted enough to have had a professional career as a pianist. Like Alma Mahler she was the daughter of a famous artist and also like Alma Mahler she chose to express her creativity through her power over the many brilliant men who surrounded and admired her. Her most glorious period was in the 1890s when she was at the centre of the activities surrounding the innovative arts magazine La Revue Blanche. Later she maintained her influence over the Paris art scene through her close friendship with Sergei Diaghilev. Her lasting legacy exists in musical masterpieces dedicated to her by Ravel, Poulenc and others, and in portraits of her by Renoir, Bonnard, Vuillard, Toulouse-Lautrec, Vallotton and Jean Cocteau.

In her own words, the story of Maria Kalogeropoulos (1923-1977), is that of the ‘ugly duckling’, but with a tragic twist. Describing herself as ‘fat and clumsy and unpopular’, with what many have described as an ugly voice, she transformed herself into a strikingly beautiful woman and became the most famous soprano of the 20th century. Sadly, her vocal gifts and interpretative genius were eclipsed by the scandals and personal dramas that pursued her throughout her life. Her influence can be heard in the performances of countless sopranos who followed her.